Enough of this posturing, lets do the right things, make the right decision; transformation not turnaround, and lets move on … Submitted to NBEA

The ST did a great job in reporting two stories in the Sunday paper. The articles on the grandmother taking care of her own children and her daughter’s children, and the article on Mr. Hargraves and the Dennison could not have hit the nail more squarely on the head than it did. It was dead-on.

Let alone our leaders, if a person who read these articles could not relate its contents to the root problems that consistently invades our schools and education system, then nothing at all will make sense to those people at all. The articles, with pinpoint accuracy screams; IT IS NOT THE TEACHERS!

No one is denying that there is hardship in this city, nor am I trying to dehumanize the plight of any family in dire straits, but can it be made any easier to see what students, family, and teachers are up against everyday. A new crop of teachers is not about to change this…it is much too deep than that.

Poverty does not mandate a child remains in poverty when he or she becomes an adult, but it correlates darn close to what occurs. For those of us in the teaching profession, what do you think the chances of the grandmother’s children will be successful after K-12 schooling? God, I hope everyone of them succeeds, but realistically what are the chances? What does the data say? Everyone knows, so lets take our collective heads out of the sand, and begin to acknowledge the real problems.

Teachers are no more to blame for a majority of student failure, as the mayor is for not having available housing for the grandmother, or for the grandmother’s broken down car, or why one student attends the Alternative School at Whaling City.

The data shows clearly that there are more transformation models in play right now in the US than turnarounds. Can the majority of school department have it wrong? Is the data flawed?

Leaders, you need to come to grasp with the real educational issues in our city, and it does not start in the classrooms. Our educational system is not just one person sitting on the top making decisions for the entire teacher and student body; without input from the teachers. It just doesn’t make sense.

Teachers did not approve the plans for these monstrosities we call (Lincoln), or our middle schools (take a pick), or our high school. Teachers have not made the decision not to supply our students or teachers with books or other resources necessary to immerse our students in the common core curriculum. Teachers do not even get a vote on a credible curriculum or period-scheduling. 

And to refer back to the articles, teachers did not create the the storylines that was written in the paper.

Enough of this posturing, lets do the right things, make the right decision; transformation not turnaround, and lets move on. Enough is Enough!