By oma

October 25, 2006 4:42 AM | Link to this

I am not sure where to begin at my displesure and unbelief of the problems with the Dayton Public Schools. One thing, Mack needs to become the Superintendent of all the people and not a few. Mack and Littlejon need to listen to their words and promises made to parents & teachers. We had money for new properties, we have money for new schools BUT haven’t the money to provide teachers and support staff for them. We have some wonderful schools and programs in place that are producing QUALITY educations for the students and rewarding careers for many. BUT those are the schools and programs we are going to CUT. Please make some sense of that to me. I see the board as a tight little circle of followers and not leaders, everyone but Lacey bobbing their heads to whatever Mack says. I feel an audit is way over due of this administration. Tighten the belts of the fluff and get on with the education of our youth. We have on the November ballot a “gaming idea” for college tuition…college???What for… we can’t find a way to educate our youth here in Dayton, why would they want to continue in school if this is what they see ? If we need to cut programs, cut those that offer so little benefit to our community, not those that fulfill the needs of the people. I have been proud to say that I graduated from a Dayton Public School and now my grandchildren go here too. But now I am sorely confused at where they are headed. If there is such a problem with Charter schools and the funding there of, we need to address that issue and stop sitting on our hands. Inform the voters of what is happening, don’t sit and whine “OH what will I do.” Do something, honor your word. And lastly WHAT is with a 7:30 AM meeting time, is that so no one will come? So no one will know first hand what the board is doing? By the way, this is my first blog ever.

By Charterschool Hater

October 21, 2006 7:10 PM | Link to this

You are missing my point. You keep talking about terra nova gains where the state who rates the schools does not use them as a barometer. I guess if you can’t win the game, you invent one that you can win(terra nova). This is in no way is to diminish the terra nova testing. But to keep talking terra nova is a bit like trying to make a strike zone in baseball wider because you can not hit the plate. The Dayton students may be doing top notch in terra nova, but it is my understanding that the state uses another formula. As for the comments about The Fordham guy, the fact about unleveled playing fields for charters, no child left behind and the fact that Boehner is a real yayhoo. I could not agree more. My concerns about the Dayton system are as follows. They can’t win at the states game of measuring the indicators so they go out and play the terra nova game which is more to their liking. We can go on and on about the fact that we do not like the 20 some indicators but it is what it is. That is the way the game is played. We can pretend that Mack and Littlejon are the best thing since sliced bread. But the facts bear otherwise. You have employee morale at an all time low. Talk to the teachers. Talk to the bus drivers, talk to the operations workers. See what they tell you about morale. You have a district that is top heavy on administrators, students not measuring up. The district is out of money. You have a HR guy that consistently hires administrators that could work no where else in America but here. Maybe you could save some money buy hiring some that . Mack is administrator of the year with so much wrong. How much did he pay them. Character assassination only goes when facts do not say otherwise. Mack should be fired and Littlejon and the rest of the Kids not first team should be recalled. We do have a bright face on the Board of Ed in Joe Lacy though. He needs some help to fix the mess that Willliams,Mack, and Littlejohn have brought upon the district. New buildings alone will not cure what ails the Dayton Public Schools. I wonder though how many of Gail’s friends got rich over the building scheme.

By Oldprof

October 20, 2006 3:33 PM | Link to this

Well, hater, I could explain to you how Terry Ryan is a fake (he’s a Fordham Foundation hack). Consider that, when he’s bellyaching about his experiment on our children not getting enough cash, he ignores two things: (1) Charters don’t have to do half of the expensive things publics do. The publics are required to provide transportation for the charter students, required to take in profoundly disabled students and pay full-time caretakers for them, on and on. Somewhere there’s a list of over 100 costly mandates that publics must perform but charters are excused from. (2) For years, misguided politicians like John Boehner have slashed education funding while proclaiming “you can’t solve the problem by throwing money at it.” (The same politicians who continue to fund the “war” on drugs, so far having no progess.) But the top charter school in the state, Cincy’s DuBois Academy, was about to close b/c they learned that the state was over-funding them and they didn’t think they could continue to operate on less dollars. If the best school is the one that got far too many dollars, then is it not possible that more money IS part of the cure? Now look: after a while the character assassination requires some evidence. Terranova scores, like all other DPS documents, are public. Go look at them, study the way that the state board of education has jerked our city around on education funding, and come back when you have educated yourself on the issue. Until then, you have no right to label anyone a snake oil salesman.

By charterschool hater

October 20, 2006 12:23 AM | Link to this

I am new to this blog. All I know is that Mack and Littlejohn are not telling us anything about Terra Nova. They ramble on and on about rising two places. That tells me there must be no demonstrable inprovements as you have alluded to. Our snake oil sellers Percy and Gail would have shoved that down our throat as well had they beleived they would have gotten any play with it. What I say is that when you are at the bottom, you can go no where but up. The Dayton Public Schools are the laughing stock of the country. That is why no one wants to attend them except folks who have to. I feel sorry fro them. What do you have to say about the editorial this morning about the other scam that Mack and Littlejon have perpetrated upon us tax payers in Dayton. That one being that charter schools have wrecked them financially. Is the editorial true? If it is then Gail and Percy have lied to us again. I will tell you what has undone them. Incompetent administrators from top to bottom beginning with Mack who oversees them, and Sweetnich who hires them. An administration that does not value it’s employees from teachers to custodians, and a Kid’s First team that is not really for all kids, just the ones who are not related to thier employees. What realy eats my crawl is that this Bd of Ed really believes that new buidings will solve all thier problems. Taxpayers like me will have the last laugh though. When the operating levy comes up, I and many like me will say NOT!! Maybe the real reason the schools are in such dire straights financially are all the duplicity that exists within the admininstation. Asssistants to the assistant mostly all imcompetants themselves.

By Oldprof

October 19, 2006 6:25 AM | Link to this

Hi Charterschool. Don’t recall seeing you here before, but we’ve had that conversation—check the archives. Yes, OBE changes test score ranges and school report card criteria annually, which makes the data fairly uesless for tracking progress—that’s why DPS relies more on its chosen Terranova tests, which don’t change year-to-year, to measure student achievement. The state’s vicissitudes notwithstanding, there also were demonstrable improvements in DPS—do you know what they were? If you didn’t know these things, then you may not understand why Susan Zelman and the Fordham Foundation are scamming the public far, far more than Gail Littlejohn ever dreamed of doing.

By Oldprof

October 19, 2006 6:12 AM | Link to this

Glad you’ve gotten a few awards, Mary. Are you cynical about them as well? Is it really true that you make no distinction between an award from a national organization to one recipient annually with those “I wore shoes four out of five days” trophies they misguidedly pile on at kindergarten commencement ceremonies? Sometimes the amount of spleen in this posts makes me concerned for peoples’ health.

By Mary

October 18, 2006 7:00 PM | Link to this

Jealous? I don’t think so. I have even had a few awards pinned on my uniform. I just think a lot of limited time and resources is spent on such things - contributing to trophy clutter. Reminds me of an editorial I read in USA Today about all the little trophies kids accummulate that end up in the garbage.

By charterschool hater

October 18, 2006 3:37 PM | Link to this

This is a response to the article that Mack got an award. Lets talk about the fact that if the formula for gauging a bad school vs a good school was changed. If you look as this years test scores and apply them to the previous formula nothing has changed. Mack and Littlejon proclaiming that they have somehow accomplished somthing novel with the move up two places is like the old snake oil trick. They know nothing has really changed and the good taxpayers of the school district need to know too. Tell the truth Mr. Mack and Ms. Littlejon Why don’t you inform the public about this scam Scott?

By Oldprof

October 18, 2006 12:53 PM | Link to this

Jealous, Mary? Having won some awards myself, I don’t see a need for cynicism—the superintendent deserved this one richly, let’s just bring our hands together and save the food criticism for Mark Fisher’s blog. I just hope the newer board of education members appreciate the work that the previous board did to bring Percy Mack to town—too much turnover at the top drags a district down even with an average superintendent.

By Mary

October 18, 2006 7:12 AM | Link to this

While he might be deserving of such an award, I am somewhat cynical about the need for professional adults to hand out and receive awards like this and eat “rubber chicken” at banquets.

By Caroline

October 18, 2006 12:07 AM | Link to this

Watch out Dayton Board of Education! By offering Dr. Mack and the teachers zero raises, they could lose both. Then what will happen to their scores/rating?