Wellington The Magazine – June 2016                                                Wellington’s Education Committee Provides A Crucial Link To The      Local School System

Story by Ron Bukley  •  Photos by Abner Pedraza

Members of Wellington’s Education Committee provide an essential service as liaisons between local schools and the village to help everyone work together.

The panel also helps dole out $25,000 grants to the elementary schools, plus additional funding for students in middle schools and high schools. The committee closely monitors the spending to get the best uses from the allocations.

As the committee’s liaison, Director of Community Services James Poag tries to provide structure to that interchange.

“I was kind of instrumental in the framework, the guidelines and the process for submitting for payment, and verifying that the money was used for what it was submitted for,” he said, adding that the committee also works to address other educational issues that take place in Wellington.

The committee is the guiding voice for the Wellington Village Council regarding issues that take place in Wellington schools.

“They provide consultation on these issues, and they are a liaison between the council, our schools and the school system itself,” Poag said.

Although grants to the schools may be the most visible work of the committee, they are only a portion of what the committee does.

“They also provide us guidance and direction in terms of my department when we say we’re going to roll out a new youth program,” Poag said. “They provide us with guidance and direction in terms of how effective they feel that program would be, and they help us in terms of recommending individual schools that would benefit most, and put us in the right direction. They can put us in touch with the right people to talk to in order to get students to participate in those programs.”

The committee also provides insight to village leaders on individual issues within the schools.

“The council members are not educators,” Poag said. “So these individuals, with their background and their interaction with the different schools, provide the council information on how we can better support schools so those students can be successful and achieve their goals.”

Looking into the future of Wellington, Poag said that the school system is one of the most important factors to continue to draw individuals to raise their families here.

“If we are going to remain a viable and sustainable community, we have to focus in on education,” he said. “We have to provide additional support to our school system so it remains attractive to individuals looking to move into our community.”

Poag is assigned to help develop strategies to provide support to the schools in areas that may be lacking.

“No community can handle their issues in terms of educational success alone,” he said. “That’s why the partnership between the Village of Wellington and the Palm Beach County School District is so important.”

Wellington’s Education Committee is the lynchpin that keeps that partnership growing.

“The committee has the opportunity to discuss those issues, provide that information to me, the liaison, then I can take those issues back to the council to consider how we provide additional support, or what other strategies can we look at to try to help resolve issues in the school system.”

The committee spends considerable time deciding how money to the schools will be spent to be most effective, on non-consumables such as computers and additional tutoring, rather than paper and pencils.

“I think the committees plays a vital role not only in providing information to my department, but to the council in terms of day-to-day issues,” Poag said. “Without them, we wouldn’t be aware of those issues, and we wouldn’t be able to formulate strategies to help provide the necessary support that the school system needs in order to ensure that our children in Wellington are getting a quality education.”