How to Attend a School Board Meeting and Make Your Three Minutes Count

You can tell a lot about a republic by who shows up to the meetings nobody covers. The school board meets in a room with folding chairs, a flag in the corner and a microphone that squeals if you stand too close. Five or seven or nine of your neighbors sit at a table and decide how a very large amount of your money will be spent on your children. In far too many districts, the audience on an ordinary night is a handful of employees and one devoted regular who comes to everything. That is not an insult to the regular. It is an indictment of the rest of us.

Here is the good news. The school board is the one level of government where a single parent with a clear question and three minutes can still change an outcome. The bad news is that almost nobody has ever been inside a meeting, so they do not know how it works. This post is the walkthrough. Seven steps, in order, with what to expect at each one.

What the board actually controls

Before you walk in, know what you are walking into. A school board is a body of elected members, often chosen in nonpartisan elections, that governs a local school district. Depending on the state, the board generally does five things:

• It adopts policy, the rules the district operates under.
• It adopts the budget and sets the property tax rate, within whatever limits state law imposes.
• It hires, evaluates and can dismiss the superintendent, who runs the daily operations.
• It approves contracts, major purchases, and curriculum and instructional materials.
• It hears appeals and complaints, in the procedures the policies lay out.

What it generally does not do is run the schools. The superintendent and staff do that. A good rule for a parent: if your issue is a policy, a budget line, a contract or a curriculum adoption, the board is the place. If it is a grade, a classroom incident or a specific teacher, start with the teacher, then the principal, and go to the board only when the ladder has been climbed. Boards almost always tell you to go back down the ladder, so climbing it first saves you a wasted trip.

Step 1. Find the meeting and the posted agenda

Every state has an open meetings law. The particulars differ, but the principle is universal: a public body must hold its meetings in public and give advance notice of when and where. That notice includes an agenda, a list of the topics the board plans to take up.

Where to look: the district's website, usually under a heading such as "Board of Education" or "Board Meetings," and often a notice board at the district office. How far ahead must the agenda be posted? That is set by your state's statute, and the window ranges from a day or so to a week or more depending on the state, so check yours. Many districts post a longer document, called a board packet, with the supporting material for each item. The packet is where the real information lives, so read it, not just the one-page agenda.

If you cannot find the agenda, call the district office and ask for it. An agency that cannot produce its own agenda has already told you something about itself. For the general toolkit of open meetings and public records laws, see open meetings and public records, a citizen's toolkit for any local government.

Step 2. Read the agenda the way a lawyer would

An agenda has a vocabulary. Learn five terms and you will read it better than most of the people at the table.

1. Consent agenda. A bundle of routine items that the board approves with a single vote and no discussion. It usually holds minutes, personnel actions, standard contracts and purchases. The danger is that substantial things sometimes ride along in the bundle. Read every line. If an item matters to you, any board member can usually ask to pull it out for separate discussion, and a parent can ask a board member to do so before the meeting.
2. Action item. The board will vote on it that evening.
3. Information item or discussion item. No vote tonight. The vote is coming later, which makes this your best chance to be heard before the decision is made.
4. First reading and second reading. Many boards adopt policy in two readings, at two meetings, so the public can respond in between. If you are at a first reading, you have time.
5. Executive session. A closed portion of the meeting. State laws allow it only for specific listed reasons, such as certain personnel matters, pending litigation, property purchases or negotiations. The board generally has to announce the legal reason for going into closed session and take its votes in public.

Mark the items you care about with a highlighter. Then look at the clock: boards often take public comment near the start, and the item you care about may come three hours later.

Step 3. Sign up for public comment

Most boards set aside a portion of each meeting for the public. The rules are written in the board's own bylaws, which are posted on the district website, and they typically cover four things: how to sign up, when the sign-up closes, how long each speaker gets, and whether you may speak on any topic or only on agenda items.

The usual time limit is three minutes, though some boards allow more or less, and some set an overall cap on the comment period. You may sign up on a sheet at the door, online ahead of time, or by calling the clerk. A few boards require you to sign up by a deadline before the meeting begins. Get there early enough to be safe, and sign up for the exact item you want to address if the rules separate the two.

A note on the law. Public comment time is a place where the government has opened a forum, and the First Amendment limits what a board may do within it. A board can enforce reasonable rules about time, place and manner, such as time limits and a requirement to speak at the appointed time. What it may not do is pick and choose speakers based on their viewpoint. If you believe you were treated differently because of what you wanted to say, write down the date and the circumstances and seek advice. Most boards, for the record, just want the meeting to end before midnight.

Step 4. Write your three minutes

Now the part that separates the people who are heard from the people who are merely tolerated. Do the arithmetic first. A typical speaking pace is around 130 words per minute. Three minutes at that pace is 3 times 130, which is 390 words. But you will pause, take a breath, and probably slow down when you are nervous, so plan for about 330 to 360 words and not a word more. A speech that runs past the timer gets cut off in the middle of your best sentence, and the board remembers the interruption, not the point.

A structure that works:

1. Introduce yourself in one sentence. Your name, your neighborhood or the school your child attends, and that you are a parent or taxpayer.
2. State your ask in one sentence. Not a complaint. A request. "I am asking the board to post the list of approved instructional materials for each grade level on the district website."
3. Give one or two reasons. Facts, not adjectives. What the policy says, what the budget shows, what happened and when.
4. Say what you want done and by when. A vote, a review, a reply in writing within thirty days.
5. Repeat your ask in the last sentence. The board will remember the first and last things you said.

Two rules of tone. Talk about policy and process, not about people. Boards commonly ask speakers not to name individual students or employees, and the public record you are building is better when it is about decisions and not personalities. And do not read your anger aloud. Write the angry version first, put it in a drawer, then write the one you are going to deliver. The second draft is the one that wins.

A sample statement, clearly hypothetical

Here is an invented example of what roughly 250 words sounds like. The district, the policy and the speaker are all made up. Adapt it to your own issue.

Good evening. My name is Dana, I live in the north part of the district, and I have two children in the elementary schools. I am asking the board to direct the superintendent to post the list of approved instructional materials for every grade level on the district website by the start of next semester. Here is why. Right now a parent who wants to know what her child will read or use in class has to ask each teacher, and the answers vary. A single, public list would save staff time, since they would not have to answer the same questions repeatedly, and it would let families prepare. Many districts already do this, and it costs little: a spreadsheet and a web page. I understand that materials change, so I am not asking for a freeze. I am asking for a list that is updated when the board approves a change, with the date of the update. I would also ask that the board take this up at a future meeting as a discussion item and report back to the public. I have left a written copy of my comments with the clerk, along with my email address. Thank you for your service and for your time. Again, my request is that the district post the approved instructional materials list for each grade level online by next semester.

Count that out loud with a timer before you ever go. You will probably find that you are a minute over, and that the missing minute made it better.

Step 5. Speak, and what to expect

Arrive early. Take a seat near the front or the aisle. When your name is called, walk to the podium, state your name for the record, and begin. Speak to the board chair, and look up occasionally. Keep your paper steady.

What to expect after you finish. Most of the time, nothing. In many districts, board members are not allowed or not accustomed to respond during public comment. Some thank you. Some ask the superintendent to look into it. Some look at their phones. Do not read the silence as a verdict. The board's rules often restrict back-and-forth during comment so that the board does not take up business that was not on the agenda. That is how the system works, and it is also why the next step is the one that actually matters.

Bring copies. Hand a printed copy of your statement and any documents to the clerk, and keep one yourself. A written copy goes into the record and can be quoted.

Step 6. Follow up in writing

Within a day or two, send a short email to every board member and the clerk, copying the superintendent. Board contact information is posted on the district website. Say who you are, say when you spoke, restate your request in one sentence, attach your statement, and ask a specific question: "Will this be placed on an upcoming agenda, and if so, which meeting?" Then note the date you sent it.

If you need documents, such as a contract, a budget detail or a policy history, your state's public records law gives you a right to request them, usually in writing, and the law sets a deadline for a response. Be specific about what you want. A request for "all emails about the curriculum" is a good way to get a large bill and a long delay. A request for "the board-approved list of instructional materials for grade four, with adoption dates" is a good way to get a document.

A letter to the editor of the local paper can add pressure, and writing a letter to the editor that actually gets printed shows how. For reading the budget before you speak, use A Worksheet for Reading Your School District's Budget Line by Line.

Step 7. Come back, and bring a neighbor

One speech rarely changes a district. A pattern does. The parent who comes back every month, who reads the packet, who is polite and prepared and who brings two neighbors with different perspectives becomes a fixture, and fixtures get returned calls. Offer to serve on a committee. Many boards have advisory committees for curriculum, budget and facilities, and they often struggle to fill them.

And remember that the board is elected. If after a year of respectful effort you find the board unresponsive, the remedy is at the ballot box, and in many places the seats are won with a few hundred votes. See how to win a school board seat when nobody else is paying attention if you are the sort who decides to run.

The bottom line

• A school board is the level of government where one prepared parent can still move the needle. It adopts policy and the budget, and it hires the superintendent. Take policy, budget and curriculum questions there, and take classroom questions to the teacher first.
• Find the posted agenda under your state's open meetings law, read the packet, and check the consent agenda line by line. Items marked for discussion are the best time to be heard.
• Plan for about 330 to 360 words in a three-minute slot: one ask, one or two facts, a clear request, and the ask again at the end. Talk about policy, not people.
• Follow up in writing the next day, ask a specific question, and request records by their specific names.
• Come back. The parent who shows up every month and brings a neighbor is the one the board remembers.