Kearney School District has a new five-year plan to help ensure that we continue to meet the public education needs of our community.

*This new plan truly represents what we heard from the community and will help get us the results our students need and deserve - KSD Superintendent Emily Miller*

The KSD Board of Education (school board) approved unanimously the 2022-2027 Strategic Plan during a meeting last night at the district’s central office. This plan is the result of a community engagement process lasting several months and includes input from students, parents/guardians, staff members, business and organizational leaders, government officials and property owners.

“It’s very important that we regularly take time to re-evaluate our goals and talk through what we want to achieve as a public school system,” Superintendent Emily Miller said. “This new plan truly represents what we heard from the community and will help get us the results our students need and deserve.”

KSD’s last strategic plan came to a close at the end of the 2021-2022 academic year. This made the development of a new five-year plan one of the district’s top priorities in the summer and fall of 2022. The launch of the sixth version of the Missouri School Improvement Program (MSIP 6) made this strategic planning work even more urgent.

The entire strategic planning process started with the fundamental belief that gathering input from a deep and wide selection of key constituents will result in a relevant long-range strategic plan that will achieve the community’s desired outcome. This engagement process included gathering input in-person from community leaders and staff. We also surveyed students, parents/guardians and employees.

The district leadership team selected 60 people to serve on the KSD Strategic Planning Committee, including staff, students, parents/guardians and community members. Over the course of five committee meetings starting on Oct. 3 and ending on Dec. 5, the members worked together with an open, collaborative and non-judgmental mindset to develop proactive solutions that best serve all students and the entire community.

The district leadership team listened attentively during committee meetings and used that input to continually improve and refine the draft strategic plan over several weeks. The public engagement efforts ended with an impressively large pool of feedback. Nearly 3,000 people contributed feedback during this process.

One of the committee’s first jobs was to update the district’s vision, mission and values. These will serve as the foundation for all of the work that happens in KSD.

Vision: Reaching beyond success to develop individuals of character

Mission: Kearney School District is committed to providing exemplary educational experiences in a safe and supportive learning environment where all students discover their gifts, find their voice, and develop into strong citizens for tomorrow.

Values:

Integrity
Respect
Future Readiness
Student Focus
Resilience

The committee also refined the public input into four key strategic pillars that are embedded with targeted objectives. These priorities will gird the district’s work during the life of this plan:

Climate & Culture - Kearney School District creates a safe learning environment of respect and belonging fostering a path to success.
Academic Success & Student Support - Kearney School District delivers high-quality educational experiences supporting the diverse needs of all students.
Responsive Leadership & Community Engagement - Kearney School District facilitates stakeholder engagement and empowers student voice.
Exemplary & Valued Employee - Kearney School District is committed to high-quality staff who are dedicated to students.

The four pillars combine to summarize how we are going to achieve our global ends: Bulldogs CARE! The result of this entire process is the engineering of a strategic plan that is focused on the core public education goals of the KSD community. Together, we will use this plan to build a school system structured on hometown values and achieving world-class results. This is how Kearney School District will frame a successful future for our students.

Visit www.ksdr1.net/strategicplan to learn more.

KPGZ News - Brian Watts contributed to this story