Courage of Their Convictions (or lack thereof)
Besides opposing vouchers for everyone else and then demanding one for herself, the one other thing that ex-D11 board member Karen Teja is known for is her constant demand that the BOE follow "process." Teja used the "process" excuse to slow down any agenda item that she opposed. She taught her current status-quo allies on the board to use that same tactic to delay implementation of any reforms in D11. "Process" was more important to these liberals than was any progress towards improving D11.
On June 6th, the D11 board voted to accept members on a committee that was formed to look into the issue of how to dispose of East Middle School now that the board voted to close the school. Interestingly, this agenda item never appeared as a non-action item. D11 board policy requires every item to appear on non-action before it appears on action at a subsequent meeting. The purpose for this process is so that the community will have time to see what items the board will be dealing with. It gives the community time to speak on those topics and to give input. For some reason, the board chose to rush this item through with no public notice at all. Teja did not appear at the board meeting screaming about "process."
More importatntly, the June 6th meeting was listed as a Work Session, where no votes are taken. Without posting any type of notice on the D11 website, Gudvangen changed the Work Session to a Special Meeting at the last minute to avoid any public scrutiny of his actions. For a person who pretends to care so much about his public, Gudvangen did not want the public to know about this meeting.
According to the minutes of the May 16th BOE meeting, this item was to be brought to the board on June 6th as non-action, then voted on during the June 27th meeting.
"Dr. Bishop advised that a list of proposed committee members would be presented to the board on June 6 and that the board would approve committee membership on June 27, 2007. Director Tanner asked to see a list of names of the applicants. "
According to the posted agenda, this item was never listed as non-action. It went straight to action without a vote of the board. Where was the "process" that always seemed to matter when we were on the board?
Notice that Tanner wanted to see the names of the applicants. In fact, Tanner was given the authority to pre-screen applicants and to eliminate applicants who she did not agree with politically. During my tenor on the board, we never pre-screened committee applicants. On one occasion when Eric Christen wanted to reduce the bond oversight committee from 48 applicants to 25, the liberal board members screamed that he was using his position to keep citizens from serving their community. They accused him of playing politics with committee membership.
Tanner eliminated 20 applicants from the committee, and the board did not have the guts to deal with this issue publicly. The board never even released the names of all of those who applied for the committee. To have done so would have shown that Tanner eliminated anyone who she felt did not agree with her anti-reform worldview. Where is the outcry from D11 watchdogs? Where is the Gazette headline?
The makeup of the committee had to be very limited to allow the administration and anti-reform board members to lead it to a pre-determined recommendation. In an unprecedented move, the administration and Jan Tanner pre-selected to committee chair persons rather than allowing the committee members, all of whom are adults, to select their own leadership. Not surprisingly, one of the chairpersons is the wife of John Gudvangen's campaign manager.
As the Gazette mentioned a couple of weeks ago, the administration wants to keep the meetings of this committee secretive. During the first meeting of this committee on Wednesday, committee members were actually told to not have conversations about committee meetings with non-committee members. This was on the instructions of Gudvangen and Tanner and the other cowards in the administration.
The reason that this board and administration are so concerned about secrecy is because they are not looking out for the best interests of the D11 community. The administration, in concert with the very weak and compliant board, are working to further the interests and fatten the pocketbooks of big-wig administrators and their liberal friends in the community. As an example, Barbara Day, a close friend of Terry Bishop, was brought into D11 to be a "program manager" for the site based management implementation. Bishop knew that he was going to eliminate this program, but he brought Day in anyway and paid her over $50,000, part-time, he said, to manege the program that does not exist. Since Day just purchased a $500,000 home in Black Forest with her boyfriend, another Bishop friend, Bishop felt the need to keep Day around, so he charged her with running this utilization committee. Bishop has not yet made public how much money he is paying his friend to "run" this particular committee. Friends of D11 administrators always receive at least 6-figure tax payer funded incomes.
Not only did the board secretively select a majority of members for the utilization committee who they could control, but now the committee members have to sit through 4 meetings wherein the administration does all of the talking. These administration lectures will be designed to lead the committee members down a particular road. Facilities director Frank Bernhard will present slanted information, and CFO Glenn Gustafson will provide limited budget figures that will support his pre-chosen path. I don't know what the administration wants to do with East or other schools, but the point is that the committee was chosen to pick the options that the administration and anti-reform board members want it to pick.
In a humorous but pathetic side note, Gudvangen told a committee member that this current board had to close East because the previous board had refused to make tough decisions. Unfortunately for Gudvangen, there is ample public record of his opposition to ever even addressing the situation with East or any other poor performing D11 school while reformers were on the board. The only reason that Gudvangen acted is because the state required the board to act. Sorry, Johnny, but pretending to be a leader does not qualify you as one.
On June 6th, the D11 board voted to accept members on a committee that was formed to look into the issue of how to dispose of East Middle School now that the board voted to close the school. Interestingly, this agenda item never appeared as a non-action item. D11 board policy requires every item to appear on non-action before it appears on action at a subsequent meeting. The purpose for this process is so that the community will have time to see what items the board will be dealing with. It gives the community time to speak on those topics and to give input. For some reason, the board chose to rush this item through with no public notice at all. Teja did not appear at the board meeting screaming about "process."
More importatntly, the June 6th meeting was listed as a Work Session, where no votes are taken. Without posting any type of notice on the D11 website, Gudvangen changed the Work Session to a Special Meeting at the last minute to avoid any public scrutiny of his actions. For a person who pretends to care so much about his public, Gudvangen did not want the public to know about this meeting.
According to the minutes of the May 16th BOE meeting, this item was to be brought to the board on June 6th as non-action, then voted on during the June 27th meeting.
"Dr. Bishop advised that a list of proposed committee members would be presented to the board on June 6 and that the board would approve committee membership on June 27, 2007. Director Tanner asked to see a list of names of the applicants. "
According to the posted agenda, this item was never listed as non-action. It went straight to action without a vote of the board. Where was the "process" that always seemed to matter when we were on the board?
Notice that Tanner wanted to see the names of the applicants. In fact, Tanner was given the authority to pre-screen applicants and to eliminate applicants who she did not agree with politically. During my tenor on the board, we never pre-screened committee applicants. On one occasion when Eric Christen wanted to reduce the bond oversight committee from 48 applicants to 25, the liberal board members screamed that he was using his position to keep citizens from serving their community. They accused him of playing politics with committee membership.
Tanner eliminated 20 applicants from the committee, and the board did not have the guts to deal with this issue publicly. The board never even released the names of all of those who applied for the committee. To have done so would have shown that Tanner eliminated anyone who she felt did not agree with her anti-reform worldview. Where is the outcry from D11 watchdogs? Where is the Gazette headline?
The makeup of the committee had to be very limited to allow the administration and anti-reform board members to lead it to a pre-determined recommendation. In an unprecedented move, the administration and Jan Tanner pre-selected to committee chair persons rather than allowing the committee members, all of whom are adults, to select their own leadership. Not surprisingly, one of the chairpersons is the wife of John Gudvangen's campaign manager.
As the Gazette mentioned a couple of weeks ago, the administration wants to keep the meetings of this committee secretive. During the first meeting of this committee on Wednesday, committee members were actually told to not have conversations about committee meetings with non-committee members. This was on the instructions of Gudvangen and Tanner and the other cowards in the administration.
The reason that this board and administration are so concerned about secrecy is because they are not looking out for the best interests of the D11 community. The administration, in concert with the very weak and compliant board, are working to further the interests and fatten the pocketbooks of big-wig administrators and their liberal friends in the community. As an example, Barbara Day, a close friend of Terry Bishop, was brought into D11 to be a "program manager" for the site based management implementation. Bishop knew that he was going to eliminate this program, but he brought Day in anyway and paid her over $50,000, part-time, he said, to manege the program that does not exist. Since Day just purchased a $500,000 home in Black Forest with her boyfriend, another Bishop friend, Bishop felt the need to keep Day around, so he charged her with running this utilization committee. Bishop has not yet made public how much money he is paying his friend to "run" this particular committee. Friends of D11 administrators always receive at least 6-figure tax payer funded incomes.
Not only did the board secretively select a majority of members for the utilization committee who they could control, but now the committee members have to sit through 4 meetings wherein the administration does all of the talking. These administration lectures will be designed to lead the committee members down a particular road. Facilities director Frank Bernhard will present slanted information, and CFO Glenn Gustafson will provide limited budget figures that will support his pre-chosen path. I don't know what the administration wants to do with East or other schools, but the point is that the committee was chosen to pick the options that the administration and anti-reform board members want it to pick.
In a humorous but pathetic side note, Gudvangen told a committee member that this current board had to close East because the previous board had refused to make tough decisions. Unfortunately for Gudvangen, there is ample public record of his opposition to ever even addressing the situation with East or any other poor performing D11 school while reformers were on the board. The only reason that Gudvangen acted is because the state required the board to act. Sorry, Johnny, but pretending to be a leader does not qualify you as one.
posted by Craig Cox | 1:48 PM
1 Comments:
Please explain to me WHY I have to read about this on a blog? Where the hell is the Gazette? Are its liberal news editors so oblivious to the plight of children that they can continue to turn a blind eye to the board and its shenanigans now that its favored liberals are in charge? These so-call bleeding-hearts, you know - the ones who care about the kids - are actively enabling their non-education. For shame. We need real journalists in this town who have the courage to shine light on the cancer in D-11 before its too late for the next generation of kids.
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