"THE RISING" bruce springsteen

I know I promised you a post on illegal immigration, but I attended Monday night's school board meeting where I was given more data on the state's assessment of Painesville City schools than I could possibly grasp. Some of the things I do remember:

We hit six of the 26 indicators this year...up four from last year.
Of the 26 indicators, we improved on 15 of them, we flat-lined on three of them and we dropped on eight of them.

Currently all the schools are in ‘Continuous Improvement’, with the exception of Elm Street Elementary, which is under ‘Academic Watch’. Graduation rates were up 10% to 75%......more on that later.

Right now, we have three appointed board members and two elected members. Mr. Bull explained that the four 'R's of the city schools will be ‘Rigor, Relevance, Relationships and Race’. In addition, we received a state grant to work toward safe and drug free schools ($50,000.00). Now just as a side note, since the schools decided to burn the parking lights long into the night, the air conditioning in the Hanlon Media Center didn't seem to be working. It was warm in there and then it got a whole lot hotter...

Ross Grippi who I have known pretty much all my life, a former coach, Harvey graduate, lifetime Painesville resident and retired Harvey teacher, got up and addressed the administration and the board. Mr. Grippi chastised the board, administration and the high school administration...and in the process answered many questions I have had. He brought out one startling fact: that from Aug 24, 2010 to June 10, 2011 the Painesville police department was called 348 times to the Harvey High School campus. Of those 348 times, over 210 were for serious charges such as assault on another student or an assault/threat to a teacher or other adult in the building. I believe he is correct when he tells us we have no control in the high school. He questioned the success or failure under the Dr. Hanlon administration and remarked that teachers were being blamed for failures that were out of their control and asked why does the board continue to stand behind this man and his poor results.

He also complained about the infamous 50% grading policy, where he presented as evidence a paper given to him by a student that said 'Oh, just give me my 50% and I won’t turn you in'. In addition, attendance records, skipping class, and tardiness pretty much goes on without any consequences. He mentioned teachers were getting poor evaluations for complaining about too many disciplinary issues. He also mentioned a math teacher who had, for the first time in Harvey's state testing history, managed to get her junior class to 88% passing the state test. The state average is 75%. The teacher was given a poor evaluation by the high school administration and her contract was not renewed. He demanded her position be reinstated, My thought: we finally got someone to do it right and we reward them by getting rid of them I thought were were to reward sucess?.

Mr. Grippi also remarked that the high school graduation numbers were fudged...although done legally it was unethical. He was cut short by Mr. Dillard (I know how that feels). Mr. Dillard interrupted Mr. Grippi to tell him his time was up, so we never did get to hear the rest of what he had planned to say. I have asked Ross to forward his remarks to me so that I could post it in its entirety here. Another thought: the wheels aren’t just spinning, they’re coming off. Can you imagine working in a place where the police show up 348 times a year...and it’s not a jail?

Oh, and welcome to your new position on the Board of Education, Mr. Tackett. good-luck!