Duval County public schools truly do have a lot of good things going on. Great kids wanting to learn and great teachers with their sleeves rolled up working hard. But despite this impressive base, overall as a district we are floundering; we are a long way from meeting our potential. Duval County needs to shake things up, we need some game changers and in these tight financial times we also have to be very strategic in what we do so. I believe the following three ideas will nudge our district towards a brighter future.
It is time the school board started working for its pay. They get paid 37,300 dollars to do what amounts to many of them a part time job. That’s the same salary a first year teacher gets and let me tell you it’s no part time wage for them. Board members need to get paid for when they work and that might encourage them to work more. It’s gotten so laughable that the local paper often reports when school board members visit schools because it is such a rare event. They should have to sign a time sheet and they are only paid for the work they do during meetings, at schools or when hosting public meetings. As for work they do at home, well lets pay them the same amount we pay teachers and that’s nothing.
Our school board has had a set policy and hope for the best way of doing things and we all know the best isn’t what has occurred. The school board members need to be in the schools daily meeting with admins, teachers and students. Not for gotcha moments but to see what does and what doesn’t work. When they rely on just the administration to get a picture about how things are going that picture is often times incomplete.
Speaking of admins, game changer two involves them. The school board and non-school based administrators have become disconnected from the reality in our hallways. I bet if some kid with his pants down around his ankles would have smarted off to W.C. Gentry we would have addressed our discipline issues years ago. The same goes for the ton of paper work, the lengths of classes and a dozen other issues.
The school board and certificated staff not in the schools should be required to substitute teach or do security ride-alongs in the schools at least two days a month, if not more often. They need to show up on time and spend the whole day as well. There should be no starting late like practically every school board meeting does.
A friend told me how in a major city the police despite the fact crime statistics were up were always reporting that things were getting better. The commissioner nodded his head and said, all right but from now on nobody can take their squad cars home. The police now having to ride mass transit suddenly had the issues facing the public right in their face. It was only after that the problems really started to be fixed. The school board and district administration are willfully cut off from the issues in many of our schools and it won’t be until they get engaged that many will be fixed.
Speaking of engagement, many of our parents have chosen to abdicate their responsibilities as well. Now I m not a blame the parent guy; I believe schools need to control what they can during the times that children are there and that should be their main priority but at the same time I do realize that some parents might need a nudge to get more engaged.
That’s why I think we should have a multiple offender rule. If a student gets three referrals they are suspended indefinitely until the parent comes in has a conference to discuss their behavior. Now the caveat is the parents could come in that very same day for the conference and the kid might not have to miss any school at all, but at three referrals a student’s behavior really needs to be addressed by all concerned parties. Then for every subsequent referral they are likewise suspended indefinitely but could come back the very next day but now only if the parent shadowed them for the whole day. That’s go to class with them, walk the halls with them, eat lunch with them etc. I imagine that for many households that would only have to happen once.
So if a kid does end up missing school well that’s on the parent not the school because they only miss time if the parent doesn’t follow through. Furthermore we have now nudged some parents to act like parents and make no mistake that some parents need a lot more than a nudge. Friends discipline is hard but when we run for it or ignore it we it makes things worse not better.
Do you know what these three ideas have in common? We could start them day one and do them for free; furthermore the first two would actually save money. The third would improve schools leaning environments and also nudge some parents to act like it.
Duval County public schools need to shake things up and above, if we want to reach our potential, is a blue print to do so. At the end of the day we can’t keep doing the same thing over and over and expect a different outcome. According to Albert Einstein and the results the school district has seen thus far, that would be crazy.
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