A Legislative Debate On Education

What a sham. Why wasn’t it just called a large debate, rather than an education forum. No matter which of these flunkies win these upcoming elections, education will be like mass transit….. MIA in their daily pol existence. There will never be education reform until we take our rightful place as the third world country we have become. As long as education remains politicized and held captive to unions we will continue to fall behind. Until we have accountability in all aspects of the educational system, we will continue to have an achievement gap (and that includes holding parents accountable for the actions of their children).Until we have a manufacturing base in this country, where students who are not suited to college can go to trade schools and learn useful life skills, we will continue to be on this downward slide of educational stagnation which we cannot politicize our way out of. Until the voters of Norwalk stop electing idiots like Bruce Morris, I fear that we are lost. It’s time for this rant to end, but thank you for the opportunity to speak my mind.

Positive, polite, public, persistent, pressure.
Perfect.
Keep up the excellent work.
We can and will right our ship and set a true course.

Have that double shot of caffine this morning yet?

Sit down here is another.

It was warm and a bit muggy outside, a fortnight before witching hour but inside the air was thick and it felt mighty cold in the bones.

The windows were frosting over, amazingly so, with all the hot air blowing around, obscuring the busy travelers hurrying outside somewhere, anywhere but here. It felt like watching a very low dough, no dough, bankrupted studio, retread of back to the future. I could see zombies peering in the windows and I began to wonder, is that a reflection from the frost on the window pane. Maybe the zoombies were inside. Grrr, shake that off.
Everytime I am in one of these caucus’es the orginal walking dead flick keeps replaying in my head. Its scary. Looking around these meetings its real scary. No wonder…

Don’t know how to bake any pie, prefer cupcakes but do know the kids are not getting a fair slice. It was disheartening to hear all the republicans still chanting about cutting services, including education, in a forum (about) education.

Only two candidates, (both dems) appeared to have a clue, did their home work and appeared to understand the challenges. It was encouraging to see Anna Duleep out there swinging so passionately for education. It was such a refreshing delight to witness Anna summon that courage to call out her opponent Larry Cafero on the carpet regarding his long standing, for profit, contract with the BOE as the districts expulsion hearing officer.Witnessing Anna blossom into a dedicated passionate community advocate? Priceless. Proud of you Anna as without doubt your family is also. Cafero has repeatedly voted against and to delay CT’s new school suspension law. Conflict? Hmmm. How many kids has this guy tossed into the abyss? How much money has Cafero collected bouncing kids to prison? Cafero’s father is the dreaded, eviction sheriff kicking families from their homes onto the streets for the cruel, greedy and oftentimes corrupt bankers. Must be in the blood. Runs, cold, only. Nice work Anna, keep swinging.

Cafero was all about the knife. Head surgeon and self appointed chief chopper. Can’t let this guy anywhere near a chainsaw. Sorry kids your art, music teachers and sports teams, buzzzz, whack!! Hey the money has to come from somewhere, anywhere but Cafero’s pocket.

What’s in your lunchbox kid? A sandwich AND an apple. You don’t, NEED that apple, I’ll take that. And give me that trombone, get your parents to buy you a walkman if you want music. No ball playing allowed. You’ll break a window. Now, move along. You kids don’t know nothing and you will never know nutin. I’ll see to that. I know whats good for you and your parents.

Really, YOU do, Larry? You know whats best for the students? Really? And you can you say that with a straight face and look the kids in the eye?
Take a stroll in the projects Larry, the kids would love to see you, real time, up close and personal. No guts, no glory, pal.

Peggy Reeves held her own, barely, but Peggy is a striking contrast to her opponent and wannabe somebody, Gail Laville, who simply has no idea where the light switch is, at all. Maybe Gail could start her own oyster clothing line, or bar. Gail would be great at Costco passing out toothpicks of cheese whiz on crackers. Or maybe we could put her on a segway and she could be the ticket girl. Got the attitude for it. Give her some perspective she lacks of the comprehension of logistics and physic’s of the actual marketing and operating of a business bottom up, in grass roots sort of way.. Being a Secretary for a bean counter on bottom of the food chain, is somehow projected as Gail being seleceted as businees woman of the year on the cover of women’s financial times You know Gail at some point you have to actually get in there and bake a cake if you want to run a bakery. Think? This is another one of them years, where do these people come from and do they drink the same tap water I drink?

JoAnne Romano, also a long time wanna be, current and former sitting town council member, with her new Sarah Palin doo, is challenging incumbent Chris Perone. Romano stumbled and stammered her way through the clock. Romano appears to be permanently relinquished back stage, to the not ready for prime time player, wheel of fortune, lucky lotto, stand by for Scabilia, in case of emergency, blue room. Maybe Joanne can get Scablia to give her on upgrade to the purple room where Palin is waiting in.

Duff spent the entire time ducking and repeating the word collaboration, (think he even spelled it out at one point), must be code for something. I think I know but I aint spilling the beans. At the first opportunity, in a roomful of cold republicans, Duff ducked out. Duff didn’t wear his long johns and spent all his time trying to explain he doesn’t have anything to do with education just bankers and real estate. Are we missing something here? What a platform to run on. Bob please tell us why we passed legislation on banks and now the banks tripled, quadrupled their fee structures around legislation. Nice work there tonto, turned an arrow into a boomerang. No mention of the food channel debacle he wasted all that energy on. One move that wasn’t well thought out, surprisingly for Bob. Smart enough not to go near Murdoch. Bob is a great traffic reporter though, has all them smoke signals down pat. If by some bizarre chance Bob loses we can always put him up in the chopper and do traffic reports like good ole Morgan Kaolin did for us for decades. Wait we have traffic cameras now to our cell devices and gps connected traffic monitoring. Well can definitely picture Bob doing the weather cant you?. Right now, he needs just a bit more seasoning right where he is. the weather gig is gonna have to wait. Duff does deserves a family mini van full off kudos for strongly supporting the education bills that were able to get out of committee and through to a vote. With such a strong record on education, should hw not be promoting and touting that and not the mess the banks and homeowners are in. Bob gets a C- for his official committee assignments, been using the lay low in the back corner strategy, trying his earnest not to be a lightening rod, carefully choosing every word, every action as well as inaction but he has consistently stood tall on education issues, very actively involved, even leading and guiding, even though, like he says, its not his job. Seems Bob would be a better fit on the education and/or transportation committees. Bob gets a A+ on those issues, does he not? Maybe that’s something we can collaborate on get him where he can do the most good rather than receive the most prestige. He has been a strong supporter for education. Education seems like a better platform with his solid record, on proactive reforms, to run a platform on rather than the housing and financial atrocities unresolved and ongoing on his watch but he appears gun shy to get too close to the front lines. Sound instinct for self preservation but doesn’t get the job done.

Artimus Kasimmis, the ultimate chameleon. This guy just doesn’t give up. Reminds us of hometown cowboy comedian Scott Merrill. Artimus is the guy crooning karaoke, way off key, at the fat old boys bar, not realising everyone already went home. AK just keeps on running and running, for anything and everything. Maybe he will get lucky someday,Than again perhaps not. No doubt a heavy lotto player, also. Maybe there is an opening coming up at the dump scales we can give him. He might like playing with the tractors. Keep him out of our hair for a while.

Absent were any school administrators, (silly local forums are not in the contract), although Dr. Marks, the districts new Superintendent, did humbly and graciously make an appearance. Guess everyone else on the third floor lives out of town. Did expect, for some odd reason, more teachers to attend but alas that is what they pay, union strong arm, Bruce Mellon, the diligent sentinel, for. Right? Can’t miss the new episode of mad men on the tube.

Alex Johnson, the New Haven (first ever, CT crisis appointed) BOE member and founder of the education reform antipoverty advocacy nonprofits, Conncan.org and RIcan.org as well as 50can.org, made time out of his busy schedule to attend. Thank you Alex. We all appreciate your support and all your “above and beyond the call of duty” efforts.

Alex is a, fast rising, rock star for education in Connecticut as well as the nation and is making a tremendous difference in uncountable children’s lives. We need to clone education rock stars like Alex Johnson. Jeffery Canada and Michelle Rhee. There are more superstars out there, working hard, quietly, out of the spotlight, not surrendering, up against the most intimidating odds.. But they don’t relent.They deliver like the mailman, through snow, sleet, and hot air. Willing and able to leap the tallest obstacles break through the thickest vault walls not for self gain but for the students and ultimately the collective gain of society.

All those, working hard for the students, our communities and our nation are true patriots. True American hero’s one and all.
Long road still ahead but with the true education hero’s, like Alex, like Jefferey, like Michelle, stepping up to the plate, we must and we will turn it around.

A big tip of the ole motar board to all involved at redapples.org and to all remaining at the LWV for putting the forum together and for attempting to give us some idea who is on the same page and who is completely lost and is in desperate need of tutoring.

addendum;

Stacey Lore received a 3 year prison sentence, Corda and Friendlander received pensions. Go figure?

Round and round we go….

Artie Kassimis made some very good points that were unanswered by Sen. Duff.
First, Kassimis gave a detailed analysis of the Education Cost Sharing formula and how each element disadvantaged Norwalk. Sen. Duff did not share many details about how he would change the formula, nor did he explain why he has allowed the inequity to exist for years.
Second, Sen. Duff took repeated credit for bringing more money to Norwalk for our schools. However, the ECS formula has an automatic increase built into it–SO ALL DISTRICTS SHOULD GET MORE MONEY EVERY YEAR. If Sen. Duff wants to take credit for that part of the ECS formula, then he must also take responsibility for those parts of the formula that advantage Meriden but disadvantage Norwalk.
If you examine the total ECS aid Norwalk received from 2002 to 2008, our percentage (of the total ECS grants awarded) decreased!
Let’s be abundantly clear– two years ago, Sen. Duff didn’t address the inequity of ECS– in fact, quite the opposite, he took credit for the money Norwalk was receiving. This year, because Artie Kassimis is a dad of school children who knows how unfairly Norwalk’s schools are funded by the state (especially compared to Meriden and other smaller towns), the issue is finally being brought to the forefront.
Like everyone else in Norwalk, I understand Bob Duff’s earnestness and his sincere belief that all the new state mandates for our schools were necessary. But, could he not have at least acknowledged that the bills he supported will have a very real and significant cost on Norwalk? Could he not have spelled out that Norwalk may have to make tough choices, because added state aid will be negligble? The fact that he didn’t, and the fact that that he doesn’t seem to equate the state’s looming budget deficits and unfunded pension liabilities with the past 2 state budgets he voted for, tells me that it’s time for a change.