This post will be used to post information about the District 300 March 21st referenda. New information about the referenda will be added to this post in the form of comments. We encourage both sides to respond. We will remove offensive comments and foul language.
The article below appeared in the December 16, 2005 edition of the Northwest Herald. CRAFT finds it offensive that the school district appears to be using these children as political pawns. Are we to believe that these children on their own initiative understand and support the full ramifications of these referenda without independent research into school finances, contracts, audits, tax codes, etc? Or have they been coopted to serve a selfish political agenda? There are school boards and professional auditors who do not understand the effects of referenda. We would like to know how many of these children are related to teachers or District employees. How will these activities affect their academic life?
Will District 300 and the NWH give equal time to students and groups that oppose these referenda? Would such a group even dare expose itself in the recrimination culture of our pulic schools? "Student groups" are using taxpayer facilities to promote the referenda. Can students who oppose the referenda have equal time and facility use? Let us hope these children will seek answers from those who do not have a direct benefit from the passage of this referenda. We wish these students good luck in getting responsible answers. We found it odd that their goal is to pass the referendum before getting the information they need. They should decide that once they get their questions answered.
D-300 high-schoolers launch campaign on questions
[published on Fri, Dec 16, 2005]
ALGONQUIN – A growing group of District 300 high-schoolers has a New Year's resolution: Get voters to approve referendums this spring. The first chapter of their mission is under way, to understand the facts – about population growth, property taxes, district finances, and the No Child Left Behind Act.
The first chapter of their mission is under way, to understand the facts – about population growth, property taxes, district finances, and the No Child Left Behind Act.
To view the rest of the article click here
Saturday, December 17, 2005
Thursday, December 15, 2005
THE MEANING OF THE WORD “EDUCATION”
The post below is from a CRAFT supporter in Mundelein. Well done Bill Zettler. We need more people like you willing to put strong pieces like this out there for the public to read.
THE MEANING OF THE WORD “EDUCATION”
Bill Clinton once told us it depended upon what the meaning of “is” is.
For Illinois citizens it depends upon what the meaning of “education” is.
Lets see if we know what the meaning of “education” is in Illinois.
We know that “education” means pensions of up to$186,000 per year for members of the Teachers Retirement System.
We know “education” means 6 figure salaries for over 5,000 public school employees.
We know “education” means over $10 million in political donations to Illinois politicians of both parties by various Teacher Union organizations since 2000.
In Mundelein “education” means a school district job for one board member, a school contract for the spouse of another board member and the purchase of a public golf course for school expansion when less expensive property is available right across the street. In Carpentersville “education” means 10% per year salary increases for teachers at District 300 at the same time they are asking for more money for the Education Fund.
We know “education” means a 9- month work year and “you can’t fire me” tenure for teachers.
In Illinois “education” means teachers can’t be fired but they can go on strike.
That tells us what “education” is; lets see what “education” isn’t.
“Education” is not vouchers for poor parents so they can decide where their kids should go to school. Fifty years ago blacks were not allowed to eat in certain restaurants, drink from certain fountains or sit in front of the bus. Today they are still not allowed to choose where their children go to school. Jim Crow is alive and well in Illinois.
“Education” does not mean tax credits for dedicated parents who home school. They pay taxes for other kids to go to school but not for their own.
And in a recent article in the Daily Herald, the United Way is asking for donations for school supplies for homeless children so we know for sure the $20 billion Illinois spends on “education” each year does not mean pencils, crayons, tablets, backpacks or scissors for the poorest of the poor.
The Illinois constitution guarantees members of the TRS their $186,000/yr pensions but does not guarantee all children adequate school supplies. Doesn’t that seem backwards to you? Shouldn’t the word “education” consider children before teachers?
So remember when teacher union officials and politicians talk about what “education” is, they do not mean what you think “education” is or should be. And as long as they are in charge of defining what ‘education” is Illinois taxpayers will pay more and Illinois children will receive less.
Bill Zettler
THE MEANING OF THE WORD “EDUCATION”
Bill Clinton once told us it depended upon what the meaning of “is” is.
For Illinois citizens it depends upon what the meaning of “education” is.
Lets see if we know what the meaning of “education” is in Illinois.
We know that “education” means pensions of up to$186,000 per year for members of the Teachers Retirement System.
We know “education” means 6 figure salaries for over 5,000 public school employees.
We know “education” means over $10 million in political donations to Illinois politicians of both parties by various Teacher Union organizations since 2000.
In Mundelein “education” means a school district job for one board member, a school contract for the spouse of another board member and the purchase of a public golf course for school expansion when less expensive property is available right across the street. In Carpentersville “education” means 10% per year salary increases for teachers at District 300 at the same time they are asking for more money for the Education Fund.
We know “education” means a 9- month work year and “you can’t fire me” tenure for teachers.
In Illinois “education” means teachers can’t be fired but they can go on strike.
That tells us what “education” is; lets see what “education” isn’t.
“Education” is not vouchers for poor parents so they can decide where their kids should go to school. Fifty years ago blacks were not allowed to eat in certain restaurants, drink from certain fountains or sit in front of the bus. Today they are still not allowed to choose where their children go to school. Jim Crow is alive and well in Illinois.
“Education” does not mean tax credits for dedicated parents who home school. They pay taxes for other kids to go to school but not for their own.
And in a recent article in the Daily Herald, the United Way is asking for donations for school supplies for homeless children so we know for sure the $20 billion Illinois spends on “education” each year does not mean pencils, crayons, tablets, backpacks or scissors for the poorest of the poor.
The Illinois constitution guarantees members of the TRS their $186,000/yr pensions but does not guarantee all children adequate school supplies. Doesn’t that seem backwards to you? Shouldn’t the word “education” consider children before teachers?
So remember when teacher union officials and politicians talk about what “education” is, they do not mean what you think “education” is or should be. And as long as they are in charge of defining what ‘education” is Illinois taxpayers will pay more and Illinois children will receive less.
Bill Zettler
Wednesday, December 14, 2005
What Teachers Do
The below Letters to the Editor appeared in the Northwest Herald. The first is Jim Peschke's parody to a pro-education establishment's LTE. The letter from Brian Schweitzer appears to be another version of one promoted by the education establishment posted on Mike Davitt website.
What teachers do
[published on Wed, Dec 14, 2005]
To the Editor:
Re: Nov. 24 letter, "What teachers make."
At a five-star dinner party, one woman, a chief executive officer, wondered how a teacher could afford $200 per plate. She decided to confront this contradiction to the "underpaid teacher" myth.
She argued, "What's a kid going to learn from someone who thinks a six-figure salary for nine months work is 'underpaid'?" To stress the point, she said to another guest: "You're a teacher, Susan. Be honest, what do you make?" (Looking for income.)
Susan, an unusually frank teacher, asked "You want to know what we make?"
"We make parents work harder than they ever thought they could. We make one-income households become two-income households to pay ever-increasing taxes for schools.
"We make kids wonder why they should bother with homework. We make kids who can't read at age 16 feel like they've won the Congressional Medal of Honor because self-esteem is more important than learning fundamentals.
"We make bad teachers earn more than good teachers. We make legislators pass laws to strengthen our education monopoly. We make Illinois bankrupt with a Ponzi-retirement scheme.
"We make friendly neighbors into enemies by running tax increase referendums every few months.
"We make the elderly choose between food and medicine because they can no longer afford both.
"We make America less competitive in the Information Age."
Susan paused, then continued: "You want to know what we make? We make ourselves out to be secular saints using silly stories like Brian Schweitzer's. We make our union bosses richer. What do you make?"
The chief executive officer replied: "We make medicine to save the lives of millions. If we take public money without delivering results, I can go to jail. What happens to you?"
Susan replied: "Nothing. I have tenure."
Jim Peschke
Harvard
What do teachers make?
What do teachers make?
Some dinner guests were sitting around a table discussing life. One woman, a chief executive officer, decided to explain the problem with education.
She argued, "What's a kid going to learn from someone who decided that the best option in life for a profession was to be involved in education?"
To stress her point she said to another guest, "You're a teacher, Susan. Be honest. What do you make?" (Looking for a dollar amount)
Susan replied: "Do you want to know what we make?
"We make children work harder than they ever thought they could. We make a kid that earned a C-plus and worked real hard to achieve that C-plus, feel like they had just won the Congressional Medal of Honor.
"You want to know what we make?
"We make kids wonder. We make them question. We make them say 'please' and 'thank you.'
"We make them so they can write properly. We make them work on taking care of their bodies. We make them read so they can comprehend the words. We make them show all of their work in math and perfect their final drafts for English.
"We make them understand that if you use your brain, follow your heart, and if someone ever tries to judge you by what you make, you must pay no attention because they didn't learn."
Susan paused and then continued: "You want to know what we make? We make a difference! What do you make?"
Any person who is involved in education, at all levels, makes every profession possible.
Congratulations to any person involved in education; you make it all possible.
Brian Schweitzer
McHenry
What teachers do
[published on Wed, Dec 14, 2005]
To the Editor:
Re: Nov. 24 letter, "What teachers make."
At a five-star dinner party, one woman, a chief executive officer, wondered how a teacher could afford $200 per plate. She decided to confront this contradiction to the "underpaid teacher" myth.
She argued, "What's a kid going to learn from someone who thinks a six-figure salary for nine months work is 'underpaid'?" To stress the point, she said to another guest: "You're a teacher, Susan. Be honest, what do you make?" (Looking for income.)
Susan, an unusually frank teacher, asked "You want to know what we make?"
"We make parents work harder than they ever thought they could. We make one-income households become two-income households to pay ever-increasing taxes for schools.
"We make kids wonder why they should bother with homework. We make kids who can't read at age 16 feel like they've won the Congressional Medal of Honor because self-esteem is more important than learning fundamentals.
"We make bad teachers earn more than good teachers. We make legislators pass laws to strengthen our education monopoly. We make Illinois bankrupt with a Ponzi-retirement scheme.
"We make friendly neighbors into enemies by running tax increase referendums every few months.
"We make the elderly choose between food and medicine because they can no longer afford both.
"We make America less competitive in the Information Age."
Susan paused, then continued: "You want to know what we make? We make ourselves out to be secular saints using silly stories like Brian Schweitzer's. We make our union bosses richer. What do you make?"
The chief executive officer replied: "We make medicine to save the lives of millions. If we take public money without delivering results, I can go to jail. What happens to you?"
Susan replied: "Nothing. I have tenure."
Jim Peschke
Harvard
What do teachers make?
What do teachers make?
Some dinner guests were sitting around a table discussing life. One woman, a chief executive officer, decided to explain the problem with education.
She argued, "What's a kid going to learn from someone who decided that the best option in life for a profession was to be involved in education?"
To stress her point she said to another guest, "You're a teacher, Susan. Be honest. What do you make?" (Looking for a dollar amount)
Susan replied: "Do you want to know what we make?
"We make children work harder than they ever thought they could. We make a kid that earned a C-plus and worked real hard to achieve that C-plus, feel like they had just won the Congressional Medal of Honor.
"You want to know what we make?
"We make kids wonder. We make them question. We make them say 'please' and 'thank you.'
"We make them so they can write properly. We make them work on taking care of their bodies. We make them read so they can comprehend the words. We make them show all of their work in math and perfect their final drafts for English.
"We make them understand that if you use your brain, follow your heart, and if someone ever tries to judge you by what you make, you must pay no attention because they didn't learn."
Susan paused and then continued: "You want to know what we make? We make a difference! What do you make?"
Any person who is involved in education, at all levels, makes every profession possible.
Congratulations to any person involved in education; you make it all possible.
Brian Schweitzer
McHenry
Tuesday, December 13, 2005
Time to quit hiding costs of tenure
Scott Reeder's series for the Small Newspaper Group
concluded last week with a good editorial, however we disagree changing from property tax to income tax. All
the articles can be reached by clicking on the title above.
An editorial: Time to quit hiding costs of tenure
Small Newspaper Group
Twenty years after the Illinois Legislature tried to
bring greater accountability into the classroom by
making it easier to fire bad teachers, Scott Reeder of
The Small Newspaper Group Springfield bureau launched
an investigation to determine the effectiveness of
those reforms.
The results of the investigation, one of the largest
in the company’s history, are startling.
Despite denials from the state’s two major teacher
unions, the data indicates that tenure has evolved
into near total job protection that mocks the goal of
accountability. The greatest abuses of this system are
often in the poorest school districts.
As part of this six-month investigation, Reeder:
-- Filed about 1,500 Freedom of Information Act
requests with various governmental entities.
-- Achieved a 100 percent response rate when seeking
data from each of Illinois’ 876 school districts.
-- Reviewed every case of a tenured educator facing
dismissal during the past 18 years.
-- Conducted one of the largest media document reviews
in the history of Cook County courts, according to
Linda Cuellar a spokeswoman for the circuit clerk.
-- Interviewed hundreds of educators, union officials
and experts.
What to do now
Students suffer when the teacher is incompetent. The
result is a disaster when the jobs of tomorrow require
higher skills than ever.
Good teachers suffer as they watch helplessly as the
standards of their profession are pulled down. They
are unfairly tarnished with the brush of mediocrity.
To add insult to injury, terrible teachers are paid
$50,000 or more to go away, while the best teachers
rarely get a bonus or premium pay based on merit. We
should have the courage to honor and reward the best
teachers. Their contributions are beyond measure, but
we must try anyway.
The taxpayers suffer by paying hundreds of thousands
of dollars in legal fees in cases to produce verdicts
that defy common sense.
For everybody’s sake, Illinois needs to bring real
accountability to the system.
A few suggestions:
-- It shouldn’t take a reporter six months to get this
kind of information. It should be collected by the
state and offered to the public as an accountability
report card each year.
-- Illinois should follow Iowa’s lead in outlawing
secret deals with bad teachers. Sunlight is a great
disinfectant.
-- Long term teachers who are incompetent should
receive severance pay reflecting their seniority,
along with professional outplacement help. This is
better than keeping them in the system, where the
damage they cause to students lasts for years after
the student has left that classroom.
-- Some teachers have students who come badly prepared
and motivated. What counts is not the starting point,
but the progress made during the year. That can be
measured and rewarded.
-- Voucher systems, allowing students to choose among
public schools, would install a spirit of healthy
competition that would wake up the school boards.
-- But the greatest reform would be a grand trade.
Financing schools with property taxes, started when
only the rich owned real estate, is wrong, resulting
in huge disparities among school districts in the
state. Illinois should replace the property tax with
an equivalent income tax, in return for real
accountability for performance. The system we have is
a sham and a disgrace..
Now that the costs of tenure are no longer hidden, we
can do no less.
concluded last week with a good editorial, however we disagree changing from property tax to income tax. All
the articles can be reached by clicking on the title above.
An editorial: Time to quit hiding costs of tenure
Small Newspaper Group
Twenty years after the Illinois Legislature tried to
bring greater accountability into the classroom by
making it easier to fire bad teachers, Scott Reeder of
The Small Newspaper Group Springfield bureau launched
an investigation to determine the effectiveness of
those reforms.
The results of the investigation, one of the largest
in the company’s history, are startling.
Despite denials from the state’s two major teacher
unions, the data indicates that tenure has evolved
into near total job protection that mocks the goal of
accountability. The greatest abuses of this system are
often in the poorest school districts.
As part of this six-month investigation, Reeder:
-- Filed about 1,500 Freedom of Information Act
requests with various governmental entities.
-- Achieved a 100 percent response rate when seeking
data from each of Illinois’ 876 school districts.
-- Reviewed every case of a tenured educator facing
dismissal during the past 18 years.
-- Conducted one of the largest media document reviews
in the history of Cook County courts, according to
Linda Cuellar a spokeswoman for the circuit clerk.
-- Interviewed hundreds of educators, union officials
and experts.
What to do now
Students suffer when the teacher is incompetent. The
result is a disaster when the jobs of tomorrow require
higher skills than ever.
Good teachers suffer as they watch helplessly as the
standards of their profession are pulled down. They
are unfairly tarnished with the brush of mediocrity.
To add insult to injury, terrible teachers are paid
$50,000 or more to go away, while the best teachers
rarely get a bonus or premium pay based on merit. We
should have the courage to honor and reward the best
teachers. Their contributions are beyond measure, but
we must try anyway.
The taxpayers suffer by paying hundreds of thousands
of dollars in legal fees in cases to produce verdicts
that defy common sense.
For everybody’s sake, Illinois needs to bring real
accountability to the system.
A few suggestions:
-- It shouldn’t take a reporter six months to get this
kind of information. It should be collected by the
state and offered to the public as an accountability
report card each year.
-- Illinois should follow Iowa’s lead in outlawing
secret deals with bad teachers. Sunlight is a great
disinfectant.
-- Long term teachers who are incompetent should
receive severance pay reflecting their seniority,
along with professional outplacement help. This is
better than keeping them in the system, where the
damage they cause to students lasts for years after
the student has left that classroom.
-- Some teachers have students who come badly prepared
and motivated. What counts is not the starting point,
but the progress made during the year. That can be
measured and rewarded.
-- Voucher systems, allowing students to choose among
public schools, would install a spirit of healthy
competition that would wake up the school boards.
-- But the greatest reform would be a grand trade.
Financing schools with property taxes, started when
only the rich owned real estate, is wrong, resulting
in huge disparities among school districts in the
state. Illinois should replace the property tax with
an equivalent income tax, in return for real
accountability for performance. The system we have is
a sham and a disgrace..
Now that the costs of tenure are no longer hidden, we
can do no less.
Monday, December 12, 2005
The city of Duluth, Minnesota made a "doleful discovery"
As you may know we have hundreds of people on our CRAFT email list sending us great information. The letter below came from our friend Herm. I know that District 50's teachers contract call for medical insurance payments for our retired employees. On top of their outrageous pensions (don't forget to check out www.thechampion.org for their new pension calculator) it is hard to see why taxpayers are willing to give more to such a mismanaged and corrupt form of government in any community. We must no longer listen to teachers and administrators whine about their low pay because those retiring today are more than likely to earn millions in retirement at the same time you will be paying for their health insurance. Teachers and school boards have no qualms about using your children as political pawns while refusing to take responsibility for actually educating our children just to get more money with no regard to the financial crisis they are creating. Again thanks Herm.
*** The city of Duluth, Minnesota made a "doleful discovery" recently,
reports the New York Times. Apparently, the town had been promising
lifetime health care to all of the town's retired workers, their spouses
and their children up to 26.
Unfortunately, no one ever stopped to figure out how much that would cost
- until a few years ago. After months of data collecting, an actuary
finally came up with an estimate of how much it would cost to provide free
lifetime health care to this group.
The total bill? About $178 million, more than double the city's operating
budget.
"Duluth's doleful discovery is about to be repeated across the country,
continues the Times article. "Thousands of government bodies, including
states, cities, towns, school districts and water authorities, are in for
the same kind of shock in the next year or so. For years, governments have
been promising generous medical benefits to millions of schoolteachers,
firefighters and other employees when they retire, yet experts say that
virtually none of these governments have kept track of the mounting price
tag. The usual practice is to budget for health care a year at a time, and
to leave the rest for the future.
"Off the government balance sheets - out of sight and out of mind - those
obligations have been ballooning as health care costs have spiraled and as
the baby-boom generation has approached retirement. And now the accounting
rulemaker for the public sector, the Governmental Accounting Standards
Board, says it is time for every government to do what Duluth has done: to
come to grips with the total value of its promises, and to report it to
their taxpayers and bondholders."
More tomorrow.
In the meantime, you can check out our special report that details what
will happen after the "Boomer Bomb" is dropped. Find out how here:
Duluth: Ground Zero of the Fiscal Firestorm Ahead?
http://www1.youreletters.com/t/222367/11640808/780395/0/
*** The city of Duluth, Minnesota made a "doleful discovery" recently,
reports the New York Times. Apparently, the town had been promising
lifetime health care to all of the town's retired workers, their spouses
and their children up to 26.
Unfortunately, no one ever stopped to figure out how much that would cost
- until a few years ago. After months of data collecting, an actuary
finally came up with an estimate of how much it would cost to provide free
lifetime health care to this group.
The total bill? About $178 million, more than double the city's operating
budget.
"Duluth's doleful discovery is about to be repeated across the country,
continues the Times article. "Thousands of government bodies, including
states, cities, towns, school districts and water authorities, are in for
the same kind of shock in the next year or so. For years, governments have
been promising generous medical benefits to millions of schoolteachers,
firefighters and other employees when they retire, yet experts say that
virtually none of these governments have kept track of the mounting price
tag. The usual practice is to budget for health care a year at a time, and
to leave the rest for the future.
"Off the government balance sheets - out of sight and out of mind - those
obligations have been ballooning as health care costs have spiraled and as
the baby-boom generation has approached retirement. And now the accounting
rulemaker for the public sector, the Governmental Accounting Standards
Board, says it is time for every government to do what Duluth has done: to
come to grips with the total value of its promises, and to report it to
their taxpayers and bondholders."
More tomorrow.
In the meantime, you can check out our special report that details what
will happen after the "Boomer Bomb" is dropped. Find out how here:
Duluth: Ground Zero of the Fiscal Firestorm Ahead?
http://www1.youreletters.com/t/222367/11640808/780395/0/
Sunday, December 11, 2005
THE COMING WORKER MELTDOWN
We must look at our education system and our legislators for creating this problem. The current system and tenure does not allow us to hire the teachers and people we need to get the job of educating all of our children to their maximum potential. If teaching is so important why can't we get rid of incompentent teachers and administrators and hire the people who can do the job right. The security of tenure only helps teachers and does nothing to properly educate our children. The below article appeard in the Decembler 11, 2005 Chicago Tribune. Thanks to Pete Speers for the heads up on this article.
THE COMING WORKER MELTDOWN
World is caught between old skills and high-tech needs
Unfortunate convergence of economic factors points to a shortfall in trained employees
By Edward E. Gordon, author of "The 2010 Meltdown: Solving the Impending Jobs Crisis"
Published December 11, 2005, Chicago Tribune
A unique combination of events--the accelerated rise of advanced technologies, globalization after the fall of communism, the 1990s stock-market bubble and its collapse, and a massive number of people retiring--have combined to produce a potential 2010 workforce meltdown.
The 79 million Baby Boomers who are running the world's industrial economies will retire between 2010 and 2025. A smaller Generation X, with 40 million people and fewer entry-level "smart" workers, will take over.
A great mismatch of too many low-skilled workers and too many high-skill jobs is set to reach stellar heights. As these high-skill jobs go unfilled, American businesses will search the world in vain for more highly skilled, job-ready workers.
According to several studies, between 2010 and 2020 the U.S., Europe, Japan, China and India will face a shortfall of between 32 million to 39 million well-educated, technically specialized "smart people." The current business strategies of outsourcing these high-skill jobs or using H-1B temporary visas to import the workers won't work anymore. Millions of lower-skilled Americans, or people educated for careers that aren't growing or are obsolete, will sit on the economic sidelines, either unemployed or condemned to a future of low wages.
A technology paradox for the U.S. industrial and manufacturing sectors that have laid off millions of low-skilled workers is that they cannot find enough people to fill growing numbers of advanced technology jobs.
A 2002 Hudson Institute study found that 60 percent of all the jobs being created require skills that only 20 percent of U.S. workers possess. For example, in November 2004, Pennsylvania reported that nearly 350,000 workers were unemployed. At the same time, 24 percent of businesses told the state they couldn't find enough qualified workers.
Between 2000 and 2005, 200,000 manufacturing jobs disappeared from Illinois. Some of these were high-pay, high-skill jobs that went elsewhere to find the workers companies can't find here. These 2010 meltdown issues do not bode well for the long-term economic development of Illinois. We need to face the facts that in contemporary America there are just too many people trained for the wrong jobs and not enough people preparing for the jobs we are creating.
The career aspirations of much of the population in the U.S. are at serious odds with the increasingly high-tech needs of the economy. Unless this culture lag is resolved in a timely way, a growing labor market imbalance will have serious economic consequences. The high standards of American life are built on a complex technological and physical infrastructure that everyone takes for granted. Its maintenance is central to the prosperity of our economy. Many areas of industry and service within our economy are involved, with health care, manufacturing, information technology and the skilled trades constituting particularly critical sectors.
Yet as the Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry has stated, "The nation's apathy toward developing a scientifically and technologically trained workforce is the equivalent of intellectual and industrial disarmament ... and is a direct threat to our nation's capability to continue as a world leader."
According to Rick Stephens, senior vice president of human resources at Boeing Corp., "The shrinkage of a U.S. technically able workforce is the greatest threat to our national security."
Many Americans already are responding to the 2010 challenge. Intel, Microsoft, IBM and others are investing more than $50 billion each year in worker retraining and student career-education programs.
Many communities have organized a variety of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), such as Bridge to Careers of Santa Ana, Calif., the Philadelphia Academies Inc. or the Tulsa Technology Center. These intermediary agencies help bridge the chasm that separates the business and labor markets from education and career preparation.
The NGOs seek to retrain adult workers through a variety of education and skills programs attuned to the needs of local labor markets. They also strive to reinvent an outmoded educational system that traditionally has sorted students into two groups: "the best and the brightest" going to college and the others who won't.
These NGO alternatives place all students in local liberal arts/career academies that prepare everyone for post-secondary education. The major objective is that most students will complete a post-secondary, two- or four-year degree or an occupational program certificate.
NGOs can facilitate a 21st Century career culture that better prepares students and adults for the careers of a technologically driven, globally competitive society. Chicago's Renaissance 2010 Program is focused on developing 100 special academies. But Chicago has 600 public schools. Will it take an entire generation to reinvent education in Chicago? Do we have the time?
America needs to embark on a new era of reconstruction to avoid a 2010 meltdown. The future depends on our individual and collective will to make the necessary culture changes now for a new America and a new Illinois.
----------
Edward E. Gordon is the author of "The 2010 Meltdown: Solving the Impending Jobs Crisis." He also serves on the Chicago Workforce Board and the Education Workforce Committee of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.
THE COMING WORKER MELTDOWN
World is caught between old skills and high-tech needs
Unfortunate convergence of economic factors points to a shortfall in trained employees
By Edward E. Gordon, author of "The 2010 Meltdown: Solving the Impending Jobs Crisis"
Published December 11, 2005, Chicago Tribune
A unique combination of events--the accelerated rise of advanced technologies, globalization after the fall of communism, the 1990s stock-market bubble and its collapse, and a massive number of people retiring--have combined to produce a potential 2010 workforce meltdown.
The 79 million Baby Boomers who are running the world's industrial economies will retire between 2010 and 2025. A smaller Generation X, with 40 million people and fewer entry-level "smart" workers, will take over.
A great mismatch of too many low-skilled workers and too many high-skill jobs is set to reach stellar heights. As these high-skill jobs go unfilled, American businesses will search the world in vain for more highly skilled, job-ready workers.
According to several studies, between 2010 and 2020 the U.S., Europe, Japan, China and India will face a shortfall of between 32 million to 39 million well-educated, technically specialized "smart people." The current business strategies of outsourcing these high-skill jobs or using H-1B temporary visas to import the workers won't work anymore. Millions of lower-skilled Americans, or people educated for careers that aren't growing or are obsolete, will sit on the economic sidelines, either unemployed or condemned to a future of low wages.
A technology paradox for the U.S. industrial and manufacturing sectors that have laid off millions of low-skilled workers is that they cannot find enough people to fill growing numbers of advanced technology jobs.
A 2002 Hudson Institute study found that 60 percent of all the jobs being created require skills that only 20 percent of U.S. workers possess. For example, in November 2004, Pennsylvania reported that nearly 350,000 workers were unemployed. At the same time, 24 percent of businesses told the state they couldn't find enough qualified workers.
Between 2000 and 2005, 200,000 manufacturing jobs disappeared from Illinois. Some of these were high-pay, high-skill jobs that went elsewhere to find the workers companies can't find here. These 2010 meltdown issues do not bode well for the long-term economic development of Illinois. We need to face the facts that in contemporary America there are just too many people trained for the wrong jobs and not enough people preparing for the jobs we are creating.
The career aspirations of much of the population in the U.S. are at serious odds with the increasingly high-tech needs of the economy. Unless this culture lag is resolved in a timely way, a growing labor market imbalance will have serious economic consequences. The high standards of American life are built on a complex technological and physical infrastructure that everyone takes for granted. Its maintenance is central to the prosperity of our economy. Many areas of industry and service within our economy are involved, with health care, manufacturing, information technology and the skilled trades constituting particularly critical sectors.
Yet as the Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry has stated, "The nation's apathy toward developing a scientifically and technologically trained workforce is the equivalent of intellectual and industrial disarmament ... and is a direct threat to our nation's capability to continue as a world leader."
According to Rick Stephens, senior vice president of human resources at Boeing Corp., "The shrinkage of a U.S. technically able workforce is the greatest threat to our national security."
Many Americans already are responding to the 2010 challenge. Intel, Microsoft, IBM and others are investing more than $50 billion each year in worker retraining and student career-education programs.
Many communities have organized a variety of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), such as Bridge to Careers of Santa Ana, Calif., the Philadelphia Academies Inc. or the Tulsa Technology Center. These intermediary agencies help bridge the chasm that separates the business and labor markets from education and career preparation.
The NGOs seek to retrain adult workers through a variety of education and skills programs attuned to the needs of local labor markets. They also strive to reinvent an outmoded educational system that traditionally has sorted students into two groups: "the best and the brightest" going to college and the others who won't.
These NGO alternatives place all students in local liberal arts/career academies that prepare everyone for post-secondary education. The major objective is that most students will complete a post-secondary, two- or four-year degree or an occupational program certificate.
NGOs can facilitate a 21st Century career culture that better prepares students and adults for the careers of a technologically driven, globally competitive society. Chicago's Renaissance 2010 Program is focused on developing 100 special academies. But Chicago has 600 public schools. Will it take an entire generation to reinvent education in Chicago? Do we have the time?
America needs to embark on a new era of reconstruction to avoid a 2010 meltdown. The future depends on our individual and collective will to make the necessary culture changes now for a new America and a new Illinois.
----------
Edward E. Gordon is the author of "The 2010 Meltdown: Solving the Impending Jobs Crisis." He also serves on the Chicago Workforce Board and the Education Workforce Committee of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce.
Saturday, December 10, 2005
Schools resort to secret buyouts to get rid of teachers
The article below appeared first in the Small Newspaper Group but was reprinted at Students First. The story below is the second article we have posted by Scott Reeder. Let us hope more papers pick up on this great information.
If teaching is such a noble profession why does such a large majority of public school teachers join the union that inflicts so much harm to the children and taxpayers they are to serve? Great teachers are accountable to the children and parents they serve. Teachers involved with the IFT, IEA, AFT and NEA shun accountability while protecting the interests of bad teachers over the needs of the students they teach.
Schools resort to secret buyouts to get rid of teachers
12/9/2005
By Scott Reeder
Small Newspaper Group
SPRINGFIELD - It has become so costly and difficult to fire tenured teachers in Illinois that school districts have resorted to secretly paying people to quit.
In fact, school boards have been defying the Illinois open records laws by promising to keep these hush-hush deals confidential.
For example, five years ago, James Galeski received $30,000 to resign from his teaching post in Valmeyer School District.
Folks in this sleepy southern Illinois community still are perplexed over why this tenured, Ph.D. science teacher left his job.
The state's largest teacher's union, the Illinois Education Association, has threatened litigation if the school district attempts to release records documenting purported problems with Galeski, attorneys involved with the matter have said.
But during an interview last month, Sharon Hill, the school superintendent at the time of Galeski's departure asserted that he:
Shared with students information on bomb making.
Grabbed a teenage girl's crotch while at school.
Taught in an ineffective manner.
When confronted with these accusations, Galeski said, "They are 99.9 percent bullshit."
He said school officials wanted him out because he was "tired and burned out" and because he was earning a larger salary than that cash-strapped school system wanted to pay.
For the public, just who is being truthful remains an enigma because the school district has acquiesced to the IEA's demands to keep the files sealed.
A circuit judge in Sangamon County ordered Valmeyer school district to hand over a copy of the settlement agreement itself to Small Newspaper Group, but the underlying documents which may explain why school officials wanted Galeski out of the classroom remain hidden.
These deals are cut behind closed doors and seldom receive much public scrutiny.
While the agreements are not routine, they are more common than actually firing a tenured teacher, said T.J. Wilson an education labor attorney based in Monticello.
School districts are engaging in these agreements not necessarily because they think they are good public policy but because they are at times a necessary evil, he said.
"It's a very frustrating situation. You want to be effective. You want to make a difference. You want to make things better for the students and you have someone like this who you cannot fire," said former Valmeyer Superintendent Sharon Hill.
Superintendent Hill used a law passed as part of the 1985 school reforms in an attempt to improve Galeski's performance. The process proved to be time-consuming, costly and ultimately less than effective, she said.
Galeski received continual evaluations and mentoring during a full school year.
"He would get better for a couple of days and then he would be back to where he was. Valmeyer was a very small school district and he was essentially the entire science department - I felt bad that the kids weren't getting a better science education than that," she said.
For his part, Galeski contends his students performed at or better than the state average.
But the allegations involving a teen-age girl were among the most troubling.
"There was a girl who was maybe 14 or 15 and very pretty. She was very friendly toward everyone. I don't know if he misinterpreted that friendliness or what. But he grabbed her crotch in front of other students. She was totally humiliated," Hill said.
School officials notified the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services of the alleged incident, Hill said.
"Nothing ever came of it because the girl's parents decided not to pursue it. They were afraid of putting their daughter in the spotlight," Hill said.
Galeski said he met with DCFS officials and the complaint was determined to be unfounded. He said when the female student attempted to write on the back of his bald head, he was startled and his hand jerked back and inadvertently touched her in a private area.
As for the assertion that he told students how to make bombs, he said he merely answered a question posed to him by a student in class about the explosive devices planted in the Oklahoma City bombing and the Columbine High School attack. But he added he did not give step-by-step instructions in bomb making.
The settlement agreement provided that all references to the DCFS investigation would be purged from Galeski's personnel file.
According to the settlement agreement, other items were also removed from Galeski's personnel file including:
A memo from his principal about plans to limit Galeski's internet usage.
Any record of Galeski being placed on remediation.
Negative evaluations of Galeski.
These types of agreements pose a major pitfall for school districts attempting to screen job applicants.
"We have teachers who should be facing judges, but instead are facing classrooms because school boards do this and then the teacher goes on to teach in another school district. The only thing I hope is that the people who cut these deals don't sleep too well at night," said Larry Janes, a consultant often retained by school districts in remediation cases, including Galeski's.
According to data collected by Small Newspaper Group, during the past 18 years an average of only two tenured teachers have been fired each year because of poor performance. An average of five Illinois tenured teachers are fired each year amid allegations of misconduct.
Jim Pflasterer was Galeski's principal at the time he was granted tenure.
"Science teachers are among the hardest positions to fill. That is the case in any school district. And if you are in a small southern Illinois school district, it is even harder ... Sometimes you have to settle for a warm body to fill a position," Pflasterer said.
Like most Illinois teacher settlement agreements, written details of the Galeski case are few and far between, in part because of the confidentiality clause signed by school officials.
"It's cheaper and more effective to just pay teachers to quit than to spend the money on attorneys to fire them. It is far from certain that a school district will succeed when it begins the process of firing a teacher," Janes said.
He added that lawyers with Illinois' two major teacher unions routinely request confidentiality as part of these arrangements.
"Almost every settlement agreement that I have been involved with includes one of these gag orders. The only person who benefits is the teacher. It never benefits the school district. But usually the teacher won't agree to the settlement unless it is included," Janes said.
But the flip side of this argument is one of government accountability.
"Members of the public have a right to know how their tax dollars are being spent. They have a responsibility to hold public employees and elected officials accountable. If this information is kept secret, they can't hold them accountable," said Barbara Mack, an associate professor of journalism and communication at Iowa State University and a practicing First Amendment lawyer.
Mack added the Iowa Legislature has outlawed these types of secret deals.
"There have been legions of governmental entities across the country that have gone through all kinds of convolutions to keep these types of settlement agreements private. But by-and-large the courts have ruled that they are public record," Scott Sievers, a Springfield media-law attorney, said.
Charlie McBarron, a spokesman for IEA, said personnel issues such as these should be sealed from public view to protect the teacher's privacy and to make it easier for an agreement to be reached.
But current case law clearly indicates that these agreements are public records, Sievers said.
Even so, school officials across the state routinely promise the records will remain confidential.
For example, in the midst of Galeski's agreement is this sentence:
"It is understood and agreed that all information regarding the terms of this settlement and this document itself will be kept in the strictest confidence and shall not be disclosed by way of statement, interview, or press release or in any manner to any person or entity."
These buyouts are far from routine for a number of reasons such as their cost.
But one of the most basic reasons is they are dependent on the teacher choosing to leave voluntarily.
"This mentality that teaching equates to lifetime employment is so pervasive in the profession that it is difficult to convince these teachers that they should resign," Wilson said. "Often the teachers involved in these cases have emotional or psychiatric problems that hadn't manifested themselves until later in their careers. They have also typically been teaching for awhile and are resistant to the idea that they are not a good teacher."
Just how much school districts pay out in these settlement agreements varies greatly.
For example:
In 2002, Kankakee Public Schools agreed to pay more than $93,000 to Beverly Tate, a teacher who resigned from the district in 2002. It has continued to pay for her health insurance. Tate declined to disclose, for the record, why the school district paid her to leave.
In 2001, Mt. Vernon Township High School District paid $73,000 to Ronald Shreve, a teacher accused of sexually harassing students. The money was paid after a state hearing officer ruled against the school district in a dismissal case.
In 1994, Rock Island Public Schools paid Randi Barnes $75,000 to resign after it unsuccessfully sought to have a state hearing officer fire her on grounds of poor performance.
Perhaps one of the greatest ironies to these settlements is that the state's best teachers do not receive bonuses or pay raises based on their good performance, but those teachers whom school districts have worked the hardest to dismiss receive large end-of-career bonuses.
Chris Kolker, a Belleville attorney, who has represented the Illinois Federation of Teachers in a number of settlement agreements said, "If we are dealing with a teacher, who is not involved in any misconduct, but just received a bad evaluation, we would expect the school district to pay the person at least $50,000." Scott Reeder can be contacted at 217-525-8201.
If teaching is such a noble profession why does such a large majority of public school teachers join the union that inflicts so much harm to the children and taxpayers they are to serve? Great teachers are accountable to the children and parents they serve. Teachers involved with the IFT, IEA, AFT and NEA shun accountability while protecting the interests of bad teachers over the needs of the students they teach.
Schools resort to secret buyouts to get rid of teachers
12/9/2005
By Scott Reeder
Small Newspaper Group
SPRINGFIELD - It has become so costly and difficult to fire tenured teachers in Illinois that school districts have resorted to secretly paying people to quit.
In fact, school boards have been defying the Illinois open records laws by promising to keep these hush-hush deals confidential.
For example, five years ago, James Galeski received $30,000 to resign from his teaching post in Valmeyer School District.
Folks in this sleepy southern Illinois community still are perplexed over why this tenured, Ph.D. science teacher left his job.
The state's largest teacher's union, the Illinois Education Association, has threatened litigation if the school district attempts to release records documenting purported problems with Galeski, attorneys involved with the matter have said.
But during an interview last month, Sharon Hill, the school superintendent at the time of Galeski's departure asserted that he:
Shared with students information on bomb making.
Grabbed a teenage girl's crotch while at school.
Taught in an ineffective manner.
When confronted with these accusations, Galeski said, "They are 99.9 percent bullshit."
He said school officials wanted him out because he was "tired and burned out" and because he was earning a larger salary than that cash-strapped school system wanted to pay.
For the public, just who is being truthful remains an enigma because the school district has acquiesced to the IEA's demands to keep the files sealed.
A circuit judge in Sangamon County ordered Valmeyer school district to hand over a copy of the settlement agreement itself to Small Newspaper Group, but the underlying documents which may explain why school officials wanted Galeski out of the classroom remain hidden.
These deals are cut behind closed doors and seldom receive much public scrutiny.
While the agreements are not routine, they are more common than actually firing a tenured teacher, said T.J. Wilson an education labor attorney based in Monticello.
School districts are engaging in these agreements not necessarily because they think they are good public policy but because they are at times a necessary evil, he said.
"It's a very frustrating situation. You want to be effective. You want to make a difference. You want to make things better for the students and you have someone like this who you cannot fire," said former Valmeyer Superintendent Sharon Hill.
Superintendent Hill used a law passed as part of the 1985 school reforms in an attempt to improve Galeski's performance. The process proved to be time-consuming, costly and ultimately less than effective, she said.
Galeski received continual evaluations and mentoring during a full school year.
"He would get better for a couple of days and then he would be back to where he was. Valmeyer was a very small school district and he was essentially the entire science department - I felt bad that the kids weren't getting a better science education than that," she said.
For his part, Galeski contends his students performed at or better than the state average.
But the allegations involving a teen-age girl were among the most troubling.
"There was a girl who was maybe 14 or 15 and very pretty. She was very friendly toward everyone. I don't know if he misinterpreted that friendliness or what. But he grabbed her crotch in front of other students. She was totally humiliated," Hill said.
School officials notified the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services of the alleged incident, Hill said.
"Nothing ever came of it because the girl's parents decided not to pursue it. They were afraid of putting their daughter in the spotlight," Hill said.
Galeski said he met with DCFS officials and the complaint was determined to be unfounded. He said when the female student attempted to write on the back of his bald head, he was startled and his hand jerked back and inadvertently touched her in a private area.
As for the assertion that he told students how to make bombs, he said he merely answered a question posed to him by a student in class about the explosive devices planted in the Oklahoma City bombing and the Columbine High School attack. But he added he did not give step-by-step instructions in bomb making.
The settlement agreement provided that all references to the DCFS investigation would be purged from Galeski's personnel file.
According to the settlement agreement, other items were also removed from Galeski's personnel file including:
A memo from his principal about plans to limit Galeski's internet usage.
Any record of Galeski being placed on remediation.
Negative evaluations of Galeski.
These types of agreements pose a major pitfall for school districts attempting to screen job applicants.
"We have teachers who should be facing judges, but instead are facing classrooms because school boards do this and then the teacher goes on to teach in another school district. The only thing I hope is that the people who cut these deals don't sleep too well at night," said Larry Janes, a consultant often retained by school districts in remediation cases, including Galeski's.
According to data collected by Small Newspaper Group, during the past 18 years an average of only two tenured teachers have been fired each year because of poor performance. An average of five Illinois tenured teachers are fired each year amid allegations of misconduct.
Jim Pflasterer was Galeski's principal at the time he was granted tenure.
"Science teachers are among the hardest positions to fill. That is the case in any school district. And if you are in a small southern Illinois school district, it is even harder ... Sometimes you have to settle for a warm body to fill a position," Pflasterer said.
Like most Illinois teacher settlement agreements, written details of the Galeski case are few and far between, in part because of the confidentiality clause signed by school officials.
"It's cheaper and more effective to just pay teachers to quit than to spend the money on attorneys to fire them. It is far from certain that a school district will succeed when it begins the process of firing a teacher," Janes said.
He added that lawyers with Illinois' two major teacher unions routinely request confidentiality as part of these arrangements.
"Almost every settlement agreement that I have been involved with includes one of these gag orders. The only person who benefits is the teacher. It never benefits the school district. But usually the teacher won't agree to the settlement unless it is included," Janes said.
But the flip side of this argument is one of government accountability.
"Members of the public have a right to know how their tax dollars are being spent. They have a responsibility to hold public employees and elected officials accountable. If this information is kept secret, they can't hold them accountable," said Barbara Mack, an associate professor of journalism and communication at Iowa State University and a practicing First Amendment lawyer.
Mack added the Iowa Legislature has outlawed these types of secret deals.
"There have been legions of governmental entities across the country that have gone through all kinds of convolutions to keep these types of settlement agreements private. But by-and-large the courts have ruled that they are public record," Scott Sievers, a Springfield media-law attorney, said.
Charlie McBarron, a spokesman for IEA, said personnel issues such as these should be sealed from public view to protect the teacher's privacy and to make it easier for an agreement to be reached.
But current case law clearly indicates that these agreements are public records, Sievers said.
Even so, school officials across the state routinely promise the records will remain confidential.
For example, in the midst of Galeski's agreement is this sentence:
"It is understood and agreed that all information regarding the terms of this settlement and this document itself will be kept in the strictest confidence and shall not be disclosed by way of statement, interview, or press release or in any manner to any person or entity."
These buyouts are far from routine for a number of reasons such as their cost.
But one of the most basic reasons is they are dependent on the teacher choosing to leave voluntarily.
"This mentality that teaching equates to lifetime employment is so pervasive in the profession that it is difficult to convince these teachers that they should resign," Wilson said. "Often the teachers involved in these cases have emotional or psychiatric problems that hadn't manifested themselves until later in their careers. They have also typically been teaching for awhile and are resistant to the idea that they are not a good teacher."
Just how much school districts pay out in these settlement agreements varies greatly.
For example:
In 2002, Kankakee Public Schools agreed to pay more than $93,000 to Beverly Tate, a teacher who resigned from the district in 2002. It has continued to pay for her health insurance. Tate declined to disclose, for the record, why the school district paid her to leave.
In 2001, Mt. Vernon Township High School District paid $73,000 to Ronald Shreve, a teacher accused of sexually harassing students. The money was paid after a state hearing officer ruled against the school district in a dismissal case.
In 1994, Rock Island Public Schools paid Randi Barnes $75,000 to resign after it unsuccessfully sought to have a state hearing officer fire her on grounds of poor performance.
Perhaps one of the greatest ironies to these settlements is that the state's best teachers do not receive bonuses or pay raises based on their good performance, but those teachers whom school districts have worked the hardest to dismiss receive large end-of-career bonuses.
Chris Kolker, a Belleville attorney, who has represented the Illinois Federation of Teachers in a number of settlement agreements said, "If we are dealing with a teacher, who is not involved in any misconduct, but just received a bad evaluation, we would expect the school district to pay the person at least $50,000." Scott Reeder can be contacted at 217-525-8201.
Thursday, December 08, 2005
Local influence adds to teacher-union power
The article below appeared first in the Small Newspaper Group but was reprinted at Students First. Much of the information in the article below was reported to be happening by CRAFT and other true education reform groups. It is great to see it picked up by the mainstream media. The education of America's children will continue to suffer as long as the education establishment continues to control school boards.
Local influence adds to teacher-union power
12/8/2005
By Scott Reeder
Small Newspaper Group
SPRINGFIELD - Illinois' two major teacher unions not only exert their political clout through lobbying the legislature but also through tough negotiating and politicking on a local level.
"One of the wonderful things about being a teacher is that you get to help elect your own bosses," said Illinois AFL-CIO president Margaret Blackshere, a former kindergarten teacher.
She said teacher unions on a local level often become involved in school board races through endorsing candidates and having members actively campaign for them.
Limited revenues often keep union-friendly boards from giving pay raises as large as some teachers might like, but there are less visible ways that board members can assist a union agenda.
Unions routinely push for adding procedural hoops for the district to jump through when evaluating teachers as a tradeoff for not receiving quite as large a pay raise as the union originally called for.
Chicago-attorney Fred Lifton has represented school districts in more than 1,000 labor contract negotiations during the past 35 years.
"Generally, job security issues are more important at the negotiating table than compensation issues. I wouldn't say that school boards have so much a pro-union viewpoint as a pro-teacher one. They ran for school board because they care about education. They want to be loved. It's a very parental, almost family-like relationship they have with teachers.
"So when unions push for making it harder to fire teachers, they often give in. They don't realize the long-term costs of not being able to get rid of someone who is incompetent."
Lifton added it is not uncommon for Illinois school board members to belong to teachers unions in neighboring school districts where they are employed or have family members working in the school district they are involved in governing.
"They will tell you this doesn't pose a conflict of interest and legally it doesn't. But it does certainly create a certain sympathy for what the union is requesting," he said.
In fact, it has become routine for school boards to give away much of the authority they have in the evaluation process during contract negotiations.
For example, the school board for Rock Island District 41 approved a contract with the union that includes 10 pages of detailed rules for how a teacher shall be evaluated.
The slightest deviation from any specification within the contract --- ranging from an improperly placed checkmark to a missed deadline can result in an evaluation being thrown out in a dismissal proceeding.
But it is not as though the district has tried to fire a tenured teacher recently.
According to the Rock Island chapter of the Illinois Education Association, the district has not used the evaluation system to try to fire a teacher since 1994, when it attempted to fire teacher Randi Barnes on grounds of poor performance. (Hearing officer's ruling in Barnes case)
In that case, the school district ultimately paid Barnes $75,000 to quit after a hearing officer ruled against the district.
The hearing officer Donald J. Peterson said he ruled for Barnes solely because of a procedural error. The district's mistake he said was that it only listed the teacher's weaknesses on the evaluation, but didn't include any of her strengths, which is required by the school code.
Although it was a provision in the law that protected Barnes, some contend union contracts are a greater source of protection for teachers than state law.
"If you can restrict through negotiations how often an administrator can observe a classroom, how many days notice needs be given before an observation or other procedural impediments, you are really affording the teacher more job protection than they are getting from tenure itself," said Myron Lieberman, who heads the Education Policy Institute.
Lifton added, "Once a board gives up some of its management authority, it is very hard to get it back in future contract negotiations. You have to offer something in exchange. And what does a school board have to offer, once it has given up some of its managerial authority?"
In school board elections, the local teacher's union often plays a pivotal role.
"School board elections have the lowest turnout of any elections in the state. Historically, no more than 10 to 15 percent of voters participate. The low turnout maximizes the influence of the teachers union, which usually is the only organized special interest involved in the election," said Ron Michaelson, former executive director of the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Lieberman contends that teacher unions find it easier to mobilize their members than private-sector unions.
"They have summers off and a shorter workday so they have more time to devote to political activities and they often have negotiated personal days into their contracts that can be used for political purposes like taking Election Day off to ferry voters to the polls," he said.
And that is certainly the case in some Illinois school districts.
"We went door-to-door for candidates, telephoned for them, endorsed them and really went out and worked for them. Our association could put together 1,500 votes - enough to win any school board election," said Philip Robbins, a past president of the Alton Education Association.
But in most Illinois school districts, the influence of the local teacher union is exerted with more subtlety.
"I'm sure teachers told friends and family members what candidates they thought would be good board members. In a smaller community that is just how things are done - by word of mouth. I don't remember our local union actively campaigning for candidates," said Craig Whitlock, who recently retired as superintendent of United Township High School District in East Moline.
They said it...
Former Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar: "They don't just put up money -- they put people on the streets. They are really the only groups I can think of outside of some of the religious groups that put people on the street."
Local influence adds to teacher-union power
12/8/2005
By Scott Reeder
Small Newspaper Group
SPRINGFIELD - Illinois' two major teacher unions not only exert their political clout through lobbying the legislature but also through tough negotiating and politicking on a local level.
"One of the wonderful things about being a teacher is that you get to help elect your own bosses," said Illinois AFL-CIO president Margaret Blackshere, a former kindergarten teacher.
She said teacher unions on a local level often become involved in school board races through endorsing candidates and having members actively campaign for them.
Limited revenues often keep union-friendly boards from giving pay raises as large as some teachers might like, but there are less visible ways that board members can assist a union agenda.
Unions routinely push for adding procedural hoops for the district to jump through when evaluating teachers as a tradeoff for not receiving quite as large a pay raise as the union originally called for.
Chicago-attorney Fred Lifton has represented school districts in more than 1,000 labor contract negotiations during the past 35 years.
"Generally, job security issues are more important at the negotiating table than compensation issues. I wouldn't say that school boards have so much a pro-union viewpoint as a pro-teacher one. They ran for school board because they care about education. They want to be loved. It's a very parental, almost family-like relationship they have with teachers.
"So when unions push for making it harder to fire teachers, they often give in. They don't realize the long-term costs of not being able to get rid of someone who is incompetent."
Lifton added it is not uncommon for Illinois school board members to belong to teachers unions in neighboring school districts where they are employed or have family members working in the school district they are involved in governing.
"They will tell you this doesn't pose a conflict of interest and legally it doesn't. But it does certainly create a certain sympathy for what the union is requesting," he said.
In fact, it has become routine for school boards to give away much of the authority they have in the evaluation process during contract negotiations.
For example, the school board for Rock Island District 41 approved a contract with the union that includes 10 pages of detailed rules for how a teacher shall be evaluated.
The slightest deviation from any specification within the contract --- ranging from an improperly placed checkmark to a missed deadline can result in an evaluation being thrown out in a dismissal proceeding.
But it is not as though the district has tried to fire a tenured teacher recently.
According to the Rock Island chapter of the Illinois Education Association, the district has not used the evaluation system to try to fire a teacher since 1994, when it attempted to fire teacher Randi Barnes on grounds of poor performance. (Hearing officer's ruling in Barnes case)
In that case, the school district ultimately paid Barnes $75,000 to quit after a hearing officer ruled against the district.
The hearing officer Donald J. Peterson said he ruled for Barnes solely because of a procedural error. The district's mistake he said was that it only listed the teacher's weaknesses on the evaluation, but didn't include any of her strengths, which is required by the school code.
Although it was a provision in the law that protected Barnes, some contend union contracts are a greater source of protection for teachers than state law.
"If you can restrict through negotiations how often an administrator can observe a classroom, how many days notice needs be given before an observation or other procedural impediments, you are really affording the teacher more job protection than they are getting from tenure itself," said Myron Lieberman, who heads the Education Policy Institute.
Lifton added, "Once a board gives up some of its management authority, it is very hard to get it back in future contract negotiations. You have to offer something in exchange. And what does a school board have to offer, once it has given up some of its managerial authority?"
In school board elections, the local teacher's union often plays a pivotal role.
"School board elections have the lowest turnout of any elections in the state. Historically, no more than 10 to 15 percent of voters participate. The low turnout maximizes the influence of the teachers union, which usually is the only organized special interest involved in the election," said Ron Michaelson, former executive director of the Illinois State Board of Elections.
Lieberman contends that teacher unions find it easier to mobilize their members than private-sector unions.
"They have summers off and a shorter workday so they have more time to devote to political activities and they often have negotiated personal days into their contracts that can be used for political purposes like taking Election Day off to ferry voters to the polls," he said.
And that is certainly the case in some Illinois school districts.
"We went door-to-door for candidates, telephoned for them, endorsed them and really went out and worked for them. Our association could put together 1,500 votes - enough to win any school board election," said Philip Robbins, a past president of the Alton Education Association.
But in most Illinois school districts, the influence of the local teacher union is exerted with more subtlety.
"I'm sure teachers told friends and family members what candidates they thought would be good board members. In a smaller community that is just how things are done - by word of mouth. I don't remember our local union actively campaigning for candidates," said Craig Whitlock, who recently retired as superintendent of United Township High School District in East Moline.
They said it...
Former Illinois Gov. Jim Edgar: "They don't just put up money -- they put people on the streets. They are really the only groups I can think of outside of some of the religious groups that put people on the street."
Wednesday, December 07, 2005
Wonder Lake the next Huntleygate
While doing research CRAFT found that Wonder Lake District 36 is repeating the same mistake as Huntley District 158. The referendum question for the consolidated 2005 election was a proposition to increase and establish the maximum annual tax rate for educational purposes at 2.40% instead of 1.82%. Prior to the passage of this referendum the current actual rate was 1.3716%. The school district advertised a 58 cent increase when in actuality the increase could be $1.0284 per 100 dollars EAV to the taxpayers.
Where are the newspaper reports on this issue? How come the Wonder Lake School Board has not told the taxpayers and parents of the district this fact?
Where are the newspaper reports on this issue? How come the Wonder Lake School Board has not told the taxpayers and parents of the district this fact?
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
TELLING WHAT WE KNOW
Thanks to our friend Kevin Killion of the Illinois Loop.org
for passing this article on. The article below appeared on the Plainview-Old Bethpage Congress of Teachers (union) website. It is nice to see that someone in the unions is finally understanding the problems the place on our society.
TELLING WHAT WE KNOW
PART I
10/17/05
If the United States is to preserve our system of free public schools, teacher unions are going to have to stop accepting the status quo and making excuses for the poor performance of our students. Most of us know that contrary to all of the talk about how we are raising our standards, in most of our schools they continue to decline. The low scores on the so-called high stakes tests are testimony to the fact that large numbers of students leave school knowing next to nothing and ill equipped for any but the most menial of jobs. While many of our most talented young people spend their days in so-called accelerated courses with curricula once thought more appropriate to the college level, too many of them have whizzed right by basic skills and cannot string together three coherent sentences or know to any degree of certainty if they have received the correct change in a store. We must face the fact that some of the right-wing critique of public education, particularly their criticism of the ever inflating costs of public education, resonates with the American public because it is true, or at least truer than some of the blather put out by the people who run the schools and the unions who represent the people who work in them. If it is true that our freedom is ultimately tied to our being an enlightened and educated citizenry, we are in terrible trouble.
Excuse number one – We don’t have enough money to meet the educational needs of our students. While too many of our school districts do need more financial resources, resources that many find impossible to raise trough the regressive property tax, the fact of the matter is too many of them also waste a substantial portion of what they have, a good piece of the waste mandated by state and federal law. I’ve written elsewhere about the administrative bloat in school districts where level upon level of bureaucracy insures that teachers and educational support staff are over scrutinized and under supervised to the point where teaching innovation and imagination are increasingly giving way to the routines of educational programs, particularly in math and English, that are intended to make teaching thinking-free. We have program upon program upon program. Can anyone seriously say that our students know more and are more skilled than they used to be? With entrepreneurial aplomb some crafty educators have gone corporate, developing and skillfully marketing programs for everything from mathematics to values education. School districts employ large numbers of central office administrators who then turn around and hire consultants who often come selling their programmatic wares. Where are the NEA and AFT to challenge this pentagon-like waste in our schools?
Meanwhile, over forty school districts on Long Island defeated their school budgets last spring. Pressed by ever-escalating property taxes, citizens were in revolt. That revolt, I fear, will spread as the middle class in the United States is squeezed more and more by a taxation system designed by and for the rich and an economy that increasingly is either exporting or abolishing the good jobs that used to support a comfortable middle class life. If education unions do not become outspoken advocates for economy in our schools, they will find taxpayers increasingly revolting against them. Surely some of the budget defeats on Long Island were aided by the local newspaper’s articles on teachers earning over one hundred thousand dollars a year.
for passing this article on. The article below appeared on the Plainview-Old Bethpage Congress of Teachers (union) website. It is nice to see that someone in the unions is finally understanding the problems the place on our society.
TELLING WHAT WE KNOW
PART I
10/17/05
If the United States is to preserve our system of free public schools, teacher unions are going to have to stop accepting the status quo and making excuses for the poor performance of our students. Most of us know that contrary to all of the talk about how we are raising our standards, in most of our schools they continue to decline. The low scores on the so-called high stakes tests are testimony to the fact that large numbers of students leave school knowing next to nothing and ill equipped for any but the most menial of jobs. While many of our most talented young people spend their days in so-called accelerated courses with curricula once thought more appropriate to the college level, too many of them have whizzed right by basic skills and cannot string together three coherent sentences or know to any degree of certainty if they have received the correct change in a store. We must face the fact that some of the right-wing critique of public education, particularly their criticism of the ever inflating costs of public education, resonates with the American public because it is true, or at least truer than some of the blather put out by the people who run the schools and the unions who represent the people who work in them. If it is true that our freedom is ultimately tied to our being an enlightened and educated citizenry, we are in terrible trouble.
Excuse number one – We don’t have enough money to meet the educational needs of our students. While too many of our school districts do need more financial resources, resources that many find impossible to raise trough the regressive property tax, the fact of the matter is too many of them also waste a substantial portion of what they have, a good piece of the waste mandated by state and federal law. I’ve written elsewhere about the administrative bloat in school districts where level upon level of bureaucracy insures that teachers and educational support staff are over scrutinized and under supervised to the point where teaching innovation and imagination are increasingly giving way to the routines of educational programs, particularly in math and English, that are intended to make teaching thinking-free. We have program upon program upon program. Can anyone seriously say that our students know more and are more skilled than they used to be? With entrepreneurial aplomb some crafty educators have gone corporate, developing and skillfully marketing programs for everything from mathematics to values education. School districts employ large numbers of central office administrators who then turn around and hire consultants who often come selling their programmatic wares. Where are the NEA and AFT to challenge this pentagon-like waste in our schools?
Meanwhile, over forty school districts on Long Island defeated their school budgets last spring. Pressed by ever-escalating property taxes, citizens were in revolt. That revolt, I fear, will spread as the middle class in the United States is squeezed more and more by a taxation system designed by and for the rich and an economy that increasingly is either exporting or abolishing the good jobs that used to support a comfortable middle class life. If education unions do not become outspoken advocates for economy in our schools, they will find taxpayers increasingly revolting against them. Surely some of the budget defeats on Long Island were aided by the local newspaper’s articles on teachers earning over one hundred thousand dollars a year.
Monday, December 05, 2005
Is it time to rewrite the Constitution?
Teachers often whine how they are underpaid compared to other professionals, yet teachers' unions have plenty of money to throw at our legislators. According to the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform, the Illinois Education Association (teachers' union) contributed $10.5 million to politicians between 1993 and 2004, more than any other statewide group. Second-place went to the Illinois Medical Society which contributed about 2.6 million less than the IEA. The third top contributor was the Illinois Federation of Teachers, the state's second-largest teachers union.
Now is the time to get tough with our legislators and let them know that we do not want the schools to receive any more money. It is time to force schools to be fiscally responsible and accountable for educating our children. Taxes will rise if the unions get their way with Constitutional Amendments.
Keep this in mind while reading the article below: Better Funding for Better Schools and A+ Illinois receive large sums of funding from the teachers unions and businesses that benefit from increased school funding.
Yes, it is time to rewrite the Constitution. We need to write true school choice into the Constitution. We must also put an end to Illinois' numerous state pension scams that threaten future generations with unsustainable debt.
The article below appeared in the Daily Southtown.
Is it time to rewrite the Constitution?
12/5/2005
By Kati Phillips
Daily Southtown
Association of School Boards calling for a constitutional convention in 2008, or sooner
Crack open the Illinois Constitution and add a line that forces the state to spend more money on education.
That's the dramatic measure a school board lobby group wants to take to obtain long-sought-after education funding reform.
At the request of more than 300 of its members, the Illinois Association of School Boards is pushing for a statewide constitutional convention in 2008 or earlier.
At a convention, delegates amend or rewrite the state's guiding document and put it up for public vote.
While this opens the door to any number of special-interest groups promoting amendments on subjects like same-sex marriage or intelligent design, it also creates the climate needed to pass education-funding reform, school board members say.
Convention delegates - unlike legislators - can attempt to raise taxes or make other hard decisions without worrying about caucus loyalty or re-election bids.
Those risks are to blame for Springfield's shrinking political will, most recently displayed when a tax swap bill that offered property tax relief failed to make it to a Senate vote, school board members say.
"Politics gets in the way of true education-funding reform," said Howard Crouse, superintendent of the Naperville district that introduced the convention resolution.
A swing and a miss
The current language on education funding was a result of the 1970 constitutional convention.
Delegates met in Springfield to find a way to get the state to pick up more of the schools' tab.
People were concerned that the state was providing just 31 percent of the money for schools, compared with 64.5 percent from local property taxes.
Districts with corporate headquarters and expensive homes were funding winners. Rural districts and industry-poor suburbs were losers.
Efforts to set a particular percentage for the state to contribute failed, but a line written by delegate Dawn Clark Netsch made it into the document.
The state has the "primary responsibility" for financing the system of public education, it reads.
"It was a club held over the heads of legislators," said Clark Netsch, a former senator and gubernatorial candidate. "The problem is, it hasn't hit hard enough."
Since 1970, lawmakers have only once raised the income tax, the main source for state education funding.
And the Illinois Supreme Court twice has rejected challenges to the state's education finance system, saying reform must be undertaken in the Legislature and not in the courts.
Though state funding reached almost 48 percent in the mid-1970s, it has dropped considerably.
About 30 percent of school funding comes from the state, and 57 percent is generated by local property taxes, according to the 2004-05 state school report card.
Rewrite every 20 years
The question of whether to hold a constitutional convention is put to voters every 20 years. Three-fifths of those voting on the question or a majority of those voting in the election are needed to convene one.
The last such referendum was in 1988, when voters turned down the opportunity. The next chance will be in 2008, unless lawmakers set an earlier date.
If voters jump at the chance this time around, they get to elect two delegates from each Legislative district to serve at the convention.
The delegates approve amendments or revisions to the constitution, and then those changes are put to a public vote. Majority rules.
Lt. Gov. Patrick Quinn said he fought for a convention in 1988 for many of the same reasons the school board association now is promoting one.
He has not taken an official position on the possible 2008 convention, but he agrees it would remove politics from the funding reform discussion.
"The Constitutional Convention may be the only mechanism taxpayers have to force a true debate on reducing the state's excessive reliance on property taxes," Quinn said.
Illinois hasn't always had an education funding system reliant on property-taxes. In the early 1900s, the state paid the entire bill for public schools.
But complaints that the state was skimping led to local property taxes becoming the main funding source.
Today, wide disparities in property values have created a huge gap in what districts spend, ranging anywhere from $4,000 to $24,000 per student.
Though more money doesn't always mean better scores, advocates say cash is key to closing the achievement gap. Many just aren't positive a constitutional convention is the way to go.
Wary of special interests
First off, a convention cannot be held on a single issue, so delegates from all political persuasions would have the opportunity to tweak the constitution, Clark Netsch said.
Abortion, same-sex marriage, prayer in school - name a hot-button issue and there would be a dogfight, school board members concede.
Secondly, there is no guarantee a convention delegate could create wording that actually would force the state to pay up and get wide support.
Instead of promoting a convention, Bindu Batchu, campaign manager of A+ Illinois, is putting her efforts into encouraging candidates for public office to support education funding reform.
The same goes for members of the Better Funding for Better Schools Coalition. Even if there is a change in the constitution, it is up to the legislature to enact it, chairwoman Sharon Voliva said. Given the state's history, she is doubtful that would happen.
"The constitutional convention won't give legislators a backbone," she said.
Now is the time to get tough with our legislators and let them know that we do not want the schools to receive any more money. It is time to force schools to be fiscally responsible and accountable for educating our children. Taxes will rise if the unions get their way with Constitutional Amendments.
Keep this in mind while reading the article below: Better Funding for Better Schools and A+ Illinois receive large sums of funding from the teachers unions and businesses that benefit from increased school funding.
Yes, it is time to rewrite the Constitution. We need to write true school choice into the Constitution. We must also put an end to Illinois' numerous state pension scams that threaten future generations with unsustainable debt.
The article below appeared in the Daily Southtown.
Is it time to rewrite the Constitution?
12/5/2005
By Kati Phillips
Daily Southtown
Association of School Boards calling for a constitutional convention in 2008, or sooner
Crack open the Illinois Constitution and add a line that forces the state to spend more money on education.
That's the dramatic measure a school board lobby group wants to take to obtain long-sought-after education funding reform.
At the request of more than 300 of its members, the Illinois Association of School Boards is pushing for a statewide constitutional convention in 2008 or earlier.
At a convention, delegates amend or rewrite the state's guiding document and put it up for public vote.
While this opens the door to any number of special-interest groups promoting amendments on subjects like same-sex marriage or intelligent design, it also creates the climate needed to pass education-funding reform, school board members say.
Convention delegates - unlike legislators - can attempt to raise taxes or make other hard decisions without worrying about caucus loyalty or re-election bids.
Those risks are to blame for Springfield's shrinking political will, most recently displayed when a tax swap bill that offered property tax relief failed to make it to a Senate vote, school board members say.
"Politics gets in the way of true education-funding reform," said Howard Crouse, superintendent of the Naperville district that introduced the convention resolution.
A swing and a miss
The current language on education funding was a result of the 1970 constitutional convention.
Delegates met in Springfield to find a way to get the state to pick up more of the schools' tab.
People were concerned that the state was providing just 31 percent of the money for schools, compared with 64.5 percent from local property taxes.
Districts with corporate headquarters and expensive homes were funding winners. Rural districts and industry-poor suburbs were losers.
Efforts to set a particular percentage for the state to contribute failed, but a line written by delegate Dawn Clark Netsch made it into the document.
The state has the "primary responsibility" for financing the system of public education, it reads.
"It was a club held over the heads of legislators," said Clark Netsch, a former senator and gubernatorial candidate. "The problem is, it hasn't hit hard enough."
Since 1970, lawmakers have only once raised the income tax, the main source for state education funding.
And the Illinois Supreme Court twice has rejected challenges to the state's education finance system, saying reform must be undertaken in the Legislature and not in the courts.
Though state funding reached almost 48 percent in the mid-1970s, it has dropped considerably.
About 30 percent of school funding comes from the state, and 57 percent is generated by local property taxes, according to the 2004-05 state school report card.
Rewrite every 20 years
The question of whether to hold a constitutional convention is put to voters every 20 years. Three-fifths of those voting on the question or a majority of those voting in the election are needed to convene one.
The last such referendum was in 1988, when voters turned down the opportunity. The next chance will be in 2008, unless lawmakers set an earlier date.
If voters jump at the chance this time around, they get to elect two delegates from each Legislative district to serve at the convention.
The delegates approve amendments or revisions to the constitution, and then those changes are put to a public vote. Majority rules.
Lt. Gov. Patrick Quinn said he fought for a convention in 1988 for many of the same reasons the school board association now is promoting one.
He has not taken an official position on the possible 2008 convention, but he agrees it would remove politics from the funding reform discussion.
"The Constitutional Convention may be the only mechanism taxpayers have to force a true debate on reducing the state's excessive reliance on property taxes," Quinn said.
Illinois hasn't always had an education funding system reliant on property-taxes. In the early 1900s, the state paid the entire bill for public schools.
But complaints that the state was skimping led to local property taxes becoming the main funding source.
Today, wide disparities in property values have created a huge gap in what districts spend, ranging anywhere from $4,000 to $24,000 per student.
Though more money doesn't always mean better scores, advocates say cash is key to closing the achievement gap. Many just aren't positive a constitutional convention is the way to go.
Wary of special interests
First off, a convention cannot be held on a single issue, so delegates from all political persuasions would have the opportunity to tweak the constitution, Clark Netsch said.
Abortion, same-sex marriage, prayer in school - name a hot-button issue and there would be a dogfight, school board members concede.
Secondly, there is no guarantee a convention delegate could create wording that actually would force the state to pay up and get wide support.
Instead of promoting a convention, Bindu Batchu, campaign manager of A+ Illinois, is putting her efforts into encouraging candidates for public office to support education funding reform.
The same goes for members of the Better Funding for Better Schools Coalition. Even if there is a change in the constitution, it is up to the legislature to enact it, chairwoman Sharon Voliva said. Given the state's history, she is doubtful that would happen.
"The constitutional convention won't give legislators a backbone," she said.
Sunday, December 04, 2005
Southtown (Newspaper) did its job in Sauk Village
Hey folks, we could not agree more with former Mayor Dean Koldenhoven. Unlike most papers, the Northwest Herald's circulation continues to grow. The NWH must choose whether to continue protecting and promoting the status quo, taking the occasional pot shot at reformers like Larry Snow, or doing some real investigative reporting into school finances. The taxpayers of McHenry County have spoken loud and clear time and time again; they are rejecting referenda. They do not want the schools to get more money and they want their money spent wisely. The Northwest Herald is promoting great changes, lets hope there are some great changes in their investigative reporting as well.
(From the Daily Southtown)
Southtown did its job in Sauk Village
"Voice of the Southland Since 1906" it states under the name, Daily Southtown. That "Voice" of the Southtown, which came about by our 1st Amendment in the Bill of Rights, namely the "freedom of the press," has shown its persistence in pursuing one of the biggest bullies in the Southland, Mr. Tom Ryan, the now former Sauk Village elementary school superintendent.
The arrest of Mr. Tom Ryan would not have happened if it were not for the Daily Southtown's role in this interesting story. Some parents of that school district told the Southtown of how Mr. Ryan was bullying and mistreating them and their children. The subsequent news stories by the Southtown came to the attention of investigators of State's Attorney Dick Devine's staff, and led to Mr. Ryan's conviction and the further investigation of other persons involved in illegal activities.
The parents and children by themselves did not have the power to bring Mr. Ryan to justice for his wrong-doings. It took the power of the 1st Amendment's freedom of the press through the Southtown's persistence to get the facts out about what was going on in District 168.
I extend my congratulations to everyone at the Southtown who was a part of exposing this unremorseful bully of the Southland. The school children in this district will be the ones who will benefit from this episode by having monies spent for their education, instead of lining the pockets of criminals. Mr. Ryan will spend eight years in prison.
May the freedom of the press continue in fine journalistic style that the Southtown has done in this news story.
Dean Koldenhoven
Palos Heights
Editor's Note: Dean Koldenhoven, former mayor of Palos Heights, writes a monthly column for the Daily Southtown.
(From the Daily Southtown)
Southtown did its job in Sauk Village
"Voice of the Southland Since 1906" it states under the name, Daily Southtown. That "Voice" of the Southtown, which came about by our 1st Amendment in the Bill of Rights, namely the "freedom of the press," has shown its persistence in pursuing one of the biggest bullies in the Southland, Mr. Tom Ryan, the now former Sauk Village elementary school superintendent.
The arrest of Mr. Tom Ryan would not have happened if it were not for the Daily Southtown's role in this interesting story. Some parents of that school district told the Southtown of how Mr. Ryan was bullying and mistreating them and their children. The subsequent news stories by the Southtown came to the attention of investigators of State's Attorney Dick Devine's staff, and led to Mr. Ryan's conviction and the further investigation of other persons involved in illegal activities.
The parents and children by themselves did not have the power to bring Mr. Ryan to justice for his wrong-doings. It took the power of the 1st Amendment's freedom of the press through the Southtown's persistence to get the facts out about what was going on in District 168.
I extend my congratulations to everyone at the Southtown who was a part of exposing this unremorseful bully of the Southland. The school children in this district will be the ones who will benefit from this episode by having monies spent for their education, instead of lining the pockets of criminals. Mr. Ryan will spend eight years in prison.
May the freedom of the press continue in fine journalistic style that the Southtown has done in this news story.
Dean Koldenhoven
Palos Heights
Editor's Note: Dean Koldenhoven, former mayor of Palos Heights, writes a monthly column for the Daily Southtown.
Saturday, December 03, 2005
Tax Group Fighting Back
The ranks of taxpayer activists continues to grow. A round of applause for our friends in Will and Dupage Counties.
Tax group fighting back
Will DuPage alliance says its levy figures came right from District 203
By Melissa Jenco
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Friday, December 02, 2005
The new Will DuPage Taxpayers Alliance went on the defensive Thursday, saying its calculations regarding Naperville Unit School District 203’s finances are credible, having come from the district itself.
The group was responding to a comment by Superintendent Alan Leis in Thursday’s Daily Herald that the community would be hearing a “flurry of numbers, untruths, half-truths and innuendoes” from people asking for a lower tax levy.
“These are the numbers, 203 numbers,” said Dan Denys, a member of the group. “So should I be cute here and say that 203 numbers are half-truths, innuendo? That’s what I’m using. I’m not making up numbers. I’m not manufacturing numbers.”
Leis said his remarks — made to about 60 community and business leaders Wednesday — were not referring specifically to the Will DuPage Taxpayers Alliance, but he felt he needed to defend the district.
“Because I felt the school system was being attacked, individuals were being attacked for not being truthful, and I didn’t think that was fair,” Leis said.
Criticism of the district resurfaced when the school board approved a tentative 2006 tax levy of $169.4 million.
While this is at least $5 million less than it could have asked for, some residents believe it’s still too high because the district already took in at least $24 million more than taxpayers expected after approving a 2002 tax increase.
The alliance plans to ask the district to reduce its levy by roughly $6 million, which is the amount the district expects to have in surplus at the end of the school year.
Leis said in considering the proposal, the district will have to look at what it means for its future because collecting less this year will mean collecting less in subsequent years as well.
“The district has rightly been focused on five-year projections and out, and we have to be very careful of the (impact) it will have in the out years and not just in next year’s budget,” Leis said.
Members of the alliance said the district can sustain a lower levy if it makes cuts in spending, which they don’t believe will affect the quality of education.
“It just really bothers me that they take the coward’s way out and make the community feel that, in order to save any money, we have to hurt the children,” said resident Maureen Taylor, who attended the tax group’s news conference Thursday. “Or if we don’t give them additional money, it’s going to hurt the children.”
The group suggested outsourcing maintenance and transportation staffs to reduce expenses.
Ultimately though, members said their goal is to promote a better understanding among taxpayers.
“If taxpayers want to pay more taxes, that’s certainly a right that they have,” said group member Ari Rosenthal. “We just want to make sure there is an open discussion and all the facts are out on the table.”
Tax group fighting back
Will DuPage alliance says its levy figures came right from District 203
By Melissa Jenco
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Friday, December 02, 2005
The new Will DuPage Taxpayers Alliance went on the defensive Thursday, saying its calculations regarding Naperville Unit School District 203’s finances are credible, having come from the district itself.
The group was responding to a comment by Superintendent Alan Leis in Thursday’s Daily Herald that the community would be hearing a “flurry of numbers, untruths, half-truths and innuendoes” from people asking for a lower tax levy.
“These are the numbers, 203 numbers,” said Dan Denys, a member of the group. “So should I be cute here and say that 203 numbers are half-truths, innuendo? That’s what I’m using. I’m not making up numbers. I’m not manufacturing numbers.”
Leis said his remarks — made to about 60 community and business leaders Wednesday — were not referring specifically to the Will DuPage Taxpayers Alliance, but he felt he needed to defend the district.
“Because I felt the school system was being attacked, individuals were being attacked for not being truthful, and I didn’t think that was fair,” Leis said.
Criticism of the district resurfaced when the school board approved a tentative 2006 tax levy of $169.4 million.
While this is at least $5 million less than it could have asked for, some residents believe it’s still too high because the district already took in at least $24 million more than taxpayers expected after approving a 2002 tax increase.
The alliance plans to ask the district to reduce its levy by roughly $6 million, which is the amount the district expects to have in surplus at the end of the school year.
Leis said in considering the proposal, the district will have to look at what it means for its future because collecting less this year will mean collecting less in subsequent years as well.
“The district has rightly been focused on five-year projections and out, and we have to be very careful of the (impact) it will have in the out years and not just in next year’s budget,” Leis said.
Members of the alliance said the district can sustain a lower levy if it makes cuts in spending, which they don’t believe will affect the quality of education.
“It just really bothers me that they take the coward’s way out and make the community feel that, in order to save any money, we have to hurt the children,” said resident Maureen Taylor, who attended the tax group’s news conference Thursday. “Or if we don’t give them additional money, it’s going to hurt the children.”
The group suggested outsourcing maintenance and transportation staffs to reduce expenses.
Ultimately though, members said their goal is to promote a better understanding among taxpayers.
“If taxpayers want to pay more taxes, that’s certainly a right that they have,” said group member Ari Rosenthal. “We just want to make sure there is an open discussion and all the facts are out on the table.”
Thursday, December 01, 2005
Ex-principal charged with stealing funds
Bravo to our Friends at Citizens for Responsible Government and Rich Conley. Well done. A special thanks to Richard Bryan retired school teacher. We need to see more current and retired teachers coming out to expose the inappropriate use of our school funds.
Ex-principal charged with stealing funds
By Bob Susnjara
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Thursday, December 01, 2005
An investigation into Warren Township High School finances that spanned almost a year ended Wednesday with the indictment of a former principal accused of misspending activity fund money on theater tickets.
Philip Roffman, the ex-principal who most recently led Gurnee-based Warren District 121’s Almond Road upperclass campus, was charged with one felony theft count. A conviction can result in a sentence ranging from probation to five years behind bars.
Roffman, 57, remains free on a $25,000 bench warrant and is to plead guilty as part of a negotiated deal Dec. 15 before Circuit Judge Victoria Rossetti. He was a Warren principal for about 14 years until retiring in October 2004, shortly after the Daily Herald began investigating activity fund spending.
At issue was convenience accounts that draw money from District 121’s activity fund. Convenience account spending by adult school employees is required to have a student connection, such as pizzas for a sports team.
Lake County Assistant State’s Attorney George Strickland said Roffman illegally spent public money on Steppenwolf Theatre Co. tickets for friends and family in 2003. Roffman received a $400 reimbursement after submitting an activity fund form that falsely stated “theater tickets for teacher/staff.”
Roffman was not charged on other spending the state’s attorney’s office confirmed would have violated the law, said Strickland, who declined to elaborate. Those expenditures were detailed in a report filed in December 2004 by special investigator Daniel Field, an attorney who was hired by Warren after the activity fund questions surfaced.
Field wrote Roffman’s use of school money to purchase 17 handcrafted silk ties for $1,186.50 from Lee Allison Co. should be considered “illegal and improper.”
Roffman bought the ties Oct. 25, 2001, documents show. The purchase went unnoticed until it was discovered in documents obtained by the Daily Herald through Freedom of Information Act requests and confirmed by Lee Allison.
To justify having a check sent to Lee Allison, Roffman wrote “healthy communication supplies for fund-raiser” on a District 121 form.
Neither Roffman nor his lawyer, Patrick Tuite, returned calls Wednesday.
Field also found Roffman improperly used Warren activity funds to pay for calls to a telephone-sex line and an Internet sex-partner swapping club membership.
In a statement issued Wednesday, District 121 Superintendent Phil Sobocinski said he was saddened, but not surprised, by Roffman’s indictment. Warren provided documents going back at least 10 years to the state’s attorney’s office.
“It is important the Warren community understand the school district does not condone the behavior alleged in the indictment,” Sobocinski said.
“From the moment the board initiated its own investigation, we were on the record that the district would pursue all legal avenues to obtain restitution from any individuals convicted of misusing any school district funds.”
Working from Field’s report, state’s attorney’s office investigator Lou Archbold spent about 10 months combing through more than just Roffman’s activity fund spending at District 121.
Archbold also explored previous activity fund expenditures by retired Associate Principal Ron Shelton, ex-Athletic Director Lenny Chimino and others who were cited in Field’s report. Criminal charges only were leveled against Roffman.
“We examined all issues that were brought up in the Field report,” Strickland said. “We brought criminal charges that can be supported and are within the statute of limitations.”
Retired Warren High teacher Richard Bryan and Citizens for Responsible Government members in Gurnee were among those who brought concerns about activity fund spending to the attention of Warren officials.
Citizens for Responsible Government member Richard Conley expressed satisfaction after learning about Roffman’s indictment.
“As a citizen and as a member of the (tax watchdogs), I am just happy that the state’s attorney took our concerns seriously and investigated them fully,” Conley said.
Strickland credited District 121 officials for their cooperation in the investigation and said the Roffman indictment means the case is closed.
Four boxes of District 121 property were returned by Roffman last year, officials said. The haul included stereo speakers, compact-disk player, digital camera and a Dixie Chicks video.
Roffman has repaid Warren for some items, but will be asked to make further restitution for unauthorized expenditures, Strickland said.
Ex-principal charged with stealing funds
By Bob Susnjara
Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Thursday, December 01, 2005
An investigation into Warren Township High School finances that spanned almost a year ended Wednesday with the indictment of a former principal accused of misspending activity fund money on theater tickets.
Philip Roffman, the ex-principal who most recently led Gurnee-based Warren District 121’s Almond Road upperclass campus, was charged with one felony theft count. A conviction can result in a sentence ranging from probation to five years behind bars.
Roffman, 57, remains free on a $25,000 bench warrant and is to plead guilty as part of a negotiated deal Dec. 15 before Circuit Judge Victoria Rossetti. He was a Warren principal for about 14 years until retiring in October 2004, shortly after the Daily Herald began investigating activity fund spending.
At issue was convenience accounts that draw money from District 121’s activity fund. Convenience account spending by adult school employees is required to have a student connection, such as pizzas for a sports team.
Lake County Assistant State’s Attorney George Strickland said Roffman illegally spent public money on Steppenwolf Theatre Co. tickets for friends and family in 2003. Roffman received a $400 reimbursement after submitting an activity fund form that falsely stated “theater tickets for teacher/staff.”
Roffman was not charged on other spending the state’s attorney’s office confirmed would have violated the law, said Strickland, who declined to elaborate. Those expenditures were detailed in a report filed in December 2004 by special investigator Daniel Field, an attorney who was hired by Warren after the activity fund questions surfaced.
Field wrote Roffman’s use of school money to purchase 17 handcrafted silk ties for $1,186.50 from Lee Allison Co. should be considered “illegal and improper.”
Roffman bought the ties Oct. 25, 2001, documents show. The purchase went unnoticed until it was discovered in documents obtained by the Daily Herald through Freedom of Information Act requests and confirmed by Lee Allison.
To justify having a check sent to Lee Allison, Roffman wrote “healthy communication supplies for fund-raiser” on a District 121 form.
Neither Roffman nor his lawyer, Patrick Tuite, returned calls Wednesday.
Field also found Roffman improperly used Warren activity funds to pay for calls to a telephone-sex line and an Internet sex-partner swapping club membership.
In a statement issued Wednesday, District 121 Superintendent Phil Sobocinski said he was saddened, but not surprised, by Roffman’s indictment. Warren provided documents going back at least 10 years to the state’s attorney’s office.
“It is important the Warren community understand the school district does not condone the behavior alleged in the indictment,” Sobocinski said.
“From the moment the board initiated its own investigation, we were on the record that the district would pursue all legal avenues to obtain restitution from any individuals convicted of misusing any school district funds.”
Working from Field’s report, state’s attorney’s office investigator Lou Archbold spent about 10 months combing through more than just Roffman’s activity fund spending at District 121.
Archbold also explored previous activity fund expenditures by retired Associate Principal Ron Shelton, ex-Athletic Director Lenny Chimino and others who were cited in Field’s report. Criminal charges only were leveled against Roffman.
“We examined all issues that were brought up in the Field report,” Strickland said. “We brought criminal charges that can be supported and are within the statute of limitations.”
Retired Warren High teacher Richard Bryan and Citizens for Responsible Government members in Gurnee were among those who brought concerns about activity fund spending to the attention of Warren officials.
Citizens for Responsible Government member Richard Conley expressed satisfaction after learning about Roffman’s indictment.
“As a citizen and as a member of the (tax watchdogs), I am just happy that the state’s attorney took our concerns seriously and investigated them fully,” Conley said.
Strickland credited District 121 officials for their cooperation in the investigation and said the Roffman indictment means the case is closed.
Four boxes of District 121 property were returned by Roffman last year, officials said. The haul included stereo speakers, compact-disk player, digital camera and a Dixie Chicks video.
Roffman has repaid Warren for some items, but will be asked to make further restitution for unauthorized expenditures, Strickland said.
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
No Child Left Behind is better than nothing in education
This great article is written by a retired school teacher. It is great to see that she understands the problems of our public education system which include the teachers' unions and lack of accountability. Bravo Johanna Haver.
No Child Left Behind is better than nothing in education
Nov. 29, 2005 12:00 AM
Some highly reputable Valley teachers have complained to me that the federal government has wreaked havoc upon their schools with its No Child Left Behind mandate.
To them, the time taken from the classroom for teacher training is counterproductive and the imposition of uniform teaching techniques on them destroys creativity. They told me of a case where an entire school that had been labeled "underperforming" was forced to make questionable changes when a problem existed in only one specific area.
Recently Superintendent John Baracy of the Scottsdale Unified School District remarked to me that the No Child Left Behind law "levels the playing field." As someone with years of experience running inner-city schools, Baracy has dealt with the challenges of educating "at-risk" students. He is well aware of the enormous achievement gap that exists between the children who come from middle-class to affluent homes and those from underprivileged backgrounds.
Like the teachers, Tom Horne, Arizona superintendent of public instruction, is not satisfied with the law, which he says contains "144 ways for schools to fail." He considers the state program, Arizona Learns, to be "more comprehensive and fair." He has made several requests to the federal authorities to have aspects of No Child Left Behind's adequate yearly progress requirements adjusted so they fit better with Arizona schools.
The federal government began its quest to solve the achievement problem with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. This provided a slew of programs for failing students and cost billions of dollars, but contained little oversight. Forty years later there is no evidence that these programs were even minimally successful. No Child Left Behind differs from the 1965 law in that it holds schools accountable.
Unfortunately, No Child Left Behind does not address other obstacles to school improvement. These include court decisions dating to 1969 that limit schools' disciplinary and dress policies, the teachers unions' protection of incompetent teachers and the education colleges' tendency to promote less-than-rigorous classroom instruction.
In the meantime, according to School Reform News (April 2005), an analysis of the National Assessment of Educational Progress shows that parochial schools are doing a better job than public ones in educating underprivileged students. Moreover, these schools spend considerably less money than public ones.
Parochial schools have some advantages: (1) broad authority over how students look and behave in school; (2) the freedom to hire and fire teachers according to merit rather than seniority; and (3) independence from the colleges of education.
It is a pipe dream to believe that the court decisions that have undermined discipline in our public schools will ever be reversed. The recent election in California indicates that even someone as powerful as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is no match against the teachers unions and, thus, they will continue to reign. Colleges of education will also survive due to the large revenues they bring into the universities from teachers who must take their courses to maintain their teaching certificates.
Whether teachers like it or not, due to default, No Child Left Behind is all we have left to improve unacceptable achievement rates in our public schools.
Johanna Haver is a retired Arizona teacher and author of the book "Structured English Immersion: A Step-by-Step Guide for K-6 Teachers and Administrators" (Corwin Press, 2003). She can be reached at j.haver@cox.net.
No Child Left Behind is better than nothing in education
Nov. 29, 2005 12:00 AM
Some highly reputable Valley teachers have complained to me that the federal government has wreaked havoc upon their schools with its No Child Left Behind mandate.
To them, the time taken from the classroom for teacher training is counterproductive and the imposition of uniform teaching techniques on them destroys creativity. They told me of a case where an entire school that had been labeled "underperforming" was forced to make questionable changes when a problem existed in only one specific area.
Recently Superintendent John Baracy of the Scottsdale Unified School District remarked to me that the No Child Left Behind law "levels the playing field." As someone with years of experience running inner-city schools, Baracy has dealt with the challenges of educating "at-risk" students. He is well aware of the enormous achievement gap that exists between the children who come from middle-class to affluent homes and those from underprivileged backgrounds.
Like the teachers, Tom Horne, Arizona superintendent of public instruction, is not satisfied with the law, which he says contains "144 ways for schools to fail." He considers the state program, Arizona Learns, to be "more comprehensive and fair." He has made several requests to the federal authorities to have aspects of No Child Left Behind's adequate yearly progress requirements adjusted so they fit better with Arizona schools.
The federal government began its quest to solve the achievement problem with the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965. This provided a slew of programs for failing students and cost billions of dollars, but contained little oversight. Forty years later there is no evidence that these programs were even minimally successful. No Child Left Behind differs from the 1965 law in that it holds schools accountable.
Unfortunately, No Child Left Behind does not address other obstacles to school improvement. These include court decisions dating to 1969 that limit schools' disciplinary and dress policies, the teachers unions' protection of incompetent teachers and the education colleges' tendency to promote less-than-rigorous classroom instruction.
In the meantime, according to School Reform News (April 2005), an analysis of the National Assessment of Educational Progress shows that parochial schools are doing a better job than public ones in educating underprivileged students. Moreover, these schools spend considerably less money than public ones.
Parochial schools have some advantages: (1) broad authority over how students look and behave in school; (2) the freedom to hire and fire teachers according to merit rather than seniority; and (3) independence from the colleges of education.
It is a pipe dream to believe that the court decisions that have undermined discipline in our public schools will ever be reversed. The recent election in California indicates that even someone as powerful as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is no match against the teachers unions and, thus, they will continue to reign. Colleges of education will also survive due to the large revenues they bring into the universities from teachers who must take their courses to maintain their teaching certificates.
Whether teachers like it or not, due to default, No Child Left Behind is all we have left to improve unacceptable achievement rates in our public schools.
Johanna Haver is a retired Arizona teacher and author of the book "Structured English Immersion: A Step-by-Step Guide for K-6 Teachers and Administrators" (Corwin Press, 2003). She can be reached at j.haver@cox.net.
Tuesday, November 29, 2005
Don't bully me
Bravo Marla Pfleger! Thank you for having the courage to speak out. Until more parents join people like Marla at speaking out and saying no more money, no more bullying and no more rejecting accountability, we will continue to see just that from the public education system. Bravo Marla! Thank you for setting such a great example for your children.
Don't bully me
[published on Mon, Nov 28, 2005]
To the Editor:
I am a parent with a student in District 15. The other day, he brought home a proposed elimination list if the March referendum fails.
I am appalled that the District 15 school board would actually think I would cave into its blatant ransom demands.
This is what will happen if the referendum fails:
– All children will get out an hour earlier, which means higher child-care costs.
– Eliminating key elements for the elementary and middle school children.
– No sports, after school activities or field trips, and no more recess.
I am disgusted with this school board and feel it is abusing our children.
To see the entire list of cuts our children look forward to, visit the district's Web site at www.d15.org.
I, for one, will not be bullied into voting for the referendum. I would rather move.
Marla Pfleger
McHenry
Don't bully me
[published on Mon, Nov 28, 2005]
To the Editor:
I am a parent with a student in District 15. The other day, he brought home a proposed elimination list if the March referendum fails.
I am appalled that the District 15 school board would actually think I would cave into its blatant ransom demands.
This is what will happen if the referendum fails:
– All children will get out an hour earlier, which means higher child-care costs.
– Eliminating key elements for the elementary and middle school children.
– No sports, after school activities or field trips, and no more recess.
I am disgusted with this school board and feel it is abusing our children.
To see the entire list of cuts our children look forward to, visit the district's Web site at www.d15.org.
I, for one, will not be bullied into voting for the referendum. I would rather move.
Marla Pfleger
McHenry
Monday, November 28, 2005
Another school official charged with corruption.
Note that she will only have to pay back half of her $3650 a month pension. Hmmm. How many of you take that home in your pension or social security?
Roslyn embezzlers now painted into costly corner
--------------------
BY EDEN LAIKIN AND KARLA SCHUSTER
STAFF WRITERS
November 11, 2005
In one painting, a full moon lights up the sky while a tall ship pushes through choppy, turquoise waves. In another, a bronze ring creates a portal view of two bright blue dolphins swimming past each other.
The artwork once belonged to former Roslyn school business official Pamela Gluckin, who admits she spent district money to buy them. Now, it's in the possession of the civil forfeiture unit of the Nassau district attorney's office, which auctions the assets of people guilty of crimes and returns the revenue to the victims - in this case, the Roslyn schools.
When Gluckin and her niece, former school business clerk Debra Rigano, were first charged in the $11.2 million theft from Roslyn, they got Nassau Assistant District Attorney Robert Nigro's standard speech.
"I am not your friend," Nigro, chief of the office's forfeiture section, said he told them, "but think of me like a credit counselor."
Of course, the six people charged so far in the Roslyn case did not always use their ill-gotten gains to buy goods that can now be returned or sold. "A lot of the money has been spent," Nigro said. "It's gone to pay bills, credit cards."
Still, the accused Roslyn embezzlers bought a lot of expensive items that can be seized. Rigano, who pleaded guilty yesterday to stealing $780,000, has so far forfeited a pair of 1-karat diamond earrings and an 18-karat gold Rolex watch band that she admits buying with district funds. Those will also be auctioned off to repay the district.
A 1985 state law gives Nigro, a lawyer and former judge, the authority to seize people's assets by filing civil suits against them. In cases with no victims, a percentage goes back to the district attorney's office to maintain the unit and a percentage goes to drug and alcohol rehabilitation and police agencies. Last year alone, the office disbursed $857,787 to crime victims, various state and local agencies and the DA's office.
In this case, all proceeds - an expected $7 million - will go to the Roslyn school district.
Since Gluckin, Rigano and former superintendent Frank Tassone were arrested last year in the Roslyn case, members of Nigro's unit have been working with Farrell Fritz, a Uniondale law firm hired by the district, to freeze and sell off assets belonging to the former officials. They will also team up to liquidate the guilty parties' bank accounts and insurance policies.
Together, they oversaw the $1.1 million sale of Gluckin's waterfront Bellmore home, where prosecutors say mortgage payments were made with district money. The sale last month netted $319,000 for the district. They also handled the sale of a Gluckin house in West Islip, selling it for $1.3 million and netting $322,000 for the district after brokers' fees and unpaid taxes. Two personal watercraft belonging to Gluckin brought in $5,100, and her 18-foot boat is being sold.
Gluckin paid more than $44,000 for the 13 paintings - including the one depicting the dolphins - at Gallery Lassen in Maui in 1998 and 2000, receipts show, shipping at least two of them to herself at the school district. She surrendered them last week, carting them herself to Mineola in a pick-up truck.
The original painting and 12 numbered prints that Gluckin bought in Hawaii each cost between $1,025 and $10,000, according to receipts from the gallery.
In addition, more than $1 million from various bank accounts and properties in Gluckin and her husband's names have been frozen since May 2004. And when Gluckin goes to jail, half of her $3,650-a-month-pension will go back to the restitution fund.
Recouping the criminal proceeds in the case hasn't been easy for the district attorney's office and Farrell Fritz, the law firm. For one thing, assets are sometimes held jointly in the names of other, non-criminally charged spouses. In the case of one of the Gluckin homes seized and sold, a small percentage of the proceeds went to her husband, who had put money into it over the years.
Farrell Fritz has more leeway than the district attorney's office, however. For example, they have sued those who cost the district money by doing a poor job, such as auditors, former board members and district lawyers.
They plan to file more lawsuits and arrange the sale of more property and merchandise. They've already settled with the district's former auditing firm, Miller Lilly & Pearce, for $925,000.
"We use different tactics," said Nigro. "But we're both working toward the same goal."
PAYING BACK ROSLYN
The following items, surrendered by former Roslyn school officials Pamela Gluckin and Debra Rigano, have either been sold or will be auctioned off, to reimburse the district.
Artwork
Dawn of New Era - $3,375
Moonlit Serenity - $3,375
Lords of Millennium - $3,150
Circle of Life - $2,000
New Hope II - $2,000
Moonlit Cove - $2,762
Circle Indigo Night - $5,500
Beyond the Reef - $3,375
Mother's Love popart- $10,000 (original)
Lahaina Symphony - $4,650
Lahaina Starlite II - $1,025
Island Romance - $1,695
Free Spirit - No receipt
Watercraft
2 Yamaha personal watercraft (Jet Skis) and floating dock sold for $5,100
2004 Monteray Pleasure Fiberglass 18-foot boat (sale pending)
Jewelry
1-Karat diamond earrings
18-Karat gold Rolex watch band
Homes
2850 Lee Place, Bellmore (sold for $1.1million)
1 Pansmith Lane, West Islip (sold for $1.3 million)
Copyright (c) 2005, Newsday, Inc.
--------------------
This article originally appeared at:
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-listuf114507553nov11,0,1799461.story?coll=ny-linews-headlines
Visit Newsday online at http://www.newsday.com
Roslyn embezzlers now painted into costly corner
--------------------
BY EDEN LAIKIN AND KARLA SCHUSTER
STAFF WRITERS
November 11, 2005
In one painting, a full moon lights up the sky while a tall ship pushes through choppy, turquoise waves. In another, a bronze ring creates a portal view of two bright blue dolphins swimming past each other.
The artwork once belonged to former Roslyn school business official Pamela Gluckin, who admits she spent district money to buy them. Now, it's in the possession of the civil forfeiture unit of the Nassau district attorney's office, which auctions the assets of people guilty of crimes and returns the revenue to the victims - in this case, the Roslyn schools.
When Gluckin and her niece, former school business clerk Debra Rigano, were first charged in the $11.2 million theft from Roslyn, they got Nassau Assistant District Attorney Robert Nigro's standard speech.
"I am not your friend," Nigro, chief of the office's forfeiture section, said he told them, "but think of me like a credit counselor."
Of course, the six people charged so far in the Roslyn case did not always use their ill-gotten gains to buy goods that can now be returned or sold. "A lot of the money has been spent," Nigro said. "It's gone to pay bills, credit cards."
Still, the accused Roslyn embezzlers bought a lot of expensive items that can be seized. Rigano, who pleaded guilty yesterday to stealing $780,000, has so far forfeited a pair of 1-karat diamond earrings and an 18-karat gold Rolex watch band that she admits buying with district funds. Those will also be auctioned off to repay the district.
A 1985 state law gives Nigro, a lawyer and former judge, the authority to seize people's assets by filing civil suits against them. In cases with no victims, a percentage goes back to the district attorney's office to maintain the unit and a percentage goes to drug and alcohol rehabilitation and police agencies. Last year alone, the office disbursed $857,787 to crime victims, various state and local agencies and the DA's office.
In this case, all proceeds - an expected $7 million - will go to the Roslyn school district.
Since Gluckin, Rigano and former superintendent Frank Tassone were arrested last year in the Roslyn case, members of Nigro's unit have been working with Farrell Fritz, a Uniondale law firm hired by the district, to freeze and sell off assets belonging to the former officials. They will also team up to liquidate the guilty parties' bank accounts and insurance policies.
Together, they oversaw the $1.1 million sale of Gluckin's waterfront Bellmore home, where prosecutors say mortgage payments were made with district money. The sale last month netted $319,000 for the district. They also handled the sale of a Gluckin house in West Islip, selling it for $1.3 million and netting $322,000 for the district after brokers' fees and unpaid taxes. Two personal watercraft belonging to Gluckin brought in $5,100, and her 18-foot boat is being sold.
Gluckin paid more than $44,000 for the 13 paintings - including the one depicting the dolphins - at Gallery Lassen in Maui in 1998 and 2000, receipts show, shipping at least two of them to herself at the school district. She surrendered them last week, carting them herself to Mineola in a pick-up truck.
The original painting and 12 numbered prints that Gluckin bought in Hawaii each cost between $1,025 and $10,000, according to receipts from the gallery.
In addition, more than $1 million from various bank accounts and properties in Gluckin and her husband's names have been frozen since May 2004. And when Gluckin goes to jail, half of her $3,650-a-month-pension will go back to the restitution fund.
Recouping the criminal proceeds in the case hasn't been easy for the district attorney's office and Farrell Fritz, the law firm. For one thing, assets are sometimes held jointly in the names of other, non-criminally charged spouses. In the case of one of the Gluckin homes seized and sold, a small percentage of the proceeds went to her husband, who had put money into it over the years.
Farrell Fritz has more leeway than the district attorney's office, however. For example, they have sued those who cost the district money by doing a poor job, such as auditors, former board members and district lawyers.
They plan to file more lawsuits and arrange the sale of more property and merchandise. They've already settled with the district's former auditing firm, Miller Lilly & Pearce, for $925,000.
"We use different tactics," said Nigro. "But we're both working toward the same goal."
PAYING BACK ROSLYN
The following items, surrendered by former Roslyn school officials Pamela Gluckin and Debra Rigano, have either been sold or will be auctioned off, to reimburse the district.
Artwork
Dawn of New Era - $3,375
Moonlit Serenity - $3,375
Lords of Millennium - $3,150
Circle of Life - $2,000
New Hope II - $2,000
Moonlit Cove - $2,762
Circle Indigo Night - $5,500
Beyond the Reef - $3,375
Mother's Love popart- $10,000 (original)
Lahaina Symphony - $4,650
Lahaina Starlite II - $1,025
Island Romance - $1,695
Free Spirit - No receipt
Watercraft
2 Yamaha personal watercraft (Jet Skis) and floating dock sold for $5,100
2004 Monteray Pleasure Fiberglass 18-foot boat (sale pending)
Jewelry
1-Karat diamond earrings
18-Karat gold Rolex watch band
Homes
2850 Lee Place, Bellmore (sold for $1.1million)
1 Pansmith Lane, West Islip (sold for $1.3 million)
Copyright (c) 2005, Newsday, Inc.
--------------------
This article originally appeared at:
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/longisland/ny-listuf114507553nov11,0,1799461.story?coll=ny-linews-headlines
Visit Newsday online at http://www.newsday.com
Sunday, November 27, 2005
The Investigation that Nabbed a School Superintendent.
The article below appeared in the Daily Southtown. A big round of applause to all the district employees who finally spoke up. Bravo to the reporters Linda Lutton, Jonathan Lipman and Kati Phillips for all their great work. Let us hope other school employees, reporters and regular citizens will start to take a closer look at school finances in their districts. Illinois spends well over 20 billion dollars to educate over 2 million kids. We are sure that more than one school district out of the 850 plus school districts that exist are misusing their funds.
How the iron fist of Tom Ryan was smashed: behind the scenes of the investigation
Sunday, November 27, 2005
By Jonathan Lipman and Kati Phillips
Staff writers
When Hank Ribich showed up at Tom Ryan's door at 8:30 in the morning, Ryan was not at his best.
The superintendent of Sauk Village schools' hair was disheveled, his chin unshaved beneath his trademark bristly mustache.
Although Ryan's 6-foot-2-inch frame towered over the squat form of the state's attorney's investigator, it was Ryan who looked uneasy. His eyes were wide and his mouth open with surprise.
It was a school day, and Ribich had gone looking for Ryan at the district's headquarters first, before finding Ryan asleep at his Orland Park home. The former Chicago cop, who bears an equally imposing mustache, had come to deliver a grand jury subpoena. And with it, a message.
"We told him he should get an attorney," Ribich said. "He said he had an attorney, but it was a tax attorney. We told him ... you should get a criminal attorney."
It was the first subpoena in a criminal investigation into School District 168 that would ultimately end with the school board president indicted, hundreds of thousands of dollars of misdirected funds seized and Ryan imprisoned.
In an interview with the Daily Southtown, Ribich and Assistant State's Attorney Sandra Navarro explained how they investigated and eventually caught Ryan.
Ryan pleaded guilty last week to felony theft, admitting to stealing up to $100,000 from the district.
He was originally accused of stealing more than $100,000, intimidating and harassing witnesses, obstructing justice, bribery and official misconduct.
He was sentenced to eight years in prison and ordered to pay $400,000 in restitution to the district.
A scion of Chicago's powerful 19th Ward, Ryan had been the unquestioned leader of the district for 15 years and once treasurer of the Illinois Association of School Administrators.
Ribich was conducting his first full investigation since joining the special prosecution bureau of the Cook County state's attorney's office. Navarro had five years with the office.
Both had years of previous experience investigating financial crimes. But the pair had an additional advantage in this case. They already knew where to look.
In March, April and May, the Daily Southtown's Linda Lutton had written a series of stories detailing Ryan's illegal use of district funds to pay for his daughters' college education and gifts for family and friends.
Lutton "provided a blueprint, I think, for the investigation," Navarro said. "Before we even got involved."
The state's attorney's office began investigating after a phone call from the state schools superintendent, Randy Dunn. He had been prompted to action by the Daily Southtown stories.
First encounters
Navarro's boss, special prosecutions bureau chief Scott Cassidy, decided to go after Ryan first.
"We wanted to know who his lawyer was going to be. We didn't really need any statements from him. The evidence was really rapidly unfolding," Cassidy said. "We also knew people were being intimidated out there, so we figured let's move on this fairly quickly. We wanted him out of there."
Ryan was unintimidated before the grand jury.
"He has that attitude about himself, that Ditka attitude," Ribich said, referring to former Bears coach Mike Ditka.
"It's arrogance," Navarro said. "Sometimes (before a grand jury) you can see a nervousness, or emotions, people cry. ... Someone did cry at the grand jury in this case; it was very upsetting the things people talked about in this case."
But Ryan, she said, was "emotionless" as he took the Fifth Amendment and refused to talk.
After that, the pair went after records. They amassed more than a dozen full-sized file boxes.
The paper trail was critical, but just as important were the district employees who began stepping forward. Cassidy said the Southtown's stories had people believing it was possible to catch Ryan.
"We had to put a trust in them," Ribich said. "It was like, 'We're not going to stop all of a sudden and go another way. We're going to take this all the way through.' "
An informal network of Ryan-hating parents and district employees already existed. Quickly, that network started spreading the word that the state's attorney's office needed help, Ribich said.
"Various clerical people who were terrified of (Ryan) gave us information," Navarro said. "Those are the true heroes, those who had the courage to come forward and to provide us with that information while they're still living under the iron fist of Ryan."
First snags
The investigators knew Ryan was intimidating witnesses. He had the entire district scared.
"Some of the employees described meetings where they felt like they were with the Godfather," Navarro said. Or like Al Capone in the movie "The Untouchables," she said.
"I don't know if you remember that scene where (Capone) walked around with the baseball bat, around the table," Navarro said. The scene in the movie ends with Capone brutally beating a man to death.
"You never knew what was going to happen next," Navarro said. "One witness ... she needed the job, but his actions made her physically sick before she came to work in the morning."
Ryan wore metal "heel savers" on the bottom of his shoes, Ribich said. They announced his presence as he strode down the halls.
"You always knew when he was in the building because you heard his cleats," Ribich said. "He'd make it a point to walk hard."
When Ryan was heading to visit a school, secretaries would call ahead to warn their colleagues.
"They would put out the announcement, 'Ryan's coming, hide the petty cash!' " Navarro said.
Petty cash was used for student activities, but Ryan would routinely pocket it, usually while lecturing staff about inadequate security and financial control.
District 168 is the second-poorest district in the county, and its three schools have lacked basic activities like music class or sports.
Ryan was dubbed a "reverse Robin Hood" by prosecutors for stealing from poor children to enrich his friends and family.
Many people in the district knew exactly what was going on, the investigators believe. Ryan hand-delivered bonus checks, directly demanding kickbacks.
"He expected you to pay, and he would tell you the amount, too," Ribich said. "He'd hand you the check, saying, 'Here, I expect $50 back tomorrow.' And you had to get it over there ASAP. Cash."
Others, such as the three school principals, were still loyal to Ryan, who gave them their jobs and took care of their needs with gifts and perks, Navarro said.
"He always had two or three envelopes on his desk that had money in it," Ribich said. "He made it known. You could see that each envelope had cash in it."
Ryan himself was closely monitoring the investigation. He told people what to say if they were appearing before the grand jury. Employees said he would watch Ribich closely on security monitors every time the investigator came to the district administration building.
"He hated it when I went out to the school district," Ribich said. "He'd get furious."
Although investigators were getting boxes and boxes of documents, not everything was matching up with the audit findings.
"It was like a 500-piece puzzle," Ribich said. "You throw all the stuff on the desk, and you look at it."
The witnesses coming forward were telling Navarro not to trust the records they were getting via subpoena. Ryan was altering them.
"When we sent subpoenas to the school district, (Ryan) would review everything, and then he would send it to (attorney Anthony) Scariano before we would even get it," Navarro said. "So they were free to change or amend and to pick and choose what we were going to see."
Some of the clerical workers in the district had saved original copies of the records they were ordered to change, and they supplied those originals to Navarro.
One worker hid original files in the basement, among the boxes holding the district's Christmas decorations. They were only rediscovered in the past few weeks, and Ribich dutifully drove out to photograph them.
Tide turns
In all, the investigators talked to 52 people. They put 24 of them before the grand jury to give sworn testimony. Only Ryan remained silent.
Every time another story appeared in the Southtown about a step in the investigation, Navarro would get "a flurry of calls" from employees and parents with tips.
People began to believe that Ryan, who had scared away so many others, was caught. Some began changing their stories.
"Some had a moment of epiphany where they felt used," Navarro said.
On July 26, school board president Louise Morales turned herself in to authorities and was charged with theft and official misconduct.
Because her name was the final authorization on improper spending, her case was easiest to prove, investigators said. And it sent a message to the community that the investigation was serious.
On Aug. 16, investigators searched Ryan's home and the district administrative office. The documents found at the district wound up being key, the investigators said.
"Then we could see things we didn't have available through the subpoenas," Navarro said. "They were originals."
"That is the eureka moment," Ribich said. "All of a sudden, bingo, you got him."
They already knew from bank records that Ryan typically took out lots of cash whenever he made a deposit, which is called a "split deposit." Searching Ryan's home, they found where that cash went. He was hoarding it.
"It was all over," Ribich said. "It was in dresser drawers, the closet. The majority of it was in the basement."
Investigators removed the cash from the house in a laundry basket.
Ryan's paychecks also were often converted into cash, so it's not clear how much of the cash found at his home came from illegal sources, the investigators said.
But since he used district money to pay for things he should have paid for himself — like meals — it didn't really matter. At least some of that money rightfully belonged to the district, and investigators seized all of it. The final haul was $730,000.End of an era
The search warrant finally convinced Ryan he was going to go down. His attorney opened negotiations with prosecutors to turn himself in.
Cassidy said Ryan wanted to avoid a trial that would almost certainly include embarrassing facts that would damage his personal and professional reputation.
They made a "gentleman's agreement" that Ryan would turn himself in, not ask for bail and eventually plead guilty. Prosecutors, in turn, would not press for a public trial and would agree to keep certain facts out of the court record.
"That said a lot to us at the time," Cassidy said. "When he agreed to do that we figured ... there's a sense of remorse here."
The investigation didn't end there. Ed Bernacki, Ryan's friend and the district's building and grounds supervisor, was charged Nov. 20 with misconduct, bribery and theft. He allegedly stole more than $100,000 from the district through rigged contracts for his company and other tricks.
His case and Morales' are still pending.
Other officials didn't deserve criminal prosecution, investigators said. Associate Supt. George Kunkel lacked day-to-day control over finances and helped investigators with their probe. Other employees were scared into doing things that may have been illegal.
Besides Morales, the school board didn't know what was going on, Navarro said.
"They were like an ostrich with their head in the sand," Navarro said. "Maybe they didn't want to know."
Investigators were surprised by the lack of fiscal control at the school district. The district's audits — which first identified problems with their accounts — were reviewed only by the school board.
Although those audits are sent to the state through the regional office of education, no one else ever reviews them.
"We want people to learn from Tom Ryan's mistakes, what not to do," Navarro said. "I don't know what they were thinking out there."
Jonathan Lipman may be reached at jlipman@dailysouthtown.com or (708) 633-5979.
How the iron fist of Tom Ryan was smashed: behind the scenes of the investigation
Sunday, November 27, 2005
By Jonathan Lipman and Kati Phillips
Staff writers
When Hank Ribich showed up at Tom Ryan's door at 8:30 in the morning, Ryan was not at his best.
The superintendent of Sauk Village schools' hair was disheveled, his chin unshaved beneath his trademark bristly mustache.
Although Ryan's 6-foot-2-inch frame towered over the squat form of the state's attorney's investigator, it was Ryan who looked uneasy. His eyes were wide and his mouth open with surprise.
It was a school day, and Ribich had gone looking for Ryan at the district's headquarters first, before finding Ryan asleep at his Orland Park home. The former Chicago cop, who bears an equally imposing mustache, had come to deliver a grand jury subpoena. And with it, a message.
"We told him he should get an attorney," Ribich said. "He said he had an attorney, but it was a tax attorney. We told him ... you should get a criminal attorney."
It was the first subpoena in a criminal investigation into School District 168 that would ultimately end with the school board president indicted, hundreds of thousands of dollars of misdirected funds seized and Ryan imprisoned.
In an interview with the Daily Southtown, Ribich and Assistant State's Attorney Sandra Navarro explained how they investigated and eventually caught Ryan.
Ryan pleaded guilty last week to felony theft, admitting to stealing up to $100,000 from the district.
He was originally accused of stealing more than $100,000, intimidating and harassing witnesses, obstructing justice, bribery and official misconduct.
He was sentenced to eight years in prison and ordered to pay $400,000 in restitution to the district.
A scion of Chicago's powerful 19th Ward, Ryan had been the unquestioned leader of the district for 15 years and once treasurer of the Illinois Association of School Administrators.
Ribich was conducting his first full investigation since joining the special prosecution bureau of the Cook County state's attorney's office. Navarro had five years with the office.
Both had years of previous experience investigating financial crimes. But the pair had an additional advantage in this case. They already knew where to look.
In March, April and May, the Daily Southtown's Linda Lutton had written a series of stories detailing Ryan's illegal use of district funds to pay for his daughters' college education and gifts for family and friends.
Lutton "provided a blueprint, I think, for the investigation," Navarro said. "Before we even got involved."
The state's attorney's office began investigating after a phone call from the state schools superintendent, Randy Dunn. He had been prompted to action by the Daily Southtown stories.
First encounters
Navarro's boss, special prosecutions bureau chief Scott Cassidy, decided to go after Ryan first.
"We wanted to know who his lawyer was going to be. We didn't really need any statements from him. The evidence was really rapidly unfolding," Cassidy said. "We also knew people were being intimidated out there, so we figured let's move on this fairly quickly. We wanted him out of there."
Ryan was unintimidated before the grand jury.
"He has that attitude about himself, that Ditka attitude," Ribich said, referring to former Bears coach Mike Ditka.
"It's arrogance," Navarro said. "Sometimes (before a grand jury) you can see a nervousness, or emotions, people cry. ... Someone did cry at the grand jury in this case; it was very upsetting the things people talked about in this case."
But Ryan, she said, was "emotionless" as he took the Fifth Amendment and refused to talk.
After that, the pair went after records. They amassed more than a dozen full-sized file boxes.
The paper trail was critical, but just as important were the district employees who began stepping forward. Cassidy said the Southtown's stories had people believing it was possible to catch Ryan.
"We had to put a trust in them," Ribich said. "It was like, 'We're not going to stop all of a sudden and go another way. We're going to take this all the way through.' "
An informal network of Ryan-hating parents and district employees already existed. Quickly, that network started spreading the word that the state's attorney's office needed help, Ribich said.
"Various clerical people who were terrified of (Ryan) gave us information," Navarro said. "Those are the true heroes, those who had the courage to come forward and to provide us with that information while they're still living under the iron fist of Ryan."
First snags
The investigators knew Ryan was intimidating witnesses. He had the entire district scared.
"Some of the employees described meetings where they felt like they were with the Godfather," Navarro said. Or like Al Capone in the movie "The Untouchables," she said.
"I don't know if you remember that scene where (Capone) walked around with the baseball bat, around the table," Navarro said. The scene in the movie ends with Capone brutally beating a man to death.
"You never knew what was going to happen next," Navarro said. "One witness ... she needed the job, but his actions made her physically sick before she came to work in the morning."
Ryan wore metal "heel savers" on the bottom of his shoes, Ribich said. They announced his presence as he strode down the halls.
"You always knew when he was in the building because you heard his cleats," Ribich said. "He'd make it a point to walk hard."
When Ryan was heading to visit a school, secretaries would call ahead to warn their colleagues.
"They would put out the announcement, 'Ryan's coming, hide the petty cash!' " Navarro said.
Petty cash was used for student activities, but Ryan would routinely pocket it, usually while lecturing staff about inadequate security and financial control.
District 168 is the second-poorest district in the county, and its three schools have lacked basic activities like music class or sports.
Ryan was dubbed a "reverse Robin Hood" by prosecutors for stealing from poor children to enrich his friends and family.
Many people in the district knew exactly what was going on, the investigators believe. Ryan hand-delivered bonus checks, directly demanding kickbacks.
"He expected you to pay, and he would tell you the amount, too," Ribich said. "He'd hand you the check, saying, 'Here, I expect $50 back tomorrow.' And you had to get it over there ASAP. Cash."
Others, such as the three school principals, were still loyal to Ryan, who gave them their jobs and took care of their needs with gifts and perks, Navarro said.
"He always had two or three envelopes on his desk that had money in it," Ribich said. "He made it known. You could see that each envelope had cash in it."
Ryan himself was closely monitoring the investigation. He told people what to say if they were appearing before the grand jury. Employees said he would watch Ribich closely on security monitors every time the investigator came to the district administration building.
"He hated it when I went out to the school district," Ribich said. "He'd get furious."
Although investigators were getting boxes and boxes of documents, not everything was matching up with the audit findings.
"It was like a 500-piece puzzle," Ribich said. "You throw all the stuff on the desk, and you look at it."
The witnesses coming forward were telling Navarro not to trust the records they were getting via subpoena. Ryan was altering them.
"When we sent subpoenas to the school district, (Ryan) would review everything, and then he would send it to (attorney Anthony) Scariano before we would even get it," Navarro said. "So they were free to change or amend and to pick and choose what we were going to see."
Some of the clerical workers in the district had saved original copies of the records they were ordered to change, and they supplied those originals to Navarro.
One worker hid original files in the basement, among the boxes holding the district's Christmas decorations. They were only rediscovered in the past few weeks, and Ribich dutifully drove out to photograph them.
Tide turns
In all, the investigators talked to 52 people. They put 24 of them before the grand jury to give sworn testimony. Only Ryan remained silent.
Every time another story appeared in the Southtown about a step in the investigation, Navarro would get "a flurry of calls" from employees and parents with tips.
People began to believe that Ryan, who had scared away so many others, was caught. Some began changing their stories.
"Some had a moment of epiphany where they felt used," Navarro said.
On July 26, school board president Louise Morales turned herself in to authorities and was charged with theft and official misconduct.
Because her name was the final authorization on improper spending, her case was easiest to prove, investigators said. And it sent a message to the community that the investigation was serious.
On Aug. 16, investigators searched Ryan's home and the district administrative office. The documents found at the district wound up being key, the investigators said.
"Then we could see things we didn't have available through the subpoenas," Navarro said. "They were originals."
"That is the eureka moment," Ribich said. "All of a sudden, bingo, you got him."
They already knew from bank records that Ryan typically took out lots of cash whenever he made a deposit, which is called a "split deposit." Searching Ryan's home, they found where that cash went. He was hoarding it.
"It was all over," Ribich said. "It was in dresser drawers, the closet. The majority of it was in the basement."
Investigators removed the cash from the house in a laundry basket.
Ryan's paychecks also were often converted into cash, so it's not clear how much of the cash found at his home came from illegal sources, the investigators said.
But since he used district money to pay for things he should have paid for himself — like meals — it didn't really matter. At least some of that money rightfully belonged to the district, and investigators seized all of it. The final haul was $730,000.End of an era
The search warrant finally convinced Ryan he was going to go down. His attorney opened negotiations with prosecutors to turn himself in.
Cassidy said Ryan wanted to avoid a trial that would almost certainly include embarrassing facts that would damage his personal and professional reputation.
They made a "gentleman's agreement" that Ryan would turn himself in, not ask for bail and eventually plead guilty. Prosecutors, in turn, would not press for a public trial and would agree to keep certain facts out of the court record.
"That said a lot to us at the time," Cassidy said. "When he agreed to do that we figured ... there's a sense of remorse here."
The investigation didn't end there. Ed Bernacki, Ryan's friend and the district's building and grounds supervisor, was charged Nov. 20 with misconduct, bribery and theft. He allegedly stole more than $100,000 from the district through rigged contracts for his company and other tricks.
His case and Morales' are still pending.
Other officials didn't deserve criminal prosecution, investigators said. Associate Supt. George Kunkel lacked day-to-day control over finances and helped investigators with their probe. Other employees were scared into doing things that may have been illegal.
Besides Morales, the school board didn't know what was going on, Navarro said.
"They were like an ostrich with their head in the sand," Navarro said. "Maybe they didn't want to know."
Investigators were surprised by the lack of fiscal control at the school district. The district's audits — which first identified problems with their accounts — were reviewed only by the school board.
Although those audits are sent to the state through the regional office of education, no one else ever reviews them.
"We want people to learn from Tom Ryan's mistakes, what not to do," Navarro said. "I don't know what they were thinking out there."
Jonathan Lipman may be reached at jlipman@dailysouthtown.com or (708) 633-5979.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
Why son refused to stand
The article below appeared in the Courier News. This is yet another example of how schools are more apt to teach their political/social agenda's instead of giving students a really sound education foundation. It is great to teach students about other cultures but in America we have the right to refuse to stand if we so choose. Bravo to this father for standing up to his son's rights.
Why son refused to stand
I am the father of the young man who did not stand for the singing of the Mexican national anthem during a cultural awareness program at Larkin High School.
I have been constantly asked to explain the details of the event, and it is in response to these individuals that I offer the following facts.
Some of the students, my son included, were compelled to attend this assembly. The Mexican national anthem was printed on fliers and handed out to the attending students. The Mexican flag was marched in and placed on a podium by itself. The attendees were then asked to stand and sing the Mexican national anthem.
My son was not alone in his refusal to stand. Statements given to me by other youths and parents put the number of refusals at close to 20.
Larkin staff members immediately confronted the seated youth. Some of the students were threatened with in-school suspension; most of the seated students were intimidated into standing.
My son explained to the angry teacher who confronted him that he did not see a U.S. flag on the podium and he did not believe they were going to sing our national anthem. This teacher stated, "They have to stand for our national anthem, so you have to stand for theirs."
My son stated in response, "Yeah, but they're in our country."
The teacher called my son a punk and sent him to the office. The administrator in the office supported the teacher's demand and told my son that he could have made a more intelligent decision. My son was not formally disciplined. The teacher who confronted my son defended her actions to her students during class the following week.
I called Larkin principal Richard Webb to express my disappointment and concern. I described the manner in which my son had been treated. I was told that my son should have stood and that the school stood by its right to have this assembly in its chosen form.
I then exercised my right as a citizen and addressed the school board.
The press was present at the board meeting and media awareness snowballed from that point forward. Some of my statements to the board included, "I am disappointed that those responsible for creating an assembly intended to educate and sensitize Americans also felt free to act insensitively with regard to our culture. It is permissible to present another country's anthem alongside ours and receive standing respect. It is not reasonable to expect or demand that Americans stand and display respect for another flag and country in absence of the American anthem or flag."
I also asked the board to consider two positive actions. "First, encourage Larkin High School administrators to not underscore one culture to the exclusion of others. This ill-conceived mandatory assembly did nothing but widen the current schism. Second, I would ask the board to lay down some principles for future assemblies. While it is good educational practice to teach about other cultures, it is not an acceptable practice to require mandatory response to the patriotic elements of those cultures."
I was appalled by Webb's printed statement. Apologizing only for the "unfortunate spotlight" placed on the school does not acknowledge the process that brought the spotlight. Lack of proper oversight created an assembly that offended a large number of people. Teachers behaving badly guaranteed parental follow-through. Administrative silence and denial has perpetuated their arrogant image.
Trivializing the incident and belittling those it concerned has only confirmed Webb's lack of grounding with the community.
Since Dec. 8, 2004, educational institutions receiving federal funding are required to hold an educational program pertaining to the United States Constitution on Sept. 17 of each year. This year, Sept. 17 fell on a Saturday.
Our high school apparently chose on Sept. 16 not to hold an assembly on the Constitution of the United States, but to educate our youth on the patriotic elements of another country.
- Bedard is an Elgin resident.
Why son refused to stand
I am the father of the young man who did not stand for the singing of the Mexican national anthem during a cultural awareness program at Larkin High School.
I have been constantly asked to explain the details of the event, and it is in response to these individuals that I offer the following facts.
Some of the students, my son included, were compelled to attend this assembly. The Mexican national anthem was printed on fliers and handed out to the attending students. The Mexican flag was marched in and placed on a podium by itself. The attendees were then asked to stand and sing the Mexican national anthem.
My son was not alone in his refusal to stand. Statements given to me by other youths and parents put the number of refusals at close to 20.
Larkin staff members immediately confronted the seated youth. Some of the students were threatened with in-school suspension; most of the seated students were intimidated into standing.
My son explained to the angry teacher who confronted him that he did not see a U.S. flag on the podium and he did not believe they were going to sing our national anthem. This teacher stated, "They have to stand for our national anthem, so you have to stand for theirs."
My son stated in response, "Yeah, but they're in our country."
The teacher called my son a punk and sent him to the office. The administrator in the office supported the teacher's demand and told my son that he could have made a more intelligent decision. My son was not formally disciplined. The teacher who confronted my son defended her actions to her students during class the following week.
I called Larkin principal Richard Webb to express my disappointment and concern. I described the manner in which my son had been treated. I was told that my son should have stood and that the school stood by its right to have this assembly in its chosen form.
I then exercised my right as a citizen and addressed the school board.
The press was present at the board meeting and media awareness snowballed from that point forward. Some of my statements to the board included, "I am disappointed that those responsible for creating an assembly intended to educate and sensitize Americans also felt free to act insensitively with regard to our culture. It is permissible to present another country's anthem alongside ours and receive standing respect. It is not reasonable to expect or demand that Americans stand and display respect for another flag and country in absence of the American anthem or flag."
I also asked the board to consider two positive actions. "First, encourage Larkin High School administrators to not underscore one culture to the exclusion of others. This ill-conceived mandatory assembly did nothing but widen the current schism. Second, I would ask the board to lay down some principles for future assemblies. While it is good educational practice to teach about other cultures, it is not an acceptable practice to require mandatory response to the patriotic elements of those cultures."
I was appalled by Webb's printed statement. Apologizing only for the "unfortunate spotlight" placed on the school does not acknowledge the process that brought the spotlight. Lack of proper oversight created an assembly that offended a large number of people. Teachers behaving badly guaranteed parental follow-through. Administrative silence and denial has perpetuated their arrogant image.
Trivializing the incident and belittling those it concerned has only confirmed Webb's lack of grounding with the community.
Since Dec. 8, 2004, educational institutions receiving federal funding are required to hold an educational program pertaining to the United States Constitution on Sept. 17 of each year. This year, Sept. 17 fell on a Saturday.
Our high school apparently chose on Sept. 16 not to hold an assembly on the Constitution of the United States, but to educate our youth on the patriotic elements of another country.
- Bedard is an Elgin resident.
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Give ’em a million, save a billion.
This is from our friend Bill in Mundelein. This one speaks for itself.
Yes, Illinois needs pension reform
Give ’em a million, save a billion.
That is my answer to Darwin Heide’s letter urging all of us to call Springfield and let them know how upset we are that they are not raising our taxes by $320 billion (or $8 billion a year for the next 40 years) to make millionaires out of public employees when they retire at age 55. It would be funny if it weren’t so outrageous. Only the teacher unions and their minions would think that taxing non-schoolteachers into bankruptcy (or more likely into a low-tax state) is fair and reasonable.
My new slogan “Give ’em a million and save a billion” comes from a simple mathematical fact. The average teacher in Illinois who retires after 34 years retires with a pension worth well in excess of a million dollars cash. So if we taxpayers just give them a check for $1 million when they retire (whatever happened to a gold watch?) we will save tens or hundreds of billions over the next 40 years.
This is easy to figure out just go to any mutual fund site such as www.vanguard.com and have them calculate an annuity for you indexed for inflation starting at age 55. When you do that you see that a beginning pension of $40,000/year requires an up-front payment of $1 million. Thus the $103,000 pension for the highest paid teacher in 2004, a driver’s ed teacher from Leyden High School is worth about $2.5 million cash up front. So giving him $1 million would save us $1.5 million and still make him a millionaire. He is not alone — the 100th highest paid teacher would have a pension cash-value of about $2 million. Suffice it to say that there are no teachers in the six-county metro area retiring at age 55 after 34 years that are retiring on pensions less than $1.25 million. Most of them are close to the $2 million mark. If they are administrators the $3 million mark is not unusual.
And the teachers’ 8-percent contribution over 34 years compounded at 6 percent adds up to about 15 percent of their pension. The other 85 percent comes right out of the taxpayers’ pocket. Which also means we taxpayers as employers are contributing about 40 percent of the teacher’s salary to their pension plan. How’s that compare to your company’s 401(k) contribution?
And the driver’s ed teacher is not the worst example. Bill Clinton’s presidential pension is about $162,000 per year. Here in Illinois we have 29 former public employees with pensions greater than the president’s.
So, yes, Mr. Heide we do need pension reform in Illinois. We need to have an upper limit on public pensions that relate in some way to the average pension non-public employee’s receive. Otherwise in 40 years there will he no one left in Illinois except retired public employees. Who is going to pick up the tab then?
William N. Zettler
Mundelein
Yes, Illinois needs pension reform
Give ’em a million, save a billion.
That is my answer to Darwin Heide’s letter urging all of us to call Springfield and let them know how upset we are that they are not raising our taxes by $320 billion (or $8 billion a year for the next 40 years) to make millionaires out of public employees when they retire at age 55. It would be funny if it weren’t so outrageous. Only the teacher unions and their minions would think that taxing non-schoolteachers into bankruptcy (or more likely into a low-tax state) is fair and reasonable.
My new slogan “Give ’em a million and save a billion” comes from a simple mathematical fact. The average teacher in Illinois who retires after 34 years retires with a pension worth well in excess of a million dollars cash. So if we taxpayers just give them a check for $1 million when they retire (whatever happened to a gold watch?) we will save tens or hundreds of billions over the next 40 years.
This is easy to figure out just go to any mutual fund site such as www.vanguard.com and have them calculate an annuity for you indexed for inflation starting at age 55. When you do that you see that a beginning pension of $40,000/year requires an up-front payment of $1 million. Thus the $103,000 pension for the highest paid teacher in 2004, a driver’s ed teacher from Leyden High School is worth about $2.5 million cash up front. So giving him $1 million would save us $1.5 million and still make him a millionaire. He is not alone — the 100th highest paid teacher would have a pension cash-value of about $2 million. Suffice it to say that there are no teachers in the six-county metro area retiring at age 55 after 34 years that are retiring on pensions less than $1.25 million. Most of them are close to the $2 million mark. If they are administrators the $3 million mark is not unusual.
And the teachers’ 8-percent contribution over 34 years compounded at 6 percent adds up to about 15 percent of their pension. The other 85 percent comes right out of the taxpayers’ pocket. Which also means we taxpayers as employers are contributing about 40 percent of the teacher’s salary to their pension plan. How’s that compare to your company’s 401(k) contribution?
And the driver’s ed teacher is not the worst example. Bill Clinton’s presidential pension is about $162,000 per year. Here in Illinois we have 29 former public employees with pensions greater than the president’s.
So, yes, Mr. Heide we do need pension reform in Illinois. We need to have an upper limit on public pensions that relate in some way to the average pension non-public employee’s receive. Otherwise in 40 years there will he no one left in Illinois except retired public employees. Who is going to pick up the tab then?
William N. Zettler
Mundelein
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