Mascot Meditations

The other day at work:

Person 1: "I was an Eberwhite Tree."

Person 2: "I was a Huron River Rat."

Person 3: "That is the silliest mascot name."

Person 4 (Me): "I love that name!"

This is a garnet. Pretty, eh?
Mascot for my high school.
Photo courtesy of Glenn Klein under a
Creative Commons license. http://bit.ly/14vLZNb

I have always preferred mascot names that convey the sense of place, or that say--in some small way--we are unique, we have our own identity. As it happens, at my high school, our mascot was not a mascot at all. It was a garnet, a semi-precious stone. I was told that when the school was excavated, a large garnet--too big to move--was found in the basement. I don't know if that's the true story, but I always liked the image of the garnet in the basement. (There was a big rock that was left in the basement of my house growing up as well, which might be why I found the story believable.)




The sense of place is why I love the Eberwhite Tree mascot. After all, Eberwhite Woods is right there. It is why I was so disappointed at the choice of Eagles for Skyline.

I have loved the name the Willow Run Flyers, with the nod to Willow Run's history as a bomber plant and an airfield.

And although I can live with the new name of the Ypsilanti Community Schools Grizzlies (and I appreciate the feeling that they should pick a "new" name), the new school district is really rising from the ashes of the old, so wouldn't the Ypsilanti Phoenix be more appropriate? Or--even better--the Phoenix Flyers? Phoenixes do fly. . . at least in fantasy novels. Oh well.

In any case, the Huron High School web site has a lovely write-up about how the Huron student body became the River Rats--find it below.

MASCOTDuring 1967-68, a new Ann Arbor High School was being constructed and there was a problem. The school that was to be Huron did not yet have a mascot.

Before the school even opened, Ann Arbor High students who were not going to be relocated to Huron came up with the nickname "River Rat". They used the name as a joke to refer to their newly rivaled classmates who would attend a school built on the
Huron River and near an old medical waste site. But the Huron students turned the joke around, and they, too began referring to themselves with pride as River Rats.

One of the versions of the River Rats logo.
Found online at: a2schools.org

 Administration felt differently about their issue of the River Rat. Huron's first principal, Paul Meyers, had an especially strong dislike of rats after bad experiences with them as captain overseas during World War II. So the nickname was ignored for the most part, and when Huron's construction finally completed, "River Rat" did not appear to be in the running as mascot.

When Huron was opened in 1969, its mascot was intended to be the Huron. However, this mascot did not draw much enthusiasm or support from the students, and shortly after its opening, Huron had a write-in student ballot to determine a few choices for a possible alternative. Several of the more popular choices, including the Highlanders, the Hawks and the Indians, were put on a ballot during the student elections that year. The River Rat never made it to that ballot. 

However, none of the listed mascots could muster up fifty percent of the votes and student kept writing in "River Rat" instead of selecting a given choice on the ballot. Huron went several years without a mascot, during which time local newspapers started referring to Huron sports teams by the old nickname. Baseball players became Bat Rats and wrestlers became Mat Rats.It was the media that validated the name River Rats.
Over time, the name eventually stuck and became ingrained in Huron's history.

Taken from About Huron on the Ann Arbor Public Schools web site.

The Evolution of Ypsilanti Community Schools, Part II

You may want to first read The Evolution of Ypsilanti Community Schools, Part I.

People are wondering some other things as well.

3. At a recent combined board meeting, the head of the (I heard this second-hand, but I think it was the) Ypsilanti custodians' union got up to speak to the board about the fact that they had been told that while teachers and administrators would get benefits for themselves and their families, the custodians, paraprofessionals, office staff, and more would only be able to get individual health benefits. 

According to a May 13, 2013 report in the Ypsilanti Courier, 

Menzel said the most significant difference [in terms of employment] is that some employees won't be eligible for spousal or family coverage. While teachers, administrators, and several other groups of staff members will receive options for single, spousal, or family coverage, other groups, such as paraprofessionals and custodial staff, will only be offered single person coverage.

And although this may be correct (based on other conversations I've had), I didn't get that from reading the minutes for the May 9, 2013 meeting, which state:  

Approval of Terms and Conditions Recommendation for Benefits
Scott Menzel, Washtenaw Intermediate School District Superintendent, provided a presentation that included the following information: Trustees Raglin and Myers served on the Terms and Conditions Committee, how the consulting firm McGraw-Wentworth was chosen, overall benefit concepts, investigating other benefit plan designs, review of current benefit plans, the McGraw-Wentworth recommendation was to stay as simple as possible as Ypsilanti Community Schools is launched and have all employees participate in a single program of benefits that may include some benefit choices and some optional employee paid plans, all benefit plans and levels should be available to all employees, the district has to follow the Personal Protection Affordable Care Act (PPAC), employees must work 30 hours per week to qualify for benefits, implementation of a new hire waiting period for employees not previously a part of either district, set a clear limit on duration of benefits extended due to disability, establishing the cap structure, plans outside the cap, offer optional life insurance arrangements that allow employees to purchase up to $100,000 coverage, a flexible spending account for health care and dependent care will be available, offering employees that enroll in the High Deductible Health Plan the ability to deposit pre-tax income into a Health Savings Account (HSA), the new district is opting for a fully insured plan. In conclusion, Superintendent Menzel thanked staff members and Trustees Raglin and Myers for the many hours spent working on the recommendation.

A motion was made by Trustee Raglin, supported by Trustee Myers:
That the Unified Board of Education adopt the attached Terms and Conditions
Recommendation for Ypsilanti Community School employee benefits. Action Recorded: 5/Yes; 0/No. 

Read the items referred to as the "attached Terms and Conditions Recommendation" in this board packet. I don't see where it recommends that some groups get individual coverage only and others get family coverage. If you see where it says that, can you point it out?

4. In fact, I have specifically asked WISD Supt. Scott Menzel and Emma Jackson (WISD Communications Director and former Ypsilanti Public Schools communications staff person) about compensation (both salaries and benefits) for custodians, paraprofessionals, office staff, etc. I got this answer back from Emma Jackson: 

Compensation for support staff employees is still being constructed and has not been approved by the board of education. 

Well, at least that explains why custodians and paraprofessionals are complaining that they haven't even been interviewed. 

[Update 6/5/2013: A person emailed me to say that she believed that those same custodians and paraprofessionals will have their benefits end on 6/30/2013, while teachers' benefits will continue through the summer. If that is true, that is another difference.]

What it does not explain is:

1. Why haven't many of the non-teaching staff been interviewed?
2. Why haven't salary ranges, minimally, been set?
3. Is it true that certain job positions will not get benefits for their families? Has this been approved by the board? Is this morally defensible? [Let's set aside, just for the moment, the fact that most of the paraprofessionalss and custodians have salaries that are low enough that their children, at least, qualify for Medicaid.]

The Evolution of Ypsilanti Community Schools, Part 1

As the weeks wind by, and numerous "lasts" at the Willow Run and Ypsilanti schools pass, I'm hearing numerous complaints about the development of the Ypsilanti Community Schools. 

Now you might think that this really has something to do with the Elizabeth Kubler-Ross's Five Stages of Grief: Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. You might think that people are so sad to see Ypsilanti and Willow Run schools go, that they are having trouble moving on. But I don't think so. 

Consider the fact that the people of Ypsilanti and Willow Run voted for the consolidation. I don't know if I would have, but they did--and that vote is a significant sign that there was a common belief that it was time to consolidate.

Yet today, if I had a dollar for every time somebody told me, "If I'd known X was going to happen I wouldn't have voted for consolidation," I'd have enough for some fine dining experiences. 

I've talked to numerous people who desperately want the new Ypsilanti Community Schools to be successful. And yet, at the same time, since they are so unsure of what the future holds (and since they do not like some of the decisions made by the board) they are making plans to send their own children to other school districts, to charter schools, or to private schools. 

I know that the new board, and the current/forthcoming superintendents, have a tough row to hoe. The consolidation is a big job with a very short timeline. Given that, there are bound to be mistakes made. Yet those very mistakes, at the same time, cut into the likelihood of the survivability of the district. 

Examples:

1. I was told that while the YCS board was meeting regularly, meeting minutes were hard to find. I asked the WISD where to find the minutes. First I got this response from Scott Menzel: 

Until July 1st, there aren't separate minutes for YCS.  Ypsilanti Public Schools and Willow Run Community Schools are operating independently and post minutes (I suspect these are available on each of their websites).  The boards convene joint meetings when discussing matters related to Ypsilanti Community Schools and each district should also have those minutes recorded as a part of the record for the individual district.  Once the new district starts, minutes will be posted on the district's website (ycschools.us).

So there is a bit of a legal fiction here, because of course YCS doesn't exist yet, but the two boards (which are the combined appointed board for the new district) are in fact making lots of decisions that will affect the new school system. The good news is that when I asked again (because I actually had looked at the web sites and couldn't find the minutes, I got this response: 

You indicated you were looking for the minutes for the joint board meeting (decisions made pertaining to YCS) and those can be found on the following site:
https://www.ypsd.org/district/board/board-meetings-jan-dec-2013/ 

(So apparently they are not on the Willow Run or WISD web sites, but at least they are somewhere! I suggest that you bookmark the site. The discussions/decisions affecting both school districts are called "joint meetings.") 

2. I've also heard lots. . . and lots. . . and lots of complaints about the teacher hiring process. Perhaps you have heard them too. Maybe you read the annarbor.com article about how slow the WISD has been in getting information about their scoring process to teachers. Now, everybody knew that they couldn't hire all of the teachers (or all of the anybodies) back. Nonetheless, people are raising concerns that the system was in some way rigged. Why does this matter? Beyond the basic issue of equity, there is a lot of concern that certain people (say, for example, active union members) were kept out even though they were excellent teachers. I have never seen any of these teachers teach, by the way, so I am in no way weighing in on the hiring decisions per se, but I do know that hiring issues can potentially lead to a lot of expensive and time-consuming lawsuits. For instance, I've heard outrage about the fact that Krista Boyer (Ypsi Public Schools union president), Matt Kazmierski (Ypsi Public Schools Band Director and DTE 2013 Educator of the Year), and Aaron Rose (Ypsi High School principal) were not rehired. About Aaron Rose, on the Ypsilanti Community Schools Supporters facebook page, the authors wrote today: 

More bad news: The well-liked and exceptionally qualified Aaron Rose applied for principal, assistant principal/AD, and assistant principal and has been turned down for all three. Given the remarkable job he has done working with a skeleton administrative crew at the high school, the award he was given by students and staff, and what our prior superintendent admitted was little help from him providing stability at the high school, this comes across as a particularly shortsighted and arbitrary decision by the district.

And the Ypsilanti Community Schools Supporters are school boosters!
[Are you wondering why all of my examples are from Ypsilanti and not Willow Run? I know a lot more people there!]

People are wondering--why was an outside athletic director hired when most people seemed to like both the Willow Run and Ypsilanti ADs?

OK, so people are wondering...

Look for Part II tomorrow.

What Should We Look For in a New Superintendent? Survey Results, Part III

Forty people took my survey! Here are the results. I've split them into three parts. Part III is the post you are reading: Looking to the future, what qualities do you think are important for the next superintendent?

Part I: Did you have personal experiences with Pat Green? Based on those experiences, how did you feel about her? Can you give concrete examples?

Part II: Do you have any thoughts/ideas about why Pat Green is leaving?

And then there is what you could think of as Part IV: My Commentary.

Part III: Looking to the future, what qualities do you think are important for the next superintendent?


Vision, gets A2.

Someone who will stay a while and will see assessment as an evil that must be minimized, not voluntarily expanded.

Clean up the building principal ranks. 

Lower pay. Knows the district. Can hit the ground running. Can listen to what teachers have to say. Is willing to work with the diverse community but also the diversity of programs. Understands how to foster better teaching and more investment from the community.

Someone who is clearly not one step away from retirement.  Stop the revolving door. It hurts the district. 

An in house candidate?

Superintendents who are nearing the end of their career and who are likely to retire are the sorts of people who might not last a long time in the superintendent's job.

Someone who comes up with solutions, not excuses as to why we can't do something

Internal candidate or local leader.  Someone who will lead the district, rather than manage.  Collaboration is key.

Transparency, working with the community, interaction with teachers and parents.

Experience with AAPS.

Perseverance, local ties.

We need someone who will use the "bully pulpit" to reach out and engage the community, as well as be active in advocacy to preserve our local public schools. We need someone who can take on the AAPS "culture," separate good from bad, and fix issues of leadership and trust.

Someone more invested in the community.

Hire from within, or at least nearby. Find someone who knows AA, knows the mess of Michigan politics, and isn't trying to impose some model they developed elsewhere without knowing about this community and what our priorities are. And who won't run when the job proves to be difficult.
        I would also appreciate it if the hiring process took into account more of the superintendent's philosophy and education background. How about we recruit the Clarkston Superintendent?

Communication, visibility, toughness.

See above. [Ed. Note: I think commenter means his/her earlier comment as to why Pat Green is leaving. The comment related to the large size of the impending budget cuts.] Someone has to get the entire city behind the fact that public schools are under a heavily funded, coordinated siege from big-business, school privatization interests. Everybody needs to man the ramparts or they will take down the public schools and children will be force-fed their ""education"" in office parks, at computer terminals administered by minimum wage attendants. Think McDonalds. All special programs such as art, theater, sports, special ed, film-making, etc., will be served a la carte for extra $$. 
       If you look at the education-related companies with public stock, they are involved in testing prep (Kaplan- the Wash Post! no wonder they get great press coverage..), charter schools (K12, BASIS, CSMC, Edison, NHA, etc), food service, maintenance contracting, ""education"" software (News Corp!!). If you wonder why the curriculum has gone so far toward standardized testing, look who's making money in test prep; If you wonder why school lunch programs are stuck in the 60's, look who's making money shoveling that crap at our kids; if you wonder why all the big ideas involve computers in the classroom, look who will make money getting rid of teachers; and so on...
      Someone needs to step forward and make people understand that this is what is happening and that everyone needs to pitch in or there will be no stopping it. 
      In the early 70's, think tanks were staring at, what is now, a $500b education budget and started scheming to get their hands on it. 40 years later...

Don't be bullied by the BOE.

Someone who knows Ann Arbor, who has risen from the ranks, perhaps. Someone who is communicative and is a willing part of the community. Someone who REALLY wants to stay for 8 years or more.Don't spend thousands of dollars on a consultant to help with the search, either.

Someone who knows the district's history, is truly involved and engrossed in the community, someone who has teaching experience, someone who is truly an advocate for teachers and students, not just testing.

Strong commitment to educational equity. Long-term commitment to community.

Great communication skills (not just sending out e-mails) - making very public appearances, recording videos of short inspirational talks, being visible in ALL schools, making some clear decisions, and not being afraid to cut administrative and superintendent pay.

"Man" of the people, good with finances.

Commitment to the community, understanding of Michigan education system and funding models (cuz we are weird).

Visible leadership in the community.  Visionary leadership.

1. continue line item accounting - it just seems reasonable.
2. good people skills - listening, communicating, directing.  
3. willing to talk about the achievement gap so that our whole community understands why it is important to them to reduce/eliminate it.  We need to really keep communication open about this - especially when we need to start making some deep cuts.  
4.  coordinate with the AAEF to fund X  and Y so that class sizes stay small and we can keep our ""specials.""  for example, in budget talks, say ""we can't raise taxes to pay teachers, but we can give money to AAEF so that they can pay our Media Specialists so our schools have this valuable teacher resource.""  We do this for 3-5 grade spanish, why not with other programs?
5.  It would be great if the new superintendent could tap into the resources in our community that are willing to get involved, but just historically get shut down.  Parents in the schools are a good thing - statistics show that involved parents = higher achieving students.  Our communities most valuable assets are not the dollars we make, but the skills and expertise that we can share.  

Able to serve as an intermediary and a translator between the public and the AAPS staff. Ability to offer some resistance to the tendency to technocratically manage ("Balasize") the district as a collection of abstract assets and liabilities.

Someone who is familiar with the Ann Arbor School district. Staff at all levels have made sacrifices in the recent past so the students would not feel the cuts (pay cuts, wage freeze, specials and support teachers taking on two or more buildings, etc). With each change of Superintendent and School Board that is getting forgotten.  

Pat Green Resigns: Survey Results, Part II

Forty people took my survey! Here are the results. I've split them into three parts. Part II is the post you are reading: Do you have any thoughts/ideas about why Pat Green is leaving?

Part I: Did you have personal experiences with Pat Green? Based on those experiences, how did you feel about her? Can you give concrete examples?

Part III: Looking to the future, what qualities do you think are important for the next superintendent?

And then there is what you could think of as Part IV: My Commentary.

The question we're addressing in Part II is, as I put it, the rumor/innuendo question: 

Do you have any thoughts/ideas about why Pat Green is leaving?

She realized she was not a good fit with "culture " here.

Because she can, and she didn't really ever want to be here.

You have people like the principal at the Dicken that does very little that you need to deal with and justify their high salary.

She is facing resistance and hostility. There are too many overpaid people at Balas who are not listening to ideas and challenges. She has fostered that, and now there is mutiny afoot from within and from the community. There are also a huge number of problems that would take a greater commitment than, perhaps, she is willing to give.

None. 

She is a good person who values education, and doesn't want to be the one to do the cuts. 

To spend more time with family.

She doesn't even live here?

She did a poor job.

She was overly confident when she was hired.  Her management style was inconsistent with AAPS culture and she refused to work with AAEA and AAAA.  She left when it was obvious she was not achieving her goals and could not be successful in AAPS.

She has to make hard decisions on budget cuts and is already unpopular--so decided to retire so she didn't get booed out of town.

Didn't want to face the fallout from upcoming budget cuts?

She recognized very early (probably six months in)  that she wasn't actually a good fit with the board and the community. It's a community that – outside of AAPS – doesn't call her (or anyone other than physicians) "doctor." She didn't care for the fact that she was expected to make herself available and accessible to the community. Meet with upset parents?? Not something she felt was part of her job. Mexicotte's letter, in its commentary on Green's involvement with the community, was generous to the point of creating fiction. Green stayed just long enough not to make it completely embarrassing for herself and the district. This way it was only somewhat embarrassing. 

No idea. There's no doubt that the job would really suck right now. No one wants to preside over the dismantling of a great school district. And with the main problems in Lansing, there's not a whole lot we can do from here. The board may have lost confidence, or they all may have decided that she has become too much of a lightning rod. So she'll be responsible for the massive cuts, and someone new gets to take on the rebuilding. Or there's always family/health issues.

She has lost community support because she appears to be inaccessible to many parents and teachers. She hides behind her minions.

It's a really hard job. I think the board hoped that by paying her a LOT more than her predecessor she would feel obligated to stick around while the state guts public education. If you don't have any connection to the community it is easy to leave. 

Not what she signed on for. Tough budgets, lots of scrutiny, lots of vocal parents with conflicting goals, the whole Skyline white elephant in the room.

"If I had to guess, I'd say she probably felt cutting the budget a further $17-20m was not doable without massively unpopular layoffs and cuts to programs and closing schools. She'd already gotten an icy welcome from the townsfolk and so the landscape ahead probably looked akin to scouring the Shire.
That said, I saw no evidence of her being any sort of transformational leader. Not of the sort that will be necessary to keep public schools together under the massive multi-decade right wing privatization machine.

The budget deficit.  She referred to the elephant in the room.  Realign the attendance areas so that kids could go to their neighborhood schools reducing the need for many bus routes. BOE wasn't willing to listen to her.  She was fighting an uphill battle.

Really don't know, but how nice she got to pad her retirement fund by 55k in two years! I want a job like that. Seriously, I don't know why except that she couldn't take the heat. And what's with Mexicotte's fawning letter? Did she write it or did Pat Green?

She seems old and tired, and frankly if I was her, I wouldn't be up to the challenge in a community that I have no ties to.  There's really no repercussions for her leaving - she's at the end of her career.  There doesn't seem to be any ethical issue for her in regard to not filling out her contract of 5 years or ditching AAPS in this crucial moment.

Ann Arbor turned out to be harder than she thought. Too much micro managing (not a good fit for her monarchy like style) and too much bad news from the state legislature and governor.

Tough to work with the board, didn't like the commute back home to husband, not looking forward to implementing budget cuts.

No.  But polished, professional folks don't just up and leave like this, so there is a story to which we are not privy.

I wonder about the relationship with the board of education - were they really so supportive of each other?  I also sense she did not have the backing of the central administration and other district employees.  It is hard not to be liked.
I am worried about a future selection.  I think we need someone that can hold their own against the BOE - they are powerful and coordinated and there should be a check and a balance for them.  Elections do this to some extent, but we also need more qualified people willing to run.  This of course is a whole 'nother topic!

Nope. I have no doubt she wanted to retire, as she claims. Whether that means she was never truly that invested in the community or the job... that feels plausible, but I have no evidence that it's true.

Teachers showed they were willing to take a pay cut for the students in the district. Once the "what pay cut will you take" ball was in the administrators' court she decided to pack it in. 

Pat Green Resigns: Survey Results, Part I

Forty people took my survey! Here are the results. I've split them into three parts. Part I is the post you are reading.

Part II: Do you have any thoughts/ideas about why Pat Green is leaving?
Part III: Looking to the future, what qualities do you think are important for the next superintendent?

And then there's what you could think of as Part IV: My Commentary.

But first, Part I of the Survey:

As you can see, 2/3 of the people who responded had never seen Pat Green in person or had only seen her from afar. By the way: I didn't take the survey, but if I had, I would have said I had only seen her from afar: at Skyline's graduation; at a budget meeting; and at school board meetings. But I have never spoken directly with her. In other words, don't take not having seen her as a sign of being disengaged with education in the Ann Arbor school district. I think it only highlights her lack of communication with people outside a limited circle. I have met several of her cabinet members multiple times.

You can see that 20% of people who responded had no opinion about Pat Green's work. Nearly all of those (7/8) were people who had never even seen Pat Green in person. On the other hand, 2/3 of the people who responded had a somewhat negative or very negative opinion of Pat Green.

Only two people who had regular contact with Pat Green responded. However, I think it's important to note that those two people had very positive feelings about her.

Can you give any concrete examples of why you feel the way you do?


Very Negative: She didn't really know how to talk about anything other than Pat Green.
Very Positive: She was hired by a bunch of  special interest Board Members. Support their cause and you do fine. Green felt that every student was important and no special interest group is more important than the group as a big hole,. She had the integrity to make that point known and that upset the special interest people. Same thing happended to Todd Roberts.

Very Negative: Her tenure there has been problematic as she is one of three people at the top that have no experience with AAPS, and instead of getting to know the district and variety of programs, she has spent a great deal of time running things from the top. Additionally, she was hired in at too large of a pay package, that is the fault of the school board.

Somewhat Positive: She told someone I know that she supported the arts.  She seemed engaged at the school board meeting.

No Opinion: The district's information sharing politics were centralized, making it necessary to submit formal FOIA requests when making routine requests for information. I don't see that as a step in the right direction.

Somewhat Negative: "The story about using a ""peace flag"" to reduce discipline infractions. The raises given to administrators. The inability to balance the budget. The exorbitant salary that returned mediocre results."

Somewhat Negative: Did not work with AAEA and AAAA [Ed. Note: teachers' union and administrators' union].  Did not understand A2 culture.

Very Negative: Lack of interaction with parent and community. New testing requirements that are not clear

Somewhat Negative: "Discipline Gap," accessibility, disjointed communication

Somewhat Negative: Asking various departments of the administration to give annual reports to the board was well conceived but poorly executed. These reports were implemented by claiming large chunks of board meeting time for their presentation. Guess what: AAPS board members can read (reportedly). The reports should have been distributed publicly via BoardDocs a week in advance. Board members could be expected to do their homework. Five minutes of overview plus 10 minutes of board questions at the meeting. That way you don't have meetings that last until 3 a.m.
         Her letter was poorly executed. She portrayed the decision as just the normal course of events. If you leave 2 years into a 5 year contract, I think you owe some kind of acknowledgment that, things didn't go as intended. At least say: I had intended to stay longer, but ..."" and fill in something fluffy if you like after the ""but ...""  But her resignation letter should have at least owned the fact that this was a premature departure.

Very Positive: I thought she was really committed to addressing some of the problems AAPS faces, especially with regard to serving the most vulnerable children. (Bringing James Comer here was a strong signal.) I also thought that she gave AAPS a much-needed shaking up.

Somewhat Negative: She hides behind jargon. Often to misdirect her real meaning. 

Somewhat Negative: She was a lousy listener--the meetings I attended, all she did was talk about herself. Her role at these meetings was to hear from a specific community of parents (she was not invited to give a presentation) but they never got a word in edgewise. I felt steamrolled. When I compared her to how Todd Roberts interacted with the same group of parents, I was not impressed by her. She had her agenda and didn't listen to anyone else. I actually supported some of her agenda (emphasis on Positive Behavior Plans for discipline, for example) but because there were plenty of things that she advocated that I disagree with, I knew that I wouldn't be heard. I found it hard to work with someone who wasn't willing to listen.
I do think she did a decent job advocating with Lansing, but they are such a bunch of nutjobs that even a steamroller doesn't have much effect.

Somewhat Negative: The invisible woman. So, she has stood and waved at Bands in Review, but that's about all I can say about her, other than her willingness to take a pay cut/forego a raise, whatever that was. It could be the decline of local media that contributed to her invisibility -- we all know the Dotcom would rather highlight car crashes that get clicks -- but in contentious times the superintendent needs to be out front.

No Opinion: I think she had a very high bar of expectations as soon as it was learned how large her salary was going to be. Then the fact that she was not an Ann Arbor local added to a sense that the board believed that the local pool of talent and ideas was insufficient. This put a chip on the shoulder of Ann Arbor and she carried that into the job.
She never shook the façade of being aloof- but that impression of her may have been due to the fact that, not being local, she didn't know anybody.

Somewhat Negative: Her starting salary, I blame the BOE mostly for that.  Took over 6 months to appoint a principal to Pioneer.

Somewhat Negative: My sense was that she wasn't communicative to staff and to families. I don't recall the issue exactly,but I remember her response to a question regarding an issue re:AAPS was that the questioner should just FOIA for an answer. I also thought she was way over paid, that the board shouldn't have bumped the salary up so high. Then it came out that she was the highest paid Superintendent in the State! Not good. I was surprised  to read that she hadn't spent time in each AAPS building. Seems like it should be a priority for most Superintendents. Finally, I know this is petty but she parks in staff-only spots where they hold the AAPS board meetings. Parking is free on the streets, and even if it wasn't AAPS would pay for parking.

Somewhat Negative: I'm a teacher in the Ann Arbor Public Schools District, and I struggle to come up with positive, long-lasting things Pat Green has done for our district.  She may have visited our school once, but I only recall seeing her from afar.  

Somewhat Negative: I have negative impressions simply based on 1)  I haven't seen much in regard to fiscal decisions made, 2)  She did not advocate for transparency, and 3)  Balas still spent much money on retreats and food deliveries while some teachers are buying their own supplies.

Somewhat Negative: I have not heard of her looking to actual teachers for any input on running the district.

Somewhat Negative: She didn't/doesn't seem to have a very open approach to sharing information.

Somewhat Positive: Based on conversations with Dr. Green, she was positioning Ann Arbor not only to take a leadership role in the county but also to provide income-producing services to other Districts and ultimately to position Ann Arbor for a leadership role if consolidation were inevitable.

Very Negative: 1.  Non-transparency of her administration.  This includes meetings that continue into the wee hours to make decisions, information available only through the slow process of FOIA, 
2.  A good leader gets everyone on board so they can be cheerleaders of your vision.  She failed to do this.  For example, the ""discipline gap"" - giving school administrators the education adn training to discipline effectively within the new guide lines and so that they could educate thier communities about why the district is changing course with discipline would have been helpful. 
3.  She did not seem to have a relationship with the BOE or any principal or teacher that I know.  The position is ""political"" and unfortunately, you must do some hand shaking in this position.  She didn't seem to be very good at this.

Somewhat Negative: She seemed to be a very top-down manager--you can construe this as "empowering" her subordinates, or as removing herself from the day to day hurlyburly, but I would prefer to see a more hands-on, more collegial and less hierarchical management style.

Very Negative: Dr. Greene  did not put effort into trying to be a part of the Ann Arbor community.  She physically had a wall built around her office area at Ballas and never lived in Ann Arbor.  She flew home weekly to be with her family.  One wonders if she even worked a full week in order to fly back to be with her family. 

Testing Tales

I'm hoping to do a series about testing--talking about the MEAP, the MAP, the ACT, the SAT, the MME, etc. But it's such a vast subject and I've been a little bit stymied as to how to break it up. Add to that conundrum a busy schedule and I've been thinking about how to write this up for a couple of months now, but I haven't actually set pen to paper [rereading this, I feel I should note--that is just a figure of speech!]. Now I have decided I will move from inward to outward. In other words, I'm going to start with myself.

I've never been a particularly anti-test person. I always thought that test taking was a skill that people needed, just like writing, arithmetic, or learning how to tie a shoelace. But I also thought we shouldn't overemphasis tests.

For myself, I have pleasant memories of filing into the school cafeteria to take the Iowa tests. I was lucky that my name wasn't something long like Smolensky or Blagojevich [sneaky reference to a former Illinois governor who is going to jail this week] because they were too long to fit in the bubbles. And of course I made sure to fill in the bubbles well with my newly-sharpened #2 pencil.

Do you remember the Iowa tests? They have a long history. They were first developed in 1935. The Iowa tests are what are called "norm-referenced" tests.  In other words, they score test-takers on a bell curve. Some students will be above average; the majority will be average; and some students will be below average.  [Below, there is a drawing of a bell curve. See how it looks like a bell? Hence the name.]

The Bell Curve

The idea behind a norm-referenced test is that it describes a population's distribution. In other words, not everyone will perform well--some people will perform poorly. But in a particular population (say, for example, Lake Wobegon, where "all the children are above average,") all of the kids could score to the right of the center line--and would look good when compared Lake Woestayhere, where all the kids are below average.

On the other hand, you can see the problem. In the broader population, it is impossible for everybody to score well. Half the test-takers would have to be below average. If a large population moves its scores (everyone starts reading better), then the bell curve shifts to the right--but still, half the kids are below average. Also, norm-referenced tests tend to focus on the kinds of questions that differentiate between students, and not the kinds of questions that show proficiency in certain areas. In other words, the point of the test is to rank students.

If, by chance, you have ever had a teacher who "graded on the curve" or "curved the grades," that teacher was working toward a certain middle ground. If she or he expected that most of the class would get a B, but the average grade was a C, they might think "I guess I made that test too hard" and they would move the average up to a B. I was very thankful for that in college physics, where my C- turned into a B- thanks to a professor's curving of the final exam.

In my test-taking heyday--which might have been eighth or ninth grade--I enjoyed the tests as a break from my regular school work. I enjoyed completely filling in the circles. I didn't feel any pressure about the tests, because a) they didn't mean much of anything and b) I always scored well on tests. In other words, whether it was an Iowa test or an IQ test (which is also scored on the bell curve), I was always well along on the right-hand side of that curve.

I never had test anxiety, which definitely helped.

But it's also true that students who fit my profile tended to do well. And of course, doing well is positively reinforcing. And since I did well the first time, why get nervous about the next year's test?

What, you might wonder, is "my profile?" Well, to begin with, I lived in a primarily white, upper middle/middle class town. I had two well-educated parents, both with graduate degrees. I had lots of books in my house. Only one of my grandparents had finished high school, but they all could read in more than one language. It turns out that the confluence of a comfortable income and an educated, literate family lead a certain population to do very well on tests. And that is true, whether the test is a norm-referenced test like the Iowa tests, or a criterion-referenced test like the MEAP.

Criterion-referenced tests sound, on paper, a lot better. In a sense, they are more like the kinds of tests that we took in high school. If you were taught the future tense in a language class, you would be expected to demonstrate that knowledge on a test. Theoretically, every student in the class could get an A if they had studied and mastered the future tense. And in this simple example, that might actually happen.

In real life, in criterion-referenced tests like the MEAP, that never happens. There are a lot of reasons for this, but here are a few.
1. Students come in with different weaknesses. If one of those weaknesses is reading, that will show up in every single other test. The social studies and science tests--and even the math tests--require a lot of reading.
2. The "cut scores," as to what "proficiency" means, change. That just happened this year in Michigan, and guess what--a lot of kids who looked "proficient" last year don't look proficient this year. Even though they might have actually done better.
3. Not all teachers teach everything that might be on the tests. And even if they cover the subject matter, the questions might be unintelligible to the student. Take, for instance, an example that a teacher gave me a few years ago. Her students (upper elementary) had a question on the reading comprehension exam about logging. Yes, I'm talking about the cutting down of trees. Her students, however, had a different understanding of logging. One logs into a computer, and logs out of a computer. . .  That reading comprehension passage made no sense at all to those kids.

But anyway, back to me. I've now had two children go through the college application process. They've taken a lot of tests. Like me when I was growing up, they have two parents with graduate degrees. Like me growing up, they live in a middle class community--and an academic community too! That is another kind of privilege. Like me, they did relatively well.

And my youngest son? He said to me, "I like the tests."
"Really? Why?" I asked.
"Well," he said, "we don't do any work during the testing periods!"

And that's Part I. More about testing, coming soon to a blog near you.

Of Presidents and Project-Based Learning

This is a great story about how a 12-year-old girl went above and beyond with a school project, and found out that all of the U.S. presidents except one are related to a certain King John, the one who agreed to the Magna Carta. If you were wondering how project-based learning works, here is a good example. And if you are a genealogist, the cautionary tale here is that you shouldn't ignore the maternal line, even if it is harder to trace. . . apparently all the professionals had only looked at the paternal lines. . .

Occupy the Suggestion Box!

I get questions about the schools all the time, and often they are of the "why" or "when" variety.

In the last week, for instance, I was asked:

1. Why is my child forced to take an online class for 10th grade English because the school messed up her schedule and then there was no room for her in a regular class? (Note: this student did not want to take this class online.)  [I don't know.]

2. When is kindergarten roundup? Have the times been posted yet? [Not to my knowledge. But Community and Skyline orientations have been posted.]

3. Why do the Skyline announcements come out in an email at 7 p.m., when many events are already over? [I don't know. But my guess is that nobody has thought of adjusting the time the automated email goes out to an earlier time of day.]

4. Why is it so hard to figure out how to access the school board packets? [I don't know. Somebody thought it was a good idea to embed it in the web site's google calendar, but how would you guess you need to click "details" to find it.]

And for all of these, if there was an easy communications link. . . a way to reach somebody. . . but who? how?

School board member Christine Stead pointed out to me that there is now a virtual "budget suggestions box" on the Ann Arbor schools home page. You're forgiven if you hadn't noticed it. I'm not sure how long it's been there, but I know that I hadn't noticed it despite looking at the home page several times.

It's tucked away on the left side, as can be seen in this screen shot.

And really, it's a good start.

DO share your budget ideas! (They say they will post suggestions and responses on the web site, but I don't see them yet.)

But let's not stop there.

What we need is a real suggestion box--virtual, and maybe the old-fashioned kind in the schools as well.
We need a place for questions, and suggestions that might improve things even if they don't save money.

So what I suggest is this:

OCCUPY that suggestion box. 

USE that suggestion box. 

INFILTRATE that suggestion box.

SHARE that suggestion box. 

Use it for all kinds of questions and ideas--not just about the budget.
(But just to be perfectly clear--do use it for your budget ideas!)

And if you want a direct response, leave your name and email address, and ask for a response.

Here is a link to the suggestion form.

My first suggestion? To create a multi-topic suggestions box!

Pilgrims and Indians

True, this post is not really about Pilgrims. Growing up in an east coast town where the first European settlers arrived in 1630, and where my neighbor's ancestor came over on the Mayflower, we spent a lot of time on the Thanksgiving story, and the histories of the Pilgrims' descendants were present in the graveyards nearby.

The presence of the Indians, though, was muted. We didn't learn too much about their post-Revolutionary War history, probably because they were mostly eradicated from the Boston to Washington DC corridor. 

In college, though, I spent a month in a tiny town in South Dakota on the Cheyenne River Reservation. [It turns out that this county currently holds the honor of the poorest county in the nation.] While there, I stayed with an Indian (Sioux) family and I learned quite a bit more about Indian history. The mom in the family had gone to one of the Indian boarding schools. I hadn't heard about them, either.

So I wasn't entirely surprised (but I was disturbed) to hear this NPR special on the South Dakota foster care system and how it affects Indian kids.

I also recently got, from a friend, a curriculum/history piece about Indian boarding schools. There was one in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan that her relatives had gone to. The ones in South Dakota, I was surprised to see, are still in operation. Visit this link and scroll down for the curriculum guide. There's also a note that says additional teacher materials are coming.

And/or listen to this NPR story, Indian Boarding Schools Haunt Many.

In any case, this Thanksgiving, let's all brush up on the Indian side of the equation.

Gender Role Models in the Classroom (My Sister Writes...)

My sister recently wrote this facebook message to her friends, and I'm reposting it with her permission, because it says so very much about the way subtle information about role models gets shared.

So last night I went to my (10th grade) daughter's back to school night. Her very passionate English teacher had the walls plastered with black/white photocopied pictures of well known figures. They spanned history and included artists, writers, politicians, activists, etc. It was a very cool display, with the big caveat being that 85% of the pictures were of men, and as we all know, 52% (or thereabouts) of the population are women.
On my way out, I asked him what the pictures were for. He said they were for inspiration--pictures of inspiring or influential people who had influenced the thinking of himself and of his students over the years. I said--it's great, but you know, there are a lot more men up there than women. He kind of winced and said-- "I know. I'm kind of pained about it." Feeling somewhat dissatisfied with that answer, I said, "Well, knowing's the first step..." and left it at that, running to the other side of the high school to get to my "next class."
Apparently, today at school he asked my daughter to relay a message to me--Tell your mom to send me names of inspiring influential women. :) I have some, of course, but I'd like to send him a BIG list.
So now I ask you all to help--please send me the names of women who have inspired or influenced your thinking- I think they need to be of the somewhat famous or public figure variety.....thanks!

And in response to a friend's comment, she says:

The pictures are added as students (and he) come up with ideas so the problem is that people often don't think of the women! Not that he is being lazy. He was asking for my own ideas about it. I am simply broadening to the next. Also, to note--Anne Frank, Rosa Parks and Oprah Winfrey were represented. Not sure about the others......

When I told my sister that my daughter doesn't like it when I get involved with her teachers, and that when my daughter heard this story, she said sarcastically, "Oh, I'll bet my cousin loved that," my sister wrote me that,

Yes, she hates it too, but I couldn't let it pass by. It was too blatant. She actually took it relatively in stride.

Parents, sometimes you have to take action. (Sorry, kids! I think my daughter learned from this story that this is a family trait.) And I'll bet that this teacher will a) learn from this experience and b) really appreciate the list--and isn't teaching really about learning as well?
 
So--help us out. 
 
Share your ideas for women who should be up on this illustrious wall in the comments. I'll share them with my sister, and she in turn will share the Big List she is compiling, and I'll post it.

To get you started, I'll put up these ideas: Billie Jean King, Susan B. Anthony, Aung Suu Kyi, Louisa May Alcott, Abigail Adams, Willa Cather, Mary Shelby, Marie Curie...

Thank You

I received two nominations for the Thank You contest. I am hoping, though, that some of you will thank those staff who have been helpful to you--directly.

THANK YOU TO:   

CARINA SIETZ of the Pioneer High School English Department. Her nominator says "Her class is very demanding but interesting. She is kind and inclusive."

THANK YOU ALSO TO:

SUSAN CARPENTER from Summers-Knoll School. Her nominator says, "She is fun, works hard, and [is] very warm to her elementary kids."

I do have a few teachers I am going to thank directly. I thought about listing them directly, but decided it would compromise my semi-anonymity. Instead, I would like to take this space to thank the administrative staff at my kids' schools,  the custodial staff at my kids' schools, and the crossing guards and lunch ladies/men.

The administrative staff have helped me track down lost kids, make last-minute copies, and solve all kinds of problems. The custodial staff have cleaned up my kids' messes, and your kids' messes. The crossing guards make sure kids get to and from school safely, and the lunch staff keep the peace. I would like to give them a round of applause. 

Now, it is your turn--take time this week to thank a school staff person. 

Thank A Teacher Contest

BUMP! Tomorrow (Monday, December 7th) is the LAST DAY for this contest. So far I have 3 nominations. Surely there are more than 3 school staff worth thanking in this whole entire county! You can email me directly at rlk234 (at) gmail.com or write your thank you in the comments below. Thank you for participating.

In honor of Thanksgiving, I am hosting my own little Thank A Teacher "contest." I put contest in quotes because in true alternative education fashion, every nominee is a winner, although there are a few simple rules.

1. Nominations can be submitted through the comments below, or by sending me an email to: rlk234 (at) gmail.com.
2. You can remain anonymous, but the teacher* needs to be identified.
3. *I should put teacher in quotes too, because you could also nominate a principal, teacher's aide, school secretary, custodian, or other school staff who have made a difference in your, or your child's, life. 
4. You can nominate more than one teacher, and please write something about why you want to thank this teacher.
5. The teacher(s) you are nominating could be someone who taught you or your kids a long time ago (or is currently teaching them), but they must still be actively teaching or working in the schools.
6.  Any teacher that you want to honor needs to work in a school that serves students from Washtenaw County (It doesn't need to only serve students from Washtenaw County. For instance Plymouth-Canton, Van Buren, and charter or private school teachers can be nominated.)

And, as I said above, every teacher (or school staff person) who is nominated--and meets the qualifications above--will be a winner! 
What the teacher/staff person will get by way of thanks:
1. Their name and position/school in this blog.
2. An email from me, to them, telling them that they are being thanked through the Thank-A-Teacher contest. If you use your name, I will tell them who nominated them. (Unless you don't want them to know who is thanking them, in which case you had better say that in your nomination.)

That's all. Except maybe I should have a deadline. Say...December 7th?
Deadline: December 7, 2009

Naomi Tutu: Race and Reconciliation

RACE AND RECONCILIATION: A COMMUNITY-WIDE CONVERSATION ON RACE
WITH NONTOMBI NAOMI TUTU
November 13–November 15, 2009

From Ypsilanti to Ann Arbor, from the University of Michigan to Washtenaw Community College, in secular and religious communities, people soon will gather in Washtenaw County to take up the national discussion on race. Facilitated by international human rights activist Nontombi Naomi Tutu, this three-day dialogue will take several forms. All events are free, and everyone is encouraged to attend.
Friday, November 13, at 7:30 pm, Ms. Tutu will share her well-considered thoughts and take questions from the audience at Rackham Auditorium, in the University of Michigan Rackham School of Graduate Studies, 915 E Washington St., in Ann Arbor. Her remarks will be preceded by a book-signing in the lobby.
Saturday, November 14, at 7:30 pm, landmark documentary Long Night’s Journey Into Day will be screened, followed by a panel discussion. The panel, including Ms. Tutu and local Fox 2 News personality Huel Perkins (moderator), will consider the ways in which this intimate film about post-apartheid South Africa and its attempts to heal itself with truth might enlighten Washtenaw County’s efforts. The location is the Towsley Auditorium in the Morris Lawrence Building at Washtenaw Community College, 4800 E Huron Dr.
Sunday, November 15, Ms. Tutu will share commentary at the 10 am service at First Congregational Church of Ann Arbor, 608 E William (corner of S State St), and The Our Own Thing Chorale, conducted by Dr. Willis Patterson, will perform.

Nontombi Naomi Tutu, global citizen and daughter of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, will help guide the three-day discussion. Her sustained and visible commitment to education, dialogue, reconciliation, and social justice on issues of gender, race, and international relations has made Ms Tutu a leader in her own right. With her immediate knowledge of the realities of a divisive society and the promise of communities that work to protect and sustain the dignity of all people, she encourages us to "be willing to speak and hear the truth because then we will have our just society." Tutu, King-Chavez-Parks Visiting Professor at the University of Michigan, is Associate Director of the Office of International Programs at Tennessee State University, founder and chair (1985–1990) of the Tutu Foundation, which provides scholarships and support to South African refugees in African countries. Born in South Africa during apartheid, Tutu has lived, worked, and studied in South Africa, the U.S., and the U.K.; is a graduate of Berea College (BA, Economics and French) and the University of Kentucky (MA, International Economic Development); and is also recipient of honorary degrees from the Universal Orthodox College of Ogun State in Nigeria and Bentley College in Massachusetts. She is author of Words of Desmond Tutu and I Don't Think of You as Black: Honest Conversations on Race.

Additional Information:
RaceandReconciliation@yahoo.com
http://www.fccannarbor.org/tutu.php
http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=150279303574&ref=mf
Race and Reconciliation: A Community-wide Conversation on Race with Nontombi Naomi Tutu is co-sponsored by Ann Arbor Area Community Foundation; First Congregational Church of Ann Arbor; Second Baptist Church of Ann Arbor; Center for Afroamerican and African Studies, University of Michigan African Studies Center, Office of the President, Office of the Senior Vice Provost for Academic Affairs; Washtenaw Community College.

Ken King and some thoughts about homeschooling

Ken King died recently.
In addition to being a regular presence at the Ann Arbor Farmers' Market and an influential local organic farmer, his death reminded me of a tape I received when my kids were pretty young. The King Brothers (Ken's and Cathy's kids) made the tape For Kids By Kids before they were adolescents, and it is good music. Fun percussion and engaging voices had us singing along to "This old man, he played one, he played knick-knack ..." over, and over, and over. (As the parent of a toddler, it is always a blessing when you like the songs that they want to hear over and over and over.) You can listen to the King Brothers on MySpace right here. (Although my favorite songs are not on the MySpace playlist--my favorites were the ones that were based on nursery rhymes.)

What caught my eye, then and now, is summed up in this description taken from the MySpace site:
Preteen pop duo that delighted the Ann Arbor area with their innocent renditions of Elvis Presley tunes and surprisingly mature originals in the late 80s, early 90s. Starting at ages 11 and 7 and recording out of a small travel trailer, the brothers released five cassettes and performed at many respected venues in the area including the Ark. Most remarkable was the fact that the brothers received no assistance in the studio or otherwise in creating their music.

At the time I got For Kids By Kids, I was a year or two away from having a child in kindergarten, and I was fascinated by homeschooling, but I didn't really think that I could manage it. I was particularly interested in the idea that with homeschooling, I could really take advantage of the "teachable moment"--that kids could find something they were intrigued in, and pursue it, and pursue it.

I think I saw the notice of Ken King's death at the same time that an intense discussion of homeschooling occurred on the Teacher, Revised blog.
(See here, here, here, and here--these links are not in order, sorry--but you can always just go to the web site and search on home schooling.)
I'm not really sure why some people are so sure that public (or private) school is always superior to homeschooling, or vice versa. There are many paths. . .
Ultimately I decided that homeschooling would not be a good thing for me, but I admit that I am frequently jealous of those for whom it works. [And many parents find that it works for some number of years, and not for others. More power to them for discerning the best ways to educate their kids.]
In any case, if you want to see an example of how homeschooling can work (really well), the King Brothers tapes are an impressive place to start. And if you like what you hear, stop by the Frog Holler booth at the Ann Arbor Farmers' Market, and let them know.

Homework Policies

Teacher, Revised had an interesting interview with Sara Bennett about homework.



I'm not necessarily as anti-homework as Sara Bennett is, but I do think there's an awful lot of homework that doesn't contribute to anything. I think that a lot of teachers feel pressure to assign homework. And all of that pressure adds up to a lot of kids having a lot assignments, often non-contributing to actual academic achievement. It's also interesting to me that Sara Bennett gives math as an example where homework is unnecessary, while other people have said to me that they think that math is the one class where homework is necessary. (That tends to be the side I fall on.) But in fact, a lot of homework assignments are given in the hope that the students will learn to "organize" themselves. Do lots of small bits of homework (a worksheet here, a worksheet there) make you organized? More importantly, do they make you learn? What about "read half an hour a night" homework?


I really liked Sara Bennett's description of how she negotiates with teachers/affirms her role as a parent. Being a successful parent in the schools requires negotiation skills. Although I have to admit that my older kids almost never want me to talk to their teachers, I realized the other day--when a teacher actually called me--that that teacher had not gotten much feedback from parents, or kids. [The reason for the phone call had to do with my child giving this teacher some feedback. Yes, she was polite. It's just that I don't think he had heard that feedback before.] Schools like to create an aura of invincible power, and when we question that, we take back our power as parents, and also open up a line of communication that is important.

In other words, don't leave your critical thinking skills at home (and don't let your kids leave theirs at home, either) when you engage with the schools.

My favorite types of homework are project-based and more holistic in nature. In other words, the point of homework should be to integrate knowledge. What do you think about homework? Did you find it essential? What kinds of homework are most essential?

School to Prison Pipeline

There's no doubt that this presentation will be thought-provoking.
Monday, June 8th, 6-9 p.m., Unitarian-Universalist Congregation, 4001 Ann Arbor-Saline Road

The ACLU of Michigan Washtenaw Branch will hold its annual Jerome Strong Awards with special guests
Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn who will speak about
Juvenile Justice and the School-to-Prison Pipeline.
In addition, the Jerome Strong Civil Liberties Award will be presented to Representative Alma Wheeler Smith, the Community Leadership Award will be presented to Derrick Jackson and Rosemary Sarri will receive the Civil Liberties Champion Award.RESERVE YOUR SEAT TODAY! Admission is free for ACLU members. http://action.aclumich.org/jeromestrong2009Non-members: Join online or at the door and your admission is free. Admission is $20/individual, $30/couple, $5/students. Join or register for this event at http://action.aclumich.org/jeromestrong2009Read more about Bill Ayers & Bernadine Dohrn at http://action.aclumich.org/jeromestrong2009

I'm wondering

Community High School Dean Peter Ways is leaving. Jennifer Hein, Assistant Principal at Huron and former head of the Student Intervention and Support Services division of AAPS (yes, including special education) has been appointed the new Dean, effective July 1. Change can be nervewracking, and at a place like CHS, that is definitely true. I'm wondering--those of you who have worked with Jen Hein, what did you think? Is this a good move?

The AAPS budget presentation is available online here. (Warning--it is a very large pdf.) There is also a way to submit questions about the budget. I'm wondering--what are your good ideas for saving money? While strengthening the district, of course.

I did post some questions that I thought I might ask school board candidates. I'm wondering--do you have a few more suggestions for questions?

In other news: The Ann Arbor Open lottery occurred yesterday. There is no posted list to check. The second round of In-District Transfer applications will begin in April.