If you do much research you are probably aware that the agenda drivers in Washington D.C. carry their causes and money making schemes through associations. Associations are also their propaganda arm. You might remember that Common Core got its credentials as having come from the states by going through the National Governors Association. The National Governors Association is a store front in Washington D.C. Some Governors belong but few have been there.
Associations drive agendas and cut the public out. Our Helena School District is looking for a new superintendent. Since we have been hiring superintendents with the "help" of the Montana School Boards Association and firms we have only gotten superintendents with the credentials to drive the national agenda. Our school district is in desperate trouble. The budget is a mess. The superintendents who were hired to put forward agendas did not care about spending our money carefully so that we could afford maintenance for our schools. Their aim was to put in new programs, build a resume' and get out of town.
In Helena we have hired many new positions that we can not afford like writing coaches and literacy coaches and behavior interventionists. We have started whole new departments like data collection and technology. The new programs are endless and the people coming in to disturb classrooms goes on and on- I just recently wrote a blog about the new suicide prevention program which will bring in "trained" counselor types from outside into the classroom. The teachers have no say in what happens here. Every month the board is treated to an extra board meeting for what many call the "dog and pony show". These meetings are carefully orchestrated to present programs and data that make the board feel that everything they are doing is oh so successful. The board walks away patting themselves on the back and the schools continue to suffer.
The more superintendents that are hired with lists from the associations or firms the more the board talks about "openness". The last superintendent went around and had town hall type meetings in every school. He promptly did nothing at all that the people said they wanted. The board can't wait to have more and more of these meetings where they listen to the public. They listen and then they do exactly what the agenda calls for with no thought whatsoever of what the public said. I guess the agenda drivers from Washington D.C. think the American public is so stupid that these feel good public meetings will make them think they are being listened to.
Today the public is treated to "Community Relations" everywhere. One of the first things the people in Washington D.C. did when they started their programs to take over the schools was to put forward that every school should have an advertisement board outside their school announcing events and so on. Then they encouraged the creation of foundations to collect money and put ads on the radio with the honor students telling everyone who their favorite teacher was and so on. Our district has a committee solely for Community Relations. In the past when we actually had good schools we didn't need "Community Relations". Our schools spoke for themselves. They were our community relations.
Public money used for advertising and "community relations" hits me wrong. It hits me as propaganda like any tin horn dictatorship would have. People shouldn't be paying for advertising and lobbying, they should be paying for good service.
For many years our district hired new superintendents by advertising for them. They even have a personnel director now who can vet the applicants and make sure they are qualified. Our school board members are elected to make good decisions for our schools. They should be making the decision about which applicants they want to interview. It's time to hire a superintendent who really cares about our school district. Someone who wants to stay. Someone who will take care of our problems like rot and decay from not having maintained the buildings correctly or sufficiently for years. Someone who will allow our children to go to their neighborhood schools once again. Someone who will listen to the teachers and do what is right for us not what they are told from Washington D.C.
Our public schools have educated the people who have built this great nation for more than a hundred years. They didn't need Washington D.C to tell them how to do it. As we have gone through the tortures of a beloved school being shut down here because of bad maintenance decisions, we have even heard liberals say that we did well in one room school houses- it's the teacher not the building! Our country is the envy of the world because of the people who live here. We can run our own schools better than Washington D.C. can. Since Washington D.C. has taken over, Helena Schools have decayed and instruction has become harder and harder to deliver. I hope our school board here will lose the associations and firms and bring Helena home to run our own schools. We ran our own schools for more than a hundred years and we did a good job of it too.
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