District data show progress on safety and staff climate but low secondary engagement, presenters say

District staff presented results from the annual Panorama climate survey and principal reflections on March 23, telling the Holyoke School Committee that the data show meaningful progress in some areas and persistent challenges in others.

Jenny Mulave, the district’s executive director of technology and data systems, said the "big takeaway" was progress in safety, family perceptions and adult workplace climate, but that students’ daily learning experiences and belonging—particularly in grades 6–12—remain areas of concern. "Students are reporting that they care very much about school, but the daily experience of learning, their relationships, their belonging are not as strong as what we want them to be," Mulave said.

Board members questioned an 18% favorability figure for an engagement measure. Presenters explained Panorama’s favorability metric counts only the highest responses ("very excited" or "extremely excited") and is intentionally conservative. Superintendent Soto and school leaders said Panorama is a single experience measure that should be triangulated with walkthrough data, school improvement plans and other benchmarks. "When Panorama and implementation data point in the same direction, the district can have greater confidence that what's improving is actually real," Soto said.

Presenters noted participation was strong among students and staff—generally above 70–75%—but family responses were lower (about 554 returned this year, down from higher recent years). They said the district extended the response window to try to boost family participation and recommended school-level SIP reviews to pair Panorama findings with local benchmarks and action steps.

Committee members asked for clearer benchmarks and a dashboard that aggregates data across measures; presenters said SIP reviews serve as school-level dashboards and offered to bring more granular findings to future quarterly reviews.