BoE votes to hold off on academies plan until 2011 …

Monday afternoon, before the BoE meeting, the District send out a message via their Key Communicator email list stating that they would be voting on the closure of WRE and consider, “a motion to slow down the implementation of the LHS academies until the fall of 2011.”   We were very happy to see the consideration of this motion as we have been hammering the BoE with this exact belief for close to month.   How can we supposedly save money by closing WRE and then turn around in the same budget plan and start a new program?  The cost to repurpose WRE has yet to be disclosed, we have only been told that the cost will be “minimal.”

We have questioned the fast-track planning that was mentioned when Dr. Patterson presented the PowerPoint presentation of the plan to the public on March 1.  She stated then that the District Administrative Team has spent just under two months putting this plan together and Dr. John even mentioned that he had rushed her to have the presentation ready for that March 1 meeting.  What they presented was certainly a respectable framework yet, when looking at other similar plans from other districts across the nation there is one very important variable that, even now, the District refuses to include, community involvement.

At the heart of the plan that that Charlotte-Mecklenburg District in NC uses and the plan that Dr. Patterson even gave in her supplemental information packet posted here, the public played a critical and integral part in the development of the over all plan.  It wasn’t until just recently that the teachers themselves were made aware of the plan, in fact it was shared with them the afternoon of the March 1 meeting.

We, in the public, are still officially being left in the dark about what is truly driving these sweeping changes, a US Department of Education program/contest called Race to The Top (RTTT).  Some of what has been proposed, in a very general sense, comes directly from RTTT; technological improvements, school closings, connecting student achievement to specific teachers, a data collection administrator, and many more.

While reading through the points system for this contest, which dangles a $4.35 billion carrot in front of State Education Departments across the country, you will see many of those sweeping changes mentioned above that we are seeing here in Liverpool.  So, the real question here is who is driving this locally?  It certainly isn’t the members of the BoE yet they are certainly taking part in the execution of the plan.  The only time we have heard someone from the District Administration or the BoE even speak the words “Race to the Top” was at the March 1st meeting when the Executive Director for School Improvement Maureen Patterson vaguely made reference to Race to the Top in her presentation.

We confirmed the following with the RTTT Office at NYSED; Superintendent Johns, Board President Patricia Mouton and the Teachers’ Union president ALL signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) on behalf of  the LCSD approving the District’s participation in this program sometime before the January 13, 2010 application deadline.   Now, again, keep in mind that at the March 1st BoE meeting when the District Administrative Team rolled out their academies plan, Dr. Patterson stated that the team had been working on this plan for just under two months.  So, the academies program and the closing  of WRE are uniquely and unequivocally tied to the RTTT contest no matter what we are being told.  We also have to question whether signing the MOU without a BoE vote follows Robert’s Rules of Order which the LCSD BoE professes following.   We have reviewed the BoE minutes and no where have we found a vote or even a mention of RTTT.

Because of local residents like members of our group and others who have been hammering away at the BoE members and Superintendent Johns over the past several weeks, it is quite clear that the delay in starting the academies has several goals; first, to distance the closing of WRE with the need for the building for the FOCUS Academy and second, the multitude of unanswerable questions that have been posed over recent weeks about the academies program has left the District with a proverbial black-eye.  They realized that we, the public, also knew they didn’t cover all their bases with the plan they presented.  Additionally, the rippling effect of this plan on students, faculty, administrators and the need for teacher training is undeniable.  We have specifically made reference to other districts across the country who spent anywhere from 18 months to 3 years to implement such a plan.   Thankfully, for the first time in close to a decade, the LCSD BoE didn’t simply jump in feet first with an invincible mentality.

We also found it quite entertaining that the BoE members and Dr. Johns would tout this sudden change in plan as “their idea.”  Since February 8th they have been attempting to shove this plan down all our throats and both residents and students alike have spoken out strongly against it.  Yet after two months of insisting that it could be done, suddenly one day they wanted to slow down and give this plan the time it needs to cross all the t’s and dot all the i’s.  Isn’t that what we have been saying all along?  Was it so hard to come forward and say that the BoE was going to listen to the public and take a step back?  This certain exemplifies where their loyalties lie.

Note of Sympathies: We purposely remained silent over the past week out of respect for the passing of BoE President Patricia Mouton.  We pass along our sympathies and condolences to the Mouton Family.

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