At a workshop meeting, Arlington ISD trustees and the Student Leadership Advisory Board spent about an hour reviewing and refining the district's draft strategic plan, focusing on values and belief statements, three candidate vision statements and a set of strategic objectives staff will measure and implement. Dr. Smith led the session with facilitators Jody Durand and Greg Gibson guiding activities.

The gathering aimed to center student voice in the plan. "You're helping us set direction for the future of Arlington ISD," Dr. Smith told trustees and students as they worked at tables to comment on draft value statements posted around the room. The board and cabinet earlier had condensed 24 suggested values and beliefs to 10 candidate statements; trustees and students used markers and dot voting to give feedback on those drafts.

Why it matters: The workshop is part of the district's process to create an actionable strategic plan. Trustees approve the left-hand column of the draft — the strategic objectives — while staff develop measures and operational plans in the middle and right-hand columns. Staff told the group they will run implementation planning with administrators next week so the board can later adopt finalized objectives.

Most important facts

- Values and beliefs: Trustees and students reviewed posters containing the district's draft values and beliefs. The leadership team said they had reduced an earlier list of 24 items to 10 candidate values meant to capture recurring themes from prior brainstorming.

- Vision statements: Participants reviewed three vision statement drafts that the board and cabinet had previously hot-dotted; those three drafts had received about 16, 14 and six votes in the earlier exercise, and the evening asked attendees to annotate the combined draft at the bottom of the handout.

- Strategic objectives and measures: The district presented a two-column format for approval: the left-hand column lists strategic objectives that the board approves; the middle columns show staff responsibilities; the right-hand column suggests measures staff will use to track progress. A handout labeled the objectives and invited trustees and students to mark priorities 1–4.

- Top priorities identified in the workshop: Facilitators and staff reported the group's top four priorities as inclusive culture, inspiring student experiences, whole-child growth and financial stewardship.

Quotes and attributions

"You're helping us set direction for the future of Arlington ISD," Dr. Smith said as trustees and students prepared to circulate and comment on posted materials. Facilitator Greg Gibson told trustees that, at this stage, "objectives should start stabilizing," while noting that specific wording could still change based on feedback. The team also asked trustees to focus feedback on priority ranking rather than reworking every detail in the moment.

Process and next steps

Staff emphasized that the board formally approves only the strategic objectives column; staff will carry the objectives into performance management and develop measures and action plans with administrators in meetings scheduled the following Monday and Tuesday. The facilitators described the current session as a late-stage feedback cycle and asked trustees to prioritize their top objectives to help staff finalize language.

Recess to closed session

At the close of the public workshop, a meeting official announced that the board would recess "and reconvene into closed session in the board chamber pursuant to sections 551.071 through 551.07084 and 551.089 of the Texas Government Code in accordance with the Texas Open Meetings Act." The meeting then recessed into closed session.

The workshop concluded with trustees thanking the Student Leadership Advisory Board and collecting annotated handouts and ballots for staff review.