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Andrea Messina is CEO of Florida School Boards Association and Kathy McFarland is Executive Director of COSSBA. Together, Andrea and Kathy bring deep experience supporting school boards and school districts across the country. In our conversation, we explore why transparency is so critical for public-facing boards, where organizations sometimes fall short, and how open meetings, clear communication, and consistent records management help build trust — even when decisions are complex or controversial.From livestreamed meetings and accessible agendas to records retention and board accountability, this Sunshine Week conversation reinforces a core leadership principle: transparency isn’t about doing things perfectly — it’s about doing them openly, consistently and with the public in mind.Listen in as Andrea and Kathy share their advice and experience for public facing boards navigating the whole area of transparency. And do stick around to the end to hear their excellent advice for building a strong culture of transparency and trust.
Compliant livestreaming: A guide for public facing boards Transparency through technology for education Transparency through technology for government Guide to board development for public facing boards
Jill Holtz: Hi everyone. Today I am joined by two education leaders. Firstly, we have Andrea Messina, is CEO of the Florida School Boards Association. You're very welcome, Andrea.Andrea Messina: Thank you, Jill. Thanks for having me. Looking forward to the conversation.Jill Holtz: And then I'm delighted to be joined by Kathy McFarland, is executive director of the Consortium of State School Boards Associations, or COSSBA for short. You're very welcome to Kathy.Kathy McFarland: Well, thank you so much for this opportunity. And anytime I have an opportunity to share the spotlight with Andrea, I'm all in. So thanks for today and I'm looking forward to our conversation.Jill Holtz: Lovely, thank you both. So Sunshine Week takes place every March. This year it's running March 15 through 21st and the goal of the week is shining a light on the importance of public records and open government. So I wanted to invite you both today to discuss this topic, why it matters and what public boards need to know about transparency for their communities.
So Andrea, to kick us off, why is transparency and sunshine week specifically so important for school boards and public institutions today?Andrea Messina: Well, first I have to mention, as you said, I am the Chief Executive Officer for the Florida School Boards Association. We are the Sunshine State, and maybe people don't know that, but we take Sunshine very seriously in the Sunshine State. And the reason it's so important, which is interesting because when we get new school board members, we really try to hone in on this concept, which is the board is elected to do the work of the people in our country and in our state.The public schools belong to the public. These are their schools. And so they have a right to know what's going on in them. And we have a responsibility to ensure that everything is transparent because we're doing the work on their behalf.Jill Holtz: Excellent. And Kathy, from your perspective at COSBA, what are the biggest risks when boards don't have strong transparency practices in place?Kathy McFarland: Yeah, so Jill, would say the number one thing when you don't have strong transparency is the biggest risk is loss of trust. Even decisions that are well-intentioned, if people don't understand how or why they were made, this creates some space for misinformation, frustration, and conflict. So I would say that the most important thing is transparency because you don't want to lose the trust of your community.Jill Holtz: Yeah, that's an excellent point. And I'll come back to you in a bit and ask you some more on that. But just as a follow up then to both of you, where do organisations most often fall short in meeting transparency obligations? Andrea, I'll start with you on that.Andrea Messina: Yeah, well, I will say that the problem with transparency has increased as the connectivity between board members and the people they represent has gotten a little fuzzy. I just had a meeting yesterday with a region of my members and one of the things they said they were unprepared for was the barrage of communications from multiple sources. So in our state and I know many others, it's incumbent upon the elected official to archive all of their communications, which is typically easy and there's typically a really good system in place for emails. But when you start getting direct messages, texts, things on Facebook, that's where the archivability sometimes, not intentionally, but due to the volume and the multiple sources, sometimes things don't get archived through those avenues. So that's the place I see the most challenge with. I also think that there's a lot of really, really, really detailed pieces of information, maybe related to the budget, things like that. And sometimes people want those pieces of detail, but they really don't understand the context around them. So sometimes there's a hesitancy to put everything out there without a context. They wanna make sure you understand it's this way because of this, maybe something like categorical dollars. We can only spend these dollars for this purpose. So there's sometimes the desire to contextualize information to ensure clarity and understanding.Jill Holtz: Yeah, Kathy, what do you have to add to that?Kathy McFarland: Yeah, I'm going to build on what Andrea said. mean, first of all, and I'm going to highlight what she said, is that gap in communication, right? You may be meeting illegal requirements, but not presenting the information in a way that's easy for the public to access or understand. So really making sure once again, we go back to that transparency. The other thing is consistency, right? Policies may exist, but if you're not applying them consistently, especially in those high pressure situations that can also be where boards fall short.Jill Holtz : So what I heard from you both there is the volume of communication and maybe moving from an email only communication strand to many, many places that this communication takes place. And that all has to be archived for public record. The explaining things really well, maybe a hesitancy if things are complex, how do we set the context? But that's where it's important to show the historical decision making as well, isn't it? And why this came about and why we're making that decision.Andrea Messina: Absolutely.Jill Holtz: As you said, Kathy, just being really kind of clear and simple in how you explain it to the community as well. And one of the things I like about Diligent Community is that it supports that compliant records management and transparency for communities for mission driven boards. So let's talk a little bit more about open meetings and requirements and realities. Kathy, open meeting laws can obviously vary by state, but they do share core principles. What are the essential elements that you think board members need to know?
Kathy McFarland: You know, just that boards can stay ahead by having clear shared systems for managing their records, responding to requests. That means having clearly defined policies, consistent processes, which is what we talked about earlier. And tools that support the organization and efficiency as volumes increase, like Andrea talked about, when you have a barrage of questions coming in. But I also believe, and one of the things that a lot of boards struggle with is their mindset. You when they get any type of like, let's say, public records requests. They often consider it an interruption, but they are a core part of public service and accountability. So when boards treat them that way, responses tend to be clearer and faster and compliant.Jill Holtz: Andrea, what practical challenges do you see boards facing and running accessible, compliant, open meetings and how can they address those challenges?Andrea Messina: Yeah, I mean, think part of the challenge is sometimes with agendas, there are personnel items that have some confidentiality surrounding them and ensuring that the right things are redacted, but not, as Kathy mentioned, when someone requests a public record, not taking too long to do those redactions. But also, I think for many school districts, not just in Florida, but around the country, some of the platforms they use were initially designed for the board member to access the material. And now I know things are being redesigned to make it not just for the internal audience, the board's use of the agendas, but as Kathy said, for the external so that community members can easily see those agenda items. So if districts are working off of 20, 25 year old platforms in some cases, the ease of being able to post large materials, large attachments, multiple attachments can be challenging. And so keeping up with the infrastructure to ensure that they can fully have everything out there and it's operable is a challenge in some places.Jill Holtz: And I suppose also just kind of a basic level for board members, particularly new board members to understand that not every meeting needs to be held in open format. And what's the difference between a publicly held meeting and closed doors and when those are appropriate? And I think we should also touch on livestreaming, because in many states, it's mandated now to live stream your publicly held meetings. And we do have a guide on compliant live streaming available that I'll share linked to in the show notes as well.
But let me go back to that thing you mentioned earlier, Kathy, the transparency helps build trust. Let me build into that, drill into that a little bit more. Kathy, COSSBA supports state associations across the country who in turn support their school districts. What have you seen in your experience where transparent practices have helped reduce conflict or build that trust?Kathy McFarland: Yeah, so, you know, I think that when agendas are shared and documents are shared and people have access to past minutes and all of the information is available to them, that has really helped, especially when you have what I would consider a pressure valve situation where you want to kind of release that pressure. To humans trust is really important, right? And trust comes with transparency. They may not agree with the decisions that you have made, but as long as they feel like they have the information in front of them, one of the things that we work with our members quite a bit with is people may disagree with your decision, but as long as they feel like they've had the information and you've explained your why to them, it helps with the conversation. Once again, at the end of the day, they may disagree with you, but they do feel at least nothing was hidden and everything is available to me.Jill Holtz: And that they had the opportunity to request to speak on a topic as well, a meeting as well, so that they can have input into that.Kathy McFarland: Correct.Jill Holtz: Andrea, in your school districts, what have you seen in the way of strong transparency practices and how that strengthens relationships with the community and families?Andrea Messina: Yeah, as we're talking, what struck me is that sometimes when public agendas are made public, they are incomplete. Maybe not all the attachments are there or maybe even an item isn't yet ready and so it's not on the public agenda when the whatever the requirement is for publication in whatever state and Florida has to be seven days and so when something gets added later sometimes it's a day later, two days later or even on the day of the meeting. Sometimes you know there are times when there would be a good excuse and a good reason for that but barring that when things are added later, they immediately become suspect. And so if people, if boards allow a regular practice of late additions to an agenda, that can undercut the appearance of full transparency and it can appear as though there's a pattern of deceptive behavior. So I do caution our boards against that.Jill Holtz: So and turning that the other way around is getting in the mindset of we need to make sure as we're possible that everything goes out at least that seven days or whatever that requirement is.Andrea Messina: Correct.Jill Holtz: And then I think it's interesting to think about as you talked there a minute ago, Kathy, about information and having misinformation on many channels and social media, et cetera. So having a single place where everything is up to date and everybody sees the same version, whether it's the board member, staff, parents, etc. That's really important as well.
So obviously, Diligent sells Technology, we've gone from BoardDocs, which was groundbreaking and establishing governance technology for education to Diligent Community, which is our next generation solution built on that foundation. We're very passionate that our technology helps boards be compliant with Sunshine Laws and transparent to their community.Andrea, from your perspective, what are you hearing from your school districts on how technology is helping to change the expectations for public records and open meetings?Andrea Messina: Well, you know, it's interesting because I was a school board member way back in the day when we would I judged my weeks on how thick the agenda was. OK, how many inches? Because it was truly paper that got copied with dividers and backup and it was a mess. And so I've seen the evolution to just get it on a share file, then move to a platform. Now we share with the community and early days way back you had to make school districts had to make X number of copies and have them available in their lobby or someone had to make a formal request to get a copy of the agenda. the idea that people can just access it immediately at the same time that the board members can and throughout the meeting, especially if they're live streaming, they can jump, they can see the attached agenda items. It's amazing. And board members back to the volume of information that I referenced. One of the reasons there's a volume of information is people can see more. They have more questions. They have more interest.Jill Holtz: Yeah.Andrea Messina: Because there's something over here. Like what does this mean? You know, when maybe a board has to vote on what's called a chiller plant, which has to do with air conditioning. There are thousands of people, including myself, who didn't know what a chiller plant was until I had to vote on one, right? And so the interest is increased, which means the engagement is increased as the transparency increases. And it's the technology that has allowed that to take people to their homes. Again, I just had a meeting with many of my members yesterday and one of the people said, you know, I really thought more people would come to board meetings, but in truth, they're watching them at home. So more people are actually participating by watching. They're just not physically in the room.Jill Holtz: Yeah, because I suppose that suits, you know, if you're on a shift work pattern or you've childcare or whatever issues, to be able to watch something without having to come in. And as you said, the access to that information, the downside is the technology has opened everything up. But then there are so many upsides if you manage that process. Well, Kathy, why do you think it's important to use technology for transparency? What does technology bring to the table?Kathy McFarland: Yeah, just as Andrea said, consistency, accessibility, confidence, all leads to transparency efforts. My thing that I would make sure is can they access it? Don't just assume there's an ongoing education to your community and to your constituents about where the information is and how to access it. you, technology is great, but if I can't access it, it doesn't do me very good. just like Andrew said, it just gives you a good consistent, but you just got to make sure that it's accessible to your community members so they can get in there and understand it. And that takes time, right? That takes educating your community.Jill Holtz: Yeah, and regularly saying to them, this is where you can find this thing if you want.Kathy McFarland: Right. Right.Andrea Messina: And the other thing that I want to mention with the technology is the archivability of meetings. If somebody doesn't have the ability to watch a meeting live on a live stream, they can catch it tomorrow morning. They can catch it over the weekend. So the archivability of it is really makes it so much more possibly accessible to people at home.Kathy McFarland: And it also keeps your board accountable, right? You can't speak to something knowing that people could go back into the minutes or go back into a document and say, nope, that's not what I have access to. So I think it's also good for a board because it does keep them accountable.Jill Holtz/l I love that I'm hearing so many strands about this, know, transparency, trust, archivability, record keeping, availability, accessibility, but also the institutional knowledge is kept there, isn't it? It's not lost because somebody left or their board member term is finished. It's all there for everybody.Andrea Messina: You know, Jill. Correct.Kathy McFarland: And also we have to remember that this isn't in some most states, this isn't their board members full-time job, right? So they've got a hundred things going on. So they can use technology to say, hey, let's go back where we last time we spoke about this, what documents did we use? So it helps them in their position and their leadership position.Andrea Messina: Yeah, the ability to go back and look at those old meetings and old materials, you know, wait a minute, we had something similar to this about 10 years ago and easily find it is invaluable to board members. I did want to share with you a story one time back in the day when I was on the school board, we actually did televise our meetings, not live, but we had them on the local TV channel, whatever. And it aired multiple times through the week. So at church one time, I ran into a lady and she said, I love watching the school board meetings but do you have to wear that white jacket every time? And I thought, honey, you're watching the same meeting over and over.Jill Holtz: That's hilarious. That's so funny.Kathy McFarland: That's funny.
Jill Holtz: Moving on to maybe touching about board member training and education around this topic, Andrea, how important is ongoing training for both staff and board members on open government records and ethics?Andrea Messina: Okay, I'm going to take them separately. New school board members. It is the number one first item in my state we discuss because as I tell my staff when somebody gets elected, our first job is to keep them out of jail and in Florida we have had people go to jail for violations of sunshine and or public records and we've had people pay hefty fines. So we're not going to let that happen under my watch. That's number one talking about staff is separate. We recommend that annual ongoing training, especially for whoever you designate as your public records person, whoever the contact person is in your district or in your organization for public records, and that you train more than one person. You can't have a single source, a single person that knows how to manage, how to take in a public records request, where to shuffle it to. If that person happens to be out sick or on vacation, then the legal ramifications of not handling it properly are not worth considering, to have regular ongoing training and it's got to be multiple people.Jill Holtz: Yeah. And Kathy, what role do state associations play in helping to educate board members on their responsibilities and how to be compliant?Kathy McFarland: Yes, the state associations play a critical role by translating those complex laws into practical guidance for boards. Once again, I go back to, know, lot of these, these, this isn't their day job and they, some states don't have required training for boards. And so a state association is there to make sure that they are a resource and that they can help with that, making sure that they understand, hey, this is a law, this is what it means, and this is what it means in your role as a board member. So associations act kind of as a trusted advisor, so making sure that school board members are making informed, compliant decisions as they are building that public trust. So they are an important partner in the role of a board member.Jill Holtz: And I'm sure many of them offer trainings and different courses as well around this topic on a regular basis as well. So that's a really great, as you said, for busy, you know, part time board members, it's really an invaluable resource. And then just the whole topic of kind of ongoing board development and that it's not just a one and done when you join that you have that regular kind of board development and board training.Kathy McFarland: Absolutely. Absolutely.Jill Holtz: So I'll also link to some board development guides that we have for school boards and local government where we have lots of practical advice and tips from other leaders on that topic.
So just as we kind of finish off, I'm going to ask you both the same question. So Kathy, I'll start with you. What is one piece of advice you would give to public facing boards about building a culture of transparency and trust?Kathy McFarland: Okay. So I would say I've got a lot of advice, but I'll stick to one. My advice is to always lead with intention. Transparency doesn't just happen by accident. It's reflected in the daily choices that you do, the communication and your behavior.When boards consistently ask themselves, this clear? Is it accessible and understandable to our community? That builds trust over time. So transparency isn't always perfection, but it should be open, honest, and keep you accountable to the role that you are in.Jill Holtz: Love that. And Andrea, what is one piece of advice you would give to public facing boards about building a culture of transparency and trust?I would say, first off, it's hard to add to what Kathy just said, but I tell my boards, you can't do something 99 % of the time. You have to do it 100 % of the time. And if you don't, that 1 % opens the door for exposure to liability or any kinds of, that's where you can get that distrust. So you have to think in terms constant, constant, constant, 100 % of the time, not 99.Jill Holtz: Love that, love that advice. Well, thank you, Andrea and Kathy for taking the time to talk to me today. I know you're really, really busy. So I've really enjoyed listening to your perspectives, your examples, the story about the church and advice. It's been so informative as we near Sunshine Week. So I just want to thank you again. It's been great to have you on the podcast today.Andrea Messina: Thanks for having me.Kathy McFarland: Yeah, thank you. And thank you for creating a tool that really benefits our board members. So thank you.Jill Holtz: Thanks, Kathy.
