Consultant guides Deming board through impact-feasibility workshop to shape strategic plan

The Deming Public Schools board spent the bulk of the meeting in a facilitated strategic-planning exercise led by Stephanie of Everest Analytics, who guided members through a framework that pairs student-impact and implementation feasibility to help select up to four goals and 16 strategies.

Stephanie framed a strategic plan as "a small set of clearly defined priorities and it's anchored in measurable student outcomes," and asked the board to evaluate candidate strategies for both impact on daily instruction and feasibility within a three-year horizon. Board members completed a matrix exercise and used five sticky-dot votes each to elevate the priorities they considered most likely to move student outcomes.

Participants clustered top choices around high-quality, standards-aligned core instruction; a guaranteed, coherent elementary experience; multilingual excellence; and student well-being and belonging. Board members also emphasized operational systems — transportation and nutrition — and teacher talent development as linked priorities. Several members said feasibility judgments require staff input and noted that some items may be important but fall to specific departments rather than the strategic plan itself.

Consultant and staff outlined next steps: collect additional stakeholder input (including Panorama surveys), produce an executive summary of patterns, refine goals and strategies for board review, and aim to finalize goals by the end of the school year with a plan launch timed to the district’s Wildcat Welcome event. The board will review drafts and the consultant will return with a proposed plan for formal approval.