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Next Panorama Survey for WS/FCS Families Coming in May
Starting on Tuesday, May 9, Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools families will be asked to fill out a new round of Panorama surveys and make their voice heard in the future of how the district conducts business.
In January, WS/FCS issued the first round of Panorama surveys to get a sense of the community’s satisfaction levels. The surveys contained questions covering a wide swath of topics, including students’ learning behaviors outside of the classroom, how safe kids feel at school, what teachers do to get parents involved in their child’s education, potential barriers to family engagement and more. Across many different topics, the common thread was the district seeking to be more supportive of its stakeholders.
“This is a way for us to assess how we’re doing at supporting our students, our staff and our families,” said LaTrayl Adams, WS/FCS Director of Social Emotional Learning and Restorative Practices.
The first wave of surveys turned up plenty of interesting results. For example, 82% of respondents had a favorable view of their child’s school’s commitment to seeking and facilitating parent involvement, although if anything could be improved, it’s that teachers are often too busy to hear parent concerns, with only 24% of respondents giving favorable answers on that front. Only 64% of first-time families felt their school was a good fit for their students, and 48% felt that classroom activities could be tailored more to student interests. With a total of 4,304 responses to the first survey, there was plenty of data to work with, but there’s still room for more.
“We had 4,304 responses, and that’s a lot of people, but we know that we can do more and capture more voices to get the best possible results,” Adams said.
Like any other school system, WS/FCS is deeply committed to giving students the best possible educational experience. Adams says that strategies are already being developed around the first set of results to implement more social emotional learning and restorative practices to improve feelings of student belonging at schools. Getting more advice this spring from both the students and their loved ones will go a long way towards making the district more effective in their mission. The more people voice their opinions in the next Panorama surveys, the better.
“We want to support the wonderful job that our parents are already doing at home,” Adams said. “When we work with people, we can achieve so much more.”
Parents should look for a message from the district about the survey starting today.