This past school year, St. Cloud Area School District 742 launched IMAGINE 742, an innovative crowdsourcing platform that provides both students and staff an opportunity to share their ideas on how to make District 742 an even better place to learn and teach. IMAGINE 742 also allows the district’s education community to share in the decision-making process by voting on ideas and bringing the best submissions to the top.
“Innovation is something that we really have strived to explore,” says Ryan Cox, director of innovation and instructional technology. “Out of the disruption of the last few years, we realized there needed to be different ways to explore new ideas and practices – be it with learning, teaching or just the educational environment itself.”
Over the course of the 2022-23 school year, staff submitted ideas that would increase opportunities for youth engagement and activities, and provide time for students at differing age levels to connect, build community and engage in shared learning resources. Staff also submitted ideas on how to improve the work experience.
Meanwhile, students submitted ideas that would increase opportunities around driver’s education instruction, make changes to the lunch and food offerings, as well as provide additional resources for students while in class such as access to music, facilities and instructional supports. However, the idea that rose to the top as a priority for students was to lower or waive parking permit fees at the high schools.
Students Make a Change Through IMAGINE 742
A team of high school students and district staff assembled around the idea of eliminating or reducing the student parking permit fee. Later, every student who voted for the idea was invited to an exploratory day. Once the team gathered, they began the research process to determine what key questions existed around the idea and the necessary steps to get started.
After considerable discussion, the idea to lower or waive student parking permit fees was deemed both viable and scalable. Students from Tech and Apollo High Schools discussed, presented and problem-solved the idea. District experts attended the exploratory day to give factual information regarding the fees – what they are used for, parking lot maintenance costs, how the budget works and so forth. Students asked questions to further understand the “why” behind the fees.
“I, personally, think it’s a good idea to get everyone together,” reflects Apollo sophomore Riley McKenzie. “Everyone has their own opinion.”
Ethan Eltgroth, a 2023 Tech graduate, took part in the process. “I really appreciate how they’re [district staff and students] working together to help the students with what they are wanting.”
After the students met for the day, they formulated a recommendation to district cabinet members, who in turn, scheduled the presentation on the school board’s agenda. Cox, along with Apollo junior, Bennett Wochnick, and innovation coach, Katie Herrboldt presented to the school board.
Wochnick presented the “pain points” of parking fees. Pain points are defined as something that gets in the way of having success. It is a problem that needs solving but is not the same as the solution. The top three pain points he presented were: lack of information on how funds were used, high annual cost (especially at the beginning of the school year) and lack of enforcement at each school.
Wochnick also shared that the students deemed the highest pain point was the cost of the permit. However, after they met with business services to discover the actual cost of maintenance, they re-focused on the distribution of cost.
Herrboldt pointed out that once students understood maintenance costs, they wanted to be fiscally conservative. She added, “Also interesting, as being a parent, they talked about the high cost at the beginning of the school year in thinking about all the things families have to buy. I thought that was a really good way of thinking about people outside their own bubbles.”
After the initial school board meeting, a public hearing was scheduled. Cox presented the recommendation again at the public hearing on the students’ behalf. The recommendation – reduce the parking fee to $10 for the life of the vehicle or until graduation. If a new car is introduced, the new permit would be purchased at $5. The previous fee was up to $85 annually depending on free and reduced lunch family status.
Concluding the public hearing, the board moved the recommendation to an action item at the subsequent school board meeting where they voted unanimously in favor of the student recommendation to change the fees.
“Really, innovation is about exploring those ideas that make things better, that solve a problem,” explains Cox. “[It] is really important to keep voice in mind [when] talking about pain points and solving those problems. That means stakeholder voice, family voice, teacher voice and student voice. And a big part of that is our IMAGINE 742 program.”
Together, students and staff have taken the next step to IMAGINE an even better experience at District 742.
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