Quolke’s Corner
SBB Rally at Collinwood Thursday, March 26th
Thanks to all of our members who attended the board work session on March 10th to show our anger with SBB and lack of investment we are seeing in far to many of our schools. As I said in my speech to the board:
“The saying goes…show me your budget and I’ll tell you what you value. Last year, this Board of Education did the right thing and sent your CEO and CFO back to the drawing board because you had a greater value for our children in Cleveland. I urge you to do the same thing and make sure what you value is what is reflected in these budgets.”
Last year, after some 400 strong CTU members showed up at on a bitter cold February night at Buhrer Elementary, waving red signs outlining projected cuts, the Board did go back to the drawing board and did find some $15 million to Invest in our schools.
Once again, we need to pack the house at Collinwood High School on Thursday, March 26th and push for a greater investment in ALL of our schools, for ALL of our students. If the board business meeting was any indication, administrators and CCAS leadership will be present to blabber on about how SBB is the greatest thing to hit this district in years. How central office couldn’t figure out how to get a full-time music or art teacher in a building until SBB. However, they certainly won’t let reality get in the way of their rhetoric. They won’t say how they axed teaching positions in favor of CIS’s or Deans of Engagement or Deans of Culture or a new “soon to be named” administrative position. No, they will do what they did at the business meeting: Wave embarrassing green signs (slightly larger than our red signs), with pre-written administrative gobbledygook double-speak, pretending to love the cuts to their schools.
The Cleveland Plan brought us catchy words like “greater school autonomy” and “Investment Schools”. Yet greater school autonomy looks little more than more of the same old same old, with principals being told what to do and how to do it by central office. Our Investment schools get hit with $5.5 MILLION in cuts in SBB….say no more.
The board meeting begins at 6:30 and I suggest you all make this your first picnic of the season: pick up some sandwiches, spend time with friends and colleagues, and get a good seat!
In Union,
David
”Nothing in this world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”
Martin Luther King Jr.