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Obama v. Patrick

No, silly. There is not going to be a lawsuit just because the President isn’t going to nominate His Excellency the Governor of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts (HETG to the BlueMassGroupies, see line 3). It’s that HETG has not once, to my knowledge, ever recognized charter schools during National Charter School Week. And below follows the proclamation made by POTUS. Hmmm, perhaps HETG v. POTUS is a catchier title for a blog entry. While pondering such imponderables, let me cue the presidential proclamation: Improving our schools is the collective responsibility of all Americans—business owners and workers, educators and parents, students and their communities. We must ensure that all students receive a high-quality education that delivers the knowledge and skills needed […]

The Trust Deficit Grows

Yesterday, I got up on my soapbox and railed about the trust deficit our state and local leaders need to close before they think about closing the fiscal deficit. Well, today, unfortunately, based on some anecdotal evidence, it appears the trust deficit may be opening, not closing. Jim Stergios has an interesting post just below mine about the fiscal shell games going on in Haverhill’s school system and – poor Wilfredo Laboy – the Lawrence Eagle Tribune reported yesterday that the embattled superintendent was made aware of the illegal background checks his assistant was conducting long before it came out in the press. To turn his ridiculous quote back on him, where is Wilfredo Laboy’s transgression in all of this? […]

Paper cuts in Haverhill

Shawn Regan reports in the Eagle Tribune that “the greatest myth in the [Haverhill] school district” is “that city schools have been losing dozens of teachers every year due to budget cuts.” Not so. But in truth, the number of teachers in the district has grown by four in each of the previous three years, according to information provided by the Haverhill teachers union — figures school administrators don’t dispute. Several School Committee members who have voted to eliminate teachers for several years in a row said they were surprised by the revelation. “The community and certainly the School Committee has believed teachers are going down every year because we’ve been cutting them,” School Committee President Scott Wood said after […]

They are good at what they do

The National Education Association is, bar none, the most effective public employee union of the past 30 years. So it is good to understand what they do and how they do it. If you are interested in seeing their 2008 election debrief, then click right here — specially delivered to you by our education spymaster. Now, of course, noting that they are good at what they do does not mean what they do is good.

Taxation without trust?

I would like to follow up on my post last week regarding the shenanigans (and there really is no other way to describe it) going on in the Lawrence public schools. I heard from people and the recurring theme in their responses to me and in the comments they left on the blog is one of fundamental distrust. This doesn’t surprise me. Not only does the mismanagement of the Lawrence public schools at this point appear to be so broad it would be impossible for even the only moderately informed taxpayer not to notice it, but the same theme appears to be playing out at the state level as well. The state is facing a truly enormous budget gap, both […]