Our teachers need a contract, our district needs a strategic plan, our community (whether we all agree or not) needs a parcel tax, and most of all our children need a good education. We have heard this rhetoric non-stop for the past year...even longer.
However...
MDEA won't settle the contract until after November, the very board members who asked for a strategic plan want to delay that strategic plan until after November, and the parcel tax won't move forward until after November. All the while, our children and teachers will continue to be used as pawns in a political process.
I support replacing the Superintendent and, at this point, I support Sherry Whitmarsh. I don't support maneuvers that are designed to accomplish these goals in the future at the expense of our students today.
A letter from teacher Randy Monroe has been making the email circuit due to it's heartfelt relevance. The Misterwriter blog has posted the letter, read it here.
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7 comments:
Did you read why Eberhart and Strange are suggesting strategic planning won't work at this time on their blog? It makes sense to me.
I'm not sure who you are referring to relative to your comment that the Board members that asked for a strategic plan now want to delay it until after November, but it seems like it is Paul and me. Just to set the record straight, we have no desire to delay the strategic planning process, in fact, I am one of the two Board members that is working directly with the facilitator, who is working with the Board to start the planning process, to plan the agendas for the meetings where we discuss strategic planning. Our feeling is that no matter what happens in the November election, it is likely that at least 4 of the 5 current Board members will remain on the Board and the sooner that we begin the strategic planning process the better it is for the district.
The other comment that you make in your blog is that you do not support the maneuvers that are designed to accomplish the goals that you outlined; I guess I would like to know which maneuvers you are speaking of. I have attempted to work with our current Board and our current Superintendent for years and it has gotten the district no where. Millions of dollars spent without Board approval, millions of dollars spent on things that were not a priority for our students, budgets that are millions of dollars misreported and inaccurate, incompetent people hired and kept around for months and sometimes years after their incompetence has been discovered, a failed communications strategy, parent and student concerns totally ignored, no planning processes, more that 3000 employees working without contracts for a 2nd year in a row, teachers with no healthcare, employee morale an all times lows, a community that doesn’t trust the district, and on and on…
My response after years of attempting to steer the district away from the current failed course was to ask the Board to join me in requesting that the Superintendent resign for the good of the district. What else could I possibly have done? What would you have done? Do you think I want to go through this? Do you think that this is a personal vendetta that I have with Ms. Treece or Mr. McHenry?
We have a Board majority that believes that everything that the Superintendent does is golden. Faced with gross mismanagement by the Superintendent, the Board majority will only reaffirm their belief that he is a great Superintendent and should remain in this district. I say again, what should I have done? What would you have done? I’m not trying to be funny, I am sincere with my questions.
I have two daughters in this district and I want the best for my kids. Our communities have 35000 kids in our district and I want the best for those kids. The average length of service for the teachers in our district has dropped from 12.5 years to 8.5 years in four years. Test scores are not improving significantly enough. Despite the fact that the Superintendent has cut out many vice-principals and campus supervisors, the Superintendent refuses to hold principal meetings after school so that our schools have a site administrator onsite for the entire school day. The other day we spent 3 hours talking about whether or not the Superintendent should provide Board members access to information within the school district that the public has access to. Our teachers don’t have medical benefits, the Superintendent insists on using the most expensive outside attorneys. Our special education population has gone down from over 5000 students to about 4000 students, yet the special education budget continues to rise by millions of dollars, totally unchecked. All this is going on, and our Board majority keeps telling anyone that will listen that things are great and we have the right Superintendent.
I don’t blame everything on the Superintendent. I blame everything on the Board because it is the Board’s role to hold the Superintendent accountable and it is the Board’s role to provide direction for the school district. Unfortunately the Superintendent has mismanaged the school district and the Board majority has done nothing to correct that. It is the Superintendent that has been setting the direction for the district and the Board majority that has blindly followed him.
So I, along with Paul Strange, have taken the initiative to try to help right the ship before all is lost. We are not masterful politicians with huge staffs of people that can help. We are two dads that are giving about all we can give to try to make this a better school district for all students. We have seen years of mismanagement and bad decision making and we decided that we had to do something to stop it. We did it because it was the right thing to do. To sit back and just allow the mismanagement to continue would have been a gross dereliction of duty.
We are committed to helping to fix this problem. I hope that people are paying close attention to what is happening. If people educate themselves about the issues, maybe we will replace April Treece with Sherry Whitmarsh. We need to change the majority on the Board. We need a Board that understands their roles. Paul and I support Sherry Whitmarsh because she is an involved parent that understands the challenges that are ahead, has the courage, conviction, and independence to provide the accountability that is required, and will be a great asset to the Board and the school district.
I am truly sorry that we have had to go through these difficult times, but what should we have done? What would you have done?
Here is my concern.
Yes all of the things you point out about the district are true. Most of us believe that and support the changes you and Paul are trying to make. The Board is 100% accountable for the fact that Mr. McHenry still has his job.
As we move into the heart of a political campaign many things are done to move agendas forward that in the long run may be good but in the short run will hurt the students at MDUSD.
1. MDEA will not resolve a contract as long as McHenry sits at the helm. That is more than the inability to agree, that is political.
2. If you spend months asking for a strategic plan and when everyone finally comes together to start that process you question the ability or motives to create that strategic plan - that is political. Why did we ask in the first place.
3. We all know a Parcel Tax is key. Once again nothing is going to happen with the parcel tax until after the election. I do not believe we will have a successful June election starting so late so I predict the ballot measure will also be delayed. Once again, the students in MDUSD keep moving through the broken system. That is political.
So if I have not been clear...
if there appears to be any success such as moving forward in a meaningful way, on any of the above issues, it will be detrimental to the argument that the District needs change in the minds of those running campaigns. I AM accusing everyone involved of being political at the expense of the students in this district.
Will this help in the long run, probably, but right now....
In terms of your points, my response is as follows:
1. I do believe that we can settle contracts with all of our employee groups with McHenry as Superintendent, but it will take a Board majority that is willing to commit to doing so. Our Board does not have a good track record of setting priorities and directing the Superintendent. I don't blame the Superintendent for that, I blame the Board. I believe that once the election is over, we can provide that direction, but only if the Board majority is shifted.
2. I am not questioning the motives of our Board members relative to strategic planning. I believe that I totally understand their motives. Regardless of their motives I am 100% behind the initiative to go through the strategic planning process. I have been saying for years that we need this and that without such an effort, our school district will never be as good as it can be.
3. I believe that the parcel tax can be placed on the June ballot. Taking steps to improve our revenue stream and insulating our school district from some of the craziness in Sacramento is critical to our success. I agree with you that starting that process prior to November 4th is highly unlikely.
I guess you don't have an answer to the question that I posed which was, if you were in my position, what would you have done differently to affect the changes that the district so badly needs?
The district is continuing to operate during these times. I do not believe that anything that we are doing relative to pushing for change is curtailing our ability to operate the district. The problem is that we really need to settle contracts and until we do, things will not begin to improve. Settling contracts needs to be the first priority. Can you believe that despite the fact that we haven't had contracts with a single employee group since the end of the 2006-2007 school year; the Board didn't even discuss contract negotiations at last nights meeting? That amazes even me.
Since I am not in your position I assumed your question was rhetorical.
My answer:
I would call on the Board and the MDEA leadership to resolve the contract negotiations now. If that meant changing how we negotiate and who negotiates, I would call for those changes. I would loudly and publicly propose deadlines and goals. I would use my influence and my position in the community to rally the parents of the district, our communities and our community leadership to pressure the board and the union leaders to settle the contract now. NOTHING would take president over that. In addition, I would use the power of my MDUSD blog site to empower these groups. I would call for action teams of experts from all of our community resources to help begin to outline the strategic plan and a plan for a parcel tax campaign now. I would ask myself what role am I playing in the process that causes a board I am a part of to spend four hours discussing document access. I would spend less time calling for the ousting of the superintendent and less time publicly and sarcastically bad-mouthing my co-board members. I would empower, not incite, the parents and teachers in the district I represent. I would accomplish the change in leadership that I desire not by incessantly discussing it but by building a strong following of constituents who recognize that I will not play politics, I will not sit by while the clock ticks away and students sit in classrooms where they are not learning, teacher's are leaving in record numbers, and we have a district imploding from the inside out.
here, here NGHSblogger, well said! As a parent this is what I want to see too. No more of the political games. We can come together and work, there are many talents out there.
I wish it were that easy. To the board majority, coming together and working together only means blindly following the Superintendent. Gary and I worked very hard to get the board to actually take some initiative prior to calling for the Superintendent's resignation (and before working to replace April Treece). It became very apparent that we had two choices: 1) follow the Superintendent; or 2) push for change. We recognized and still recognize the impact that pushing for change has. It is not fun and it is not easy in the short term, but we believe that the long term benefits outweigh the short term costs.
As for your proposals:
1. Call on the board and MDEA to resolve contract negotiations now:
We have done this - we have tried to change the negotiations. I think a board member should be part of the team. I think we need less lawyering and more talking (and I'm a lawyer).
2. Publicly call for deadlines and goals:
You are probably aware that the actions that the board takes with regard to negotiations are confidential. It makes it rather difficult to call for deadlines and goals. In particular, we are bound by the rules of collective bargaining and making public statements regarding something like deadlines, etc. probably constitutes an unfair bargaining practice (particularly if you were to attempt to use such an approach to force MDEA to engage or to make them look bad).
Besides, what good is setting a deadline going to do? The board majority can just ignore it and what is the repercussion? Without a board majority, we have no enforcement ability.
3) Parcel Tax:
Gary and I have personally attempted to engage the community in a parcel tax effort for years. I recruited folks to show up at a meeting last summer which resulted in the board even looking at the parcel tax.
4) Role in a board that spends hours talking about document access:
This should be real clear. Gary and I want basic access to information. The board majority has not supported us in this effort in the past. This is very simple and only takes rational thinking, but for whatever reason, the board majority has been unwilling to require basic access of the Superintendent. It is precisely issues like this that are causing the problem. We should not have to spend time talking about this, it should be a given. So what should we do on this one? Refuse to discuss it? This is one of the fundamental issues that allows board members to do their job. It seems as if you are criticizing us for pushing the board majority to support basic access to information.
As for your final comments, that is exactly what we are doing. We are reaching out to the public, to our constituents - in a way most politicians would never even try. Sure, Gary and I both get sarcastic sometimes. We get sarcastic when it gets to the point that we can't take it anymore - when the board majority seems to be living in a fantasy world where everything is fine and the Superintendent is everyone’s hero.
We are not sitting by. Our efforts are an attempt to change the status quo – something we have tried to do in many less confrontational ways. Our aggressive approach has started a little change, but this is no way to run a district. We cannot force change through public berating over the long term. We need board members who recognize the need for change and will work together with us to get there.
Let’s be honest – if we were not discussing most of this stuff, no one would be. We are making change and we will keep pushing until the district is righted.
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