The piece is about a conference of the Education Equality Project, co-sponsored by "strange bedfellows" Schools Chancellor Joel I. Klein and the Rev. Al Sharpton.
I'm not sure exactly what this means:
After Education Secretary Arne Duncan spoke enthusiastically about giving mayors of large cities control over their schools, saying that “we need the collective weight of the entire city behind us,” many in the audience responded with skeptical boos.
The Flint Journal took it to mean that Duncan is proposing mayors take over the duties of the superintendent (I think).
Egads!
It's hard enough to find someone who's qualified to be mayor at the salary this city pays-much less than many of the people who report to him, which is shameful, in my opinion, no matter who's in the corner office - much less finding someone who's both qualified to be mayor and to run the school district.
Then again, that's what a school board is there for. And of course Newburyport is not a large city so we wouldn't qualify anyway.
But would we want to?
Pay the mayor what we pay the superintendent ($140,000/yr. or thereabouts) and maybe a couple of SuperPeople who could do both would take a run at it.
Just a thought ...
2 comments:
Making this even more complicated is the reality that running the Flint school system requires someone who knows how to close down half the schools in the district because of the shrinking population. That's a weird job requirement...you're an expert in education and you're asked to dismantle a school district and deal with all the frustrated parents. Not an easy job, regardless of who ends up doing it.
Gordie, our (soon to be ex-)superintendent had to do that. He had to re-configure the elementary schools because of budget shortfalls. And boy was there fallout ...
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