Chron: Ackerman -- why stay?
One of the more controversial posts to this blog so far has been Caroline and Nestwife's The Ackerman-must-go movement. This post has led to an op-ed piece in the Examiner and appears to have contributed to yesterday's Chron editorial, Don't drive out Ackerman.
Many have read that and have concluded that this blog is hopelessly biased. I hope that does not prove to be the case. I hope to include a wide variety of voices here. In that spirit, here is a letter to the editor from today's Chron, Ackerman -- why stay?
Editor -- Your editorial 'Don't drive Ackerman out,' July 28, was very offensive.
You stated that if San Francisco public schools superintendent Arlene Ackerman were driven out, the city would need to find a leader 'tough enough to withstand meddling by school board members.'
The people of San Francisco elected those 'meddlers' -- we did not elect Ackerman. Those 'meddlers' receive a paltry $500 a month and take a lot more flak than Ackerman does. Ackerman gets paid $250,000 a year, plus a $2,000-a-month housing allowance.
Ackerman complains constantly about the school board members not 'working with her' but at the same time refuses to meet with them to discuss the dire problems facing the San Francisco Unified School District.
Ackerman complains about the current divisiveness in the district, but at the same time she deliberately sets out to pit parents against parents, schools against schools, and board members against board members.
Perhaps The Chronicle should increase its very limited coverage of issues affecting the city's public schools, instead of just defending Ackerman.
You claim that driving Ackerman away would be a mistake, but you fail to state why it would be a mistake.
KATY FRANKLINSan Francisco
Personally, I find the whole mess to be very disheartening. I keep waiting for cooler heads to prevail. Could be a long wait...
Labels: SFUSD Politics
3 Comments:
Thank you KC for trying to add different perspectives to the great blog! nice piece by heather knight about the blog too in today's chron as well.
Lets look at the Ackerman legends.
1) She got the finances under control.
Yes, but any honest mediocre junior college business grad could get the finances under control after Bill Rojas. In reality we faced a $22 million deficit for next year. That's not under control. Now that she's run out of people to sue, the extra funds have dried up. She and her staff should have seen that coming. Her budgets are not in line with reality.
2) She's raised test scores.
Yes, but she's done so by forcing teachers to "teach to the test". She's teaching the students how to take tests! That's not a real indicator. Look at graduation rates. Look at the percentage of special education students. Look at the rate of students demitted from special education and moved back to regular curriculum.
Anyone who does that will see a totally different story.
3) She's the best person for the job. No one is insane enough for it.
Totally WRONG. There are many administrators all over the country chomping at the bit to take the reigns at a large urban school district. Especially a challenging district. The clout that comes with that position in the education profession is enormous. A success in that position enables one to write their own ticket.
4) She's picked on by The Board.
No. She's held accountable. To her that is being picked on. In DC she has defacto, actually I believe dejur control of The Board. In any case she was the board. In San Francisco that is not the case. She doesn't like being asked critical questions, plain and simple.
She tightly controls information given to The Board and disallows staff from making recommendations to The Board. Her staff only gives rigidly defined information and nothing more. She herself won't give her recommendations.
The state of relations with The Board are her doing. Blaming Mark Sanchez or Eric Mar for asking questions is that same thing as blaming them for doing their job. No matter what the questions. If you don't like the questions don't vote for them.
Thanks Eric. I would like to diversify the team here at sfschools.org, but until that happens I will try and find other views that I can quote. One way or another we'll...
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