November’s Two Tracks — Progress Check and Goal-Setting Groundwork
November 9, 2027
The October data review is behind you. Your board either made written decisions on every goal, published a community summary, and calendared November check-ins — or it did not.
Either way, November determines which kind of board you are.
The superintendent has had roughly four weeks to execute any directed changes from October. The November board meeting is approaching. And the board has one of two jobs depending on whether it adopted goals for 2027.
Track one: Your board has adopted goals
If your board adopted student outcome goals for 2027, November is your directed-change check-in.
Pull the October data review decisions. For every goal where the board directed a change — strategy adjustment, resource reallocation, escalation — place one item on the November agenda: “Progress check on October directed changes — fifteen minutes.”
The superintendent presents a brief update. What changed? What did not? Is the trajectory correcting?
The board makes one of three decisions per goal — the same three from October. Accept trajectory. Direct additional change. Request more information with a specific timeline.
Fifteen minutes. Not a full data review. A follow-through.
Here is what this looks like in practice.
I worked with a board in the Midwest that directed changes at their October data review. Three goals were at risk. The board asked the superintendent to adjust the reading intervention schedule, reallocate instructional coaching hours, and provide targeted professional development for the elementary math team.
The superintendent made the changes. And then — nothing. The November meeting came. The board had a full agenda. The check-in was not calendared. By November, the board was discussing facilities and curriculum adoptions. The October directed changes were never mentioned again.
I called the board president in December. She said they had moved on. The superintendent, it turned out, also moved on. The reading intervention schedule reverted by January. The coaching hours were redistributed. The math PD was not delivered.
That board governed one month at a time. The October meeting was productive. The November meeting was efficient. And the student outcomes did not improve, because no board direction survived more than thirty days.
A board that governs on trajectory does not start from zero at every meeting. It picks up where it left off. The November check-in is the mechanism that makes that possible.
Track two: Your board has not adopted goals
If your board is still operating without adopted student outcome goals, November is the month you start the 2028 goal-setting process.
The October baseline data exists. Your district has first-quarter student outcome data. The superintendent can produce it. The board’s job is to use it as the foundation for the 2028 goal set.
I have watched boards without goals spend November in the same pattern as October. Committee reports. Operational updates. Public comment. No discussion of where the district is headed. Those boards enter December with no draft, no superintendent presentation, and no path to adoption before spring.
A board that intends to have goals by January does something different.
Here is the timeline. The board president and superintendent agree on a goal-setting timeline this week. The superintendent presents a draft goal set at the December board meeting. The board reviews and discusses the draft in December and January. The board adopts goals by the January board meeting.
The draft goal set must include: specific student outcome measures, current baseline data, a four-year trajectory, and an annual target for 2028. Not aspirational language. Measurable commitments.
The December board meeting agenda includes a dedicated goal-setting work session — not a fifteen-minute item, a forty-five-minute governance discussion. The board president facilitates a conversation about each proposed goal. Is the target ambitious enough? Is the measure the right one? Does the goal reflect the community’s priorities?
A board that starts this process in November will walk into December with a draft goal set, a superintendent who knows what the board expects, and a clear path to adoption in January.
A board that waits until December will not adopt goals in January. It will push goal setting to the spring — or skip it entirely.
What both tracks lead to
Whether your board is checking progress on October directed changes or building a goal set from October baseline data, both tracks lead to the same December destination. Every board in this arc will face a year-end governance reset — connecting the fall execution cycle to the 2028 goal refresh. The December piece will give you the protocol for both.
That follow-through — refusing to let the governance cycle reset to zero every month — is what separates boards that produce outcomes from boards that produce meetings.
Your October data review told your board where it stands. November tells your board whether it is governing on trajectory or governing from scratch.
Your free CTA: Reply to this email with the keyword BaselineNow and I will send you the BaselineNow Kit — the data deck template for your December and January goal-setting conversations. The kit includes a baseline data summary format for each student outcome measure, a goal-writing protocol that ensures your goals are specific and measurable, and a superintendent goal-presentation template that structures the board’s discussion around the right questions. Use it to build your 2028 goal set from the data you already have.
Your paid CTA: I offer a Goal Setting Facilitation Coaching Call — a ninety-minute virtual session with your board and superintendent to facilitate the goal-setting conversation. I work through each proposed goal with your board, ensure the targets are ambitious and achievable, and provide real-time coaching on the board-superintendent dynamics that surface during goal adoption discussions. The call requires the superintendent and board president to commit to attending together. Reply to this email for details.
This continues the October-December Fall Governance Execution arc that opened on October 5. The October data review piece covered the three-outcome protocol for the board’s first data review of the fall (Oct 12). This piece covers the November fall progress check for both tracks — boards with goals (directed-change follow-through) and boards without goals (goal-setting groundwork). The arc continues with the December year-end governance reset and 2028 goal preview (Dec 7) and the 2028 goal adoption preview (Dec 14). Each piece builds on the month before it. The full arc follows the September Fall Operations Transition series — the October data review preparation (Sep 21), the superintendent partnership protocols (Sep 23), the board self-evaluation diagnostic (Sep 28), and the step-by-step self-evaluation guide (Sep 30). Subscribe at effectiveschoolboards.com to continue the series.
Backlinks: The three-decision protocol (accept trajectory, direct change, request more information) extends the ESB Framework’s Progress Monitoring domain established in the September 21 preparation piece and executed in the October 12 first data review piece. The baseline data format for goal setting draws on the Wichita goal trajectory report structure referenced in the October 5 arc kickoff and the October 12 data review piece. The fifteen-minute directed-change check-in format follows the time-use framework from the Governance Team domain. The forty-five-minute goal-setting work session structure follows the self-evaluation facilitation protocol from the September 30 self-evaluation guide (SelfEvalNow keyword). The December year-end governance reset and 2028 goal preview reference the December 7 (YearEnd keyword) and December 14 (Roadmap keyword) pieces in this arc. The January 2028 goal-adoption deadline aligns with the standard ESB coaching calendar for high-performing boards. Subscribe at effectiveschoolboards.com to continue the series.