Fred Says "Money Talks."

The (Gun-for-Hire) Advocate has printed another chapter for the superintendent's public relations machine, with a front page article and smiling photo of the man himself. Evidently, money (the well-known "drug" of choice of the superintendent) is urgently needed to keep security cameras on at night and to purchase new hydraulic lifts at the English and Keverian School. In "question and answer" style, The Advocate allegedly asks the superintendent several questions about the security cameras and the hydraulic lifts. We say "allegedly" since Mr. Mitchell only knows the phone numbers of public officials when he's looking for advertising....which means that John Cook Dowd probably cooked this one up. If it was Mitchell, Journalism 101 should have had inspired him to call members of the school building commission, who could have either verified Mr. Foresteire's claims, or provided historical background. Fair and balanced? You be the judge.

In the article, Mr. Foresteire pointed the finger of blame at the Ragucci School Building Commission. He alleged that the school building commission failed to provide "state of the art" security, instead of the security systems currently in use at the English and Keverian Schools. The current system requires operation by means of a "joystick" and the superintendent insisted that this would require an operator all night.

The superintendent also found fault with the purchase of a hydraulic lift at the English School. Mr. Foresteire alleged that the lift was the wrong size, and that he "advised" Mayor Ragucci and the SBC of this issue - to no avail. He has also stated that the lift originally slated for the Keverian had never been delivered. The lift from the LaFayette has to be moved between the LaFayette, English and Keverian schools, which has led to the damage of the sole hydraulic lift.

What's the truth here? It's hard to say. It might be true. Then again, it might not be. Memo to Steven Simonelli, the Ward 2 Councilor whom the Superintendent wants to propose a resolution to secure the money. Ask Fred for the documents that support everything he says. Ask him for the letters that he wrote to Mayor Ragucci about the lifts and the cameras. Ask for the written opinion of an independent security firm to determine whether the security system is as obsolete as Fred claims.

Check it all out before another dime of taxpayer money is handed over. Remember what Ronald Reagan said. "Trust, but verify." In this case, given the history here, you have every reason to verify these claims before proceeding.

Hypocrisy - The School Department, Accountability and the Budget Process

According to local press and the Board of Aldermen, our indicted superintendent of schools isn't accountable to anyone but the school committee. Or is he?

Check out this website.

Evidently, this is NOT what Fred said to the the nice folks from "Building Blocks," an educators' website created by Mass Insight Education. Mass Insight Education is an organization devoted to helping school districts reach higher levels of academic performance. Under the title, "Educators Blue Prints for Effective Standards Based Reform," Fred evidently sells one story to his peers and educators and quite another to the parents, taxpayers and city government. Our editorial comments are in "blue."

From the site:

In Everett, accountability isn’t just a catch-phrase. Everyone in the school community — from the superintendent to the parents — shares responsibility for improved student learning. The district employs specific evaluation systems to communicate and assess each party’s role in helping students meet the standards. Furthermore, it provides incentives in return for greater teacher accountability and takes action when anyone fails to do his or her part.


Step One: Hold the superintendent accountable, through regular reporting of performance data
Superintendent Fred Foresteire says he is accountable not just to the mayor and school committee — but also to the students, parents, school councils, teachers’ professional organizations, and the citizens within the district. [Funny, that's not what he says in Everett. He had his high priced school attorney send an alderman a long windy letter stating that he was only accountable to the school committee.] He strives to make that line of accountability crystal clear by communicating progress, data, and action plans on student performance clearly and regularly to all constituents. [Communicates progress? I guess we missed that school committee meeting!]

The Blueprint:
The superintendent must report regularly on progress with all constituents. The superintendent presents a formal progress report to the school committee three times a year. [Mr. Alconada...are you sure that this is happening?] Presentations are televised and available on the public access channel. [Mr. Alconada - what channel is this on, the fantasy channel? Most of the time, your members waive the reading and vote!] The superintendent and other central office staff also make regular presentations, in person, to the city council, school councils, teachers’ professional organizations, students, and parents. The emphasis on candid, regular, comprehensive progress reporting has helped to focus the entire community’s attention on academic achievement — and what must be done to continue improving it. [There has to be a parallel universe where these presentations are being shown....'cause it's not in Everett!]

The superintendent provides performance data to support budget requests. [Clearly, hell must have frozen over when this allegedly happened.] When presenting to the school committee, the superintendent provides updates on school improvement plans, outlines specific actions targeted for the year, and uses MCAS and other data to demonstrate progress toward those goals. [If Fred used MCAS data, he would be getting significant budget reductions, given that last round of scores.] Only then, with all of the data laid out, does he address the budget. [What? We honestly thought Fred figured out what he needed for football first, and then built the rest of the budget around that. Ask the special ed parents, and don't miss the state audit! ] The school committee and town budget managers have been responsive to the progress shown on these achievement measures (see the profile of Devens and Everett schools), and has generally funded the requested operating budgets. As Foresteire notes, “People are willing to pay for results they can see.” [We're still waiting for results we can see. He's right about people being willing to pay for results but we're also tired of paying for a broken, top heavy school system that delivers little in the way of educational excellence.]

Obviously, there's a huge difference between what Fred says and what Fred does. Fred doesn't do most of the "best practices" that he's laid out for Mass Insight. Everett Educator and sad student, among other commenters on this blog, have given us tremendous insight into what is really happening in our schools. But what Fred does have is an incredible public relations machine, building him up to be the posterboy of urban public education; he's even used special education money to pay for it, according to the state audit. But as the school falls down around him...our school committee refuses to act, despite a state audit revealing mismanagement and incompetence at almost every level. According to the audit, Fred's staff can't even take staff attendance right.

Memo to City Government - hold Superintendent Foresteire as accountable as he tells his peers. Get "all the data" he claims to provide before approving his budget. And if he screams - point out what he told "Building Blocks." If you still you don't get the data - call the Department of Education and ask them to step in before it's too late. The children of this city are counting on you.

St. Patrick's Day

Happy St. Patrick's Day to one and all. This song has enjoyed a comeback, thanks to Boston's own Dropkick Murphy's. It was originally published in 1888, in remembrance of the Famine.

THE FIELDS OF ATHENRY

By a lonely prison wall,
I heard a young girl call:
"Michael, they have taken you away,
For you stole Trevelyn's corn,
So the young might see the morn.
Now a prison ship lies waiting in the bay."

Refrain:
Low lie the fields of Athenry
Where once we watched the small free birds fly
Our love was on the wing
We had dreams and songs to sing
It's so lonely round the fields of Athenry.

By a lonely prison wall,
I heard a young man call
"Nothing matters, Mary, when you're free
Against the famine and the crown,
I rebelled, they cut me down.
Now you must raise our child with dignity."
Refrain:

By a lonely harbor wall,
She watched the last star fall
As the prison ship sailed out against the sky
For she lived to hope and pray
For her love in Botany Bay
It's so lonely round the fields of Athenry.
Refrain:

What Happened to the Best Blue Collar School System? The 2005 MCAS Rankings

This post was inspired by an Everett educator who recently posted several comments about our broken school system. This is the post, in its entirety:

While I honestly do understand that most of the people who rant on this site and others like it do so because they sincerely care about the city and the people in it, I think that sometimes many of us get caught up in partisan political “gotcha” games and lose sight of the larger picture.I know that many, many people are aware that the Everett Public Schools are in shockingly bad shape and getting worse every year. I know that a great many people have some ideas about who to blame for our woes, and I’m not saying that blame or even criminal prosecution would be inappropriate in some cases. However, I also know that most of the people who spend tremendous amounts of time and treasure fighting these battles would get far more accomplished if they turned their attention toward the schools themselves. Several of our schools have descended over the last few years to the level of unmitigated disaster. If you doubt this, please examine the MCAS scores from the last few years. The numbers are humiliating. It is time for all of us to stop the usual partisan business as usual and focus on improving the actual day-to-day condition of our schools. We need to demand that the city government put an outright stop to the violence in our schools, the shameful practice of promoting students who cannot do basic grade level work, and the utter waste of our tax money on patronage-style cronies masquerading as educators.If we don’t do something drastic ourselves right now, the state of Massachusetts will be running these schools sooner than we might think, and Everett’s status as a statewide educational laughingstock will be cemented for years to come.

Everett Educator 02.24.06 - 4:04 pm #

We were shocked by the allegations, and decided to take a look at those MCAS scores, as suggested by Everett Educator. It was, after all, school committee member, Lester MacLaughlin who coined the title, "best blue collar school system" in the Commonwealth. It was a cute turn of phrase for an embattled school department, beset by indictments, overspending and an audit that revealed wide-spread mismanagement. It was Robert Alconada, the current Chairman of the School Committee, who stated that as an educator, Mr. Foresteire is A+, a quote that was reported in the Boston press.

MCAS rankings, though, are where the rubber meets the proverbial road.

2005 MCAS rankings on Boston.com reveal that Everett is listed as a "declining district," having dropped its tenth grade passing rate in English by 7%, from 89% to 82% - and dropping even further in Math by 11%, from 87% to 76%. Click the link for the details:
2005 MCAS Results:

Far from the "best blue collar district," the very communities that we use to handily outperform on MCAS....are now out performing us. Out of a possible 278, our tenth grade high school students are ranked 245 for English, and 243 in Math. We're in the bottom 15% in the Commonwealth, along with such notables as Lynn, Lawrence, Boston and Fall River.

Who's outperforming Everett now? In 10th grade English, it's Somerville, Chicopee, Brockton, Revere and Malden. Chicopee! Chicopee use to be the worst performing school district in the state! In 10th grade Math, it's Lowell, Chicopee, Malden, Revere and Somerville. It's hard to understand why, given these communities are very similar demographically or worse off than Everett. For example, in English, Revere has a higher number of students in the advanced and proficient categories(54%) vs. Everett (47%). Same for Brockton...which is interesting, because they have more than twice the students taking the test, and more students (63.7%) considered low income than Everett (47.2%). Even looking at Limited English Proficient students, Somerville has more LEP students (14.2%) than Everett (10.6%) and more low income students (61.8%) Lowell has its challenges too, with twice as many LEP students (23.1%), and more low income students (65.1%) Granted; some of the differences between Everett and these other communities are small...but we are declining. Slipping 7% and 11% in a single year should be a wakeup call.

What happened to the "best blue collar school district in the Commonwealth?" Communities with more low income students and more Limited English Proficient students are outperforming us. Is this the work of an A+ Superintendent of Schools? Is this the work of well-managed, tightly run, morale boosting school system? Not when we're being outperformed by Revere and Brockton, friends. It was reported in the Indendent last week that the MCAS scores were one of the reasons cited for the creation of a new charter school in the Everett-Revere-Chelsea area.

Thank you, Everett Educator, for educating us about the realities at Everett High. I hope it's not too late to turn the ship around.

As for the school committee? Let's make a bet that they give Freddy another big, fat raise for his "A+" efforts as an educator.

UPDATE: Why Don't We Just Give Them Our House Keys- Part II

From the Washington Post, 1:58 p.m. ET Thursday, March 9, 2006

Dubai Firm Gives Up Stake in U.S. Ports The United Arab Emirates company that was attempting to take over management operations at six U.S. ports announced today that it will divest itself of all American interests.The announcement appears to head off a major confrontation that was brewing between Congress and the Bush administration over the controversial deal.
For more information, visit washingtonpost.com

Worthy of Praise: New Facilities Management Director, Barry Doyle

A good appointment is a good appointment. Mayor Hanlon appointed Barry Doyle to take over for outgoing Facilities Management Director, Dick Dell Isola, and from what we hear, he's been doing an excellent job. He's a multi-talented fellow, with a background in mechanics. He's been able to fix some things around city hall and the school department that would have ordinarily had to require outside help and significant costs. We also hear that he's got quite a work ethic, going into city hall hours before anyone else and staying as late as it takes to get the job done.

Clearly, we're getting bang for our buck with this appointment. Good luck, Barry, and congratulations to the mayor for this fine appointment.