DeKalb school board: Save the governor the trouble and step down if you are part of the problem
Not sure anyone is surprised at the announcement today that DeKalb County Schools are on probation with the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.
(Here is the full SACS report.)
I am a bit surprised at school board Chairman Gene Walker’s dismissal of Gov. Deal stepping in and removing board members — a power Deal now has under a sweeping school board reform law.
Here is a suggestion: Save the governor the trouble. Quit.
The DeKalb board members who are guilty of the mismanagement outlined by SACS — including missing money, school board nepotism and board influence on which schools students — should resign and save the governor the need to formally oust them.
I don’t understand why elected officials who have failed at their jobs and left their constituents worse off don’t just do the right thing and go. If I served multiple terms on a school board and created more problems than I solved, I would let someone else try.
DeKalb has many elements in place to be a far more successful district than it has been, including taxpayers willing to take on new taxes for the sake of their schools. Some of the blame for DeKalb’s current financial problems falls on the school board for its poor management.
At some point, fresh outlooks and new ideas are vital to an organization’s health and future. I think that time has come in DeKalb.
An accrediting agency is accusing the DeKalb County School District of a decade of “poor, ineffective governance,” announcing Monday that it’s placing the district on probation, leading to possible removal of the school board. After a six-month investigation, the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools found evidence of missing money, school board nepotism and board member influence on which schools students, particularly athletes, attend.
Despite exerting influence in areas where they had no formal role, members of the school board failed to oversee their primary responsibility: the money. DeKalb is “perilously close” to running out of cash, said Mark Elgart, the president and chief executive officer of SACS parent company AdvancED. Despite annual revenues approaching $1 billion, some students don’t have textbooks and most have no access to computers or the Internet. This is because the school board, administrators and others in decision-making positions put the interests of adults before those of children, he said. Meanwhile, academic performance has been sliding.
The findings prompted SACS to bring the ultimate threat: loss of accreditation. It could happen a year from now. Until then, DeKalb is on probation, Elgart said. School officials have the interim to address the concerns. SACS will be sending teams to monitor the response in the spring and fall.
School board chairman Eugene Walker said he was disappointed by the decision. “Nobody wants to be on probation,” he said. He also said he understands why SACS reached its judgment. The school board will take the message seriously and respond to restore its accreditation, he said. “I’m also optimistic that we’re going to rise to the occasion.”
Walker said he’s not concerned that Gov. Nathan Deal will remove the school board, which is possible under a new state law that covers districts on probation. “We’ve not done anything egregious,” Walker said.
–From Maureen Downey, for the AJC Get Schooled blog
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74 comments Add your comment
Bartow Citizen
December 17th, 2012
9:22 pm
This kind of stuff is going on in Bartow County, but SACS won’t investigate despite numerous complaints and the filing of lawsuits because Board Chairman Davis Nelson is on the Georgia Council for SACS.
Board Member Angie Cornett violated the law by trashing current and former staff members, revealing personnel information in an open board meeting. She also trashed staff members on school issued phones via text message and had a principal demoted to teacher for personal reasons. http://www.bartowforabetterboe.com/
Bartow Citizen
December 17th, 2012
9:24 pm
Oh, and this board member is recorded in a phone call berating one of the teachers that was moved to another school for personal reasons. SACS should be ashamed for ignoring Bartow County for the same reasons Dekalb is on probation.
Concernedmom30329
December 17th, 2012
9:54 pm
Bartow
It took a decade for SACs to do much about DeKalb.
While I think the report is a small start in the right direction, I don’t think it shined enough light on the problems that the current administration has because they are so far over their heads.
Walker is a world class joke. For years, he has denied the fiscal reality that is DeKalb County. He has made the situation worse by ignoring the budget reality. He needs to resign. He ran because Paul Womack was running and Walker couldn’t stand Womack. Womack is gone as of Jan 1st to now it is time for Walker to retire. No reason to stay on since his old foe is gone.
teachermom
December 17th, 2012
9:58 pm
Atkinson and her gang need to resign, I called area superintendent Renee Ziegler and was told by her assistant that she would have to call me back the following day because she was working on her doctorate! There is an interesting Dekalb watch board for teachers and parents. Why does Dr. Atkinson have a personal driver???? Meanwhile, my son has no science book and shares one….. Why are all the schools in the other metro areas updated while Dekalb continues to have schools that are falling apart?
Livsey Parent
December 17th, 2012
10:32 pm
Do you want to know how our Superintendent “cut” Adminstrative staff? She moved them to other budgets. Ask our area principals how many people they have in the budgets who don ‘t work in their schools. Check opengov.com. – The principal who was in the palace under the friends and families plan was transferred to Livsey as a principal. His salary – $164,000!!!!!!! Over $50,000 more than our former principal who had a real doctorate from a real school.
Dekalbite
December 17th, 2012
11:13 pm
You can email Governor Nathan Deal your thoughts regarding his appointing a new Board of Education for DeKalb County Schools by clicking on the link below. He now has the power to do this since SACS has put the school system on probation:
http://gov.georgia.gov/webform/contact-governor-domestic-form
Dunwoody Mom
December 18th, 2012
7:02 am
Here is an update from Fran Millar. These were posted on his Facebook page yesterday:
I with other members of the DeKalb delegation will be meeting with Governor’s office on this matter after the holidays. I need to review the entire report since ONLY the media was invited to the press conference
Further to the suspension below, the State Board is required to to conduct a hearing in not less than10 days nor more than 30 days and recommend to the Governor whether to suspend all eligible members of the local board. I will monitor the State Board to make sure the law is followed.
gonefromdk
December 18th, 2012
7:03 am
We pulled our kids out several years ago and haven’t looked back!!! It’s time for the citizens of DeKalb to wake up and see just how bad the schools are…. i used to teach in Gwinnett and that is one of the best run school systems in the country. Teachers in DeKalb high schools don’t have textbooks, desks, and even toilet paper!!! Too many people working in the central office. It is going to take losing accreditation for change to actually occur.
catlady
December 18th, 2012
7:44 am
Here is something I have to question: The AJC is urging the Dekalb board to quit, yet seemed to “prop up” (ie give a pass) to the Beverly Hall administration. Why?
Private Citizen
December 18th, 2012
8:38 am
participation in SACS is expensive
Is it not odd that governance is by paid membership? It is completely bizarre, like a clever play at a big card game. It seems the results are evident when you privatize judiciary and regulation. School funds are from property ownership and they can and do seize property if the taxes are not paid.
Private Citizen
December 18th, 2012
8:39 am
Anyone care to do / provide a study of how regional school regulation is done across the country / civilised world?
Eugene Walker Must Go
December 18th, 2012
10:04 am
Poorly run organizations are typically incompetent at the top. Gene Walker is a great example of this. Seems like most of the money laundering, corruption and graft are from 2008-9. Current board members who served during that time frame should resign or be forced out.
Pride and Joy
December 18th, 2012
11:45 am
APS Oldtimer — the principal of ANY school does not deserve his own private potty at ANYpublic school ! These tax dollars are MINE and I don’t expect ANY public servant to waste my money on his own private bathroom. This is outrageous!
And…just because the principals at other schools in APS have one is no excuse to continue the waste and abuse of my tax money.
redweather
December 18th, 2012
12:09 pm
@catlady, “Here is something I have to question: The AJC is urging the Dekalb board to quit, yet seemed to “prop up” (ie give a pass) to the Beverly Hall administration. Why?”
Maybe they learned their lesson?
my2cents
December 18th, 2012
3:35 pm
If I were on the school board and enjoyed flexing my political muscle, I just might be dismissive of this whole probation thing, too. As it is, I’m just a fed-up parent and taxpayer and I had already called the governors office to get him to step in and help with this. At last something is happening. Too bad I’ve had to pay so much for so little.
Terry Krugman
December 18th, 2012
4:07 pm
Someone asked who doesn’t have textbooks. My Advanced Placement students at Lakeside do not have books for the second term. Either they will need to purchase their own ( I hope not) or I shall be spending a lot of time I don’t have photocopying for them. There are other teachers here with the same problem.
The county has little credibility with us. Each new mandate or initiative- usually presented in acronyms or in Eduspeak- is met with incredulity.
Betsy Parks
December 19th, 2012
12:43 am
I’ve started the petition “Governor Nathan Deal and Georgia State Board of Education: Review SACS findings, if accurate REPLACE the Dekalb County School Board. ” and need your help to get it off the ground.
Will you take 30 seconds to sign it right now?
Please share with your friends!
http://www.change.org/petitions/governor-nathan-deal-and-georgia-state-board-of-education-review-sacs-findings-if-accurate-replace-the-dekalb-county-school-board
Susan
December 19th, 2012
11:49 am
ha ha…. Walker would never, ever step down. What part of “We’ve not done anything egregious,” do you not understand?
Ray
December 19th, 2012
3:02 pm
I understand SACS’ criticism of board members micro-managing, meddling, or seeking preferential treatment in areas they should not be — getting transfers between schools approved for athletes, for example. But I think SACS is way off base when it criticizes school board members for occasionally dropping by the schools in their area or that they represent. SACS is also off when it criticizes newly elected school board members — new members elected in July who don’t take office until next month — for dropping by schools in their area. I live in APS and we welcome our local school board member occasionally dropping by our school. We invite them to meetings at our school on certain issues that it might be appropriate to involve them in. School board members visiting schools in their area, attending some meetings or functions at those schools, and generally making themselves accessible and available is a good thing. School board members who are active and visible can affect positive changes, and can hear and learn things at their local schools that can help them govern at the district-wide level. It is good to visit the schools that you are governing. Yeah, don’t meddle or micro-manage — use good judgment as to when to insert yourself. But certainly don’t folow a blanket policy of never making an appearance or visit, as SACS appears to demand.
If SACS can’t differentiate between good, proactive, positive school board member visits or contacts, and meddling, micro-managing visits or contacts, and instead just declares all school board member contacts at local schools as bad, then it makes me wonder about SACS’ judgment. Can we write a 20 page report criticizing SACS and put them on probation?
Concernedmom30329
December 19th, 2012
4:44 pm
Ray
I don’t think you understand what SACs is saying. Many of DeKalb’s current and former board members can’t help themselves and they meddle. Paul Womack, during his first tenure on the board back in the 1980s, was known for going into schools and yelling at teachers. His behavior was so bad that the board adopted a policy about board members dropping in on schools. Twenty years later when he ran for school board again, no one remembers his bad behavior.
SACS isn’t suggesting that board members shouldn’t come to schools when invited. They are suggesting that board members aren’t suppose to run the schools. (Ask teachers in the McNair cluster to tell you stories about Sara Copelin-Wood and their schools. Scary stuff.)
Also, at least one of the newly elected school board members is doing far more than dropping in.
Ray
December 19th, 2012
5:25 pm
Concerned Mom: I understand what you are saying. But the SACS report also takes some of the newly elected board members (of which there are 3, I believe) to task for dropping by schools in their area, possibly to introduce themselves, or whatever. There’s nothing wrong with that, and in fact, that is good. I get that there is also a meddling and over-involved type of contact with the schools. But I’m sure some of the board members, and certainly some of the newly elected members, have the sense and the good judgment to know the difference between the two — as should SACS. But the terms of SACS’ probabtion seem to require that no board member should ever visit a school on their own, and that’s just crazy. The same as it’s crazy to order that board votes should tend to be unanimous, and not 5-4.
Maria Pico
December 19th, 2012
5:48 pm
This has been going on for decades, way before Crawford, Eugene Walker got his daughter a job at Clarkston HS back in the mid 80’s when he worked at the district office in a high level job he was not even certified to do. Yes they all need to resign but the real question is why were they elected and re-elected in the first place and why were/ are incompetents such as Brown, Lewis and Atkinson hired to lead as superintendents? Atkinson who could not get hired in Atlanta City had typos on her cover letter and resume that she submitted to Dekalb. The janitorial staff at several of the schools I worked at during my 29 year career with Dekalb could have run it better and were certainly harder working individuals. Glad my pension in no way tied to DCS!!! Sorry for the kids who will suffer because of the ignorance of their parents who kept these illiterate fools in office.
Diane
December 29th, 2012
1:08 pm
The children currently enrolled in Dekalb Schools don’t have time to “wait” for this mess to be made right. Do whatever it takes to get them into a private school NOW.
Tammy
December 30th, 2012
12:09 am
WOW. First, every parent in GA should be outraged. 48th out of 50 in the United States! The fiasco in DeKalb is systemic of the overall state of education in GA. There is no excuse for the lack of accountability at every level of this mess. We are paying more for less and someone needs to be accountable. Starting with the current and previous School Boards, past and present Superintendents and most importantly our State elected Legislators where there has only been passing the buck. Every single one of them has been aware of the continuing financial mismanagement of funds for over the last ten-twenty years in DeKalb. And it was state mandated that school systems could raise the class size as “they felt needed”. Are you kidding me?!?! Twenty four kids in a Kindergarden class and 34 to 37 in 4th grade. This isn’t teaching it’s daycare. And the SACS report itself drives me nuts. I agree with a lot of it. But I applaud any School Board member that questions expenses and demands accountability. Every employee of the tax payers should have to account and justify expenses (Go Nancy!). A Board Member should be responsible for demanding accountability of funds. And further, if it was done properly in the first place, it would not take away “valuable” time to print out a report outlining the outlay of funds. Why would anyone with a justifiable expense feel attacked when asked for justification? Present it, get it approved and move on. No business could operate this way. And when you have a budget of a billion dollars there is no excuse not to have financial reports readily available for review by any Board Member, State Legislator, Auditor or a parent. It’s called open records for a reason.