- I am always amused when average citizens attempt to handwave serious problems away by saying that “They should do something”. Not to minimize those nuisances at all, but the response to them follows a predictable and perhaps less-than-helpful pattern. Those citizens often have specific ideas for what should be done, which generally translates into spending unlimited money on the problem until the nuisance is abated. Those citizens also don’t seem to care who “they” are doing the spending, as long as it happens quickly and to their approval. (And it’s not the citizens themselves directly.) Here is a case in point, in which a nuisance building in Toledo has been causing average citizens a lot of concern, with the added wrinkle that one of the “they”s who is invoked to “do something” is a charter school. Any charter school. Longtime Gadfly Bites subscribers will recall that while Frogtown is home to two of the most beloved charter schools in the state, it is also the city where average citizens used the municipal zoning infrastructure to stonewall a successful charter school’s expansion, hose the YMCA out of millions, and ultimately close the school. I think an observer could be forgiven for thinking that suggesting a charter school come to the rescue and renovate a derelict building to the tune of however many millions of dollars is a fantastical idea. (WTOL-TV, Toledo, 12/8/21)
- The City of Columbus has quietly shuttered its standalone education department, folding its staffers and its remaining activities—whatever those might be—into the mayor’s office. Despite being created with much fanfare and high hopes back in 2014, former Mayor Michael Coleman’s effort to shake things up and improve education in his city ran into some status quo roadblocks right from the start. One of them is elucidated in the story thusly: “Coleman wanted [former teachers union boss and education office head Rhonda] Johnson to be considered a nonvoting member of the Columbus Board of Education, but the seven-member elected body never gave her a seat at its board table — instead seating her at a separate nearby table next to the superintendent.” Sounds about right for Columbus City Schools. (Columbus Dispatch, 12/7/21)
- Here’s a little bit more on how folks on Lorain City Schools’ payroll are feeling about the state’s acceptance of their “academic improvement” plan. Everyone’s pretty happy that they can say they defeated HB 70 and that they get to call the shots going forward. “Now the real work gets to begin,” said the elected school board president. I’m sure this sentiment reverberated well among the group, but it erases all of the real work done by other people over the last four years (more on that presently), ignores the fact that the folks in charge now are the same ones who ran the district when it was declared to be in Academic Distress, and elides the fact that they already seem to be prepping for not getting the job done. “It’s a rigorous pathway,” said the prez, immediately pivoting to “it’s something that we can’t fix overnight” and seeding outside factors such as “poverty and job loss” as obstacles. Just in case, I reckon. (The Morning Journal, 12/6/21) The response is exactly the same in Youngstown City Schools—happiness for Pyrrhic victory, ignoring the past, deflecting the blame, and already prepping for timeline extensions five years down the line. They’re just more…Youngstown about it. (WFMJ-TV, Youngstown, 12/7/21) The most annoying thing about all this for your humble, and long-suffering, clips compiler is the revisionist history already being solidified around the CEO-style Academic Distress Commissions. Look no further than this infuriating editorial from today’s Chronicle for the perfect example. While it doesn’t exactly let the current/past leadership (same folks, remember) of Lorain City Schools off the hook, the piece definitely gives them the benefit of the doubt as well as a rhetorical wink-and-nod. “Lorain’s first CEO, David Hardy Jr., was a micromanaging disaster who refused to meet with the board,” the editors opine, “even though its only real remaining authority was to place tax levies on the ballot. Furthermore, although Lorain did see some small progress under Hardy, he never came close to leading the district out of state control.” There are a million fallacies in those two sentences alone, but let’s just focus on the fact that the so-termed “small progress” equated to a state report card grade of D for the district – the first time it had earned anything over an F in nearly a decade. And Hardy accomplished that in less than 18 months against enormous resistance. Truly a fantastical bit of thinking there that will be the calcified rhetoric against ADCs going forward. (The Chronicle Telegram, 12/8/21)
- Speaking of editorial boards with blinders on, this editorial lauds exactly one statistic for Sandusky City Schools: soaring graduation rates. You can see the inexplicable numbers at the bottom of the piece and the reason for the rise remains unexplained throughout. It is an empty, grasping “celebration” that blatantly ignores student reality. (Sandusky Register, 12/7/21)
- Lest you think that I only hit you with bad news edition after edition, we’ll end today with a story that can only be described one way: Wowza! Jacob Bennett is a freshman at Teays Valley High School in Pickaway County. By all measures he is excelling in his classes, his AP tests, and ACT/SAT results. Dude just loves learning and is motivating himself to do more and better every day, just to see how far he can go. I hope you will be heartened to hear his take on his teachers, his peers, his motivation, and his future options. He’s got his college sights set on the Ivy League and would be the first county grad in 40 years (!) to attend an Ivy if he did so. But pay attention to what Jacob’s mom has to say about his trajectory and how she has supported him along the way. Simply awesome. Enjoy! (Circleville Herald, 12/6/21)
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