Participation Boundaries for Providing Public Comment at a School Board Meeting (Poster 3)

• In Event: Mapping the Field: The Role of Space in Educational Equity

Abstract

Public comments are an important component to the local democratic activities of a school board's decision-making (Castro et al., 2022). School board policies are locally defined and relegated by state agencies. Citizens wanting to engage in school board policy decision-making need time and resources to learn the policy mechanisms bounding participation (Collins, 2021). To better understand the participation boundaries in local school policy, we mapped the socio-spatial participation structures organizing participation in Sunny Field school district’s (SFSD) school board meetings. Awareness of the spatial dimensions of participation in school boards contributes to better understanding obstacles to civic engagement, political strategies, and the role of space in civic engagement. Our guiding research question is: What are the available resources and participation boundaries existing to provide a public comment at a school board meeting?

We use a socio-spatial lens to consider an individual’s navigation of the available resources Sunny Field City and the policy, laws, and regulations set by the SFSD school board. Space in itself is given, but people, institutions, and political entities define, organize, and use space as a “product of social translation, transformation and experience” (Soja, 1980, p. 210). The socio-spatial perspective emphasizes the relationship between the social and the spatial as well as their interaction with the political (Soja, 1980; Roca, 2020). The social and spatial interact to produce a framework for participating with the SFSD board. In our case, the SFSD board has created avenues of participation that require individuals to learn about the means of participation. We explore this relationship through policy documents and ethnographic methods. Various points of data were used to map how citizens can participate in public comments including procedures for public comment from the SFSD website, Local Board Policy Procedures Handbook, and documents available at school board meetings (e.g. public comment sign-up form). The first author also attended a school board meeting. As part of the field notes on participation processes, photos were taken of the location. The data was then used to map a possible participation framework.

Our preliminary mapping (see Figure 1) emphasizes the resources needed to participate in providing a public comment. For example, Sunny Field City does not have a public transportation system; instead the city council contracted with Uber to provide $4 one-way share rides within the city limits. Additionally, there are rules bounding one’s public comments. For instance, a time limit ranging 1 to 3 minutes depending on the number signed up for public comment. This makes it difficult to prepare statements in advance. SFSD board members can also not respond to public comments.

Socio-spatial relationships help in seeing the entanglement of space and civic engagement. Understanding participation boundaries and available resources provide insight into one’s access to policy-making spaces and engagement in civic activities. Understanding the rules of the game—participation boundaries—provides opportunities to teach others how to disrupt and make space for others.

Authors

• Carlos Nicolas Gómez Marchant, University of Texas at Austin

• Emma Carene Gargroetzi, University of Texas at Austin