The Governance Seal · Founding Pilot Study
Six boards will set the standard for how school districts are governed.
Not trained on a case study — building their own guiding markers, on their own data, across the full year — all part of the pilot. What the pilot boards build becomes the reference for every board that follows.
The free self-test. Eight questions, no data pull, run by your own board.
The same eight protecting questions — asked before any instrument exists. It takes about three minutes and gives you a self-map you can bring to the day. It is never a score, and never a grade on your board.
What good looks like
You stepped up to serve your schools. Your first training taught the rules — this teaches the how.
The required training covers the laws and rules that govern a district — the what . This is the how : reading your own district on evidence, in plain language, so no meeting arrives cold.
The Governance Lab is where a board builds those instruments itself — guided, in the room — and then runs them on its own data across the year that follows. EJC teaches and guides; your board builds; your board gains the skills to govern; EJC certifies the result.
✦ You already bring the expertise. The Lab hands you the language — and four markers to see with.
Your first training was the rules that govern. This is the how — with a plain-language primer on the what.
- A short session — the nearest comparable certification runs two to three hours.
- Hours counted toward a training requirement, then logged.
- A completion record — attendance, not a marker the board keeps.
- Nothing to post, run, or answer from once the session ends — that's the gap this fills.
- A full year of demonstrated practice — one day in the room, then twelve months building.
- Four guiding markers your board builds from data it already files: the Status Board · Reach Map · Handoff Log · Cadence Panel.
- All eight protecting questions answered live, from your own record.
- A public record posted on cadence, and the Ready · Built · Proven ladder.
The nearest comparable product is a two-to-three-hour session; this is a year of demonstrated practice. Systems proven — never outcomes promised.
One day in the room. Four movements. Four guiding markers your board builds and keeps — from reports you already file.
The first block seats your board in front of a real district record — de-identified and current. A question lands cold: how many, who owns it, which direction is it moving. The room feels the gap on purpose — then watches the same data answered in minutes from a live instrument. You leave able to answer it in minutes — that's the help.
Each founding board takes one day. Three day-slots per window.
- The process and the four modules — how the year runs.
- Which parts of your public record we'll use to build your corpus — and the tools that do it.
- Your window, your seats, and the MOU.
No commitment before that call — it starts with a conversation and a review of the MOU.
Boards can lock in anytime — a changed roster doesn't undo the commitment. Florida is a host, not a boundary; the set is national by design.
The room holds nine seats. Your board has first claim on every one.
A board is trained on its own data — so the room stays small on purpose. Nine seats, no more. A board that brings at least five members works its own record: your real board packet, your real numbers. Bring fewer than five, and the day runs on the de-identified anchor district instead.
Your board holds all nine. Tell us how many you'll use, and we'll open the rest to leaders who want to learn what you're learning.
Individual leaders — including anyone running for a board seat — can claim an open seat and earn Governance Ready, the individual credential that travels with the person, not the district. Your data stays yours: you bring it, you work it in the room, EJC never takes custody of it. Aggregate figures only; no student names.
One year, mapped — with a clear answer for your community at every step.
- Are our students on track — and who's off?
- Is attendance a signal we act on early?
- Are the students the law protects being reached?
- Was each access point built and communicated?
- Do we catch struggles early, while a small move works?
- When we act, who owns it and what did we fund?
- Are the numbers acted on, not just published?
- Is the money — facilities included — on a steady path?
Owned outright. On the record.
Four guiding markers
Built during the year, kept by the board, used at the next meeting.
A public commitment
Named on the record, dated to your next meeting, witnessed by your community.
CEUs in progress
IACET Authorized Provider status in progress. Pilot boards receive a certificate of completion — CEUs can't be awarded retroactively.
A governance credential
Governance Ready — the portable credential, earned member by member.
📍 See it for yourself — the reports a board reads tap to open
Some of this is hard to picture in words — so here's what a board actually gets to see.
These are the board's quarterly marker reports — one read a quarter, never real-time. A full quarter gives your superintendent time to adjust and govern before the next report.
Start from a decision the board actually voted on, and follow it: who does it reach, where, and by when? Districts already report this reach in their federal entitlement applications — the Reach Map puts it in front of the board that cast the vote.
Same curriculum, same door — but it doesn't open the same way for every student. General-population students walk through it fine. For everyone else, a funded support opens the door — and the students it's meant for are the ones written onto the funding application . The door only counts if that support was built and those students were told. The Reach Map shows which doors are open, by group:
The funding names the students it's for; the door proves each one was actually reached. One row reads "built — not told": the support exists and is funded, but the students who qualify were never informed — so it's closed in practice. The board sees which group, which fund, which door, and who can open it — not a single average that hides it.
This one shows the hard spots on purpose — that's the reality a board has to steer. Every flag comes with the next two steps and who owns them.
A district can sign millions in HVAC contracts and still have students sitting in classrooms with no working AC in July. Money moving is not the same as buildings fixed. The Facilities Panel puts condition, backlog, and what's actually funded in front of the board on cadence — so the gap between a signed contract and a working system shows up before a heat wave, not after.
The board builds one instrument a quarter, on its own data, until all four run live.
About eight online hours across the year — and certification lands at month 12.
📋 See two live example reports — Status Board + Purchase Markers tap to open
Two examples, built on a de-identified anchor district: the Q1 Status Board, and the Purchase Markers that ride on a big commitment. Don't take our word for it; look.
| What the board watches | Now | On the team | This quarter |
|---|---|---|---|
| Students off-track on ≥1 early-warning indicator | 1,240 | Student Services + Counseling | → steady |
| Chronic absenteeism (missed ≥10% of days) | 18% | Attendance + School Ops | ↓ worse |
| 9th-graders on-track to promote | 82% | HS Leadership | ↑ better |
| Off-track students with a named adult on the team | 96% | Student Services | ↑ better |
And the Purchase Markers — the seven checks a system keeps on a big commitment (a curriculum buy, a platform, a vendor). Every one sits upstream of student outcomes : they show whether the commitment is being carried, long before any test score exists.
| Marker | What the system has in place | Status |
|---|---|---|
| Need on record KNOWN · Reach Map | A board-documented reading gap, reviewed each fall — not one the vendor defined after the fact. | In place |
| Alignment verified SEEN · Status Board | Fit to K–5 standards checked on evidence, not the vendor's claim. | In place |
| Piloted before scale ANSWERED · Handoff Log | Ran in 2 schools last year, with a defined response to a bad pilot signal. | In place |
| Implementation supported STEADIED · Cadence Panel | All K–5 teachers + coaches trained (2 days, Aug); a mid-year hire gets onboarding + a coach — funded, not just the license. | In place |
| Sustainability — the cliff STEADIED · Cadence Panel | The recurring cost past the one-time money is not yet in the forecast — the gap to close. | Not yet |
| Usage monitored SEEN · Status Board | Actual use tracked across all 8 schools — day-one kits reached every room. | In place |
| Evidence-of-impact plan ANSWERED · Handoff Log | DIBELS 8 — included in the purchase — 3× a year; first read at winter. A vendor-independent way to know, set up front. | In place |
🏛 A public record — what the town gets to read tap to open
The instruments don't stay in the boardroom. They become the record the whole town can read.
Once the four markers run, the board reports from them in public, on a set cadence — the public record every certified board is required to post. Four fields, aggregate only, never a student's name:
- 📍 Count — the number, in the aggregate.
- 🏛 Manages the strategy — the superintendent, with the team — in metrics, not evaluations.
- 📅 Deadline — when the next move is due.
- 📋 Trend — which direction it's moving.
Not a badge on the wall. Each cycle the board answers the same eight questions again, from current data, in public — so the town reads a living status, not "passed a test in 2027." Earned by practice; kept by continuing to practice.
✦ The tools a board uses to steer a district should be as public as the budget it approves. The Seal makes them so.
The same question, in two languages.
A parent doesn't need to know what a Status Board is — they just want to know their kid is seen. So every marker answers a plain question the town was already asking: the instrument on one side, the family's words on the other.
In every module you take the mic and answer one of these in the town's words — never a quiz, never alone. A facilitator sets it up, your instruments are right there to point to, and you leave having said the answer out loud once already — so the first time isn't the night a real parent asks.
✦ A board earns trust not by promising outcomes, but by answering — in public, on the record — the questions its town already carries. By month twelve, you've said every one of these answers out loud, with your instruments behind you. The Seal is that answer, in both languages.
Become part of the pilot study.
Six boards, nationally, once — chosen by application. Bring at least five members, twelve months, and your real data. What your board builds becomes the reference for every board that follows.
Signing up is itself a public signal — your board, on the record, choosing excellence before anyone required it.
Apply to bring your board →Pilot participants receive a certificate of completion. CEUs cannot be awarded retroactively; IACET Authorized Provider status in progress. The nearest comparable product is a two-to-three-hour session; this is a year of demonstrated practice. Systems proven — never outcomes promised.
