What would you tell the state board today about the performance of the DeKalb school board?

I sure hope that school systems like Dekalb County are at least receiving ‘consulting fees’ or royalties from the companies pushing charter schools. Because the breathtaking incompetence, cronyism and dysfunction these systems routinely display is playing a very large role in diminishing public perception of traditional public schools. The plagiarism story the AJC is now running is stunning.

I’m not sure what’s worse. That the plagiarist is an education *cough cough* professional. That he was paid $10,000 for an audit that reads like a 9th grade book report (at least until you get to the stolen parts). That he was subsequently hired by the system for over $100K/per year. Or that according to the AJC story, “School Superintendent Cheryl Atkinson said Taylor’s job is safe. “The infraction pertains to his work as a consultant, not as an employee,” she said through a spokesman.”

What a joke. Ask any college freshman what the consequences are for this type of transgression. Plagiarism aside, that ‘paper’ wouldn’t even pass a basic formatting standard.

Here is my question for my northern neighbors in Georgia. If your Governor and Legislature are both very pro-charter (like here in Florida), what would be the State’s incentive for intervening in this school crisis? Why not let the system implode like APS? You can avoid the political prickliness of direct involvement in that county and you can always sit back and say, “See? Many of these traditional systems couldn’t manage their way out of a wet paper bag. We need alternatives to address these problems.”

I honestly feel bad for Dekalb County’s citizens. School systems are so often the ‘canaries in the coalmine’. I’m friends with a couple that is relocating to the Atlanta area this year. She’s graduating from medical school and is going to work for some hospital in that area. They started looking around for a place last summer and were warned by a realtor about “Dekalb’s issues/uncertainty”. I actually turned them on to this blog when they mentioned that conversation. I think they ended up concentrating on Fulton. That’s a killer when a community gets the reputation that new arrivals must factor in private school costs. Most communities don’t come back from that type of decline.

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Oops! Wrong DeKalb County. My bad.

However, adhering to copyright laws are still part of BOE policy. After searching a bit, here is the DeKalb County School System (GEORGIA) Internet Acceptable Use policy. Adhering to copyright laws is mentioned numerous times in this Board policy document.
https://dcss.schoolnet.com/aup.aspx
DeKalb County School District Acceptable Use Policy

For example,
“The DeKalb County School System provides computers, networks, and Internet access to support the educational mission of the school system and to enhance the curriculum and learning opportunities for students and school system staff. ”
……..”1. Any use that is illegal or in violation of other Board of Education policies, including harassing, discriminatory, or threatening communications and behavior; violations of copyright laws, etc.;….. ”
………”Transmission of any material in violation of any United States or state regulation is prohibited. This includes, but is not limited to, copyrighted material…….”
……”The DeKalb County School System reserves the right to examine all data stored on workstations, servers, and storage devices within the WAN, LAN or school-wide networks, i.e. Intranet, to ensure that all users are in compliance with copyright, security and DeKalb County School System policies and procedures. ”
………”Users will not transmit or download information or software in violation of copyright laws.”…..
……”A copyright policy should be posted in any room where a computer is located. ”
…..”Electronic transmissions, uploading and downloading materials are all forms of copying. As specified in this Technology Use policy as well as Copyright and other Intellectual Property Laws, no unlawful copies of copyrighted materials may be knowingly reproduced, transmitted, or stored on or using DeKalb County School District?s web servers.”
……..”
6.0. COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT COMPLAINTS
DeKalb County School District respects the intellectual property of others. If you believe that your work has been copied in a way that constitutes copyright infringement, please follow the instructions provided under Contact Information and provide DeKalb County School District’s Communications Officer with the written information specified:
(i) an electronic or physical signature of the person authorized to act on behalf of the copyright owner;
(ii) a description of the copyrighted work allegedly infringed upon;
(iii) a description of where the alleged infringing material is located on the DeKalb County School District web site; (iv) your e-mail and postal address, as well as your telephone number;
(v) a statement by you that you have a good-faith belief that the use of the alleged infringing material is unauthorized by the copyright owner, its agent, or the law; and (vi) a statement by you, made under penalty of perjury, that the above information in your notice is accurate and that you are either the copyright owner or authorized to act on the copyright owner’s behalf. ”

So infringement of copyright laws appears to be against Board policy.

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It appears to me that residents of DeKalb have three legitimate choices:

1. Engage in the political process.
We have done this to the best of our abilities as individuals and communities but the school system itself employs about a third of the entire county and a simple political mailer can cause many uninformed voters to do as they are told and vote for the choice their party tells them is the right one. Ditto for South DeKalb, but this influence comes from the New Birth Church instructions during sermons. And, besides having children to raise and jobs to hold, we are all in a time of economic crisis, Dr. John. Many people in DeKalb are struggling to pay bills, stop foreclosure, keep food on the table or look for work. It’s hardly the time to advise people to start saving their pennies for poster boards and markers so they can make a difference at the polls. Board members have come and gone and the outcome for our children remains the same. This is not as simple as voting for someone new every four years if you are not happy with the results. What are you suggesting we do while awaiting the next opportunity to vote? Let our children suffer the many, many problems in this system, the worst of which were not even addressed by SACS? Sorry, but that’s a pipe dream that many of us subscribed to when we thought the rules of this game might still be enforceable. We must take action now and sitting around waiting to talk politics in hopes I can convince others to vote the way I tell them seems a bit like SACS telling me to follow the chain of command – a joke. A very bad one.

2. Send your children to private schools.
Okay, I did that. Now what? My property taxes are still funding a corrupt system that is harming children, turning out criminals into our communities or filling our prisons. And, if you haven’t noticed, there is a recession going on, so no one I know can actually afford a private school right now without it coming at the price of sacrificing our children’s college savings fund. So, we either suffer now and save for later, or spend now and try to explain all this to our children later when we tell them they have to go into debt in order to fund their own higher learning because we had no choice but to blow our savings on a basic education so he/she could learn to read and write. Yeah, they should understand that. And, they will end up with debt over their heads as they start their journey into the “real” world, just like we did, and they will not get any further in life than we did as a direct result. Private schools may offer a way to ensure a decent education, but exempt me from paying my portion of property tax if that’s the only solution here. And refund the $50k I have already invested in the time I have lived here. After all, I thought I was paying for education of children, not the Superintendent and her friends from out of state who want their PHd’s or the board member’s entire families. If you are rich, then go buy a private school and leave the politics out of our public schools. Those who can afford private can also afford to pay off board members and get whatever they want for their own community while harming everyone else. Enough is enough already!

3. Move out of DeKalb County.
Sure, I would love to move, but the crappy schools have cost me close to $100K loss in my property value and even with that I probably wouldn’t be able to find a buyer now. And, what a crock anyway… why should I have to abandon my home just so my child can get a decent education without being bullied, sexually assaulted, or used as a guinea pig for an experiment on radiation effects from cell phone towers? We should not have to flee our homes and abandon our neighborhoods when we have done nothing wrong. These board members are the ones who should be forced to relocate and face criminal charges.

Illegitimate Options:

1. Call upon an “outside influence group” (viz., SACS) to do your work for you.
My work? Since when is it MY work to oust criminals from our government? We have followed chain of command and this is where it has led us. I just wish it hadn’t taken so long! No one has told SACS to “do work” of any kind, but there are a lot of people who have been complaining to any and every possible group for help. SACS decided to take the action on their own, with the help of the new legislation and likely the Governor. You don’t think it is all coincidence the way these steps are just falling into place, do you?

2. Call upon the State School Board and/or the Governor to do your work for you.
Again, the state legislature made this law and it is now a process that is working on its own. If nothing else, it will at least help inform voters without children that we need them to step up and vote right, too.

3. Whine and complain (e. g., writing anonymously on blogs).
How insulting. People have the right to privacy and an obligation to protect their identities when it is possible that their children could become targets for retaliation by the people in the system who may not like what is being said. We have a right to free speech and you should not be attempting to insult people who are trying to use that right in an effort to protect our children and stop the theft of billions of our collective tax dollars.

You are clueless about how things truly work here.

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And, I wish everyone would stop talking about this stupid north / south thing. We all have children we care about. We all want better results. This is not the time to start more bickering and blaming. It is time to band together. You have to start thinking in terms of what’s best for all the children, not just your own or the ones who live near you. We will never have a unified board if we cannot for once even have a unified discussion about how to rid our schools of criminals. Sheesh!

And, by the way, Dr. John, have you read the SACS report? Part of the reason the accreditation is at risk is because the board members are listening to questions from their constituents, so advocating for us to vote for better representative for our own areas is like telling us to go ahead and throw gas on the fire as the best way to put it out. Now, if we could have an opportunity to vote for ALL the board members, not just the ones in our little portion of the county, then we might see some progress. And, the non-partisan issue is a bunch of crap. If the schools are being used to run political agendas then we should be informed of the political parties of those running for office! Bring back the disclosure of the political party, otherwise we have nothing other than a name on a sign to guide us toward an understanding of how a particular person will vote on issues that concern us.

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Last comment… the Governor would not be unseating elected officials, per se. He has authority to suspend them. They can then appeal the decision and possibly get reinstated individually. And they can always run for re-election.

Don’t feel sorry for the three new board members. They were all deeply entrenched in the muck of the system before they heroically decided to step up and run for these positions. No “real people” would have had time to run for an office because the maps were not completed so we didn’t even know what district we lived in, must less which one to vote in. The new ones are mentioned by SACS as aready out playing the game by the same rules as the old board, so they truly do need to all be removed and some fresh outside air brought in.

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Get rid of all the power hungry idiots on this board. Then go after the unbelievable top heavy administration that gets paid on average more than twice what teachers make.

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Dr. John, my feelings are not hurt. I just don’t think today is the day for encouraging the voices of the people to quiet down or think of another option. This is the way the chips are falling and we need to make the most of it. I appreciate hearing about your involvement and that helps qualify your opinion, but this is a different day and time and perhaps we will not be doomed to follow the same pathway to destruction.

The more people who come forward and speak the truth, the closer we will come to an understanding of all perspectives. Nothing good can come from ignorance. Keeping quiet is what the “system” wants people to do. But, communication is the only way we will ever gain understanding.

Screw the politics. This is about our children!

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I would say the DeKalb Board has had 5 years to get its rear in gear, but instead continues to steal money from its employees by hiring self serving administrators and nepotism. The Board should be fired and the new board should fire the current superintendent and asst superintendents. They don’t want to help employees survive and prosper nor the students. The students have 38 other kids in the classroom, the textbooks are falling apart and cannot be reordered. We are short textbooks and have classroom sets, but yet fees are being collected for lost books and no new ones ordered. They say they reorganized central office, but yet kept 50 plus idiots and gave them a new title. The superintendent got a new car and has a driver, she hired her plagiarizing doctor friend and yet everyone knows that a DR. knows to cite material that isn’t theirs. Spokesman say oh well he didn’t plagiarize he just forgot to give credit.. well duh… that’s plagiarism !!! Ron Ramsey is a state senator double dipping salaries.. how can you be in two places at once.. its one job or the other thank you!!! Employees haven’t gotten raises in 7 years and in fact have lost pay and I hear another 4% is coming.. it may be time for teachers to take matters into their own hands .. Chicago ring a bell with anyone!!! Our demands are not being heard yet the superintendent and principals and other staff get brand new IPhone 5’s yet we have no text books.. no raises.. huge class sizes.. unbalanced classes.. how can one class have 38 kids and another have 8.. yes its true.. 8 kids in one class and 38 in another!!! People can’t keep looking out for themselves.. they have to look at the whole system. Employees are in need of some kind of raise.. in this economy you would think we could fill a secretary position at a school.. no one wants to work for DeKalb.. they can’t keep bus drivers.. enough is enough.. clean sweep is needed and don’t look back. Good by board.. good bye super and cronies.. hello someone with morality and values. They took Premier out of Premier DeKalb because it was a LIE!!! Have some cajones and help DeKalb prosper…

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If providing a sound education to students is a priority then this Dekalb County school board needs to be immediately removed.
Too many students, for too long have been negatively impacted by their ineptness, foolishness, incompetence, corruption etc.

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I would ask the state board to follow their best judgment and do the right thing. Having watched their proceedings yesterday, I realized what a mockery of decorum our board actually is. The state board conducted themselves as well-trained, respectful adults who are capable of conducting business in an intelligent, respectful manner and always with the mindset of what’s best for the children. Our board members just didn’t seem to actually get it. They interrupted the state board members, denied their own personal contributions to the demise, seemed oblivious to the connection between what is taught and how they behave and had no real plan of action for saving the accreditation – just empty promises and denial.

We have not been a big fan of the idea of an appointed board. However, after seeing the difference between this state board and our own, we saw the first glimmer of hope for DeKalb. We actually felt for the first time like the future of our school system may actually, even if temporarily, be in capable hands.

Now, let’s just hope and pray that the politics do not corrode this process and no one succumbs to a death of natural causes between now and Feb. 21. Sometimes the best way out is to just close your eyes, cross your fingers and put the pedal to the metal. Let’s go DeKalb! The squeaky wheels are about to fall off this bus and, guess what? We actually had the ability to fly all along!

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Affirmative action and political correctness have RUINED education and the country. It is long past time for everything to be based on merit! It is obvious that the majority of the school board are incompetent and they must be terminated. Base your decisions on merit, on what’s best for education, on what’s best for the taxpayers! It’s time to consider taxpayers and stop with the political correctness!r your comments here

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I’d tell them to allow democracy to run it’s course. We elected these folks to do a job and do not need a state that ranks 2 slots from the bottom nationally to appointing members for us. Slavery is over folks, the days of telling us black folks what to do are long gone. If the state removes any of our elected officials there will be a price to pay.

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If you are a teller in a bank and you mismanage funds continually you will be fired and if the funds are alot you will be prosecuted.

If you are a cashier in a retailer and you mismanage your till, you lose your job.

If manage a business and you cannot account for your labor costs and operation costs and customers are complaining and leaving, you lose your job.

If you are on the DCSB you just say that you are TRYING to correct the problems and part of the problem is that the public does not trust us, thus trying to shift part of the blame on the public themselves.

Investigate, fire and if perhaps prosecute. Replace the Board.

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