The Denver Waldorf School Strategic Plan is intended to be a dynamic document. As such, the Plan is updated each year. The Plan is structured in three parts. The first part is intended to review the priorities that were set for the current school year and to report on progress made. The second part is to make recommendations for the future to the Board and Faculty out of the progress made during the current school year on the above priorities. The third part is intended to suggest possible focus areas and priorities for the coming school year, keeping in mind that a priority for the Strategic Plan will always be to work the plan and its components – Academic Plan, Campus Master Plan, Five Year Budget, and Benchmark Indicators – thus always looking at least five years into the future.
As the Strategic Planning Committee reflected back on this school year and common themes, we noticed a few worth reporting. We noticed that a large part of the year has been spent within the community focusing on community enrichment, enriching our community to be in alignment with the Denver Waldorf School Mission. We worked hard to do this in the Board, College, Faculty, Administration, Board Mandated Committees, Parent Council, all school events, and especially the Community Enrichment Evenings. Implicit in the Mission is the balance of honoring the individual — “We are dedicated to the conscious evolution and development of the whole human being” and “The growing child is the heart of our work” – and honoring the whole community – “ Our school is a community of children, teacher, parents, community leaders, family and friends joined in a celebration of life and education.”
We also noticed a dynamic tension as we strive to work with consensus. Consensus governance is in its nascence and comes with challenges as we grow in our understanding and implementation. The Strategic Planning Committee would like to use Board Studies next year to understand our school’s mission and to understand the workings of consensus, including trust and respect for committee work built out of transparency and clarity of process.
Finally, when we submitted our first Strategic Plan in the spring of 2007, we asked to have as a priority the development of an abundance consciousness in our community. Out of that intention, we feel that we actually have created a perception in our community that we have an abundance of resources. While this is fabulous and true in some ways, it is misleading in others. Some community members may feel that they do not have to give because we already have enough. We would like to change this consciousness to honoring and nurturing an abundant community. The school provides events and means for enriching our community, including first and foremost the education of the children, and parent education as well. We ask in return that members of the community, including staff, recognize times to give and times to receive. We are all rich in some areas and poor in others.If we share our abundant resources in partnership, we can feed and nourish our growing organism: The Denver Waldorf School.
Strategic Plan
The Denver Waldorf School Strategic Plan is intended to be a dynamic document. As such, the Plan is updated each year. The Plan is structured in three parts. The first part is intended to review the priorities that were set for the current school year and to report on progress made. The second part is to make recommendations for the future to the Board and Faculty out of the progress made during the current school year on the above priorities. The third part is intended to suggest possible focus areas and priorities for the coming school year, keeping in mind that a priority for the Strategic Plan will always be to work the plan and its components – Academic Plan, Campus Master Plan, Five Year Budget, and Benchmark Indicators – thus always looking at least five years into the future.
As the Strategic Planning Committee reflected back on this school year and common themes, we noticed a few worth reporting. We noticed that a large part of the year has been spent within the community focusing on community enrichment, enriching our community to be in alignment with the Denver Waldorf School Mission. We worked hard to do this in the Board, College, Faculty, Administration, Board Mandated Committees, Parent Council, all school events, and especially the Community Enrichment Evenings. Implicit in the Mission is the balance of honoring the individual — “We are dedicated to the conscious evolution and development of the whole human being” and “The growing child is the heart of our work” – and honoring the whole community – “ Our school is a community of children, teacher, parents, community leaders, family and friends joined in a celebration of life and education.”
We also noticed a dynamic tension as we strive to work with consensus. Consensus governance is in its nascence and comes with challenges as we grow in our understanding and implementation. The Strategic Planning Committee would like to use Board Studies next year to understand our school’s mission and to understand the workings of consensus, including trust and respect for committee work built out of transparency and clarity of process.
Finally, when we submitted our first Strategic Plan in the spring of 2007, we asked to have as a priority the development of an abundance consciousness in our community. Out of that intention, we feel that we actually have created a perception in our community that we have an abundance of resources. While this is fabulous and true in some ways, it is misleading in others. Some community members may feel that they do not have to give because we already have enough. We would like to change this consciousness to honoring and nurturing an abundant community. The school provides events and means for enriching our community, including first and foremost the education of the children, and parent education as well. We ask in return that members of the community, including staff, recognize times to give and times to receive. We are all rich in some areas and poor in others.If we share our abundant resources in partnership, we can feed and nourish our growing organism: The Denver Waldorf School.
The Denver Waldorf School’s Strategic Plan is available to read in PDF format (requires Adobe Acrobat).