Anoka Uses SchoolCenter To Engage And Inform Voters On Issues

• • The Challenge

    All school districts across the country have faced challenges in receiving funding at one time or another. Approval for the necessary finances crucial to the improvement of many schools often depends on local voters. Anoka-Hennepin School District 11 is just one such district. Anoka-Hennepin School District realized that if they were going to continue to receive vital education funding, they needed the public to support an upcoming levy. Without the public's support, Anoka-Hennepin would be forced to slash their budget by $42 million and eliminate over 500 positions. Such a reduction would drastically impact the quality of their students' education and produce devastating consequences. They had only a few critical months to educate their voters as to why they needed revenue from the levy.

  • The Solution

    With such critical funding at stake, Anoka-Hennepin turned to one of its longtime partners, SchoolCenter, to help educate their voters. Anoka-Hennepin used their SchoolCenter website to inform voters about the three levy questions and the technology bond. They chose to present the vital information on their SchoolCenter website for three key reasons:
     
    Since the website is a content management system, Anoka-Hennepin could easily update their information. Equally important, the public could easily access such information.
     
    Already heavily used by the public as a source of important information, Anoka-Hennepin's website served as the most flexible and dynamic tool for educating the public on the upcoming levy questions. Using their website's communication tools, Anoka-Hennepin created video podcasts, posted timely information on the What's New component, produced a slideshow presentation with the Album, and distributed critical information in PDF format using the Document Manager. They also relied on the Mailing List Manager and used the Global Message feature to communicate important information. By using a myriad of formats familiar to the public, Anoka-Hennepin provided the community with information they needed to make an educated decision.
     
    SchoolCenter's reliable high level of service and technical support, coupled with their effective communication tools, gave Anoka-Hennepin the capacity to effectively educate their community.
    
    

    The Outcome

    Informing the public through the Anoka-Hennepin School District website was key in determining the outcome of the referendum questions. The partnership that Anoka-Hennepin and SchoolCenter has developed made it possible for the district to rely on the software for the critical challenge of informing the public. On November 6, 2007 the first levy question passed by 62% and the second by 56%. Although the third question and the technology bond question were not approved, the margin was extremely narrow.