My Goal in Blogging

I started this blog in May of 2008, shortly after my election to the School Committee, because I believed it was very important to both provide the community with an opportunity to share their thoughts with me about our schools and to provide me with an opportunity for me to ask questions and share my thoughts and reasoning. I have found the conversation generated on my blog to be extremely helpful to me in learning community views on many issues. I appreciate the many people who have taken the time to share their views. I believe it is critical to the quality of our public schools to have a public discussion of our community priorities, concerns and aspirations.

Monday, June 14, 2010

Amherst board hears legal advice, will discuss breakup of school union

Note: The link to this story was not available on Saturday, when this story was published. Hence, I'm just posting the entire story, contrary to my typical practice, given that this story related to tonight's Amherst School Committee Meeting.

Hampshire Gazette
By NICK GRABBE
Staff writer
June 12, 2010

AMHERST - The questions of whether and how Amherst could withdraw from the union that links its elementary school administration with Pelham's will be up for discussion at Monday's School Committee meeting.

In a rare Friday meeting, the committee reviewed an opinion by attorney Sharon Siegel in which she answered questions about the union and its future. Some committee members had questioned the two towns' equal representation on the panel that governs the union while Amherst has 10 times the students that Pelham has.

A new law enables towns to unilaterally leave a union, but it "has yet to be interpreted and implementing regulations have yet to be drafted," Siegel wrote. If Amherst voted to leave the union, the state would "most likely exercise its review/approval authority," she wrote.

The attorney's advice cost $2,145, said Irv Rhodes, the committee chairman.

A breakup of the union would not save Amherst any money, but the issue is governance and the hiring of a superintendent, said committee member Steve Rivkin. Currently, the panel overseeing the union and the Amherst School Committee both vote on any decision to hire a superintendent.

The committee should consider forming a task force to look at the advantages and disadvantages of alternatives to the current union, and take public comments, Rivkin said. He compared the process to the one that led to the vote to close Mark's Meadow School a year ago. There's a policy that the union and the region agree to hire only one superintendent, said Farshid Hajir, chairman of the Regional School Committee. The discussion should take place in the context of the imminent report by a four-town panel that's been reviewing the option of extending the secondary region to the elementary schools, he said.

Parent Tracy Wolfe said Amherst must consider its options. "It would be irresponsible for the committee not to be investigating it,' she said.

Retired teacher Karen Dimock said the decision shouldn't be up to just the five members of the Amherst School Committee.

"The committee will act with openness and sensitivity, with extensive involvement of the public in multiple forums," said Rivkin. "We recognize the gravity of the situation."

31 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why shouldn't it be up the 5 school committee members? Isn't that why we voted for them? akab

Anonymous said...

Because the at least three of the curretn Amherst SC members have an axe to grind.

They lost the vote concerning the selection of the interim Super and that is the reason this is happening. They are NOT disinterested parties.

Anonymous said...

Perhaps there was a good reason they opposed the appointment of an internal candidate for 16 months. They all seem like intelligent, dedicated individuals interested in what truly is best for Amherst kids. They have much more knowledge of the internal workings of the administration (since they must work closely together) than the average taxpayer. If they want to bring in someone from the outside, that makes me sit up and listen. Especially since our current interim Superintendent has never had Superintendent experience before (not counting her interim time here in Amherst).

Anonymous said...

I actually think Maria Geryk is doing a great job as Interim Superintendent.

When Jere Hochman left quite suddenly, we brought in the Spragues from the outside to be Interim Supers....that went really well - didn't it?

When they left early (a fortunate thing for Amherst) Maria Geryk stepped in and did a fantastic job.

I think it was a wise choice to bring Maria on as Interim in the midst of a chaotic couple of years at the top.

I hope the SC has alot of good candidates to choose from for the next permanent Super and I hope they make a wise choice.

Anonymous said...

It's interesting to think about how Catherine had nothing but praise for Maria Geryk when she served as interim supt. after the Spragues left. She praised her repeatedly on this blog. What changed, Catherine?

Catherine A. Sanderson said...

I'm going to repeat something I've said about 100 times already (am pretty sure I'll need to repeat it 100 more times):

1. I do not believe it was appropriate to appoint an interim superintendent (Maria or anyone else) for 16 months without having an opportunity for the COMMUNITY to weigh in on this choice. This has nothing to do with Maria's qualification, or experience, etc. As Anonymous 11:20 noted, I've praised Maria's performance repeatedly - so this is NOT about Maria Geryk. It is about hiring a superintendent for 16 months without allowing for any community input whatsoever. If the community came forward and said "we believe appointing Maria Geryk for 16 months is the right way to go," I would have taken those thoughts VERY seriously; but the other members of the Regional SC didn't allow this type of input, given the rush to appoint Maria for 16 months that evening.

2. I believe the COMMUNITY would have been better served by appointing Maria for 4 months (as occurred after Helen/Al resigned last February), and then having a search for an interim, which could have included Maria (if she had chosen to apply) as well as outside candidates. Then, the SC and the COMMUNITY could have seen the range of candidates, and evaluated his/her strengths/weaknesses, and made a choice about who would best lead us in the next year. If that person was Maria, that would have been evident -- and then it would have been clear that she was selected from a range of candidates and after all members of the SC and the community could have had information about the options.

3. Although people would like to focus on Union 26 as being about personalities and tone (as it is far easier to criticize the decision based on these superficial features than to defend the substance of the agreement which gives a town of 1400 people and paying 6% of the bill veto power over a superintendent for the Amherst and Regional schools), this isn't about Maria Geryk, or Catherine Sanderson, or Steve Rivkin, or Irv Rhodes. We will all be served if people can think beyond the current players and think about what benefits Amherst residents in the LONG TERM, because the Union 26 agreement (if it continues for another 103 years) will outlive all current members of the SC and administration.

It is a simple question, and has nothing to do with whether you like current members of the Amherst SC or the current interim superintendent: do you believe that Amherst residents, who pay 94% of the elementary school bill and have 35,000 residents, should have the SAME say as Pelham residents, who pay 6% of the bill and have 1400 residents? If you believe that this arrangement is fair and equitable, just say that. But make sure you would continue to believe that if you LOVED the Amherst SC in a few years and they lost the opportunity to hire the superintendent YOU loved, because Pelham was able to block this hire (which they can do).

TomG said...

Who can help identify the PROS of Union 26 for Amherst residents?

Anonymous said...

There has been so much turnover in the ARPS administration in the last decade. It would not have benefited the students or the community to appoint MG for four months, then appoint a longer-term interim for 12 months, and then conduct a search for a permanent supt. That would have wasted time and energy and sacrificed stability. Just the way this discussion over Union 26 is wasting time and energy that ought to be directed toward more substantive matters. (I was relieved to see Catherine post recent articles on the math curriculum – something that affects ARPS students way more than the vagaries of Union 26 ever will.)

Catherine A. Sanderson said...

My responses:

Tom G - the only "pro" that has been identified for me is that Pelham pays 6% of the bill (so, this reduces some of the payment Amherst would have to pay). It isn't clear to me at all whether that amount is a net gain (e.g., given that we have to do two sets of billing for all elementary school matters in central office).

Anonymous 1:33 - if the community shared your view, people could have requested that the SC continue Maria's appointment past the 4 months, and/or could have recommended that she be chosen over other candidates. Do you not believe the community should have been able to share their views?

Ed said...

Amherst residents, who pay 94% of the elementary school bill and have 35,000 residents, should have the SAME say as Pelham residents, who pay 6% of the bill and have 1400 residents? If you believe that this arrangement is fair and equitable, just say that.

It doesn't matter if we like it or not, I am 99% sure that it is illegal and all it would take is one aggrieved parent to pick up the phone and call the US Attorney and there would be a bigtime mess.

First, the _Baker v. Carr_ decision is "one man, one vote" - that was the US Supreme Court and before people are want to dismiss it, remember that this was the same court that gave us the _Roe_ decision legalizing abortion.

The simple fact is that my rights as a citizen are being violated by my (Amherst) vote not counting as much as that of a Pelham voter. SCOTUS said this, it is the law, and it is being violated.

Second is the Voting Rights Act, and there are far more black & hispanic voters in Amherst than Pelham. Thus you have the "dillution" of minority votes that is an explicit violation of the Act.

The consequences: the entire district could wind up in recievership (like Boston did during the 1970s), you could have forced bussing of Pelham students to Amherst elementary schools, you could have a Federal Judge picking your next superintendent.

Folks, it doesn't matter if you like the arrangement or not, it is if you are stupid enough not to see that eventually someone, at some time for some likely quite petty reason, will call the US Attorney.

And back to Catherine's point about 103 years -- women couldn't even vote in 1907! And while Massachusetts let minorities vote - we have a distinguished history of having black voters voting on the ratification of the constitution in 1788(?) -- not all other states did.

My point - the agreement was legal in 1907, it just isn't now.....

Anonymous said...

Catherine, in the meeting on Friday night, did the lawyer Amherst SC retained address either the Baker v. Carr issue or the Voting Rights Act issue? Those do seem like two key arguments against the current situation. Especially given Amherst's "committment to social justic."

Ed said...

One other thing -- lets say that some perp did something really bad downtown, in front of absolutely everyone, and there was absolutely no doubt that he was guilty.

Should the police chief just simply shoot him on the spot? That is the classic picture of this from the Viet Nam war, with the hammer down (gun has fired) and blood starting to come out of the now-dead man's mouth, and what is not as widely known is that everyone did know that he was guilty. That he would have lawfully been executed after trial.

Yet the 1968 picture of the Saigon police chief shooting of the Captain of a VietCong "Revenge Squad" that had murdered dozens of unarmed civilians earlier that day - the "really henious thing in front of everyone" - didn't matter in the public reprehension of the lack of due process.

Had he been given a trial and then shot, it would have been a different story...

Maria Geryk may well be a good superintendent, the problem is that any consideration of her qualifications is clouded by the lack of due process in her hiring. Just like shooting the guity guy without a trial, hiring a good superintendent (should she be thus, and I haven't seen her personnel file) without a search makes all other facts irrelevant.

BTW, have we seen her CV yet?

Ed said...

One other thing -- lets say that some perp did something really bad downtown, in front of absolutely everyone, and there was absolutely no doubt that he was guilty.

Should the police chief just simply shoot him on the spot? That is the classic picture of this from the Viet Nam war, with the hammer down (gun has fired) and blood starting to come out of the now-dead man's mouth, and what is not as widely known is that everyone did know that he was guilty. That he would have lawfully been executed after trial.

Yet the 1968 picture of the Saigon police chief shooting of the Captain of a VietCong "Revenge Squad" that had murdered dozens of unarmed civilians earlier that day - the "really henious thing in front of everyone" - didn't matter in the public reprehension of the lack of due process.

Had he been given a trial and then shot, it would have been a different story...

Maria Geryk may well be a good superintendent, the problem is that any consideration of her qualifications is clouded by the lack of due process in her hiring. Just like shooting the guity guy without a trial, hiring a good superintendent (should she be thus, and I haven't seen her personnel file) without a search makes all other facts irrelevant.

BTW, have we seen her CV yet?

Anonymous said...

Catherine said: "if the community shared your view, people could have requested that the SC continue Maria's appointment past the 4 months, and/or could have recommended that she be chosen over other candidates. Do you not believe the community should have been able to share their views?"

Since when do you care what the community thinks? Many in the community were against the closing of Marks Meadow..but that happened anyway.

What I want to know is "what harm has Amherst suffered due to the Union 26 Agreement." To be spending this much time and money an something I sure would hope that there is some thought that Amherst has been harmed in some meaningful way by being part of Union 26.

Anonymous said...

How does the SC weigh public comment and then decide on a matter such as Union 26? When the public speaks at SC meetings it is such a small subset of people (who may have their own selfish interests in mind rather than that of the students of Amherst). If there had been an opportunity for the community to comment on the appointment of MG for 4 mos vs 16 mos - how would the SC have taken that into consideration in a way that truly reflects the will of the community?

Anonymous said...

It is looking more and more as though this entire mess is being stirred up by a dug-in, "traditionalist" cabal - of Pelham whites.

Eileen Marasco said...

For the love of God, would everyone just stop with the Union 26 dissolution talk already & get to the real matter at hand. Steve, Catherine & Irv were outmaneuvered by Andy Churchill & the Union 26 voters from Pelham on the Maria Geryk vote. Let it go!!! There was about as much due process in the deliberation regarding the re-hiring of Maria as Interim Super as there was airing of the topic of offering world language at the elementary level at the most recent Amherst SC mtgs. This is all such a tempest in a teapot. Maria serves at the pleasure of the Amherst Regional School Committee, if you don't like the way things went down then introduce a motion to replace her, can her, put her out of all this misery of armchair quarterbacking, second guessing, & general bloviation 3 MONTHS INTO HER TERM STILL & move the hell on. The woman is a saint for staying on in the position with all the perseveration that surrounds her appointment.

Meanwhile, we have the man she replaced garnering praise from Catherine in print for his performance on the job here just baiting the members of the Regional SC & Administration into a comment regarding his departure that would violate a confidentiality agreeement that could cost the district more "Florida dollars".

Review & revise the Union 26 agreement if it's illegal in a bilateral fashion with the parties involved from Pelham, stop the threatening potshots & posturing b/c this district doesn't have time for this continued gamesmanship. There's work, real work that needs doing in this system & oh, btw, can anyone imagine the negative impression all this backbiting in the press & online is creating for potential Super candidates out there googling us? Not pretty, not prudent & lousy for the morale of every Amherst schoolteacher, administrator, superintendent & stakeholder.

It's way more than a case of being outmaneuvered on an early March evening, people...don't think for one minute that the ACE Axis on the current SC doesn't also have their sites set on beating Michael DeChiara, Chair of the Shutesbury SC who helped spearhead the legislation that passed thru the State House this year which allows a single member of a school union to unilaterally withdraw from the union if it determines that it is no longer in its best interest to continue in the relationship. Let the games begin! We're all working toward regionalization of the 4 towns' school districts, right? You've got the power, but by no means the political will.

Last thought, it was that wacky Tracy Farnham, a Pelham School Committee member & representative to the Regional School Committee who voted alone last year to fail the search & not hire any of the candidates when the salary requirements of the candidates in the pool were known to Regional SC members & before a final selection was made. That, to me, is a strong argument in favor of continuing the Union 26 arrangement. She comes off now as a seer. Go Tracy! There are a myriad of reasons to continue a mutually productive & fair relationship with Pelham as the Amherst elementary system moves forward into a redistricted & reconstituted configuration...there's no good reason to go around picking on poor Pelham & less of a reason for Amherst taxpayers to be footing the bill. Examine, thoughtfully review the facts, discuss, decide & move forward. We have much bigger fish to fry in this system.

Catherine A. Sanderson said...

My responses:

1. The lawyer only responded to our questions, and we didn't ask about voting rights stuff. It is clear from her letter that we have options -- and we don't need to prove voting violations to exercise them. The question now is whether we WANT to exercise them.

2. Anonymous 2:21 - I care a lot what the community thinks. That's why we had a huge number of forums about both closing Marks Meadow and redistricting. And in all of those forums, no one ever could tell me that they were comfortable with putting 100% of the K to 6 kids in Amherst through the types of cuts necessary to keep Marks Meadow open (not even Marks Meadow parents) - huge class sizes, no intervention teachers, no music/art/PE. It is fine to say "don't close a school" - but no one could articulate a preference that allowed us to keep it open and maintain what we needed to. That is where community feedback is really important.

I believe that the community could have shared many views about the benefits of conducting a search for an interim versus appointing an insider -- and I wish they had had that opportunity. But they didn't, and we are moving on!

3. Come to tonight's meeting to learn more about the Union 26 agreement, and its benefits/costs for Amherst. It will be shown live on TV, and the presentation will be put on the web.

4. Eileen - thanks for using your name! But a few corrections here:

First, Spanish has been discussed in the district since 2000, including a world language report by teachers/staff in the last 2 years. There was CONSIDERABLY more discussion about Spanish than at a single meeting in which an interim was appointed.

Second, the Amherst SC understands that Maria will be the superintendent for 16 months. The question is whether the Union 26 agreement is best for Amherst moving forward. We are discussing that tonight.

Third, I voted, as you might recall, for David Sklarz. I was the only one ultimately voting for him. I believe we would NOT be in the situation we are in now if the Regional SC had agreed with me on this.

Fourth, Michael DeChiara created the change in the law that allowed Amherst to leave Union 26 ... because he wanted that option for Shutesbury to leave their own union! Apparently what is good for Shutesbury (freedom) is bad for Amherst?

Ed said...

Steve, Catherine & Irv were outmaneuvered by Andy Churchill & the Union 26 voters from Pelham on the Maria Geryk vote.

NO! My vote is not equal to a Pelham resident's vote. It takes me and HUNDREDS of my neighbors to equal the vote of just one resident of Pelham and that is inherently unfair - and illegal. Churchill was way out of bounds tonight and I have now seen something worse than UMass....

But the most bottom line is this: my vote should be equal to that of a Pelham voter, the same court that said that Abortion was legal said so....

Anonymous said...

I think that it's impossible for the Union 26 issue to be examined in a clinical, dispassionate manner by this community RIGHT NOW given its origins in the public debate: namely, the meeting that appointed Maria Geryk as interim for 16 months.

I watched the meeting last night with interest.

And I listened carefully to Steve for the urgent rationale for rethinking the arrangement, and I didn't hear it. Once he got past the valuable information and got into the reasoning for addressing this now, the clarity got lost for me.

I have heard the argument that another arrangement would simplify any future Superintendent's life and might make for fewer meetings for her/him to attend. I get that. But that doesn't make it Job One.

Mr. Churchill was right: we know what started this, and it involves political sour grapes. In its essence, what he said was not an "attack" as Mr. Rhodes put it, but simply a candid statement of how we got here. His characterization of "a solution looking for a problem" accurately expresses some of the quizzical head-scratching going on in the community: why now? Sure, you could tell that he had some anger in his voice, but so what?

I think that the people of Amherst and Pelham need some time to sit and think about this. And it may take years to come to a consensus about what to do. Properly, the impetus for any changes should probably come from Pelham, since that community has the most immediate problems regarding the survival of its elementary school.

But as a subject of controversy in Amherst, I am starting to see the Union 26 issue as this School Committee's oil spill, beginning to take over and obscure everything else that needs to be done.

Rich Morse

A.N.W. said...

This school committee's oil spill? What an accurate description of this "discussion"!

I thought the most interesting part of last night's meeting was when Rick Hood talked about how the Union 26 discussion came up, and reminded us that the Union did not cause Geryk to become the Superintendent. And someone (Catherine?) said that's true, but without it, Amherst could have vetoed the vote. And Steve hushed Rick up, with a "now now that's not the way we want to do this. we don't want to go backwards we want to go forwards...."

I still don't see how spending time or money on this moves us "forward". $3000 is not small change when our kids still don't have text books. I'm getting impatient that the SC is spending time and money on this folly, which even by Steve Rivkin's presentation won't mean substantial savings for the town.

Anonymous said...

"the impetus for any changes should probably come from Pelham"

If the Pelham stake was 94% and the Amherst stake 6% I might agree but its opposite whether the chosen metric is funding (taxes) or population.

Take a look at the decision Pelham made to keep its elementary school open even though the funding of which is not sustainable with or without school choice revenue.

In my opinion, it would absurd for Amherst people to delegate the impetus to Pelham decision makers.

Anonymous said...

Oil spill? nothing! How about Dachau work camp! Oh never mind.

I have a better idea. Let's talk about the pros and cons of Union 26 for Amherst (...instead of waiting for Pelham to take the initiative)

Anonymous said...

Pelham is not going to take any initiative because the situation they are currently in is best for them in every way! The question is not 'why do this now?' it is 'why not do this now?'

Michael Jacques said...

Rich,

Whether for good or bad it does feel like the Union 26 discussion came from the meeting in which Maria was appointed for 16 months.

Certainly as a resident of Amherst and a person who left that Marathon meeting between 8:30 and 9:00, I would have liked to have had the same voice the administrators had during this meeting.

All of that aside, I think this decision and the meeting woke people up to a really inefficient system. Three committees with influence over the Amherst school system makes as much sense to me as the law that does not allow you to park your horse on Main Street in Palmer after noon on a Saturday (yes this was a real law still active in the 1980’s to my understanding).

I really do believe that changing this system to something like K-12 makes so much more sense. It simplifies meetings for involved parents, School Committee members and school staff. It would also give us more flexibility with our budgets.

Maybe a K-12 region is way off in the future but ending Union 26 and starting a K-6 Amherst Pelham region may be a step toward change and simplification.

I also believe it does improve our chances of getting top talent to submit resume's to work in Amherst. I believe this works the same way as zoning changes that simplify Amherst to attract more businesses.

So maybe the Union 26 agreement came under scrutiny for less than desirable reasons but that does not make the need for change any less important or valuable to our community.

Anonymous said...

Michael,

If you and I were working in a laboratory with our white lab coats on, it might be great for the two of us to get to work changing a system that you and I just discovered doesn't make sense.

But this isn't a laboratory; it's politics.

You've done a good job above of finding "the problem that this is the solution for" as Andy Churchill aptly put it last night.
But that doesn't mean that this matter should instantly skip to the top of the priority list.

This issue is something that most Amherst residents, in their quest for absolute politeness in all things, detest: it's pure politics. And I would submit that there's a enormous burden of proof to gain broad public acceptance for changes in long-standing political arrangements. We're not even close to that now.

So this Amherst School Committee will have to expend political capital to change this, precious political capital that could be used on changes to DIRECTLY benefit school kids, either in Amherst or in the Region.

So the question is: does the "efficiency" achieved from this change outweigh the bad feeling that will inevitably be created in the Region, in Pelham, and in some quarters in Amherst for having done it relatively quickly? Would it better to wait for the political mandate for this change to develop (or not) over time in Amherst and/or Pelham?

There's a giant assumption at work here that I'm not sure has been borne out in fact: a supposedly profound and permanent divergence of interest on educational matters between the people of Amherst and the people of Pelham, a divergence that would affect the hiring process for a future Superintendent. All coming out of one vote in March and the reasoning backwards from differences in the demographics of the school populations in the two towns??

This is why Mr. Churchill's remarks last night were so important. This is ad hoc agenda setting, something that no one uttered a peep about in the recent SC campaign. And, as Abbie Jensen pointed out elsewhere, it is at least one degree of separation from policy that directly benefits kids.

Rich Morse

Anonymous said...

I am upset that this never came up in the recent School Committee election. I would not have voted for candidates who said this should have been a #1 priority. Making it a campaign issue would have given voters a say.

questions:
1. what small town would want to be in a region with Amherst given its disrespectful treatment of Pelham?
2. And if we all think a K-12 region is looking like something we want to think about, why would this School Committee do anything to jeopardize that option?
3. What action has happened in real life where Union 26 was harmful to Amherst students, teachers or schools.

Using $3000 of our money to investigate this agreement at this time, after a long hard fought override, is a slap to the Amherst voter... who supported additional funds for the schools, not to bolster the power of this School Committee.

But to this School Committee's credit, perhaps the issue of Union 26 should be shelved for future discussion - when regionalization is discussed - when it might be more timely, helpful and needed.

Ed said...

Mr. Churchill was right: we know what started this, and it involves political sour grapes.

Rich - do you refuse to prosecute a case because someone "dropped a dime" as part of sour grapes, political or otherwise? Do you have any idea the amount of valuable & accurate information I was given by disgruntled maintenance employees wanting to cause their boss trouble? And of course I acted on it - and if the boss wants to then give me the dirt on the place next door, fine. And I suspect Rich that you have a similar attitude -- if something is wrong you address it and you don't care why someone told you.

Notwithstanding this, I don't think this is sour grapes as much as a candid realization that the exact same sort of thing the next time there is a vote on a superintendent. And the time after that. As has been happening ever since this system was set up to prevent the hiring of a Catholic superintendent a century ago.

It has its roots in bigotry. That is important to remember before you start justifying it....

In its essence, what he said was not an "attack" as Mr. Rhodes put it, but simply a candid statement of how we got here.
Churchill was out of order, and any member of the board should have raised a "point of order" that the topic on the floor was the desirability of withdrawing from the school union, and not engaging in ad hominum attacks on various persons.

The principle of meetings is that people are going to be on topic. H*ll, I could have given a dry run of a speech I am giving this Friday, seen how I come across on television and the rest. I wouldn't have had anything to say about the Amherst schools, let alone the topic of the school union, but I could have done it.

No, I couldn't - we have rules.

Mr. Churchill did not follow the rules of order. When someone did something identical to what he did at a meeting of the South Hadley School Committee, they had the police drag him out. I am not saying that either, only that if Mr. Churchill (and others) wish to be respected as an adult, he needs to act like one.

You folks wouldn't tolerate this kind of behavior from a UMass student, I am suggesting that you ought not display it either...

Anonymous said...

"Growing number of Amherst children attending charter or private schools or schools in other districts"


I'd like to point out that we don't know that people are moving their kids out of the Amherst district because they are so dissatisfied with the Amherst schools.

We do know that charter schools and school choice have drastically altered the educational landscape simply by offering choices that didn't used to exist.

Where's that school district "exit interview" data?

Anonymous said...

There are campaign issues and there are issues that arise from time to time without forewarning. The issue of Union 26 is here. That is was not foreseen and therefore debated during election season is a red herring. The central question is a question of relative priority.

Let's examine the pros and cons of the union including public opinion regarding the union.

Perhaps the question can be settled in a time frame that connects nicely with hiring the new superintendent.

Who do you represent? said...

I would hope that the Amherst School Committee vote to end the school union with Pelham -- then work to create a more equitable agreement with Pelham. There is no animosity to Pelham but the voting numbers are just unfair now due to Amherst's population growth. The Amherst School Committee members are obligated to best help and represent the interests of Amherst school children. If they vote to keep this union they are failing this obligation to the children they represent.

I cannot just hope that the Pelham School Committee will promote Amherst childrens' needs and interests when voting. The Amherst School Committee rightly needs the power to select a superintendent that is best for Amherst school children -- who come from many countries, ethnic backgrounds, languages, economic backgrounds and beliefs. Their duty is to these children -- and no one else.

The decision needs to be made soon, after public input from Amherst residents and talks with the Pelham School Committee. Don't let this important issue that so many were unaware of languish in indecision and discussion. We've had enough of that and it doesn't help our children -- or make the debate and hard feelings go away. Do the right thing.