Oswego School D-308 leaders talk financial responsibility, investing in staff

Every year, about 1,400 students graduate from Oswego School District 308.

“We’re helping them prepare for success,” Bednarcik Junior High School principal John Francis told those attending the first Annual SD 308 District Dialogue: CommUNITY in Education event June 11 at Oswego High School.

District 308 is the seventh largest school district in the state and serves all of Oswego and portions of Aurora, Joliet, Montgomery, Plainfield and Yorkville. Francis noted that this past school year, 98 students achieved a seal of biliteracy.

“That means they are proficient in two or more languages,” he said.

Francis and other speakers spoke about the successes and challenges facing the district. The district works to prepare students starting at the pre-kindergarten level, he said.

“We are in the business of educating children, but we know if we don’t have the financial resources, none of this would be possible,” District 308 chief financial officer Raphael Obafemi said. “So our goal is to make sure that we have the money necessary for our kids to get the absolute best education possible in the world.”

Obafemi said the district has been trying to be more efficient in how it spends its money, including in the district’s transportation department.

“In the past, what we would do is that we would lease a lot of buses,” he said. “We leased the same amount of buses every year whether we needed them or not. This year, we only leased buses that we needed. So by doing that this year only, we saved some money.”

Bryan Zwemke, the district’s assistant superintendent of human resources, said the district is focused on retaining its staff.

“We have to invest in our folks,” he said. “And the more we invest in our folks, the more we take care of them, we have a better chance of retaining them. We will not lose them to our surrounding districts because we’re going to keep them and work with them here. We focus in on our best and our brightest and we’re going to continue to do that.”

Plans are to hold similar community dialogue events in the future.

“We hope that this is a start to a continued engagement between our district and each and every one of you,” Oswego School Board vice president Eugene Gatewood told about 85 people in attendance.