All Circuses Have Clowns

The School Board continues to grope and fumble around some fundamental questions on Employment criteria, union & management relations, and community transparency. However they do seem to be actively engaged and, hopefully, that will lead to growing insight, skill, and application that will benefit the citizen in the not too far distant future.

They might start affirmatively with dismissing the Superntendent. This is long overdue and surely there must be some sense of the need for this on the part of some school board members who are most likely those elected most recently. Were this done, a dark cloud would begin heading southeast and arrive somewhere in Suffolk County; a more amenable location for this controlling, unaware and stultifying force who has damaged our district and actually our non-eductional growth and development prospects and possibly done so mortally.

Any reader of this blog has all the ammunition necessary to support this motion. Alas, so does the school board and this lack of insight leads those of us who love the City and want the best for our children, to seek out alternatives to bring the school board to heel on this most elemental and obvious front….. our school district continues to fall short despite protests to the contrary and even a cursory examination of student performance, graduation rates, and failures in simple oversight over discipline, staff and management issues make this abundantly clear.

Organisciak is truly the Ringmaster and, unlike other circuses, the Ringmaster is also the presiding clown. On December 6, the recently appointd School Chancellor, John King, visited New Rochelle where, quite appropriately, he was shown several of our most prominent programs at Columbus and Daniel Webster. He had a positive opinion of both and congratulations to those teachers and students who did our City proud.

What should we know about King? He is someone who is committed to change, to reform. He sees potential in merging school districts where and when possible. He recognizes the considerable fiscal restraints on the State, local issues around the tax base, and the practical fiscal and hopefully, educational realities of Race to the Top. He is new on the job, is not fixed in “old ways”, seems to be a change agent, and likely has a broad vision and some specific initiatives and plan to bring this vision to life

In sum, a challenge to the embedded bureaucrats, the pedagogic infrastructure, and managing clowns, ringmasters, and plodding boards throughout the State.

Enter the O Master. Let’s look at his words as presented to us by Gary Stern of the Journal News.

He wondered whethr state-imposed reform efforts can help schools with unique needs. Thus sayest Organisciak… “these are ambitious efforts and there are good reasons to try to hold people accountable, but reform doesn’t work when you say everyone must do the same thing. You have to know what you want to accmplish school by school.”

These are words worth in the neighborhood of a quarter of a million dollars a year? Can some of you take a little time out of your day to dissect these pearls of wisdom and enlighten me on meaning and yes, intent?

If anyone in the Council or School Board or City Hall reads this, can you tell me why we have not shipped this guy to Suffolk years earlier? This is the voice of education past and present and if you want it as your voice for education future, you should give a thought about those seeking a place to move to to raise a family and businesses looking to establish themselves in our community and hire our local citizens.

I repeat what I have said earlier… if you cannot find a better head of our quarter of a billion dollar or so district, you could do worse than the guy managing FUSE. He knows the district and comes out ahead in every conflict or negotiation with the District.