Anyone remember what the DPS School Board is there for?

15 thoughts on “Anyone remember what the DPS School Board is there for?”

1. She’s done. This was the last straw, in my view.

   She should resign, and if she doesn’t, she should be recalled.  

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   1. What does it take?

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2. I’m pretty sure there’s no recall process, but certain;y some public shaming is in order.  Maybe just multiple attendees wearing white t-shirts bearing the words “BUYING MERIDA COSTS JUST $5K!” or something like that? Low cost, high impact, and they couldn’t kick you out without losing a First Amendment lawsuit.

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3. do we pay these people?  Can we not pay these people and instead pay teachers what they should be making?

   If people like Andrea Merida and Theresa Pena want to talk about issues at DPS, wonderful.  Our schools need it.  If they want to use it as a fighting ground for Romanoff and Bennet, they should be ashamed.

   If they both want to say there is no connection between their work on the school board and their work on the campaigns, they should leave the campaigns (or the school board)

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4. Anytime you see a political hatchet job like this, you know a paid political hack is behind it.

   Zeller is a taxpayer subsidized hack working for A+ Denver, a sham group designed to create false consensus to support DPS administrative miscues.

   Less parse this puppy a piece at a time. Zeller’s “ethical concerns” canard has no specifics- and lacks the important disclosure that Theresa Pena, also a DPS board member, is the campaign treasurer and a surrogate for Michael Bennet’s Senate campaign. Surely, if Zeller has no concerns about Pena, the same should go for Merida.

   Zeller, and many of her ilk, don’t grasp the importance of neighborhood public schools. And since she is not a parent, and not directly involved in public schools, I guess that is understandable.

   And Ms. Zeller, i invite you to actually visit some of these North Denver schools with me, so you can actually get an idea of what you are addressing.  As for the community planning process Zeller criticizes, it what the product of Bennet supporter Mary Seawell and Romanoff supporter Arturo Jimenez, and passed the board unamimously. As a parent in North Denver, like most of my compadres, I loudly applaud the action. Funnily enough, Zeller doesn’t mind the similar process taking place in NE Denver, where her organization has a stake.

   Lastly, Zeller, what exactly are the issues Merida has introduced that are of “questionable significance?” Are they questionable to a paid political hatchetwoman, or are the questionable to Merida’s constituents and the taxpayers of Denver? The answer, of course, is the former.

   Zeller, until you have real skin in the game of DPS education, keep your baseless, even mindless, political attacks confined to the proper theater of operations.

   Zeller’s group, paid for by a group of rich charter school zealots, is, as one would expect, subsidized by the taxpayers.  

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   1. ,

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   2. 1. My employer, A+ Denver, is a nonprofit advocacy organization with a point of view. I blog under my own name here occasionally because I happen to share that point of view and want to be personally accountable for it.
      
      2. A public official’s being paid to be an advocate, and a private citizen being paid to be an advocate, represent two different standards.
      
      3. Everyone in Denver has skin in the game in DPS, Guerin, whether we have children in the system or not. Not that it is any of your business, but both my children graduated from DPS.
      
      4. Ms. Pena’s position with a campaign appears in public on every piece of campaign stationary. Ms. Merida’s position with a campaign was disclosed only this past week by an investigative journalist.
      
      5. The implications of the NW Denver vote about which I raised concern was the inability to provide new school options in an area of the city where so many schools are failing Denver’s children, not the community process.
      
      6. The rules of the game for a debate on Coloradopols exclude personal attacks. Maybe you should review them before you post again.

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5. Glad to see that DPS is now another arena for the Romanoff/Bennet cage match.  Keep your eyes on the prize folks!  It’s all about your campaigns; forget the kids.

   This is all so disgusting. F-minuses for everyone involved.

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6. I think Ms. Zeller’s point here was about transparency; she’s willing to post and comment under her own name; Ms. Pena is pretty transparent about her activities.  Ms. Merida was not.

   And perhaps Ms. Merida did not intend for her paid involvement to look suspect, but she would have had at least some respect for saying, “yes, I’m being paid but this is what I believe.”  Now it looks slightly smarmy.

   While I’m at it?  A minor point?  There is NO reason to think that just because a school is traditional, it’s bad; or that because it’s a charter school, it’s bad, either.  

   There are some amazing schools and educators out there, at charter and traditional alike.

   So don’t paint with too broad a brush — that Ms. Zeller must be an idiot because her organization sometimes supports charter schools; or that Theresa Pena is bad because she supported MLK remaining traditional but gave the school more independence.  And before you paint me? I have two active teachers in my family (one on the West side), three retired teachers; I spent several years profiling excellent public and private schools in two different TV series and one staff development series on best practices in education and education reform, and I’ve sat on two CSCs and a bunch of thankless committees.  Like most of the folks commenting here, I do care alot as well.  So chill, please.

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