FWCS "turnaround under way" too late

About 800 teachers are currently in training sessions for the district's 11 FAIL schools. FAIL is not an acronym for anything, like the "LEAD" schools FWCS came up with. It's just an accurate adjective for their status. Karen Frisco editorialized on the "profound" changes under way in the JG today. As always the real story is not what's printed in the JG editorial pages.

For starters, why is this happening now? When PL 221 was passed by the legislature ten (or so) years ago, it should have been obvious that there was going to be trouble in River City. So why didn't FWCS try to do something before now? Basically they just blew it off. They didn't want to hear it. Year after year we just heard about their concerns about lack of progress, that they were always striving to do better and working very hard to improve... yada, yada , yada. They were actually more concerned about remodeling their buildings. What we have now is the result of years of miserable leadership by the administration and the board. I would add FWEA but their mission has always been self preservation. The "Proven Leadership" you saw on Steve Corona's campaign billboards two years ago really meant "Proven Incompetence".

Then Karen says "not all teachers were eager" to go FAIL schools. I'll say. The law requires that 50% of the teachers in a FAIL school be changed. So about 400 teachers were forced to go through an interviewing process by giving them layoff notices. Those who got the notices were mostly the ones with less than 10 years seniority. The teachers who got to stay at their current schools without interviewing were the older ones, who may or may not have been the most competent. The "best" of the laid off teachers were then picked by the "new" (that's another story) principals of the FAIL schools. The "worst" of the laid off teachers were mostly assigned to other schools that had vacancies. So schools that were doing OK got the short end of the stick on teaching talent. How that affects those schools is of little concern at the moment. What's more important is that FWEA preserved jobs.

FWCS is actually divided into two systems by Coliseum Boulevard. The "poor" district south of Coliseum if failing and probably beyond saving. For twenty years the district has been busing (at great cost to taxpayers) as many kids as they can accommodate to schools north of Coliseum to even out the problem. But "school choice" didn't save the FAIL schools and is only speeding up the deterioration of the entire district.

Then Karen says the community leaders and taxpayers should take note and support the profound changes going on at FWCS. Never mind that their ONLY motivation for change is self preservation in light of a possible state takeover. What taxpayers should really consider is that over the last several decades the (inflation adjusted) cost of educating a student has doubled along with the number of adults employed to do that. And what do we taxpayers have to show for it in terms of academic achievement? Locally, eleven FAIL schools with more to come. If you're incensed about bailing out failing Wall Street firms and the auto industry, think about what we're doing here year after year.