This is the Way Public Education Ends

Okay, so you really should give this a listen. It’s the story of a school district in New York where a motivated majority takes over the school board. They do it in order to destroy the public school system. You see, they educate their children privately and use their power to their own personal benefit at the public’s expense. They’ve illegally funneled money into their private religious schools. They’ve reduced their budget to the point where kids in the district have schedules that include four lunches and a study hall because they simply don’t have enough staff to teach courses. And on at least one occasion they had a building fraudulently appraised at half its value in order to sell it to themselves.

So? Why should you care? Ohio isn’t New York. Because it’s a working model of how a group of people, duly elected, can go about destroying a public school system with impunity. It’s a model that can be adapted to work anywhere.

Any sign that such things are going on here?

Well, yes.

In troubled Reynoldsburg, for example, there dwells upon its board at least one member, Elaine Tornero, who actively campaigns against levies for her district and wouldn’t mind seeing more experienced, “jaded” teachers leave her schools. According to the Columbus Messenger, “After 15 years without an increase in local operating taxes, the district has made more than $20 million in cuts during the past five years and identified another $3 million for the next school year.” Tornero is unmoved, “We’ve made a lot of cuts,” she said. “Regardless, the community still feels as they do and the economy still is what it is. To throw it back on in May is just too soon.”

Things have also been interesting in Springboro, Ohio, where “(t)he board came under control of a three-person Tea Party faction a few years ago. The bloc was led by local parent Kelly Kohls, head of the Warren County Tea Party.” Their goal of teaching creationism in schools fell short when voters ousted that faction and moderates were elected in their place.

And there’s been some sign of Tea Party activists seeking control of school boards elsewhere in the state.

After a Tea Party takeover of the board In the West Clermont School District in Amelia, Ohio, the new majority was caught violating the law in order to switch legal council (eerily similar to what happened in East Ramapo, New York) in an effort to hire an anti-union law firm with no experience in education.

Now, Reynoldsburg has been through the wringer, Springboro corrected itself, the folks in West Clermont are fighting, and Tea Party takeovers have succeeded and failed to various degrees across the state. But let’s not lose sight of what’s happened in East Ramapo that was the subject of the piece on This American Life. Sure people there are fighting – they’ve got a Facebook page and a radio show, but they’re losing. Without a way to loosen the grips of the group currently controlling the board, they’re stuck.

The only remedy is an informed and educated electorate and enough registered voters with a functioning conscience.

Be active. Be informed. Vote.

By Vance J. Lawman

About this time four years ago, I entered my thirteenth year of teaching with a sense of excitement. I was feeling confident as a professional. I had just finished a summer of teaching English, and I remember telling colleagues that I could easily see myself teaching forty years. “What else would I want to do?”

This year, I start my seventeenth year feeling worry and frustration, which masks the excitement that comes with meeting a group of new students and forging new relationships. In place of teaching summer school, I spent the summer honing my skills as an activist, and forty years in the classroom seems laughable. I’m focusing on one year at a time.

My change of perspective and career focus comes not from being burned out by teaching, but from the barrage of attacks on public education and the teaching profession over the last four years.

Four years ago, there was no such thing as Senate Bill 5.

Four years ago, there was no Ohio Teacher Evaluation System (OTES), incorporating student test scores into teacher ratings.

Four years ago, there was no Third Grade Reading Guarantee to frighten teachers, students and parents with thoughts of retention for nine-year-olds.

Four years ago, our state legislature wasn’t allocating close to a billion dollars annually to under-performing charter schools that don’t have to be accountable with taxpayer dollars.

This time, four years ago, we had no idea what was coming as a result of the November 2010 elections.

Unfortunately, we now know the ramifications of that election. We know that it doesn’t matter whether you’re an educator who is Republican, Democrat or Independent. The education mandates of the last four years apply to all of us equally. We know what happens when we elect people who don’t value public education, who are more loyal to charter profiteers than to Ohio’s children.

With all that has happened in the last four years, is there any doubt how critical this November’s elections are?

Can we handle four more years of over-testing, under-funding and continuous attacks on our profession?

From now through November, we have to do all we can to support pro-public education candidates, regardless of their party affiliation. We have to make their stance on public education the defining factor in whether they get our votes or not.

It’s not just about who is in the Governor’s office. It’s about the State Board of Education, where we have a chance to elect people like retired teacher Michael Charney. It’s about the state-wide races, like Attorney General, Auditor, Treasurer and Secretary of State.

Take the pledge to Vote Public Education in this election! Then get your friends, neighbors, family members to do the same. Research shows that making a commitment and a plan to vote increases the likelihood that you will return your mail-in ballot, vote early in person, or get to the polls on Election Day, even when life tries to get in the way.

I know that over the next couple of months — between the lesson planning, grading and preparing for OTES — I must find time to support the candidates who are going to support me as an education professional, whether it’s by walking door-to-door, making phone calls or talking to colleagues, family and friends about the November elections and all that is at stake. I urge you to do the same.

 By Dan Greenberg, Sylvania Education Association

Visit action.ohea.org for a list of pro-public education candidates.