Friends – How many of you know much about what goes on at the Hillsborough school board?

My guess is very few.

Don’t be fooled into thinking that isn’t by design!

The time of day the meetings take place and the fact that they are almost never close to home for the majority of people in the district is designed to allow district leadership to transact nearly $3 billion(!) worth of business every year with almost no input from the parents whose families are affected by the decisions the board makes.

The supposed reason for the time and place is to accommodate the staff who come to the meetings.

Parents are the ones who should be accommodated!

So here’s another flawed financial vote that you wouldn’t know about if you didn’t receive these emails. You might want to forward the information to your lists just to make sure your friends know. If you do forward it you’ll want to take out the “unsubscribe” information at the bottom of this message or your friends may accidentally unsubscribe you.

You’ve probably heard about the Gates Grant – now being called Empowering Effective Teachers or “EET”. If you followed the discussions when it was being considered, you’ll remember that we were told that there were no “matching funds” involved. There was discussion of outside money, money being re-allocated, and of private dollars possibly coming to the table.

What you didn’t hear about is the fact that the district is on the hook for $250 million over the 12 years for which the board entered into a contract with the Gates Foundation.

In the same May 8 meeting we looked at last time, Dr. White made a motion asking the Superintendant to bring a report covering the financial situation with respect to sustaining EET. Again, an excellent way to be prudent with the district’s finances.

Mrs. Kurdell voted “No” to this motion!

I couldn’t help but wonder this time if it was her own involvement in pushing for EET, combined with the bad press it’s been getting and the poor reviews from those affected by it, along with her loyalty to the Superintendant that led her to vote against this common sense effort to make sure there’s accountability for such a huge experimental program.

You can see the transaction take place by clicking here. In the “QuickTime meeting archives” select the meeting for May 8, 2012 and once the video begins advance the time slider to 2:45:00. The entire discussion and vote are completed at 2:47:48.

Together we can make a difference!

God bless you!
Terry