DAVID Y. IGE CATHERINE PAYNE GOVERNOR CHAIRPERSON STATE OF HAWAI‘I BOARD OF EDUCATION P.O. BOX 2360 HONOLULU, HAWAI‘I 96804 June 4, 2020 TO: Board of Education FROM: Catherine Payne Chairperson, Board of Education AGENDA ITEM: Board Action on State Librarian’s evaluation for 2019-2020 School Year: end-of-year evaluation The Board of Education’s (“Board”) state librarian evaluation process, revised on August 15, 2019,1 includes an end-of-year final evaluation of the state librarian’s performance on predetermined professional standards based on the American Library Association’s description of required skills for library directors and multiple public library director evaluations from across the country and annual state librarian priorities. The state librarian is to provide the Board with a self-assessment along with supporting documents and evidence to help inform its evaluation. State Librarian Stacey Aldrich’s materials related to the end-of-year self-assessment are attached as Exhibit A. The evaluation process envisions the Board conducting its end-of-year evaluation of the state librarian in executive session, taking action on the assessments in public, and publishing its ratings and comments on its website. However, on June 27, 2019, the Hawaii Supreme Court issued an opinion regarding discussion of personnel matters in executive session.2 Based on this opinion, the discussion of the state librarian’s performance should occur in public because there is no clear, legitimate privacy interest in highly personal and intimate information, as described in the opinion. Because the entire discussion will occur in public, it is more appropriate for the official meeting minutes to serve as the record of the evaluation rather than a separate summary document. 1 The memorandum on the revisions to the state librarian’s evaluation is available at: http://boe.hawaii.gov/Meetings/Notices/Meeting%20Material%20Library/Special_20190815_Action%20on %20State%20Librarian%20evaluation%20recommendations.pdf. 2 Civil Beat Law Center v. City and County of Honolulu is available here: https://oip.hawaii.gov/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/CBLC-v-Honolulu-Police-Commission-Kealoha-exec- session.pdf. Exhibit A State Librarian Stacey Aldrich’s 2019-2020 Self-Assessment and Supporting Documents an Evidence STATE LIBRARIAN END-OF-YEAR EVALUATION WORKSHEET STANDARDS Professional Standards Ratings Standard 1: Visionary Leadership and Organizational Culture Highly Effective Standard 2: Operations, Resources, and Personnel Management Effective+ Standard 3: Board Governance and Policy Effective Standard 4: Communication and Community Relations Effective+ Standard 5: Ethical Leadership Effective+ Component 1 (Professional Standards) Overall Rating Effective+ Justification In review of this past year, and the most recent COVID-19 crisis, I would rate myself Effective+. Our organization has been able to create agile plans that are allowing us to pivot our services based on the environmental situation, and provide services to the community both virtual and now physical. PRIORITIES State Librarian Priorities Ratings State Librarian Priority 1 Delayed State Librarian Priority 2 Delayed State Librarian Priority 3 Under Construction Component 1 (Professional Standards) Overall Rating Justification These priorities were not completed due to COVID-19 crisis, which required all of my energy and that or the organization to rethink, redesign, and plan for a changing new normal in just two months. These priorities are important and we continue to work on them, but are rethinking how we will accomplish them now. We continue to use our HSPLS Framework to guide the work we do, but pivoting to meet the challenges of the new normal. Stacey A. Aldrich | June 4, 2020 1 BOARD ACTION ON STATE LIBRARIAN’S EVALUATION FOR 2019-2020 SCHOOL YEAR: END-OF-YEAR EVALUATION | JUSTIFICATION The following are a few examples related to the standards and priorities set forth in this evaluation. Most of my examples are related to the recent COVID-19 Pandemic because it is fresh in my mind and has been all consuming. In terms of the priorities, you will see that we were not able to accomplish everything we sought to complete. This is a combination of the challenges of COVID-19 and one of the priorities is big enough that it needs more time to be developed. I must note that the accomplishments of the Hawaii State Public Library System have been made by a team of very dedicated staff, and I am blessed to work with them to support our communities. STANDARDS STANDARD 1: VISIONARY LEADERSHIP AND ORGANIZATIONAL CULTURE RATING: Highly Effective JUSTIFICATION: I believe this an area where I do my best working leading. The following are examples to highlight the work done in this area. 1.1. Clearly aligns leadership actions, staffing, and resources to a patron-centered vision and ensures the vision is evident in the culture of public library branches; My thinking about what we do always starts with the patron. I am always asking why and what the impact is to the people we serve. When the COVID-19 pandemic began and we were closing, we had to pivot our services and think about what we could do to support our patrons in the locked down environment. We thought about access and resources. For those who did not have library cards, they couldn't use our digital resources and they could not visit a library to get a library card. To ensure access, we created an online library card application. The online library card is good for 45-days and grants immediate access to all of our digital resources. There have been 3300 online applications in just a few weeks. We also lifted any restrictions on patrons who had above the maximum fine limit on their library cards, so that they too could continue to use our online resources. We did not stop with an online library card application. We redesigned our homepage for easy access and add new resources and features. Please see attachment 2 for more information about the changes. As we have been planning for a phased in reopening, we have used a collaborative approach that is focused on how can we support the health of communities and also provide services. When we were planning together with the branch managers for our Library Take Out service, we started with a template to consider all the aspects of this service and how it would best work in each branch. Next we all met together on Microsoft Teams to discuss the plans. We started the conversation by asking staff to tell us what the service would look like from the patron’s experience. It's easy for us to get caught up in how we are going to do something, but the question is will it make sense and serve our patrons? Attachment 1: Online Library Card Application Attachment 2: Improved Access to Resources and Information | Website changes 2020 Stacey A. Aldrich | June 4, 2020 2 1.2. Creates an organizational framework that guides the library system in the development of people, place, collections, and services and programs; Our organization uses our HSPLS Framework for planning and communicating internally and externally. It helps us keep focused on what is important, but also leaves room for addressing the details. All of our communications have been designed around people, place, collection and services and programs. From the testimony to the legislature to communicating rapid changes to staff, it provides common vocabulary and simple way for us to think about our complex organization. For example, all of the communications that we created internally for staff about COVID-19 changes were all framed around people, place, collections and services and programs. We were able to succinctly provide guidance for staff, what would happen with our physical locations, how we were going to handle collections, and how we needed to wind down physical services and programs. Attachment 3: HSPLS Framework Attachment 4: Legislative Informational Budget Briefing, January 17, 2020 1.3. Nurtures an organization of working together, trust, and high expectations by supporting leadership and staff who work behind the scenes and in branches to make decisions that improve library services; COVID-19 provided a myriad challenges and opportunities to continue to nurture our organization. The Executive Team and myself have worked tirelessly to keep communication open, encourage ideas from all levels and build trust. I sent out updates called READ | Stay Healthy and Stay Informed that covered issues, process, news and concerns. Sometimes I would include a poem to inspire. I met with the Executive Team every morning to discuss issues/concerns/plans. The Executive Team met three times a week (MWF) (25 meetings) with the Branch Managers to discuss the latest information/concerns and planning. The support staff leaders and the branch managers met with their staff to convey information, gather questions and to do planning. The first day that all staff were back to work, we had a Welcome Back Webinar to review our plan, safety protocols, material protocols and what is coming next. With an amazing Executive Team, we have created structures to do our best to communicate and include all voices. And a standard practice in our organization, is if we are going to do something new, we have small teams form to develop and make recommendations to the Executive Team. This is true of Summer Reading, which each year we ask staff from across the state to help design and develop. We set the foundations and expectations and then we ask people to step up and excel. Another great example of this is the Virtual Programming that was developed. We had one staff member lead and bring in several others to set the foundations for our library system as a whole. Within two weeks, they had figured out how to record and make accessible virtual programs to support children who missed their storytimes with our librarians, and fun crafts to do while at home.