LoisLane wrote:
chugar52 wrote:
Who said that this is someone's friend or brother? I must have missed that in the article.
Sorry if I jumped to my own conclusion, but, it kind of smells bad. You know, just like the all expenses paid weekend in Chicago, which you neglected to comment on. But then, you probably have a reason not to comment.
All of the expenses for this weekend in Chicago? Let's see. Most people know that when someone goes to a conference, there is a special rate for the hotel rooms. I would say it is no more than $150 per night per person, which is about $300 per board member for 2 nights. Most of the time the vendors take out the Board members for dinner, at no cost to the district.
Do you or anyone else that has been posting have any idea how many hours a Board member puts in during a years time -
AT NO PAY???????????? It's not just board meetings that the board members attend, it"s committee meetings such as negotiations, policy, building, building and grounds, expulsion meetings, etc. Board members VOLUNTEER hundreds of hours, if not thousands of hours, for every year they are on the board. Even if a board member puts in ONLY 500 hours a year, that costs the tax payers less than $1 an hour for every hour a board member puts in. Would you work for less than $1 an hour?
The conferences are training. EVERY year there are different sessions. There are hundreds of topics and there is no way a board member can even think about attending them all in one year. What might apply to a district one year doesn't apply another year. There might be sessions on a Superintendent search, building a new building, new laws, different strategies. A Superintendent search might be important one year, but not the next. Building a new building might be important one year, but not the next, etc. For the board members who are there to do what is right, it's not a weekend for fun and games. It's a weekend to LEARN and bring things back to the district that might help keep the grades up and do what's best for the kids.
The conferences are educational and help boards learn to do their job better, just like with any other job, there is continuous training. Don't forget that there are also several NEW board members on the board and they need the training because there is a lot that they have to learn. In the newspaper article, one of the Superintendents mentioned TAG (Targeting Achievement Through Governance). TAG doesn't cover all of the things that are covered at the conferences, so that was a moot comment.
As far as staying downtown, it is much more convenient to stay there and be able to get to the sessions without having to rush home Friday night, after being in training ALL day, turn around go back on Saturday morning, be in sessions ALL day again, go home Saturday night, then go back on Sunday morning again. There would be mileage expenses, parking expenses, as well as meal expenses. Is it a little cheaper to travel back and forth every day? Yes, but as I said Board members get NO pay for their long hours and to pay for a hotel room for a couple of days is not being frivilous.
Don't forget that Board Members are tax payers also. It's their tax money too, but as I said, they put in hundreds, if not thousands of hours
EVERY year they're on the Board with
NO PAY!!!!!!
There have been complaints on this forum about this board "stinking" like the old board. Do you really believe that? The old board was giving an incompetent Superintendent almost $250,000 for resigning and doing nothing!!!!!!! The old board was letting teachers, mainly white teachers, be harrassed. The old board looked the other way when it was discovered that the Superintendent wasn't certified. I could go on and on about what the old board did, but I'm sure most people remember, and the NEW board is doing NOTHING illegal or immoral.
There was a comment about lowering the standards so kids can play sports, and people are trashing the board. The board did NOT vote on that, it was PARENTS at the meeting that want to lower the standards, not the Board.
There were comments about changing the name of the school and once again people on this forum were trashing the board. WHY???? The Board didn't vote on that. It was a PARENT who brought that up at a meeting. The Board did NOT decide to change the name of the school. It has NOT been voted on by the Board. It was mentioned at a meeting, that's it!!!