New Woodburn Community School

THE AFT NEEDS ITS OWN MEDIA TO DO ITS GOOD WORK

Below is a vital letter from the American Federation of Teachers objecting to Mon Schools’ scandalous new administrative position and posting. Read the rest of this entry »

WHEN WEATHER HITS AND TRAFFIC SNARLS

Woodburn Principal Charlene Brown sent out a mass telephone call at 2:25 today, about an hour after students were supposed to finish school for the day explaining to parents that none of the buses had arrived yet and that it was not clear when the buses would arrive to bring the children home. So the teachers remained with the students in school.

Meanwhile, student walkers had been home for nearly an hour, throwing snowballs and building snowmen.

Consolidating schools means more children have to travel more distances to get home, causing all kinds of problems. Mon Schools has cut its number of elementary schools nearly in half since 1998, while the number of students has increased.

Mon Schools decision to have a 2 hour early dismissal today was a major fail (see comments at WBOY article). Within a half hour of the first flakes, at the latest, it was clear the snow and traffic were going to be major problems, growing worse by the minute. The dismissal should have been immediate, closer to 4 hours early dismissal rather than 2 hours. Read the rest of this entry »

LEADING FROM BEHIND

The Dominion Post reports today that in a study on graduation rates only half of the local school respondents ” ‘agreed or strongly agreed that their opinions are respected’ in their respective school – compared to 65 percent nationally who answered the same way.”

The Post also reports:

“[Mon County School] Board member Mike Kelly, who has long championed higher graduation rates in the county, said outreach will be the key to success – specifically, getting those parents and other caregivers to school for conferences and other interaction. “We’re going to have to find a way to break the ice,” he said.

Outreach? Why has Mon Schools failed for over a decade to make all its school board meetings available by audio and/or video podcast online? That simple step would improve outreach dramatically. It’s easy to do and could be done immediately. Why does the board continue to refuse to make its meetings widely accessible? Read the rest of this entry »

SYSTEMATIC MISDIRECTION

Superintendent Frank Devono claims in today’s Dominion Post that “If the judge does rule against us” on the green school site “we’ll do what we need to do to get the site compliant.”

Maybe the Superintendent will jack the site up on 500 meter stilts above the health-damaging vehicle exhaust.

Maybe the Superintendent will direct the Department of Transportation to abandon the impending divided four-lane highways and four-lane intersection or to move both highways and their intersection hundreds of meters away. Good luck with that.

The point of the lawsuit is that not only is the site not compliant but that it cannot be made compliant, and the Superintendent knows it. Or should.

The Superintendent also says fatuously, “I’m not even sure if a judge would say no at this point, since the state board [of education] has already approved it.”

How dare a judge find a state agency in violation of the law!

Is the separation of powers between the judicial, executive, and legislative branches of government not taught in the schools that the Superintendent oversees?

Judge Jennifer Bailey will hold a hearing on the lawsuit in Kanawha County Circuit Court on Friday, February 18 at 1:30. The hearing, according to the judge’s office, is to be about two things, 1) the state’s motion to dismiss, and then 2) a status conference.

THE BULLYING STARTS AT THE TOP

Will the administrators at Monongalia County Schools ever grow up and out of their culture of bullying? How do they expect to deal with any bullying among students when the administrators don’t hesitate to bully themselves? The administrators continue to try to bully a new elementary school into a zone of health damaging vehicle exhaust and crash-prone heavy traffic over the loud protests of parents. The school board bullies forward onto the site right along with the administration.

There is something rotten in Mon Schools. It starts in Central Office, is rubber stamped or overlooked by the school board, and extends out from there.

And they talk about reducing bullying among the students. What a joke. The administration needs to first get rid of its own despicable culture of bullying.

TIME FOR THE RIF LIST TO RIP

What kind of threat or incompetence is the reduction-in-force (RIF) list?

The Dominion Post reports:

Does Mon Schools every year expect a mass die-off of students so that, Hey! We may not need 50, 100, or 150 teachers and staff next year!

The RIF list is idiotic at best. Threatening otherwise.

The student population scarcely fluctuates except to rise on average. And even when it does dip some years, instead of cutting teachers and staff that Mon Schools may desperately need the following year and who provide continuity and gain experience, why not give the students a break, cut their classes sizes a bit, thereby providing for all the teachers and staff and overall helping out the school, the teachers, and the students, their education not least. Additional teachers per students should be looked at as a wonderful opportunity, rather than as a curse to be avoided.

How many RIF workers were transferred each year as opposed to being cut? It’s not called the SHIFT in force list, it’s called the REDUCTION in force list. Being transferred (shifted) to another school across town as opposed to being cut (reduced, a euphemism for cut) from all the schools in the area are two totally different things, and such workers should be on two totally different lists, if such lists in some reasonable form are necessary at all. But Superintendent Devono irresponsibly and unprofessionally talks and acts as if mass layoffs could ensue, not least by even having such a list. This outrageous posturing has a severe chilling effect upon teachers and staff from feeling free to speak their minds.

RIF shifts and cuts can be used as an anti-educational way to save a few bucks. But save for whom? Not for the students whose class sizes would remain jacked up, not for the employees who contribute to the life and culture of the school and the local communities, not to their continuing work growth and experience. Read the rest of this entry »