No Fair Stranger Slog
Here's the headline at the Stranger Slog:
I know, I know you read the first 3 words and get a little...well, something.
The story is about her resignation from the NWEA Board that she announced at Wednesday's Board meeting. The SEA's comment (bold theirs):
The Seattle teachers union, the Seattle Education Association, listed Goodloe-Johnson's position on the board as a conflict of interest when they voted to have no-confidence in her last month. "It's good that she is hearing concerns of educators in Seattle and taking account of what they think of her leadership," said union vice president Jonathan Knapp. "There would have been more confidence in her had she disclosed that she had this connection and nevertheless recommended the services of this company. In my opinion that's not good practice."
Good for the Slog because they seem to be trying to keep up more on local education issues.
Goodloe-Johnson Resigns from Board Amidst
Criticism of Conflict of Interest
Criticism of Conflict of Interest
I know, I know you read the first 3 words and get a little...well, something.
The story is about her resignation from the NWEA Board that she announced at Wednesday's Board meeting. The SEA's comment (bold theirs):
The Seattle teachers union, the Seattle Education Association, listed Goodloe-Johnson's position on the board as a conflict of interest when they voted to have no-confidence in her last month. "It's good that she is hearing concerns of educators in Seattle and taking account of what they think of her leadership," said union vice president Jonathan Knapp. "There would have been more confidence in her had she disclosed that she had this connection and nevertheless recommended the services of this company. In my opinion that's not good practice."
Good for the Slog because they seem to be trying to keep up more on local education issues.
Comments
The teachers' no-confidence motion had a very lengthy laundry list, any single item of which could have inspired any reasonable person to vote no confidence. To suggest that this tiny modification in Darth Goodloe-Johnson's overall terrible job performance, had it actually happened, would have resulted in "more confidence"....Well, it makes Mr. Knapp sound like, to put it charitably, he needs a loooong rest.
Let us remind ourselves that NWEA received a sole-source contract. That's in litigation right now.
When Goodloe-Johnson resigned her NWEA Board membership, as long as it was after that contract was prepared, and it was after she revealed her membership on the NWEA Board to the School Board, is immaterial (except, seemingly, to Mr. Knapp)
Although I think we can say about this resignation that
a) Dr. No-Confidence held on to it FAR longer than was politically saavy
b) which perhaps demonstrates just how out of touch she is with the peons
c) It attempts to end far more than a "distraction". More like the tip of a vast iceberg of financial malfeasance
d) Based on the tone of her announcement at the Board meeting, she was pissed at having to do this.
e) So it wasn't her idea, and somebody held her feet to the fire...
f) In the hope this will all go away.
Think again.
The whole business is still a BIG HUGE FLAMING PILE OF STINKING CORRUPTION AND CRONYISM.
ken berry
What, up from "no confidence", which could easily be construed as ZERO confidence to, say, .01% confidence. In everyday math, I think that could be seen as a 100% improvement.
Let's somehow figure out how to fire the Union leadership and the District leadership. Now that might lead to progress!
district stuffs up over enrolment
Parents have appealed the Boards approval of an "extension" (actually, the original contract had no provision for extension) to the NWEA contract. The original contract was procured, like so many others, by individuals departments with little involvement of professionals who know the right and wrong ways to spend public dollars (not to say there is ANYONE like that at SPS.)
On the Seattle School's Labor Relations Homepage, top of the page, is a photograph of the smiling main members of Our School's Coalition, which directed the Broad Superintendent, through their Gates and Broad funding and through their nasty push-poll which was facilitated with names obtained from the district while it was in labor negotiations, to make sure MAP was in the new evaluation:
Caption:
Government and community leaders join Superintendent Goodloe-Johnson and School Board Director Steve Sundquist to highlight the importance of the landmark agreement with the Seattle Education Association. Left to right: George Griffin III, 2010 Chair of the Board, Alliance for Education; Maria L. Goodloe-Johnson, Superintendent, Seattle Public Schools; Chris Korsmo, Executive Director, League of Education Voters; Estela Ortega, Executive Director, El Centro de la Raza; and Tim Burgess, Councilmember, City of Seattle.
Isn't it unethical for the superintendent to be the pawn of Our Schools Coalition during negotations? You might also remember that the Board agenda item last week on the parapro contract mentioned under "community engagement" that while the negotiations were closed to the public, League of Education Voters was allowed to insert their agenda items into the administration's negotiating points.
WHY is this picture of Burgess, LEV, et al on the main page of the Labor Negotiations site at SPS? WHO is running this district?
Mary Tate, if you were not a reader of this blog a month ago, then you might not know that the district did try to shut this blog down in a way. tried to claim Melissa is not a journalist or up to its ethical standards LOL LOL LOL ... see the community freaked out, the comms people in the district backpedaled faster than an olympian. Oh, and the DISTRICT has been remanded by the board to hire an ethics officer.
Keep reading. Tell your neighbors and parents to start reading. It is the only place you can get anything other than the district Party Line (circa 1950 Russia).
WV sez "bectizen". Yes, we all need to Be Citizens and lend our voices.
No one can do it all, but when a lot of folks get curious about things, then the overall coverage is pretty good. Several folks are well versed at submitting open
records requests. All that knowledge adds up.
Don't try to learn it all at once, but keep paying attention and when you find something you are curious about, keep asking, research and learning. That's what you did with the MAP, right? Keep it up.
And do NOT Believe all of what you read. Not from any of us. WE all have our biases and our misstatements. And vote No on the supplemental levy.
Actually, the secret is to care about the district beyond your child and his/her school. You'll be in the swing soon enough. Get a friend or two to join you and we'll all be the better for it.
Each of us can, however, get interested in one small part, keep a close eye, and then share what you've learned here. The more folks that contribute here the better informed we all are.
Even if it's just posting what's going on in your school, it's helpful to other parents to get a better idea of what is going on in other parts of the district.
You read what is posted at the district's website (I still don't know how Charlie seems to find so many documents).
Bird makes a good point, though. Have a particular issue in mind? Get to know it, its history, the staff who administer it very well and you will be a big help here.
No one knows everything and it is great to have more parents interested in the district. We may be the only ones in the city keeping them fractionally accountable.