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By Mary Schaefer
IASA Director of Communications & Marketing
Roselle SD #12 Introduces
NewDigital Magazine:
D12 Path to Excellence
Roselle SD #12 successfully secured passage of a voter
referendum in March of 2016 allowing for a .60 percent property
tax rate increase to help resolve a structural deficit the district
had incurred for over 30 years, according to Dr. Melissa
Kaczkowski, superintendent of the district.
To showcase some of the achievements made possible as a
result of the referendum, the school district created a full-color,
quarterly digital magazine,
D12 Path to Excellence ,in May of this
year. The first edition of the 46-page digital magazine included
feature stories of plans underway at the district for the upcoming
school year, insight into how the district changed financially
and academically, facility upgrades, special student programs
underway, as well as bios on administrators, teachers and staff
in the district.
“The digital magazine allowed us to talk about the district
turnaround that was made possible as a result of the property
tax referendum. Not only are we keeping the promises made
in the referendum campaign, we are exceeding them,” said
Kaczkowski, who is in her fifth year as superintendent at Roselle.
“Just the impact of being a district that didn’t have the financial
resources to do what we needed to do, we have changed the
picture of the district financially, academically and from a facility
standpoint. We had buildings that were 52 years old and were
crumbling and major facility work that needed upgraded.”
Kaczkowski placed priority in sharing with stakeholders
through the digital magazine all the progressive work that
was being made possible as a result of the tax increase the
voters approved.
“We were excited to tell our story, and we have tackled all the
work that we identified needed to be done when we talked about
what could be possible through the referendum. We are now in a
place where we are not just talking about what we had planned
to do with the new funds, but we have the data and product
in place to show people we have exceeded every promise
we made,” said Kackowski. “We knew what we wanted to
accomplish could not be done through state funding, and we had
major facility work that needed to be done, which we completed
this past summer.”
The May issue of
D12 Path To Excellence
promoted
how the district is coming full circle in addressing a
long-term structural deficit in the district’s finances, including
significant investments and improvements in teaching,
learning, curriculum and instruction and how the district
was prepared to tackle construction projects in the summer,
including $8.8 million in facility upgrades.
Kaczkowski is proud the district was able to install new
floors in schools, purchase new furniture for students, paint
the school buildings and add new LED lighting and security
enhancements this past summer.
To illustrate the overall district turnaround, the magazine
showcases the upward trajectory of the district from the
first balanced budget in more than 25 years and an almost
unheard of two credit rating upgrade in the past year, to
three curriculum upgrades and rising test scores.
Kaczkowski says the district plans to keep producing
a quarterly magazine in order to have a source of
accurate and positive information about the district within
the community.
“When we started on the road to secure successful
passage of the referendum, we knew communication was
going to be essential with voters on why the referendum
was necessary,” adds Kaczkowski. “We were up against
some huge challenges, and we want to continue to share
our success story out there to keep promoting the power of
communicating what has been made possible as a result of
the new funds.”