Dipti Khanna was recently elected to the BOE. This document is a collection of her responses to BHCW questions and articles she has submitted. I organized this so that parents and other residents can learn about Dipti as she takes on this new role next year.
Question on Budget:
(1) What qualifications do you hold to manage a 60 million dollar budget?
I am running for a three-year term in the upcoming November election, and I will be the strongest advocate of the students of Berkeley Heights and put their interests above everything else. I grew up in India and graduated from Mumbai University with a Bachelor’s degree in Electronics Engineering. I am an Enterprise Solution Architect in a multinational consulting firm, and the core of my job is to understand business problems and craft solutions that drive value for our clients. I lead multi-disciplinary teams to bring every part of the solution together meaningfully and manage multiple stakeholders. My education and training have prepared me to learn and adapt. My travels and experiences have given me an appreciation for different cultures and diverse viewpoints.
I am an engineer by training and a problem solver at work. In my professional experience, the question that I ask myself every single day is – how does this decision or activity drive value for the client?
I would apply the same principle when looking at school budget and asking how we can maximize the value and impact on the students, their education and experience inside and outside the classrooms.
(2) If you were given a marker and the ability to do so, what is one thing you could change about the Budget? (name more than one if you want)?
The dictionary lists the definition of the word “goal” as “the object of a person’s ambition or effort; an aim or desired result.”
“Budget” is “the amount of money needed or available for a purpose.”
A school district defines the goals to set its ambition for the students and then decides to put in the required effort to achieve the desired result.
The goals shared in the 9/22 BOE meeting are a series of actions the district intends to take, but no specific, measurable goals are attached to these actions.
School districts around Berkeley Heights seem to be approaching the issue in a slightly different way. For example, New Providence appears to have a set of goals tied to a time horizon with a little more detail and something actionable. Summit publishes an end-of-year update on district goals to keep their community informed of the progress. Millburn defines board goals that are distinct from district goals that provide an insight into the priorities of the Board.
I would encourage our school district to integrate budget process to the specific and measurable goals to ensure that our tax dollars are channeled towards the district goals. The district could provide more transparency and engage the residents through the budgeting process.
What could it look like if the Berkeley Heights BOE decided to set its own goals? Based on the mounting legal bills of the school district, the Board could consider setting a goal for itself on how to prudently manage our tax dollars.
Managing a budget needs to take a holistic approach – taking into account the district goals, priorities and having a contingency plan for surprises that might arise during the course of the year.
(3) What would you do to bring order and cohesion back to the BOE while simultaneously trying to initiate the changes you have discussed thus far?
Our district needs to improve in the way it engages and communicates with the parent and resident community. I believe that transparent, effective and timely communication goes a long way in establishing a trust based relationship. I do not view differences as criticism. I might disagree on a viewpoint, and I will be civil when doing so.
Being transparent means, we might not always agree on everything, but I would be honest and open in my interactions, negotiating with shared interests in mind instead of positions and acknowledging issues and addressing them together. I believe that parents and residents asking questions should not be marginalized or criticized and ridiculed.
The Berkeley Heights Board of Education needs fresh ideas, a different perspective, and to dedicate our tax dollars to improve the quality of education and student experience.
Question on Meetings:
“I would like to hear from BOE candidates as to whether they would be willing to adopt any of the following or if they can share any of their suggestions and ideas if they agree that this is far too much information and this is an issue that needs to be addressed:
(1) Schedule more frequent meetings so that there is not so much to go over at one time potentially keeping meetings from being 5 hours long, making it more likely that all BOE members will be familiar with what they are voting on, and making it easier for parents to attend meetings.
(2) Share with residents a sort of ‘Cliff Notes’ version of what is on the agenda.
(3) Make the agenda and any attachments available the week prior to BOE meetings.””
Thank you for the question. This topic is important to me as a parent and everyone trying to keep up with the happenings and updates from the school district. The BOE leadership together with the district administration leaders made the decision to reduce the number of meetings in a month which has directly resulted in meetings that run late into the night because of a packed agenda. Even those parents that try to make it to a BOE meeting on a weekday are not incentivized to stay for the entire duration of the long meeting. Our district administration routinely dumps hundreds of documents a day or two before a BOE meeting. If they are really looking for a robust dialogue and participation, they need to give their stakeholders sufficient time to review and digest the materials in advance of the meeting.
I would recommend that our district go back to a cadence of meeting twice a month, as was the practice till 2021. The increased frequency will help with managing the agenda and retaining the parent and resident engagement during the meetings. The school administration also needs to utilize the equipment that was procured and provide the Zoom meeting access to increase and encourage more participation into the meetings. Just as our students use technology in their classrooms, our school district needs to leverage the technology and tools available to increase public participation and engagement.
Another area of improvement is to provide an insight into the agenda for the BOE meetings in advance, ideally a week before the meeting. Any materials that would be referenced or used for the meeting need to be circulated at least 4 days before the meeting in order for the BOE and residents to come prepared to discuss and express a point of view during the public comments part of the meeting. The BOE and district would benefit from having an informed parent and resident community.
Parents are increasingly using OPRA requests to get information from the district. The district could publish the information requested under OPRA in the minutes of the meetings or on the district website in an effort to make the information accessible to parents and residents.
I would extend this idea to everything – in a true spirit of transparency and partnership, our district administration needs to make it easier for parents, students and residents to access relevant information, provide feedback and input.
As always, thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts and ideas.
Question on Teachers and District Employees:
If elected, what would be your plan to ensure every single employee of the BHPS system is supported, valued and partnered with in approaching significant decisions that impact the District?”
Thank you for highlighting a critical element of what makes a high performing school district – trust of the teachers and support staff. The success of our school district and students is not possible without the efforts and commitment of our teachers, support staff and custodians.
My memories of school and college are shaped in large part by the experiences and interactions with my teachers. I hear the same when I talk to my children about their experiences in school.
Our school district does a great job of recognizing our teachers and support staff through partnership with the parents and students.
However there has been a lot of churn in the district over the past couple of years between the pandemic and new administration.
If I were to be elected to the BOE position, I would work with the district administration to create trust based relationships with our teachers; which means being transparent and honest in our interactions, negotiating with shared interests in mind instead of positions and acknowledging issues and addressing them together.
As an example, I think our teachers and support staff could have received more support and help when several had to move schools as a part of the reconfiguration and redistricting process. Packing a classroom that has been built up many years is an emotional and arduous process and perhaps our district administration could have offered more support through that move across schools.
Several of our teachers and support staff are teaching a new class for the first time coming out of the pandemic that need more time to adapt and support from our district administration.
Being transparent means we might not always agree on everything, but I would be honest and open in my interactions balancing the interests of teachers and support staff, students and parents when making important decisions.
As always, thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts.
Question on holding the Superintendent Accountable:
What will you do to reassure these residents (mostly parents) that you will not be another rubber stamp for the Superintendent? Would you be open to putting the Superintendent on a Performance Improvement Plan? Are you open to holding the Superintendent PUBLICLY accountable if similar behaviors were to occur again in the future?
Please understand that promises of “better communication” will likely not suffice in responding to the question as that really is, in the mind of many parents, a small part of a collection of concerns.”
“Thank you for your question. As a parent of 2 children in the Berkeley Heights district and another one in the Union County Vocational schools, my primary concern is to get the school district to focus on academics and student achievement.
The focus starts with the Superintendent being held accountable to how the district performs on student achievement, effective stakeholder management and communication and making sure that all decisions and actions drive value towards the students and residents.
As an example, our district needs to make sure that district communication is clear and timely, and that parents are not blindsided by decisions shared at the last minute. They need to make it easier to access information than making parents and residents jump through hoops to get data from the district.
Another example is the amount of energy and money spent on attorney fees and the transparency around why this is required or what value does that drive for the students?
Over the past 2 years our school district has seen a significant churn in the district administration as well as our schools with the reconfiguration and redistricting. All throughout that time, there was little information shared that could justify the basis of such a huge change. I feel that our Board of Education missed several opportunities to engage and collaborate with parents throughout that process.
Most parents were left frustrated at the end of the process and that has eroded trust in the administration. The significant number of teacher retirements during this period is also going to introduce a big change for the students and their learning in the next few years.
The Board of Education has the responsibility to provide oversight and steer the district towards better engagement with the students and residents.
If elected to the Board of Education, I will not rubber stamp decisions or proposals from the district administration without fully examining the merits and data surrounding the proposal.
My campaign for the BOE is based on an emphasis on academics and accountability and I appreciate the opportunity to share my thoughts.
May I request to pls add the following link from a BOE meeting from June 2021 asking for more information on the decision making process of the district administration.”
Dipti’s Articles:
HOW CAN WE IMPROVE THE CURRENT THINKING CLASSROOM MODEL
OPMA & OPRA: WE SHOULD FEARLESSLY DEMAND TRANSPARENCY
