This past year I've refrained from writing frankly about the charter school on this blog. As president of the board, I didn't think it was professional or prudent to discuss the psycho, rude, pain-in-the-ass parents I've had to deal with. And I still won't because it'll come back to bite me in the ass. Here's why.
Over a year and a half ago I wrote about the fall out from a charter school informational meeting when I publicly dissed my neighborhood school. Yep, the one down my street in my housing development. I wrote the parent a very heartfelt email and never got a response from my apology. I was not surprised since many people don't have the manners or class to accept one.
But I learned my lesson, and tried not to bad mouth my neighborhood school. So when I heard that people were reading A Mama's Rant for information about the school - instead of the school's website, duh now - I had to post this disclaimer and remove the school's name from my blog. It just seemed wise.
I try to be neutral about my neighborhood school. I don't attempt to talk people into pulling their kids out of it. Instead I tell them if they want to learn about the charter school, I'd be happy to answer any questions they may have. I was even working with my Usborne Books supervisor, H., on doing a book fair fundraiser for them. Then she called me a few days ago with news about the account.
Three of the PTO moms (I think I know who they are) had come to the volunteer we were working with, and had her tell H. that they didn't want me for their Usborne rep because I wrote bad things about their school on this blog.
When I heard that I happily turned the account back over to her. I knew this school was going to be difficult to work with from the start. After all, H. has been trying for over a year to get them to do a book fair and finally got the go ahead to something the last week of school that got them (maybe) $200 in sales. The school probably spent more making copies of the flier and cover letter that went out in the kids' folders than they earned in free books.
These ladies had passionate feelings about something I wrote over a year ago (the TRUTH) to throw me off the account, yet they're not passionate enough to put the effort into getting free books for their library and classrooms. Honestly, I don't need to deal with parents who have that kind of attitude.
Instead, I want to work with charter school parents like ours who put in over 11,000 volunteer hours in last school year. For a student body of around 300 kids, that's amazing! I want to work with parents who encourage their children to read and try to make their school a better place. When I see that my charter school's Usborne book fair earned over $2,200 in free books, I know I'm in the right place. I'm with people who give a damn about their school. (By the way, the charter school is H.'s account. As a board member I'm not allowed to make money off my school.)
And for all the petty b.s. these women who live in my neighborhood dealt out to me, I know they really don't give a damn that their school:
- is already at 131% capacity, is adding two more trailers to the five they already have, and will go to a split schedule in two years.
- will be at 181% capacity in 2010. According to the principal, unlike other district schools where parents are extremely upset and very vocal about over crowding, "nobody is whining and complaining about it. I think that’s the interesting part."
Oh, they'll probably point their fingers at me and say how poorly our students did on state tests. Then I point my finger - the middle one - right back at them and say, well, where did you think many of our students were last year? At your school!
Our kids did poorly because they had such terrible starts. Here are a few examples of what the charter school had to deal with:
- Kids who couldn't read.
- First graders who didn't know their alphabet.
- Students who were a year or two behind where they should be, yet their parents were told that their children were doing well. Still, the parents always had a sneaking suspicion that they weren't, which is why they enrolled their children at the charter school. I know of one student who was three years behind in math, yet her parents were always told she was only a "little behind" the other kids. (She's now a year behind and quickly catching up.)
My neighborhood school isn't a good school because the parents don't care. As long as no one speaks the truth - and baby, they can't handle the truth - they're satisfied with the status quo.
