Signing Off...

This blog was originally created to support the no on the recall campaign.

It served its purpose. We got some truth out there in the midst of the poisonous pool of information that permeated this community for too long.

I do want to apologize for casting any aspersions on Mr. Bray, my question was more about the idea that the district had issues with content on computers. It is not my issue, nor my concern. Mr. Bray is a competent and solid technology expert who has provided much support to the teachers and students of this district.

However, my time is done now.

I do not want to degrade down to the level of the lebanon truth blog that seeks out issues just to hurt people.

Not to sound to X-filesish... but the truth is still out there, someone else needs to pick up the baton and keep looking... hopefully they will be powerful enough to bring those who have done such great damage to light in such a manner that vindication will be had for the victims of the Robinson regime.

A personal message to LT... you certainly can keep on with your venomous attacks and continue to move for the disintegration of a healthy community... or you can decide to let the community work towards resolution and closure on a very painful time in our history and sign off as well.

I acknowledge my part in the hard times we have had. I accept that I allowed myself to justify continued blogging because I thought "someone has to counteract that other blog" because I truly believe in everything I have said here. But to continue now, would be total selfish desire to hurt people who have hurt people I care about and I end up no better than LT.

I will trust in the new strength found in the board leadership and I wish Lebanon the best and hope for a positive future.

Responding to more comments...

My goodness. I spend a couple of days out of state and things sure do pile up. I apologize for the delay in responding to some of the comments out there...

1. I appreciate Mr. Bray's response. I have always found him to be a reliable source. So, the rumor, that I posted as a rumor has been dispelled. I do appreciate truth.

2. It is never libelous to state that you have had heard a rumor.... semantics are important.

3. I have reported rumors in the past.

4. I find it interesting how adamantly defensive the commentors have become about this blog. I have found significantly more evidence to the inappropriate things happening in this district over the past decade, than proof of positive things coming out of what we were doing in the past.

If you ascribe to the belief that we were on the "cutting edge of school reform" in my opinion you were blinded by a charasmatic leader who got you to drink some metaphorical kool-aid that caused you to be incapable of ever seeing anything but the truth he led you to believe which makes you an unreliable witness.

If you were deeply damaged and publicly maligned by powerful employees of this district there seemed to be a revenge aspect or a simple, "you are not one of us, therefore we must discredit you" sort of "put people in their place" mentality of those in power.

The chicken's head has been cut off, but the body is still writhing and causing damage as it tramples through the barnyard....

Welcome new super...

Don't forget to come to the board meeting at 6:00pm to meet the new super.
It is important for the community give their input and support.

Rumors...

A few new rumors...

1. Rumor has it that the new super will be in charge immediately after confirmation...who will that most effect?

2. Rumor has it that the director of technology erased a lot of files relative to the high school from a middle school teacher's computer.... what was that about?

3. Rumor has it that there is a million dollar grant for agriculture programs at seven oak, but there is some friction with the high school agriculture teacher... what is going on?

What do we know about the new Interim?

Oh to be fly on the wall as the Board deliberated. I truly wonder what was it about this man that got their attention? His bargaining ability? His experience with budgets? His experience with personnel?

If anyone knows anything about him...Please feel free to let the rest of us in on it!

More about the schedule...

One of my commentors made a comment that leads me to believe that I have not addressed their issue. I am sorry you felt that way.

I have tried to make sure I don't make the same mistakes that the other blogger has in printing things that there is little or no proof of without labeling it clearly as rumor... so I verify and ask questions.


Here is what I found out yesterday:


1. Kim Fandino asked to discuss with administration before the board meeting to be able to mitigate the problem because she did not want the schedule to be a board action and wanted to present a united response to the board. As of yesterday, no building principals have ever discussed the issue with her. She also did apologize at the board meeting for any contention that had come from this.


2. She has asked people to look at the schedule, or has asked people to just be willing to look at it in departments and view it with objective eyes... your comment today leads me to believe there might be a misunderstanding around this.



3. She stated clearly at the board meeting that it was supposed to go to the teachers in departments as a draft and that the teacher assignments were designed to lessen the number of types of courses each teacher had in any given day. She also said that the departments should look at who should teach what, she actually said that who teaches what wasn't the important thing other than that teachers should teach what they love.

4. Rumor: I heard that she would like the opportunity to address the staff and answer all questions and concerns about what happened. (Opinion: they probably won't let her because they might come off not so well once the faculty hear the whole story.)

5. She may have made a mistake in giving a parent group a copy of the schedule, but how could she know it was a mistake up front? Who would ever believe that the a high school schedule would be such a big deal. The only reason this was a problem was because the administration appear to have no intentions of fixing the problem or they simply could have nipped everything in the bud by saying, "we are taking this to the faculty for input and if it has merit, we will try to do it." No harm, no foul. But, apparently, they were so mad at Fandino (without ever talking to her) that they decided to make her an example.

Before I make my next statement, I do not want to be a hypocrite, I have indeed called people out on this blog. However, there have been facts attached, or I have clarified them as rumors with sufficient circumstantial evidence. I have never made up a fact to try to sway my readers to my perspective and get people to hate others like the other blogger has done.

People need to stop hating each other. "Let him who has not sinned cast the first stone..."

Sorry, but I refuse to jump on the anti-fandino wagon. I have seen how she cares about teachers and kids and I know that anyone who has actually worked with her on something that is good for kids has found her to be a passionate advocate whose bottom line is kids. Sometimes I may disagree with some points, but never her motives. Anyone who is willing to face all of her detractors and answer all questions is a braver person than most and the cowards who would attack her with lies deserve no credibility.


There are plenty of people out there for themselves, and I think they are the ones attacking people like Ms. Fandino.

If the interim superintendent reads this blog...

It was recently discovered that some of the LHS counselors told students that they could get credit for taking the same required class twice and it would count as taking "both" of the half credits required in that area.... a specific example.... taking Health 1 twice and pretending that it counts as Health 1 and Health 2. (Since a prominent citizen's son is one of the vicitims who just found out that the Health class he has been taking all trimester long will not count (as he was told by his counselor apparently) he now has basically forfeited the opportunity that he could have had during this trimester to take something he needed or wanted, he now, as a senior must give up something he had planned.

I blame the grown ups for that one... but he will be the one that pays.

I have heard rumors (and I repeat, these are second hand rumors, not first hand, albeit from reliable sources) that credit has been given to kids who needed things to graduate by secretaries and counselors who did not want the kids to be banned from graduating. The hitch is that no class was apparently taken...and in other cases apparently grades were changed on transcripts without the teacher's knowledge.

It seems to me that we need several audits:

1. An audit of courses and transcripts for the issues listed above.

2. A special ed audit.

3. A forensic audit of all the books... (unless the audit we just did meets that level of investigation).

4. A testing audit.

And we need some surveys:

1. A survey about administration (from the teacher and staff perspective).

2. A survey about teaching and effectiveness (from the kids perspective).

3. A survey about the morale and climate of each building.

4. A survey of the community needs relative to the district.

Welcome Mr. Interim, we really need you, we just hope we got it right!

The rest of the story...

After writing my last posting, I read the articles in the paper and then I was contacted by someone who made a comment that interested me and peaked my interest so I contacted someone who was present at the Board meeting and a couple of teachers at the high school.... It would seem that the pattern of harassment toward Ms. Fandino did not stop with Mr. Robinson's departure...

Here are some facts:

1. The administration was going to be changing the schedule anyway.

2. She approached administration and asked permission to work on the schedule, she was given the blessing and data by the administration.

3. She took used a math formula to calculate how many classes are needed based on how many kids there are that wanted or needed each class.

3. She stated at the board meeting that the intent was for departments to decide who taught what and in fact actually was quoted by one listener as saying, "I could care less who teaches each class, but we all know that if someone loves what they are teaching they do a better job than if they are teaching a class they don't like."

She mentioned that the intent of the draft was to create a place for each class and then you can swap the classes in any given period between teachers. Which, by the way, is how it was done for years and generated very positive relations with the teachers.

4. She did check with people in most of the core subjects to see what preferences there were and tried to reflect that.

5. Now here is the crux of the issue. She gave administration the schedule proposal BEFORE anyone else saw it. Apparently she had asked administration to stop by to talk about it, but when they never showed, she emailed it.

She was contacted by the math mom later that evening who requested that Ms. Fandino help her understand the scheduling issue because that group had been talking about it already, and wanted to have a clear perspective on what can and cannot be done. According to the math mom, Ms. Fandino was clear that she had given the schedule to the administration and that it was simply a draft that she had created and wanted to get in the hands of teachers.

Also, it should be noted that the math mom showed it to others, what happened from there was not Ms. Fandino's doing.

6. BUT here is what was really upsetting to the administration... she actually talked to students, teachers and parents as she worked on the schedule. She stated at the board meeting that these were drafts and that in fact she had adjusted the first draft after hearing from the parents in the math group.

She purposefully tried to get input from those who had been left out of the schedule creation to get what she referred to as a "fresh perspective."

That makes sense. According to Mr. Kelley, the current schedule was created by 8 people who took several weeks to make something that is full of flaws and problems. According to Ms. Fandino she started the process last Wednesday and worked about 6 hours.

Also, she stated that not one of the administrators came to her to discuss the proposal ever.

It would seem that the administration got showed up by Ms. Fandino and rather than work with her, they decided to use their favorite play from the Jim Robinson playbook, discredit those who have upset you and make them look bad.

- - - -

In short... Ms. Fandino tried to work with those who had been disenfranchised in order to do what is best for kids, administration didn't like it, they went after Ms. Fandino, history repeats itself.

What's up with the LHS schedule?

So apparently Kim Fandino, former union leader, made a schedule for the high school. It was brought to the board and there will be a board work session discussion about it on the 17th.

I have discussed the scheduling issues before, but the interactions at the board meeting seem to beg further questions...

1. According to Ms. Fandino, the administration knew that there was a problem and they were going to work on it. If they knew there were issues because staff brought them up last year, why did they wait until there were only a few weeks left to address the issue?

2. Who made the current schedule? If it is as bad as I hear, they probably should not be the ones working on things like this. According to a former registrar, the administration set the schedule before there was a decent percent of matches for the students. According to at least three unhappy teachers at the high school Mr. Finch made it very clear that there would not be any changes when the schedule first came out, and held to that for most of the teachers until there were apparently legal issues with who had what license.

3. Why did the administration let Ms. Fandino work on the schedule and then leave her hanging out to dry in front of the public? She stated that they had not contacted her at all about the schedule. Maybe they could have worked together? Or are they so unprofessional that they would snub her just because her schedule was better received?

4. Ms. Fandino also stated that she viewed the schedule as a draft for the departments to discuss. I hope that happens. It seems like the people who are doing the work are often left out of the conversation.

Bottom line.... do we need a new schedule? If so, why not work together openly to make it happen? Isn't about the kids needs anyway? Why are the grown ups making it so hard?

Okay, so you want to debate...

The last few commentors assume that I have not spoken with people from the opposite view point.... Actually, I have discussed these issues with several teachers who disagree with one or the other of the points I have made, but not one of those people has disagreed with everything...the debate rages around the "water cooler" on most of these issues, but there are more things that make sense from my perspective that seem to resonate with more people.

What is frustrating is having community members who have not spoken with any teachers besides the one that has been theorized to be the other blogger and others who only think like her and they honestly believe that they are getting an objective view.

I have actually had conversations with that particular teacher and her like-minded friends. None of them were employed when much of what was done well was going on here. They do not know what 15 years ago looked like. I walked the halls of LHS when things were different in a good way.

Just a note about the graduation requirements that we are not offering.... the loss of the advanced programs makes it difficult for people to graduate with honors, and it is a shame that people would be okay about decreasing the opportunities of our advanced students and not just have them graduate with the lowest common denominator education that they have been forced to embrace by the current administration.

About the seniors and "leaving them alone." I am not advocating any changes other than a schedule fix that would allow them to get all the classes they need to graduate because according to several advisors at LHS there were very limited offerings of some important classes, like Algebra 2 etc. students were not able to find classes they needed or wanted to complete the second half of a course because they are scheduled against each other. How does rearranging the schedule with the SAME classes offered, just more available, hurt the seniors? Leaving the schedule alone will cause them more trouble.

More answers to comments...

1. Do I check my facts with people in the trenches? Absolutely! I only post what I know to be fact, or I state that it is rumor. I usually hear from two or more sources before I do my own investigation, calling people involved and asking questions. Then, and only then, do I post.

2. The comment "leave the seniors alone" was made. They are the ones who are clamoring for a schedule that will meet their needs.

Answering reader comments...

1. The Special Ed issues. It is a fact that some students IEPs are changed by the district after having been approved. IEPs are not always followed, teachers are not given information about IEPs in some cases, and the law that requires that they not be displaced more than 2 years from their peers are violated.

2. The testing issue... this is a question that has never been answered by the district...

Do we test by age (if we are an ungraded system) or by grade (if we "have grades") according to several teachers we do not have grades (which means we should test by age), and yet, we test by grade (which means some students will never be tested and makes it look like our test score percentages are not accurate.)

3. The Green Acres Principal's actions are related to calling out staff members publicly when they don't sign up for voluntary activities, talking about them with other staff and parents, and in general creating an atmosphere of intimidation. He is actually remarkably similar to Jim Robinson...the philosophy is interesting, but the implementation alienates everyone you need to succeed and dooms things to failure.

4. Missing classes at LHS.... If you want, you can look at some of my earlier posts for more, but here is a short list....

On the advanced end....AP Chemistry, Advanced LA 9, Advanced LA 10, Advanced Global Studies, Advanced Freshman Science, Advanced Government, Advanced Economics, Advanced Personal Finance...

On other fronts, Freshman Core, the reluctant learner program, the credit recovery program, an entire alternative high school program.

All of the family and child classes are gone.

We now have 1 art teacher for the entire school.

The auto shop is gone, the welding program is half time and the architecture and other vocational programs are decimated.


Please keep asking your questions. I will continue to seek out answers.

For those of you with short memories...

I know we are all fixing our eyes on this Tuesday and the bigger, nation-wide, situation, but we need to remember that we are looking for an interim superintendent this week and the reason is because the community (as proven by the other recent vote) wants us to stop the educational nonsense that has been pushed on our kids for years and bring some semblance of normalcy... unfortunately, even though this has been fast, there is still a need to get some things fixed faster than may be possible...

The principal of Green Acres has been using heavy handed tactics with his staff and wonders why the morale in the building is so low.

The LHS schedule needs to be fixed by second trimester so that kids at the high school might actually be able to take classes they need to be on track for graduation.

The financial situation needs to be resolved.

The Special Ed. situation needs to be resolved.

The testing issues need to be resolved.

Whoever is selected will have a lot to do right away if we are to help the kids we have right now and not make them wait while we get our collective acts together.