Let me make my position perfectly clear

I have been advised to write short and simple postings; I struggle with that for three reasons. The first is that I am, by nature, long-winded. The second is that despite the political attractiveness (and necessity) of keeping it simple, these are complex issues; they aren't simple- you move one facet, you affect so many other things. The third reason is that I believe a community that is given all the information it needs to make an informed decision will make a good decision most of the time.

As much as I set this blog up to help in my campaign to be re-elected to the School Committee (have I mentioned I'm running?), I also want it to be a place that provides information that might help engage the community, the whole community, in finding answers we can all live with.

Any strategy that seeks to accomplish a political solution by demonizing or scapegoating doesn't really lead to a solution. I'm happy to mix it up with anyone on these issues, and can agree to disagree; I can even accept a bottom line of "I do not want to pay a dime more in taxes."

That's a legitimate position, and I can accept that for what it is.

But assertions that are not based in fact, but represent opinion dressed up like a fact, frost my cake. "Too many administrators," is an example of that. Comparable school systems have more administrators, the DOR in its report stated we needed a full-time human resource manager; we have one curriculum coordinator for pre-school through 12th grade, we went two/three years with three elementary schools and two principals. More importantly, the school-based administrators have critical functions- they hire personnel, supervise them, evaluate them, provide remedial plans to improve teaching, in additional to the myriad of other activities they perform.

Until we stop throwing crap like that against the wall one more time just to see if it sticks, rather than having a genuine discussion about how we can create a collaborative or innovative supervision process or evaluation tool for teachers, we are stuck. Stuck.

And in this world, in this culture, in this society, stuck really means going backwards.