A different perspective on the current state of Jeffco schools

Month: October 2017

Board treats many central Jeffco taxpayers & students like 2nd class citizens

While schools in central Jeffco continue to deteriorate, the Board prioritizes spending $32M (originally $67M in 3B) on moving 6th graders to middle school and building schools for brand new Jeffco residents.

Is it fair to longtime residents of Jeffco who have paid taxes to support their neighborhood, and Jeffco, schools for years and years to have the Board tell them there is no money to maintain their schools? How is it that the Board can find at least $32M to controversially move 6th graders to Middle School and spend millions more in building brand new schools for people who have just moved to Jeffco in new housing developments?

I don’t think that is fair or equitable.

Of the high schools, Wheat Ridge, built in 1956, has the District’s worst Facility Condition Index. Green Mountain and Arvada are not far behind. There are reports of black ooze at Alameda and asbestos at Jefferson. There are similar situations at the District’s Elementary and Middle schools in these older areas.

Haven’t the residents of these areas been paying taxies longer than anyone else? Why should they, and the students attending schools in these areas, be treated like 2nd class citizens? Is it because some of these areas are some of the poorer areas in Jeffco?

I understand 3B didn’t pass, but if the Board can find money to build Three Creeks and additions to Sierra, Drake and Dunstan (with more coming) couldn’t they have chosen not to have made the K-5, 6-8 decision universal and to use some of that saved money to maintain the school buildings the District already has?

The school Board made a decision. They chose to implement a K-5, 6-8 plan that was optional, not supported by academic studies, questioned by the community and costly.

The school Board chose to ignore the needs of long time, lower income communities in favor of newer, more affluent Jeffco residents.

I think the school Board didn’t listen to the community and made poor choices. Unfortunately the children living in those ignored communities are the ones who will suffer.

Accountability? Not in Jeffco with Mitchell, Rupert & Harmon.

In a blow to transparency and students and parents at low performing schools in the District, the incumbent Board members don’t think that low performing schools should be accountable to the Board.

In response to a question during the October 25th Candidate Forum:

“Would you support low performing schools having to come to the Board to discuss improvement plans?”

Mitchell, Harmon and Rupert replied “No”, while Shields and Van Gieson replied “Yes”.

I guess this isn’t a surprise as the current Board doesn’t seem to want to hold anyone accountable for the atrocious education achievement and growth we see in Jeffco.

You would normally think that the Superintendent would have a vested interest in improving education results, but didn’t the Board let him completely off the hook by giving him a compensation package that contained NO education performance incentives similar to what the two previous Superintendent’s had?

The pattern, and culture, is that accountability doesn’t seem to be high on the list of priorities for our current Board members, and that isn’t good for our kids and District. These are just examples of a “We don’t care about education results” attitude in our District, that starts from the top.

But to make things worse, isn’t the Board hypocritical when they fully support performance reviews for the 3-5 year Charter renewals?

In a second question, the candidates were asked:

“Charters come before the Board every 3-5 years for renewal consideration. Would you support having neighborhood schools do the same for performance reviews?”

Again, Mitchell, Harmon and Rupert replied “No”, while Shields and Van Gieson replied “Yes”.

However, Mitchell added he didn’t support these reviews because:

“We don’t have contracts with our neighborhood schools”

To which Harmon agreed.

It is absolutely shocking to hear Board members emphatically state that they don’t have “contracts’ with our neighborhood schools.

Isn’t it the Board’s job to ensure high-quality education? Isn’t it the job of Board members to hold the Superintendent, Principals and teachers accountable for providing high-quality education and obtaining results? Isn’t that a contract with the students, parents and taxpayers of this District? Is the Board saying the District doesn’t have a contract with the neighborhood school to pay the principal and teachers to provide high-quality education? What are principals and teachers getting paid for then?

In my career, employees usually get paid to deliver results and are held accountable for providing value in exchange for earning that salary. I guess that our Board views things differently here in Jeffco.

Brad Rupert and Susan Harmon don’t tell the truth.

Surprisingly, Support Jeffco Kids (SJK) and I agree on one thing. We don’t like lies or liars. In a post published on October 15th, SJK wrote:

It is never okay to lie to get elected. NEVER.

 

I agree, but I take that a step further in that I don’t think it is EVER okay to lie PERIOD.

Yet, isn’t that what both Brad Rupert and Susan Harmon did at the League of Women Voters Candidate forum on October 17th in response to a question on the sources of their campaign funding?

I was there. Ron Mitchell was the first of the incumbents to answer and I will give him credit in that he took time to think about the question before answering. Brad Rupert was the next incumbent and he answered adamantly that the “vast majority” of funding came from within the District. Susan Harmon was the last of the incumbents and she used Brad’s exact phrase and replied “vast majority” came from within the District.

The problem is that those statements are just not true. Certainly we could argue the meaning of “vast”, but unfortunately for Brad using the phrase “vast majority” for 58% is intentionally deceptive and falls into Webster’s definition of lie for me. It is worse for Susan.

For Brad, $22,279, by my calculations from http://tracer.sos.colorado.gov/PublicSite/SearchPages/CandidateDetail.aspx?SeqID=37387, of $53,007 in total contributions, 42% was contributed to his campaign from outside the District. That is not a “vast majority” from inside the District, Brad. The largest contribution of $20,514 came from a Committee controlled by the state teacher’s union (CEA). Brad also received $4,010 from the Jefferson County Education Association (JCEA), or local teachers’ union for a total of $24,524 from the teacher unions.

For Susan, it is worse. A MAJORITY of her funding actually came from OUTSIDE of the District, $24,847 of $49,626, or 50+%. Susan’s largest contribution of $20,514 also came from a Committee controlled by CEA.

So, in front of a packed room of people, with complete conviction and without hesitation, both candidates didn’t tell the truth in a blatant attempt to deceive the audience in an attempt to get elected

I know what I think of those candidates. Truthfulness is one of my core values. I literally cannot stand people who intentionally deceive, don’t tell the truth and lie.

I wonder what Support Jeffco Kids thinks of their candidates who can’t tell the truth now?

To a lesser degree, it is disconcerting to me where Brad and Susan’s money is coming from. It is coming from the teachers’ unions. We saw what happened when the unions contributed nearly $275k to elect their “clean slate” in 2015. It resulted in nearly $40M in teacher compensation increases over the past 2 years.

If the incumbents win in 2017, will the unions be repaid again? The incumbents are already talking about teacher compensation increases and as we saw last week, they will lie to keep the voters from knowing where their contributions are coming from.

Our School Board has failed!

You only have to listen to the incumbent Board members tell us what they have accomplished in the last two years to realize that they have failed.

What do you hear them say most often?

  1. They have returned civility to the Board room.
  2. They hired a new Superintendent.
  3. They have slowed teacher “churn”.

However, it’s especially disappointing that you never hear them talk about the improvements in education they have fostered in the District. But with 68%% of Jeffco grads not College and Career ready and more than 55% of 3rd Graders (in 2016) not meeting state standards, I guess they can’t really do that. In addition, removing incentive based compensation from the new Superintendent’s contract certainly isn’t an indication that education is a primary focus. Actions speak louder than words in my book.

They also don’t talk about their failure to get needed Mill levy and Bond measures approved by the voters last November, the only major school district in the state that didn’t get tax measures approved. 3A and 3B were messes and the incumbent Board oversaw and approved those.

Still, I think it is important to examine what the Board has been touting as their accomplishments:

It is misleading at best when the incumbent Board members talk about returning civility to the Board room. Wasn’t it their supporters and the pro-recall organizers who created the most disruption in the Board room? I’m not sure this really qualifies as an “accomplishment”.

I won’t disagree that the Board hired a new Superintendent. But, the real questions are ‘Why did the Board hire a new Superintendent? And “What was wrong with the previous Superintendent?” Unfortunately, again it doesn’t appear that the primary reason was to improve education in Jeffco. If you compare either Jeffco’s education achievement or growth results with Eagle County (here, here and here), where the new Superintendent came from, the Jeffco results are better. We didn’t get someone who has a history of moving the education needle. By education performance measures we didn’t get someone who was better. In addition, the incumbent Board candidates like to continually remind us that they think it is important to have “continuity” in the Board and District leadership positions, but it looks like that only applies to their positions as they were the cause of a drastic change in “continuity” in the more important Superintendent position.

Finally, the Board members like to talk about how they have reduced teacher “churn”, the turnover of teachers each year, a result of their nearly $40M in teacher compensation increases over the past two years. Unfortunately this claim is mere speculation as the District does not conduct exit interviews of teachers. Every year teachers, like many people, change jobs for a wide variety of reasons such as retiring, moving for family reasons, pregnancy, changing careers, and yes, moving for compensation reasons. But, to claim that the $40M in compensation increases had a direct impact in reducing teacher turnover is completely unsupportable and misleading, and demonstrates that the incumbent Board members don’t really understand the number they are using (http://improvejeffcoschools.org/index.php/2017/06/26/the-continued-spreading-of-alternative-facts-regarding-teacher-turnover/).

For these reasons, and others, I think it is time for a change in the composition of the Board. We need a Board that is focused on student achievement, a Board that is focused on accountability and a Board that doesn’t try to avoid and mislead us about what they have done and “accomplished”.

It is time that we have a more balanced Board that actually listens and better represents the diversity of thought in our District.

I will be voting for that change by voting for Erica Shields and Matt Van Gieson for School Board in November.

Why wasn’t the decision to close Pleasant View revisited after state funding was more than anticipated?

I don’t understand why the decision to close Pleasant View, and the other February budget cuts for that matter, were not re-examined after the final state funding was more than originally anticipated earlier this year.

According to District budget documents, the saving from closing Pleasant View was $663,000. Yet, the Board decided, without reviewing prior budget cut decisions, to allocate the additional state funding to:

  • $3.7M in Additional SBB Allocation for One-time use
  • $600,000 for Alternative Pathway Factor
  • $412,000 for IT Funding for School & Community Engagement
  • $669,000 for Support for High School Athletics & Activities

I’m not saying that any of these allocations were not needed or a good use of the funding (other than the $600k in Alternative Pathways funding).

But, shouldn’t there have been a discussion on revisting the cuts of February 9th and a complete weighing of options?

There certainly should have been!

For example, is $412k for IT Funding for School & Community Engagement more important than saving Pleasant View?

To the Cabinet and Board it is!

Once again, the Board blindly went with the Cabinet’s recommendations and went forward with their plans to close a “community school”, similar to the Jefferson “community school” that Ron Mitchell likes to claim he and the Board supported.

What’s so different about Pleasant View and that community?

I don’t know, but it doesn’t look good to me.

Board didn’t ask single question on accountability when approving $600k in additional Alternative Pathways funding

Let me be clear, I think that Alternative Pathways funding is needed and is a great idea.

However, the allocation of that funding is inequitable and there is no District accountability for that funding.

In essence, the District doesn’t know if this money is being spent at the school level on Alternative Pathways or toilet paper. Don’t you think that if you are allocating $2M for a specific purpose during a Board described “budget crisis” there should be some accountability that the money is actually being spent as intended? I would hope so.

But let me talk about equity first. The Alternative Pathways funding is equal, not equitable. Every HS gets the same amount. Yet, aren’t our High Schools different sizes? Don’t our High Schools have different needs?

For example, does Conifer with fewer than 800 students, a 75% matriculation rate and 14% Free and Reduced Lunch rate have the same alternative pathways needs as Alameda with 1300 students, 41% matriculation rate and 84% Free and Reduced Lunch rate? I doubt it, but the Board’s “equalization” of this funding says they do.

For this reason alone this allocation is just poorly thought out.

And what about accountability? There is none!

In response to a CORA request I submitted the District responded:

The District has not requested or collected information on the pathways funding expenses. Schools allocate the budgets, there could be multiple lines and staff, and it is unknown.

There it is! No accountability. No budget line, no tracking, no accountability! No understanding if there even was a need for additional Alternative Pathways money at a school, or if the money previously allocated was used for its intended purposes.

And, to make this even worse, no Board member even asked a question on how schools spent the previously allocated $65k. They blindly, with complete disregard of taxpayer money, approved another $50k to each High School.

This is just one of the reasons the taxpayers in this county don’t trust the Board to be good stewards of our money and why we need change on the Board.

Does the Teacher Union “own” the School Board? Follow the Money!

During the last Board election in 2015 the National (NEA), State (CEA) and local (JCEA) teachers unions provided nearly $275,000 in support to get the current “clean slate” Board members elected.

  • National Education Association, $150,000
  • Colorado Education Association, $113,500
  • Jefferson County Education Association, $20,000

Was that money well spent?

First, the teachers were immediately rewarded with a new 5 year contract that included more than $20 million in one-time and ongoing raises in May of 2016.

But then, only one year after signing that new 5 year contract the Board fabricated a “budget crisis”, which included school closings and cuts to programs to generate an additional $19.5M in teacher compensation increases beginning in 2017-2018..

Even with all of that, Jeffco staff and Board members are already saying that the current salaries are not competitive for mid-career teachers.

I don’t see that when looking at the 2016-17 salary graphs here.

But, I guess that’s what you have to say to try to get people to support additional budget cuts or tax increases if you want to try and push through another big compensation increase for your employees and supporters!

Anyway, you can decide for yourself on the reasons for what’s transpiring.

But, as they say on the TV crime shows – “Follow the Money”.