Johnson County school district working on public curriculum website

BUFFALO (WNE) – Parents in Johnson County could soon have an inside look into some curriculum materials being used in their children's classrooms, thanks to a curriculum library website currently being built by Johnson County School District No. 1.
"It's that transparency piece that we've been talking about," said Steve Miller, district director of curriculum and learning. “We shouldn't be ashamed of what we're teaching. (There) should be an open door policy, without apologies, that (says), 'Hey, this is what we're teaching, with fidelity, and this is what we're doing.'" 
Miller said the district is still in the process of collecting curriculum materials from teachers, which includes, for example, curriculum maps, proficiency scales - tools used to assess student progress - and priority standards - the academic level that students are expected to be at by the end of a school year. 
The curriculum library will be housed online, he said, and the website is currently under construction. The end product that will eventually be available to parents will allow them to look at the broader curriculum materials that give an overview of what is being taught in classrooms around the county.
More specific materials such as assessments, however, won't be available for public viewing. 
Miller said the district is creating the public-facing portion of the website with the
hope that allowing parents and other community stakeholders easy access to curriculum materials can help build trusting partnerships between parents and teachers.
But he said he wants to take care that having the materials online doesn't turn into micromanagement of teachers.
"There should be partnerships, but not in a way where the parents are micromanaging the teachers, because the teachers are the expert(s)," Miller said.
 
This story was published on July 7.