The Observation Deck

The following article was printed in the January 25th issue of the Lakewood Observer.

Will our the Lakewood Board of Education change? Are the Lakewood Schools ready for new leadership?

What are your thoughts?

Will We Be Awake In Time For Our Children?

Last Tuesday’s Lakewood Board of Education meeting marked the beginning of some changes to the way the Board will be conducting business—at least on the surface. There were changes to the way they sat, a change intended to facilitate discussion among members, and a return to how members will be reporting Board business. Mr. Matt Markling, newly elected President, opened communication with personal comments, an annual tradition that is allotted to the incoming Board president. Mr. Markling decided to build upon the spirit of the recent Martin Luther King holiday and read a portion of a lecture given by Dr. King entitled, The Quest for Peace and Justice, (Mr. Markling’s comments were posted on the Lakewood Observation Deck and are in this issue of the Observer).

I understood Mr. Markling’s sentiments, and believe that overall, he has done his best to keep our Board of Education transparent and accountable to the community. In other words, I think Mr. Markling is “awake”. However, I wonder if the rest of the Board shares Mr. Markling’s enthusiasm to be interested in what the community, especially families with children in the Lakewood Schools, wants or values in education. Mr. Markling answered questions about awake-fullness with an emphatic ‘yes’. “Yes, we are awake. And we will remain wakeful only through transparent and accountable leadership.”

It seems to me we ought to be asking the rest of the Board of Education, “Really? Will you wake up”?
More importantly, maybe we ought to be asking ourselves if we will wake up. This fall there will be three seats up for re-election on the Board of Education. Lakewood voters will have the opportunity to decide if our Board is awake and consider if our current Board members are really connected and understand the typical experience of the average family living in Lakewood. Families, the economy, education, and how we live in Lakewood have changed significantly since most of our members began to serve on the Board. Ohio schools are facing financial challenges and uncertainty like no other time in recent history.

We have a choice to be bold and to vote for candidates who can prove that they understand the challenges that Lakewood’s young families are facing, and that they value what Lakewood parents have to say. We need representatives on our School Board who don’t put out fires today, but who look toward the future with long-term planning that is visionary and takes into account the kind of education our kids will require, far into the 21st century.

We all should be awake and asking ourselves if we are willing to support a Board that puts self-interest and special interests before the interests of average families and the educational needs of our children. In the last Board of Education election all of the incumbents ran unopposed. Are we really going to tolerate that again?

I believe that many in our community will view Mr. Markling’s comments as a positive signal that he wants to lead the Board in the right direction, and I for one, commend him and wish him luck on his new journey.

The question remains, will the rest of the Board members follow? Will the Lakewood Board of Education’s business really be conducted in the light of day? Will families and parents be consulted on important decisions? Will there be an effort made to find out what families most value, before decisions are made FOR them, with their own tax dollars? Will the Board commit to improving education for all of our students including students with special needs? Will there be oversight in regard to financial and school-closing decisions?

Who knows, maybe by fall we will have some clarity before we go to the polls. For now, you know the saying, “You can lead a Board to transparency by having them face each other during the meeting, but can you make them transparent?”

Mr. Markling needs and deserves all of our support as he takes over the presidency of the Board. Our children need and deserve us to be AWAKE way before the elections roll around in the fall.

Kristine,

Great article. I think it went well the printed text of Matt Markling's speech, who has proven that he is awake. I'm with you in wondering whether the rest of the Board can prove that they are awake in any way.

I've been very worried about what the School Board does with our money ever since the preliminary Phase Three decision was made and the four Board members who supported closing Grant Elementary School couldn't come up with any legitimate criteria that addressed how this decision made educational sense for Lakewood's children.

When later we found out that the their decision will cost the state of Ohio and Lakewood tax payers 12 million dollars more, and that even that amount of money didn't make them examine their decision-- "Yes, we want Lakewood citizens to go ahead and pay 12 million dollars more for a school in the wrong place, and we have NOT ONE REASON WHY" I started to feel very unsafe.

When Superintendent Madak tells us how tight things are budget-wise I believe him. When he says we are all worried about how much money the state of Ohio will cut from the District's budget, I worry with him.

But I worry more because the majority of our school board, with their inexplicable Phase Three decision have PROVEN THAT THEY ARE IRRESPONSIBLE WITH OUR MONEY AND OUR CHILDREN. Their decision will cause more children to walk further in less safe environments. Their decision will make it less possible for children to have access to programming. All of this in the face of Lakewood citizens who asked that the District preserve neighborhood schools-- ie, schools in the same neighborhoods that families live in-- ie, what Lakewood has always had-- and make sure that each school had equal access to all programming.

At this point, if they can just throw around 12 million dollars like that, how can we trust them when they say they don't have enough money to hire even one more teacher? Or when they say they can't open modulars when a school is overcrowded? Or, the worst thing that has happened to our District in my opinion, that they have to cancel Gifted and Talented for Second Grade? Lakewood's GT program has always been one of the things that attracted new residents and new students to this city. Some of that 12 million could probably fix a lot of these things.

So from where we sit as parents, what do we do? How do we get the Board to care about what families value? How do we get them to take our needs seriously?

Matt Markling's announcement in another thread today, that Board meetings will move around, is a start. Maybe more parents and citizens will attend if the meetings are located at the school in the center of their own neighborhood, which would be great. But how do we get the Board to be accountable, when, in their own words, their bylaws don't say that they ever "have to explain themselves"?

I know we can vote them out, but it would be great to evolve a respectful system, on both sides, to work with them, the ones that are there now, and the new ones coming in the Fall, a system that stayed in place to serve the educational needs kids of the city, no matter who was on the Board.

So Kristine, and anyone else, I pass it back to you. What do we do?


Scott-- Thanks for the cool picture and quote. I confess I understood that one more quickly than I did listening to Frank Sinatra. (maybe I just don't want to think about it.)


Betsy Voinovich

So from where we sit as parents, what do we do? How do we get the Board to care about what families value? How do we get them to take our needs seriously?

We know that the way the BOE is configured now that there isn't a commitment to reach out to the neighborhoods and families to find out what they value or want in education.

Of course, the State determines much of what it taught; however, Lakewood voters passed a levy last spring without knowing what programs may be on the chopping block. Mr. Markling’s idea to rotate the Board of Education meetings is a great idea that I would like to explore and take further. One way to do that would be to meet regularly with parents within their neighborhoods on an informal basis and to invite parents to participate in feedback sessions.


I am not talking about huge committees that work only every few years designed with surveys or that are facilitated by expensive consultants. I am talking about communicating with parents and community often to build trust.


Right now I think most of the BOE members are very disconnected from the families they were elected to serve. It is not a good place from which to make decisions.

I think most people want to support our Board of Education and want them to succeed. After all, when they succeed, we all do. Yet, right now most don’t because they don’t feel invested in the process. I know some really smart and competent people who could have served on the Phase 3 committee that you referred to in your post. They didn’t even try because they didn’t believe that the current Board really wanted an honest process in which their opinions really mattered.


Again, you can’t force people to behave the way you want. If you want a Board of Education that is committed to making decisions for the right reasons then you have to ask questions and find who they are during election process. What else have they done in the community that proves a commitment to transparency, families, and doing the right thing despite who may be pressuring them to make decisions that only serve a few.


I think people have to figure out what they want in their leaders and hold them accountable. How do we do that? By holding open committee meetings and getting help from the community to create oversight committees--especially needed is financial oversight.


The question becomes what do you want in an educational leader? What changes do you want to see in the BOE? Or, are most people okay with the way it is now? I am asking these questions to anyone who is reading this...