(l to r) Goldman, Malone, Tedesco, and Margiotta (Ted Richardson/N&O)
RALEIGH – Haste makes waste, or at least some parents, teachers, and community supporters of the Wake County Public School System think so.
This idiom means that if you try to do something quickly, without planning it, you're likely to end up spending more time, money, etc, doing it. To the people who walked out of the WCPSS school board meeting last night, some in tears, this definitely is the direction the district is heading.
Four new members of the Wake school board were sworn in Tuesday, and moved very quickly to make good on campaign promises. Chris Malone (District 1 – Northeast Wake), Debra Goldman (District 9 – Western Wake), Deborah Prickett (District 7 – West Raleigh/Morrisville), and John Tedesco (District 2 – Southeast Wake) jumped right into action, adding several items to the meeting agenda – most of which the incumbent members of the board had not seen prior to the meeting.
Returning member from Apex, Ron Margiotta (District 8 – Southern Wake), was voted in as school board chair, replacing Kevin Hill (District 3 – North Raleigh) as BOE top dog. A change in leadership like this usually would not take place until June. Goldman was elected as vice chair.
Hill said of the added agenda items last night: “To me this is a process that is very new to the school board, where essentially half the members are not privy to information prior to the meeting.”
People are also wary about the four new members because all of them ran with a campaign strategy extremely critical of the current Wake County socio-economic diversity policy.
Once the meeting began, obvious displeasure ran throughout the audience, with some people even walking out of the meeting. Tempers flared, and tears fell as the meeting carried on.
County parent Diana Bader made her feelings heard during the public comment portion of the meeting: “What you did tonight was irresponsible. You added items to the agenda that the parents, business, and community have not even looked at. Your board members have not even looked at. You’re asking us to make public comments on items that we have not even seen!”
Loud applause fed throughout the crowd, leading Margiotta to threaten to cut all public comments off completely.
Some of the things that happened last night:
• The board voted to end Wake Wednesdays, the early release day for teachers and PLT’s in the county. This comes to an end at the conclusion of the 2009-2010 school year.
• A resolution to change the Student Assignment Policy, which included elimination of the reference to "creating and maintaining a diverse student body" was referred to the Policy Committee
• A resolution to ensure parental choice for year-round schools was reduced to a superintendent's review of utilization and capacity of current year-round calendar schools and a parent survey on demand for year-round schools.
• A resolution to save costs and expenses and implement a hiring freeze was reduced to a written agreement that the budget cuts announced by the Superintendent on Nov. 19 would be presented to the board as planned for its March meeting.
• A resolution to end all expenditures on the H-6 (Forest Ridge High School) site was passed, but the site was not eliminated from consideration.
• The board also voted to resurrect a Dec. 15 meeting that had been cancelled.
With nine total members on the board, the new members plus Margiotta formed a 5-4 majority, leaving Hill, Keith Sutton (District 4 – East Raleigh), Dr. Carolyn Morrison (District 8 – Central Raleigh), and Dr. Anne McLaurin (District 5 – Southeast Raleigh) on the outside looking in.
“I felt like we got punched in the mouth,” Sutton said, following the meeting.
Do you have a question for Chairman Margiotta or any other member of the school board? If so, send an email to Examiner.com, and it will get answered!
WRAL’s coverage:
ABC11’s coverage:
For more information:
WTVD: New School Board With New Mission
WRAL: New Wake school board makes changes on first day
News & Observer: Switch is sudden on Wake school board
MyNC.com: New Wake School Board Majority Makes Power Play
Comments
Kudos to the new members. We voted them on the board to rid our county schools of the so-called "diversity" correctness. The early release Wednesday policy was a joke to those hard working parents that cannot maintain multiple work schedules at the office. So yes we voted them in and as far as "thunderous applause" goes, I was there so you may want to replace your reporter who obviously has a biased view in this matter. Can we have real journalists report for a change????
Example by omission: Below was said by the board member but edited out in your column:
"At the beginning, if this were a football game, I felt like we got punched in the mouth," said Keith Sutton. "But after some thoughtful deliberation and a recess, I think calmer heads were able to prevail."
So things were worked out in the end.
I appreciate your comment on my article.
I changed "thunderous" to "loud," after you seemed to think it gave to much of a spin one side or the other - that was not my intention. I used that particular adjective to describe the fact you could barely hear Mrs. Bader or Chairman Margiotta over the applause. My job is to report what happened without a bias one way or the other. My sincerest apologies.
Having a family member who teaches in Wake County, and several other friends who are fellow teachers there (yes, I am a teacher as well), I agree that Wake Wednesday was a bad idea. I agree also that some things do need to change. My opinion in this matter, however, had no bearing on the article at hand.
Your vitriolic response I felt was a little over the top. However, thanks for reading, and I hope to see you commenting on future articles!
Thanks for supporting Examiner.com!
John V. Wood
Raleigh Top News Examiner
To Forest who believes things worked out in the end:
Last night, politics got in the way of what the School Board is supposed to be about -- children and learning. Creating a hostile environment and putting adult egos over learning in schools is detrimental to the children being taught each and every day in our schools. If the bullying attitude of the new school board does not cease, (and allowing an agenda that has not been seen by the whole board IS bullying behavior) then the next four years will not only hurt the children in our schools but will also severely discredit those board members. Let's hope they think wisely and listen to ALL of the people in the county they represent before acting so quickly in the future!
Received our yellow postcard today to ask us whether we intend to reenroll in our wonderful year round school. I went to say YES for both of my children, to make sure they counted us in. Well don't try this because the school borad does not have the page ready yet. You have 13 days, during the holiday season, when a lot of year round school families aren't even in town to get the postcard much less respond during the school board's 13 day window. What in the world? I am fine with families having a choice - if they do not like year round, but don't want my voice to be silenced. We love the two year round schools that our children attend (after years of trying private, so our children would not have to be moved around all the time), the best thing we ever did was put them in a well-rounded, diversified, year round school!.
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