NASHUA — As the school district enters the fourth year of its five-year strategic plan, some school officials are criticizing the document they helped create.

“I think we were doomed from the beginning with these general goals,” said Thomas Vaughan, member of the Board of Education.

Vaughan told his fellow board members Monday that he finds the strategic plan difficult to understand and absorb, saying the problems the district is trying to resolve are not clearly stated.

“The Road Ahead,” a strategic action plan for the 2012-2013 school year, is the latest and fourth annual installment of the district’s five-year strategic plan. The 14-page document includes nine major goals that should be reached this year, along with 15 strategies on how to meet those goals and improve the city’s 17 schools.

Not all board members are pleased with the final product.

“It is bewildering,” board member David Murotake said. While the plan may look good on paper and even sound good, the document is not concise or clear, he said.

The strategic plan is the board’s responsibility, and therefore the negative comments should not be a reflection of Superintendent Mark Conrad’s update on the status of the plan, Murotake noted.

Members of the Board of Education reviewed the plan Monday, discussing the first goal of increasing student learning and achievement through all teaching and learning practices to maximize each student’s personal growth, while meeting district, state and federal standards of accountability.

There are several ways to achieve the goal, according to the plan, which recommends a guide for all grades to increase teachers’ instructional expertise and student achievement in mathematics.

The plan also mentions continuing the district’s literacy initiative and inquiry-based science curriculum for all grades, and the development of a long-term plan for renovations to four city schools — Broad Street, Sunset Heights, Main Dunstable and Birch Hill elementary schools.

Other priorities include the establishment of a career exploration and planning process beginning at sixth grade, revising teacher and principal evaluation systems and continuing the development of course competencies for grades nine to 12.

“These goals are so general that they don’t include the definitions as to what the specific problem is,” Vaughan said.

Murotake echoed his concerns, maintaining the plan does not identify the problems, but just highlights the strategies.

Robert Hallowell, board president, said he also struggles with the plan and its various strategies, questioning what it means when the district has one strategy removed and then replaces it with another strategy the following year.

He suggested that the board work to reformulate the wording of the five-year strategic plan, especially since a new plan will need to be established soon.

“We approved this strategic plan, so we should be criticizing ourselves,” said Steven Haas, board member.

Haas argued that it is a good document that helps improve student learning and achievement, although he agrees that the district has not done a good job of evaluating and monitoring the various priorities from year to year.

Some of the goals have remained in the plan since 2005, said Vaughan, adding it is disappointing to have the same items appear annually.

Other recommendations include the creation of an innovative middle school program, updating the district’s long-range technology plan and establishing a speakers’ bureau with parent and community speakers who visit classrooms and share their expertise.

khoughton@newstote.com