Carmel Valley News Letters, 3-13-08
There were dark days in the Del Mar Union School district a few weeks ago following the decision of three out of the five school board members to force and accept the resignation of Superintendent Tom Bishop.
To a small few, the decision was no surprise, but to an overwhelming majority of parents and faculty the decision brought total shock and outrage. I consider myself to be an involved parent with two children having gone through the district and one to go, and I was completely surprised by the timing of the decision!
The special board meeting was called just a few days prior by posting it on the district Web site, giving little time for parents or staff to prepare for what would be the inevitable. But rally we did and a standing room only crowd showed to make a plea to the school board not to fire our successful superintendent. The rally was to no avail. The decision had been made and the expected vote of 3-2 to push Mr. Bishop out left everyone with unanswered questions and grave concerns. I personally feel like our district has been hijacked, and now I would like to find the ransom note!
What can parents and community members do for our board of trustee members to put our district back together? Will we even have a say in the hiring of the next superintendent? What is the policy on this?
Some research I have done reveals that the board of trustees voted to form a Personnel Committee in April of last year. I find this out of the ordinary because a school board of trustees' sole personnel responsibility is the hiring and/or firing of superintendents. But according to the charter, part of the committee's responsibility is to over-see the hiring / firing of new teachers and staff, possibly making changes to the employment structure, too! Sounds OK, maybe at first glance, but this is a perfect open door to begin making what could become very costly and disruptive changes. Interesting…. Since the committee was formed, our district has lost to either resignation or retirement, several of our long time staff members. Our director of technology, pupil services director, and now superintendent are just to name a few. Just how much money is budgeted to re-structure our district?
The minutes from the committee show a plea from school administrators to please replace the technology team who left in October. These positions remain vacant and the plea sites that the technology departments are seeking direction for its program. It seems to me that the house cleaning is disrupting our children's learning opportunity. It would be so much easier if the board would let our human resources director continue to do his job! Why the need to micro-manage?
It was no secret that a few of the board members didn't like Mr. Bishop from their campaign speeches. It is rumored that shortly after taking office, Mr. Bishop's recommendations and reports were not even given the courtesy of being heard. What an embarrassment! Couldn't they just agree to disagree?
I think the expenditure to let Mr. Bishop go is reckless. Thanks to our current budget crisis, our district will already have to dig in to reserve money to avoid increasing class room sizes and handing out pink slips like we did three years ago during the Basic Aid crisis. (Thanks to Tom Bishop, and his foresight after that battle, we do have a reserve to bank on!)
The “firing” appears to be self serving with no grounds, just out of disrespect. The find the lack of comment by the board to be eerie and misleading. Of course personnel issues are private, but the fact that the board is buying out the contract shows that there was no real grounds for the “dismissal.”
Our children are the ones who ultimately pay for such decisions! Their school year is interrupted by unnecessary distraction and reorganization, and money that could have been spent on hiring enrichment teachers or curriculum supplies is unnecessarily being used to cover a self-serving decision. Why couldn't the board exercise the same character we Del Mar parents try so hard to instill in our young and just let Mr. Bishop finish his contract? Instead, they spent unnecessarily and have squelched our voice in the state budget crises discussion. (Supt. Bishop was part of a larger budget conversation, representing our district very well in San Diego County and in Sacramento!)
The cost of forcing a resignation on our district goes beyond the buy-out, expected to be just under $300,000. There are legal fees, the salary of the interim superintendent and all the cost involved in interviewing and hiring a new superintendent.
And to those of us parents and teachers who have worked on our mission statements and strategic plans — what will become of those? Will the board deem them to be hog wash, too? What will be the next change? It has been stated in the papers by one board member that one possible change will be in our attendance boundaries. My guess is that our community at large would not like to have yet one more negative factor affecting their property values! Opening the boundaries arguably would create even more confusion and alienate children who want to walk to their neighborhood schools.
I would like to just relax and have trust in the elected board members. They are, afterall, elected to serve our public education interests. But now that the district has been “hijacked,” trusting is a luxury we can no longer afford. If a decision to spend $300,000-plus of our district's money can be made in just one board meeting can be made without waking up our community, I don't know what will.
Is it really OK to spend precious education money to buy out a superintendent who unequivocally can stand proud on his successful collaborative efforts to grow the Del Mar district from three to eight schools in just 10 short years of service? He didn't do it on his own. He worked with our parents and teachers and staff. He worked with the elected officials in the county and state. He led the way to put Del Mar Schools on the map, becoming a premier district, boasting the number one school in all of San Diego County!
We can't bring him back, but we can certainly continue to collaborate together to build on a strong foundation! But, it appears that our elected board members are chipping away at that foundation...to what end?
The school board has three primary duties: To set school policy; to hire a qualified superintendent; and to approve a working budget. I feel that the board is stepping beyond its duties to micromanage and hold hostage a district whose only direction should be up. Why fix something that is not broken?
I hope our school board members would share with us their “ransom note.” What do you hope to gain from your most recent actions?
Comischell Bradley-Rodriguez
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