I have a few questions in regards to the survey that was conducted on this website about the school building issue. The first being, exactly how many respondents were there that completed the survey? Also, were you able to gauge from which community the respondents were from? It seems to me that this survey would be a little skewed coming from a Minonk-citizen ran webpage with a overwhelming response of saying either repair or rebuild with the middle school.

Additionally, I am baffled by some of the comments. Especially with comments 10, 12, and 17. See them below:

10. I would like to East closed and the K-6 split up between South & West. This can happen with Junior High & High School Combined-can this be feasible with repairs only and not a new builing?

12. i feel that the schools of west south and high school are functional and can be repaired . Do nothing to east and move those children to other facilities or add on to one of the other buildings .

17. Close a building, the one that is in the worst shape, and repair the others

I have to ask the reasoning behind the people's thoughts for closing the Wenona school building? Can you justify them?

If you, and this is a general you, attended a informational meeting on the school building issue, you would know that it is NOT FEASIBLE to close the Wenona school building and put students that attend there in other buildings - there is simply not enough room. I am just taken aback by the fact that 22% of the respondents of this survey want the school board to do nothing with the Wenona school building. So I just want some justification behind these comments.

Thank you.

Braiden Skinner

Editor's reply: Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I sincerely believe you would be most comfortable taking the next step and doing your own survey. The upcoming 4th of July celebration may facilitate this process, which should only take a couple of hours. From conversations I've had, taxpayers are struggling to meet daily family needs on less dollars, and don't like their treatment by the school board.

1. What information do we want to get as a result of the survey?
2. What are we going to do with the information?

I think we all know the answer to #2 - the Board will use the survey as part of the decision-making process on whether to repair or build new.

However, the way the questions are designed, I have a hard time understanding how they will be able to intelligently and accurately interpret the survey results. I had to read the questions several times to differentiate between the available options in order to rank them; all the options seemed to similar. My anticipation is when they get the results, there will not be enough statistical difference between responses to draw any clear conclusions.

Perhaps the best options for people taking the survey is to simply state their preference in the open-ended text response provided after Question 1. Hopefully doing that will provide a clear message to the School Board in an otherwise confusing survey.

Also a special thank you to the City of Minonk crew who always go out of their way to help our group set up and take down for the event. Without their help it wouldn't be possible.

Thanks for the continued support for this wonderful cause.

Dr. Daniel L. Oakley, Superintendent
Fieldcrest CUSD 6