Scandals at Enron, HealthSouth, Tyco, and Worldcom point to the problem of outside directors not knowing enough about the corporations' accounting practices to fulfill their duty as watchdogs of management. What past corporate managment sought was directors of outstanding achievement in fields not directly related to its business whose names would look good on the masthead and who would feel "honored" to serve as figureheads. We have suffered the end result. Perhaps with Sarbanes-Oxley directors will treat their duties as more than honorary.You may already have spotted the similarity to the Charleston County School District and its Board of Trustees. When school districts were small and handled what CCSD would consider "chump change" now, having trustees (i.e., "outside directors") who viewed their positions as honorary or believed that finding problems within the "system" would hurt the community or were hand-selected by the superintendent (i.e., "management") to run for "election," were relatively harmless in the damage they could wreak. Not so today.
It is past time for the CCSD Board of Trustees to grasp the enormity of their duties. The last element needed in a newly-appointed member to the Board is sycophancy, nor will the presence of an additional dilletante ameliorate a difficult situation. Think of the responsibilities of Superintendent McGinley as gravely as those of Enron, if you like. Hundreds of millions of your tax dollars spew out of 75 Calhoun every year, affecting every corner of the district and your taxes. If its Board of Trustees is as ignorant of how this money gets directed and spent as were the outside directors of Enron, it must share the liability when the bubble bursts--and it will at some point, just like Enron or the housing market.
For Maria Goodloe-Johnson, the bubble finally burst in Seattle last March. We have no reason to believe that her management style, nor McGinley's, was any more effective during her tenure in Charleston.
Maybe, just maybe, Seattle's board took its role as watchdog more seriously, especially in regard to finances and auditing.
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3 comments:
A sobering message as we approach the season that teaches us to celebrate light.
I'm curious about the buzz over the Teach For America contract. The published reports in the paper were vague on details, pro and con, but the administration is jumping hoops to show how much in favor they are with this. I share the same concerns raised by some. New teachers, in spite of their academic qualifications, employed over a very limited time frame and in such few numbers can not possibly become vested in these schools and communities in a meaningful way.
NJM goes so far as to describe these short-term teachers to be driven with "missionary zeal". Oh, great! Just what we need. More deaf missionaries.
How about just raising the standards, reducing class sizes, actually evaluate existing teachers properly and start recruiting more of the highly qualified teachers who are now leaving Charleston County to work elsewhere?
BTW: What is the connection between Teach For America and the Heartland group which made the pitch for TFA at the last school board meeting?
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