Small School, Big Impact: Eric Bonniksen Shares Community-Centered Leadership Strategies

You know, a lot of times we get, you know, higher profile people on this, on this podcast. They've done something sort of remarkable and magnificent that sort of captured the attention of some media or at least the, the community in the edtech space. Today we're going to talk to a small school superintendent. So I don't, that kind of sounds like, I don't know how to put it, but I am so excited about talking to him because, you know, I started my career in small schools, still work with small schools. That's, that's all edutech really does is work with small schools. And I think this is a, this is a place that we've got to go more often because most of the students in this country are in small school districts. And I can't wait to hear what he's doing successfully and what his challenges are compared to some of the other guests we've had. Well, and Eric is also just a superhuman being, just an incredible man. And so I think this is going to be a really special podcast. Stay tuned and listen. Hi, everyone. Welcome to another episode of Learning Through Technology, a K12 podcast. We have an exciting guest today. We have the superintendent of Placerville Union School District, Eric Bonnickson, who is also the president of the Small School District association in California. Eric, welcome to the show. Hey, I appreciate it, Alex. Thank you so much for inviting me. Thank you for so much for having me be a part of this, Bob. Also, glad you got you, Glad you're here as well. This is a great, great opportunity to kind of share what we're doing in Placerville, I think, and share what we do with small school districts all over the state of California. So again, thank you so much. Absolutely. This is going to be great. Eric, tell us a little bit about yourself and about your school district. El Placerville. We are a small school district. We sit on Highway 50 between Sacramento and South Lake Tahoe here in California. I have been the, it's my pleasure to have been the superintendent here for the last 14 years and thoroughly enjoy the community. It's a great, great place to be. Great, great opportunity to be a superintendent, without a doubt. Excellent, excellent. Bob, we got a pretty big freeze there. Did you see that? Yeah, yeah, I think we're all right. Okay. Because I'm just going to lead here from a question about his, his time there and then that'll lead us into the conversation about the. So, yeah, yeah, I, I, it was close there, Alex. I was like, okay, we're gonna, I know it's like, right on the edge. Second there, Eric, but we already knew what you're going to say, so we're good. So we're going to take it right from here. I'm, I'm just going to start with the, the next question. So, Eric, the first thing that struck me when I was reading your profile and then you just mentioned it now is 14 years as superintendent in a public school district is nearly unheard of now. So what do you, what do you, what, what do you. Is that chain you down? Like, how did this happen? Oh, no. If you need help. Yeah. When you find that right place, when you find, when you have people that you enjoy working with every single day, when you have people that have the right mindset, that they're here about kids, they're doing what's right, and, and we're all working together to, to, to meet the needs of the students we get to serve. You know, when you, when you have a board that has that same mindset that they're here about students, and that's what's important. I mean, you want to stick around, you want to, you want to do the great work for these kids. And Placerville is a phenomenal community, really is very student centered. And, you know, it's a, it's a community. It's a family that we really have here. Yeah, that's, you know, one of the things that made us so interested in chatting with you too, is, is the relationship that you seem to have with, with your community. Tell us, how do, how do you foster that? How do you maintain that? And, and, and how do you. There are so many districts that have, you know, activist boards that make things particularly challenging for superintendents, and somehow you appear to have sidestepped all of this. How did you do this? It takes time. I mean, it, it takes time, but it, but it's about relationships. It's about building relationships and then fostering those relationships. Having one on one conversations with staff members, having one on one conversations with parents, being in the community, being at the community events, it's all about building relationships. Because there's going to be difficult conversations. There's a lot of great things that happen, but sometimes there's some difficult conversations that you have to have as well, and those happen a lot smoother if you already have built that relationship, that trust. And I think trust is extremely important in all of this. You mentioned boards and the importance of board plays in school districts and do they have the right mindset when they're coming onto the board as a board member Are they here about their special issue? Are they here to be an activist board member and change things? Or they hear about students and doing what's right for kids? And we have been so fortunate here in Placerville that over the 14 years I've been superintendent here, our board members, our board as a whole has 100% about. Been about students. Our motto is students first. And they. They buy into that. And that is. That is where they make decisions, is what is best for the kids. That's great, Eric. So we asked this of many of our guests here, and I think you might have a harder time with this, of 14 years of that kind of stability and growth. But we like to talk about what's been successful for you, what you take pride in, what you've done there. So if you could share with us some of those events or solutions that you've come up with. I mean, we try to be innovative. We try to do things that are in the best interest of our students, and we try to also listen to our community and their needs and then try to meet the needs of our community, our families, our staff. Couple examples that we have that, that I think have been. Been a real benefit to what we do in our district. We have our significant Hispanic population here within our district. And one of the things that they talked to us about over a few years is wanting to maintain the culture and wanting to maintain the language for their students. And so we began and started a dual immersion program at one of our elementary schools, which is built over the last seven years and now is moving into our middle school. And that started with conversations with parents saying, this is something we would like to see. Is this something you could do as a district? It wasn't. They didn't come in and demand anything, but they said, would you look into this? Is this something you could do? And we did. We researched, we evaluated what some of the programs might be, and we brought it in because it was meeting the needs of some of our families. That's. That's how we interact. That's what we do. That's nice. Yeah. Another. Another option. Oh, go ahead, Alex. Sorry. Well, I was going to say we were chatting just a little bit before we started recording, and you shared, you shared a fascinating story about kind of how you guys are funding some of your technology. And it clearly extends from community trust. Can you share a little bit about that? 100%. Taking a look. And we're now looking back 12 years ago, we saw, and we saw that the need for technology in our classrooms was going to be a continuing growing trend. It wasn't going away. It wasn't something that was a fad. It was something that we knew was going to need to be an integral part of what we did on a daily basis. And so we said, okay, how can we provide top level technology into our classrooms but have it not dramatically affect our general fund budget? Because we still know, and I think we all agree that good first instruction with a high qualified teacher in the classroom is, is where that best instruction comes from. And then the technology just enhances what's going on. And so, but we saw a need for that. So what we did was we took a look at how can we fund that through a bond. Typically bonds can only meet the life of what that bond is funding. So how does technology fit into that? And so we did a technology bond within our district that has short term issuances of money. So we will go out for a bond funding and then that the payback on that bond is for four years and so short of the most bonds. So it's a short term bond that then again still meets the life of the devices or whatever it is that we're purchasing to go into the classroom. Right, right. And also it's also a very low cost payback for our taxpayers as well. So we have four issuances of these short term bonds over a 16 year period that will continue to allow our classrooms to have the most up to date technology for our students, for our teachers, for our staff. So they're using the most up to date technology through the bond funding on these short issuances of funds that we're able to get. So we built out a 16 year technology plan on how we are going to continue to have technology within our classrooms. Now while Alex speaks for me plenty of times, I won't speak for him in this instance, but that's a model I've never heard of before and it seems like duh, why haven't we heard of this before? So my question is more of the nuts and bolts because I'm the engineer of the two of us, what technologies are you buying with these bonds? And picture one to one devices, but also are you buying network equipment, phone systems, what are you looking at across the board? Across the board, 10 years ago we totally redid our, our full infrastructure. Wiring, wireless, servers, switches, all of the backbone. So, so that was the end. And right now we're in the process of updating all of that again. Ten years is a pretty good life life for your backbone at your school and so, so we're, we're in the process of going through that, that again. So we, so that was part of it and then it was then the classroom devices and we currently use Chromebooks in all of our classes. We have a one to one situation in all of our classrooms and have again like I said, for the last 12 years. But we have that, we have the touch screens, we have the document cameras, we have some special equipment in our science labs, those type of things that we've been able to bring in through this. So, but what this does is it also allows us if something new comes out, if something that, hey, this is going to really benefit what we're doing within the classroom or change what we need on the technology side, it allows us to pivot and make that change because those funds are set aside, they're available and allow us, allow us to do it. That's great. Have you found that your bond issues have generally maintained the same level of voter support over those 16 years? The one, like I said, the one thing that I think was, was really beneficial with the way we structured this bond is the payback is virtually a one to one payback for the tax. Yes. And so that is a huge selling point. You know, there are some, some bond paybacks that you see across the state or across the country that you're, you're pushing a 2 to 1, you're pushing even a 3 to 1 payback. Ours is almost, almost virtually a 1 to 1 payback. That's a huge sell for our taxpayers. And so that helps again provide that selling point to the community that we did what we said we were going to do and we actually are paying it back at a lower rate than we said we were going to. I think those are both huge selling points for the bond. The other thing that this is a bond that directly impacts the instruction in the classroom. And I think that's really important as well. A lot of bonds, bond structures as they need to be, provide buildings, provide furniture, provide those, those type of things you need to have that you need to have great quality buildings to be able to have your education in. But this directly in impacts the daily instruction in the classroom and the instruction our students are able to get. Rarely do you see a bond that's able to do that. That's awesome. Do you fund the management of that technology through the bond or is that done through your operating agreement? I mean operating budget. That's through the operating budget. We're not able to provide any people. We can't pay for any people. Through the bond, that's all through our general fund. Excellent. Excellent. So that's a lot of success and pretty exciting stuff. The. So we also like to ask our guests to kind of discuss some of the challenges that they run into as well. And so what are, you know, you, you. Over 14 years, you've clearly had multiple successes and you've been able to, to draw your community in to support you on many of your challenges. And sometimes they're bringing you the challenges and you work together like you mentioned with the immersion program. What are some challenges that you're dealing with that you maybe don't have some answers to yet that you're still kind of struggling with? Right now, our biggest challenge is staffing, finding the high quality individuals we want to bring into our classrooms, that we want to bring into our support services. Staffing is probably our number one challenge right now. And it's something that we're going to, we're, we're continuing to work on, we're reaching out, putting our, putting our hands out in the, in the different areas that we can find, find those, those right people that want to be part of our community, want to be part of our family here in Placerville. And, but that is, that is a, an ongoing issue. And I think you're seeing that across the country, especially in some of your smaller rural areas that maybe don't have that, that direct pipeline from a university or something like that is, is, is being able to, to fill some of those, some of those hard to fill positions. You know, your, your special education, your math instructors, instructors, science, those specialized fields, finding those individuals to come into small, small areas is, can sometimes be a difficult thing to do. Eric, do you find. So you spoke of, I'll preface this a little bit in that you and I both work in small school districts. So all the challenges of a big school district with, you know, fractional funding and fractional resources. So I've, I have seen this. But I'm curious for you. It, it's my experience it's not just certified staff and teaching staff. It's bus drivers, it's people to work in the cafeteria, it's technology, it's custodians. Are you finding, is that part of your staffing problem as well? Or is it, is it just really the certified staff? Oh, no, no. It's across the board. It's across the board. It's finding good quality, high quality people in all avenues. The first, the first one that you mentioned was bus drivers. And I mean, I don't know that There's a district across the country that is, that is not struggling finding bus drivers. I have so much respect for anybody that's willing to drive a bus and have 82 students behind them as they're, as they're picking up and dropping off kids every day. And, and that role, as you know, is, is so vital. That's the first, that's the first point of contact a lot of kids have, and the last point of contact a lot of kids have are those bus drivers. Those people are so important. And having the, having the right people behind the wheels is, is huge. Finding those individuals is, is always a difficult task. I. So we've been doing our work with, with schools and sharing services for, for about the same length of time. You've been superintendent since 2013. And I would tell superintendents, I'll talk about technology because that's what I know about, but it now applies to so much more is I would tell the superintendent, here's the problem with hiring technology people is when you go to hire a teacher, you're competing against the schools around you for that talent. And you're all in the same pension. You may even be in a health consortium where you have the same health benefits, that sort of thing. When you're trying to hire a technology person, you're competing against. Where I'm at, we compete against Sherwin Williams and Progressive Insurance, and, and it's hard to convince somebody, Trust me, in 30 years, I know you make half as much, but in 30 years, the pension rate, so, so stick here. And now I've heard, like, schools losing bus drivers because Amazon pays for Amazon delivery and they take that license and they go drive a commercial, you know, know, truck, and it's, it's the same thing. And, and I imagine food services is, you're competing with, you know, with restaurants and with, with other hospitals competing with McDonald's down the street. You know, I mean, that, that type of thing, especially, especially with the, with the, the mandatory minimum wage here in California. I mean, we're, that, that's a, that's a huge issue that we're dealing with and trying to compete on that level as well in. Across the board. Yeah, that's, that is rough. So what are some of the things you're. You're trying to do? I have no doubt that you're going to solve this problem, Eric. 14 years, you've solved all the other ones. What, what are some of the things that you're trying to do to solve these problems? It's just part of it is the widespread nature that we have and. And where we're reaching out to people to find. Find the right people for our district. But another big part of it, I've got to say, is building the right culture within the district so that it's a place where people want to be, where people are valued, where they know they're cared for, where they know that people care about them in the district, and not just them as an employee, but them as a person. I think building that culture does draw people in and. And makes people want to be part of what we do. And so I think that that's a huge part of it. And that goes, like I talked about, you know, at the beginning of this, is that. That importance of. Of relationships and building those relationships. And people feel like they're part of what we do. They're not just. They're not just somebody that comes to work. They're part of the family that we create here. And that culture, I think, builds on itself and permeates through the community and permeates through the area. So it's a place where people want to be. I have a colleague who frequently says that culture eats strategy for breakfast. Right. And I deeply believe that because you can build the greatest plan and then tariffs happen or something, you know, and. And you just, you know, things that you didn't anticipate can totally upend what you wanted to do. But when you got culture, when you got people who really want to be part of something, they're going to help you solve those problems. So, you know, how do you. So I think a lot of superintendents think of culture in terms of their faculty and the relationships that they build with their students. But, you know, this challenge that we're talking about now has a lot to do with the culture that you're building with the staff. And one of the challenges that we have or that we see when we're working with districts is, you know, educational collaborators works a lot with professional development. We see a lot of professional development going towards faculty, but almost none, sometimes going to staff. Right. And so that's a. That. That's a part. That's an extension of the culture. And so a lot of times we don't see staff being considered part of the overall district culture in the same way that faculty have. And just from your last answer, and for the listening audience, we did not talk about this in advance, but. But how do you draw. How do you build that culture that makes that difference with your bus drivers, cafeteria workers, maintenance staff, business office? How do you build that in your district, well, first and foremost, you value the work that they do. That's great. And you let them know that you value the work that you do by the conversations that you have. By meeting on a regular basis with all of the staff members, depending on what the issue is and valuing. Like I said, you value what they do and you have them feel that I am a valued member and what I do is important to the education of the kids that we get to serve. You know, so the bus driver, what they do is extremely important as to what happens in the classroom. Our food service workers are extremely important to what happens in the classroom. Our yard duties that are out there, extremely important to what happens in the classroom. And they hear that from us. And the other part of it is again, and I hate going back to this, but it's building that relationship with all of those individuals having a one on one conversation with a bus driver, with a yard duty, with a food service, whatever it might be, talk about their kids, what's important to them. You know, how. How is your son doing? I know he was playing baseball at the high school. How's the season going? Or have a bus driver that loves working on old cars. You know, I mean, what, what's going on now and where are you at in the, in that restoration that you were doing and building that relationship and, and knowing the people that you work with individually and what's important to them allows them to feel that value. All of that just again continues to build the culture you want to build. There's something you said in there. This. It struck a chord with me. Maybe it's not as profound as I thought. I'm sure Alex will tell me if it's not. Whether he does it in front of you or alone. Everything you say is profound, Bob. When Bob talks, people listen. I've noticed that. I've noticed that already. Right, you. A hush falls over the crowd. I'm going to go back a little bit. And you talk about the culture and people wanting to work there. One of the things, I'm an accidental entrepreneur. I never set out to start this business and we've been fortunate that it has grown. But one of the things that I've been taught by people who've been successful, including Alex, almost spit his water out in that if you weren't. If you are not watching, you should be. Because I almost got Alex to spit out his water by saying something night. One of the things I was taught is it takes so much effort to get a customer that you have to be prepared to keep them like they have to be. Yes, they happy. Well, as you were talking about getting a chance with somebody who says, okay, I'm going to take a chance and I'm going to do the training and I'm going to be a bus driver there. But if they show up and it's a miserable place to work or they're not welcomed or they don't feel supported, all that effort to recruit that one bus driver or that one night custodian is lost without that culture. And I don't think I only thought of this. So this is mine. I only thought of this while you were talking about that culture is it's important to get every win you can when you do convince somebody to join your team, that it's a team worth joining and you could tell them all you want that it's a team worth joining, they'll know when they walk in the door. So, and it must be so you wouldn't have stuck around there. We. How many small school district superintendents have we seen who've leaped to bigger schools, more responsibility, more money? And it must be that way from the top down for you. Oh, without a doubt. And that's why you have people that stick around. That's why I stuck around here in Placerville for so long is. You love the people you work with, you love the people you work with and you love the families you get to serve. And if you continue or focusing in on how can I better serve, I see the job as a superintendent as you know, I provide support and I provide service so that the people in the classroom or the people that are one on one with the kids can do their job better. And so what is it that I need to do so that you can do your job better? And that's the way it always needs to be. That's, that's awesome. I've always said that the, I mean, the people truly make the difference. Right. And, and I won't say the names of the places to, to disparage them, but I worked at two pizza places when I was younger and, and, and one of them was just miserable. I mean, I, I, I watched the clock move more slowly than physics would allow it to move. And, and it was just, just awful. And I, a couple of years later, worked at another pizza place. Both pizza places, same, same work. But the people made the second one so joyful, so wonderful. I made the same kind of money, did the same kind of work. But the difference is, was just the experiences could not have been More different. Right. And I'm still connected to the people that I worked with when I was 18 years old in this pizza place just because the culture and the community was so, so amazing. And so I think, I think it really doesn't matter where It's. It's that culture that really drives that. Oh, totally. So true. Totally true. I agree. And just what I wanted to share on that, just to add to what you were saying is it's also a culture of that customer service and how everybody in different roles within an organization, within a school district sees their job as customer service as well. Who are our customers? Who are we serving? And for each position might be a little bit different of who those customers are, but what is the customer service that we're providing? And I think that's extremely important. I know Bob talked a little bit about technology and that we're competing for, for hiring the right technology people within our district. What we look for when we're hiring people that work in our technology department is how are they going to provide customer service to our staff, to our teachers, to our parents? Sometimes that's difficult when you're hiring the. Hiring technology people. They, they, they. A lot of times are focused on. On the devices or on the, the, the. Oh, yeah, you know, the, the. The program that, that they're, that they're trying to implement. It's all about people preaching to the choir is 100% about customer service. I mean, we're so fortunate to have the technology people we have because that is their focus is how am I providing the best service to the people that I get to serve. Yeah. Not what it. What's working on this piece of hardware. Yeah. Yeah. So we have. Our time has flown by. I run the clock here. Alex gets to run everything else, but I run a clock here so that we know where we're supposed to be and we're. We're to the end. And before I ask you the next question, it's your last question. I'm going to take a look at the tote board. And Bob leads 196 to 3. So, Eric, if you could help me improve my, my record here, I would appreciate. I. I'm sure you can. You were made for this, Eric. So in any time, you know, I'm going to win this because Eric lives this. Yeah. Yes, you are. I already knew. Eric, would you share? I'll quit prefacing this and beating on Alex. So, Eric, would you like to tell us a little bit about a favorite teacher or instructor or educator that impacted you positively or made a difference in your life. Oh, I will tell you, and I know this, this might sound a little corny, but the educators in my life, that influenced me the most and I've had a lot, but the two that have influenced me the most are my parents. Oh, nice. My, my father was a superintendent for a lot of years. Worked in education and watching him and how he went about his day to day business, working with the staff and working with students influenced how I wanted to do it in, in a good way, you know, because he had that same, same idea of relationships or are what are key and what's important. And my mom was a teacher and a counselor and watching her and how she interacted with students and the care and the love that she showed just influenced, I think, how I wanted to make sure that I was showing that same love to the kids that I got to work with as well. And so, you know, it might not be the most amazing thing, but my parents, my parents are the ones that really drove forward where I wanted to be and who I wanted to be in education. That's, that's great. And clearly they raised you well. So. And the district gets to benefit from that. Well, Eric, thanks so much for joining us. This was a great conversation. I know we could talk longer for sure. Oh, anytime. You got it. So this was great. Well, thanks so much. Thanks so much. And I look forward to connecting with you again. Appreciate it. Alex. Bob, thanks so much for, for having me. Really, really had a great time. Oh, that was such a fun conversation. And Bob, I know obviously how close small schools are to your heart. You must have really enjoyed that. Well, I do. You know, we, we have built our podcast on building on talking to bigger school districts or people who are of higher profile. And it's really nice to talk to somebody who's been 14 years in the same district who probably knows all the students of the senior class when they graduate and. Right. I just, it's really, it's just so nice to hear about a superintendent who talks about one on one conversations with parents, with teachers, with administrators, and, and I, and that's no shade on the big school districts. It's just that that's something you can't keep in those. It's just not possible for a superintendent of a school of 30,000 students to be able to have those conversations and get to know the students in the, in the community at that level. And I think it really showed in his, you know, the trust that he's built with the community. Bond issues every four years. Come on now. Right. I know that that is incredible, but I think that, you know, there are so many challenges, and you have to wear so many hats when you're in a small district like that or a small school like that. But. But there's a real advantage in the kinds of relationships that you can build. Right? And. And I hope that people that hear this podcast, all 11 of you, you know, if you are looking for opportunities, if you are looking for opportunities for your work to mean something, small communities and small cultures can really be that. And clearly, he's. He's cultivated that. I just thought that was really. Was really awesome. We agree. So, well, until next time. Thanks so much for listening, everyone.