Duval County Public Schools are being told to under project enrollment by 50 students at every school.

That is basically two teaching positions

The reason being given is the district doesn’t know the effect on enrollment that all the new charter schools that will be starting next year. It doesn’t mean that every school will be down by 50 kids and some schools won’t see growth but it means it is likely that school teachers will lose their jobs.

Another reason the schools might be told to under estimate is to make it easier to get rid of administrators, librarians or other teachers that speak up or question how things are going. 

Don't think for a second that Duval County isn't ground zero for the privatization movement of public education.

Want to let the District know how you feel about the Iranetta Wright promotion

Want to let the District know how you feel about the Iranetta Wright promotion

I would start at the school board meeting tomorrow night at the school board building. Each member of the public is allowed to speak for three minutes.

Then you could always e-mail the super and the board members. The public deserves to have their voices heard.

leef@duvalschools.org
couchr@duvalschools.org

wrightp@duvalschools.org,
nvitti@hotmail.com
vittin@duvalschools.org
grymesc@duvalschools.org,
fischerj@duvalschools.org,
hallc6@duvalschools.org,
juareza1@duvalschools.org

Betty Burney nearly wrecks the district, gets district job for her efforts

Betty Burney was part of a group that ran the district onto the ground so I have to say I was enraged, flabbergasted and glad I wasn’t eating when I read her I’m a Star Foundation was in line to get a contract with the district to help provide services to overage children.

The foundation’s staff would knock on parents’ doors, host-parenting sessions, or do whatever it takes to get them to motivate their child, said Burney, a former School Board member.

It’s unclear how many foundation workers would staff the expansion, Burney said, because the nonprofits are still fine-tuning their contract with the district.

Mind you this is a job that is hard to quantify and it needs somebody of utmost integrity to do. Does that sound like Betty Burney to you? No, it is unfreaking believable but I am not the only one that thinks so. These were some comments from Times Union readers.

From CrazyBob: Betty Burney who allowed Duval county schools to lower levels of ranking during her tenure and still has a fine unpaid from the state of Florida.

How come under Burney, she was unwilling to do anything but now; she is part of this, what money from this program is going to her???

How many of former school board members are now riding on the budget of Duval county schools? WHY?

How many of former failed leaders will vitti tap to make changes to the already failing system?

From ComeonJacksonville:

I thought this was supposed to be the Superintendent of Change. If that is so, why is Betty Burney getting a contract with the school system? The same politics that have always existed are still in Duval. We just exchanged an old Pratt-Dannals for a new one.

Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/news/metro/2013-06-08/story/superintendent-nikolai-vitti-looks-expand-overage-student-services#ixzz2Vk5CYzbZ

Duval County starts surplussing and non reappointing librarians.

The district starts surplussing and non reappointing librarians.

For a district with a reading problem if this is true, this is unbelievable.

This is a letter I received from a local librarian.

Chris, people are getting letters from the district, non-reappointing them or surplussing them - instead of hearing from their principals.

Vitti told them, that's my job. So principals are staying silent to their own staffs, letting him do the dirty work. Very impersonal! Everyone depends on their jobs, people are buying houses, caring for sick relatives. Such a disrespectful way to treat people!

Compared to the rest of the state, Duval Struggles on EOCs and FCAT

A cursory look says many of our scores are below the state averages. This isn’t to say we didn’t make improvements I just didn’t do the comparisons (yet) between this year and last.

If you would like to see the scores (and why doesn’t the Times Union  include a link in thier piece), click the link below.

http://fcat.fldoe.org/mediapacket/2013/default.asp

Superintendent Vitti hires bully to be area chief, district takes step backwards

There is one thing you can say about Iranetta Wright the principal at Jackson high school, she apparently knows where the bodies are buried and that is th eonly reasonable explanation for why a second superintendent has seen fit to promote her. Sadly saying things like leadership and results would be a stretch. Despite this Vitti recently promoted her to area chief. Lets examine this bully masquerading as an administrator’s recent career.

In 2008 she arrived at Jackson high school and promptly took it to the bottom. At one point the school was ranked 404 out of 404. Somehow she survived F after F that would have sent other principals into retirement or to Assistant Principal land at a middle school. Yes the school did eventually improve but only after half the student body left and the district partnered with numerous other organizations and started to address the outside school needs of those few students who remained.  

Why then did Vitti promote her? Maybe it was her autocratic leadership style. A former teacher said; she would talk to the staff in a fashion that if we would talk to the kids that way we would get fired. Her motivation techniques consisted of threats and intimidation. Much of the veteran staff she inherited has moved onto other positions in the district or has left the teaching field all together replaced by “easily moldable” rookies who often don’t know that they shouldn’t be talked down to and forced to work sixty hours a week.

Let’s compare her to another principal that the district forced out.

A quick review of Jackson's data would indicate serious problems with her leadership.
The students obviously get that something is wrong with Jackson's leadership. In 2009-2010, there were nearly 1200 students. Enrollment as of 6/11/12 was a little over 700 students.

1200-700=500 students GONE

With regards to academic performance, the school has not made a lot of progress since she first became principal of the school.

In 2007, Reading proficiency was 18%. In 2012, it has only increased by 1 percentage point to 19%.
In 2007, Writing proficiency was 80%. In 2012, it has only increased by 2 percentage points.

Some are going to argue that she has been able to increase the number of students making gains. And gains are great. However, we need to create a culture of moving our students to proficiency. Iranetta cannot get these kids proficient and the sad truth is when you get rid of some of your worse performers scores are going to go up.

Another argument some might make is the improbability of real improvement happening at the high school level.

Well, let's look at Ribault High School which has had more F grades than any other school in Northeast Florida before Dr. Young arrived in 2009.

Reading proficiency was 18% when he arrived. In 2012, the Reading proficiency has increased by 13 percentage points to 31% (highest in school's history).

Writing proficiency was 75%. In 2012, the Writing proficiency increased by 5 percentage points to 80%.

What Iranetta had not been able to do in her almost 6 years before the district started to make super human efforts at Jackson and almost half the student body left, Young was able to do 3 years. Oh and Young was loved and respected by his staff while Wright is feared.

Another difference is Wright just got a promotion and Young is no longer in the district. 

Here is the thing even if you love wright shouldn't she prove she can turn a school around without superhuman initiatives before she is put in charge of a whole bunch of schools? What exactly has she done to merit this promotion? As far as I can tell, nothing.

Is Wright the best candidate that Vitti could come up with, a bully masquerading as an administrator with a dubious track record of success?  If so then Duval is worse off than I thought it was.

For shame Superintendent Vitti, you can do better and you are going to have to if you want the district to.

Librarian slams district over priorities, you will to after you read this.

This is from a librarian friend of mine. -cpg

It appears that Dr. Vitti is willing to sacrifice a Library Media program, but spend 21 million dollars on a Dean, an ISSP teacher, and a testing coordinator -- none of which has ever been in our budgets/on our staff, none of which is instructional, and ALL of which have been ably handled by school-based teachers/admin with not even a stipend or a supplement. ISSP is often empty, seldom full. Not a single argument for dumping Media for these positions has made any reasonable sense, considering that research shows having an active Library Media specialist leads to academic improvement and reading gains.

I have to add, a district with a reading problem should not be cutting its librarians. 

Where can you get 5 Fs and walk at graduation? Duval County

This is an e-mail a colleague sent me. I am not going to put his name to it in fear of retaliation but I find him above reproach. Also if it happened at my friends school it happened all across the district

One of my former nonstudents, came to class less than 20% this semester, walked across the stage this past Tues. He had F in every session of every class for the 5 academic classes he took this year, and he did grade recovery for all 5 credits in the past 3 weeks so they put him in. (is it possible he cheated? gasp!) Only problem is with all that GR his District GPA was still only 1.66, so I am convinced at this point there is no criteria for being in a graduation ceremony in this county.  

Also we were given District EOC result print outs for seniors on May 23rd. Today we were given the same printout but many of the scores are different and lower, 5 of my student gains became statistical losses now. Problem is the tests were of course scantron, and the results should have no possible way of changing (unless someone is playing games?) My AP is "investigating". I'm sure we will never get to the bottom of this. Can we sink much lower?

Wow! Well what do you think can we sink much lower?

Why do some principals get promoted in Duval County?

Benjamin Perry was the principal at Ed White high school. If you don’t recognize the name don’t feel too bad he was only there one year. Though in that one year the school grade went from a D to a C and he was well liked by the staff. When he said they were a family you got the feeling that he really believed it. Unfortunately a lot of principals pull the family card but what they really mean is, shut up and sit down.

Then there is Dr. James Young of Ribault who had a reputation of turning around struggling schools. A dear friend of mine worked for him for two years and would say he was often strict but fair, he didn’t play favorites and if you needed help he made sure you got it. She said; we really felt respected and valued.

Both of these men believed in supporting their staff, not bullying them or ridiculing them and if results on standardized tests are the bottom line then they both did a good job there as well.

Neither of these two is in the district anymore. Confused? Well both of these men clashed with Education Directions the EMO brought in by Pratt Dannals and managed by his friend Steve Hite. Sticking up to them and sticking up for their staffs probably factored greatly in why they are no longer employed by the county.

Iranetta Wright on the other hand isn’t just still in the district but apparently she is moving up the ladder. Sadly she also has a reputation of cajoling, bullying and intimidating her staff (a reputation too many principals in the district have) and furthermore her numbers don’t back up a promotion to a district position where she will be in charge of other schools.

Under our last super things like leadership and ability were secondary to who one knew and many of us dared to hope things were going to change under superintendent Vitti.

My questions to Vitti and the district are isn’t there another principal who has the data and who is respectful to their staff as well? Is our bench so shallow that we feel the need to promote Mrs. Wright and there are no other qualified candidates? Is this a racial thing and he wanted an African-American in the position? If that’s the case I think he has misjudged the African America community of Jacksonville who would have preferred that the district reached out to James Young. Or is it something else because there are plenty of rumors about her and a former assistant superintendent.

I think the people of Jacksonville many of whom are scratching their head over this one need an answer and hopefully that answer isn’t same old same old.

Will they won’t they, will they won’t they, it looks like Duval’s librarians are going to be cut.

A little over ten days ago middle school and senior high school librarians were told to expect the worse and elementary school librarians were told they would most likely be working at two schools. Fast forward a week, after frantic e-mails, calls and a sudden epiphany that a district with a reading problem shouldn’t be cutting its media specialists and it looked like they were going to be saved.

The reprieve was apparently short lived as the following is what librarians are now being told. Basically, librarians are cut for middle & high, will split between schools at elem level. It will be a surplus situation for those LMS who weren't teachers first, those of us who cert in other areas will go back in the classroom, bumping other teachers based on seniority.

I have e-mailed the district for confirmation and if above is true this is sad news for the district.