Gasp! Reporters Discover CCSD's Segregated Schools!

If you really want a quick run-down of de facto segregation in the Charleston County School District, I recommend the left-hand subject column of this blog. What you will discover is that, silly me, for my first five years back in Charleston after more than 40 living in various parts of the country, I actually thought CCSD's schools were integrated! It's a subject that our local paper has chosen not to explore--until now.

The Jonathan Green mural at Sanders-Clyde and the school's curriculum specializing in the history of slavery are a case in point. The mural greets children as they enter--but only black children, since no white faces appear. This message seems appropriate for a segregated school. Well, Sanders-Clyde does have one white student; evidently, CCSD administration never planned for any more. Meanwhile, fully 40 percent of its 720 students have transferred in from other schools. You can't insinuate, as Parker and Hawes do, that only white and not black parents request voluntary transfers based on race. They aren't making these choices based on the school's performance.

Learning of these statistics, what conclusion can you reach except that many black parents want a segregated school? If you know of some other reason, please comment. "Convenience" is the buzz-word for voluntary transfers, and CCSD does not provide transportation.

Let's not forget that federal government policies after World War II started the move from the peninsula to the suburbs as it granted returning veterans VA loans only on new construction. Talk about unintended consequences! But it's ridiculous to suggest that white movement off the peninsula in the seventies and eighties caused downtown schools to re-segregate: the population on the peninsula has remained (and increased) as majority white since the sixties.

It is remarkable to think that the only high school in this majority-white downtown has merely one white student; it's even more remarkable to realize that nearly 30 percent of Burke's students have transferred from other zones. Again, what gives? It's not the lure of its football team!

Parker and Hawes also try to make the case that Berkeley and Dorchester counties lack these fully segregated schools. They cite that Dorchester District 2 "doesn't have a single school lacking in diversity." Of course not: it has Dorchester District 4 to take that position!

Berkeley County is a different story. Traditionally a rural and black population, only in the past 30 years has it developed as a suburb--and new construction disperses whites from Ohio into the diverse mix. The Charleston peninsula has an entirely different, and much older, history.

Kovach Indictment Cramps CCSD's Style on Not-a-Penny Tax Extension

When the Charleston County School District last kicked off its Yes4Schools campaign in 2010, the initial press conference was held at Sanders-Clyde Elementary. What a difference a little fear can make!

This time the press conference's appearance in a vacant lot opposite Dunston Elementary School on Remount Road shed any perceived impropriety that the tax is being pushed by CCSD. The Chamber of Commerce spokesman carefully pointed out that "no school employees were at the campaign kickoff."

Crimping Nancy McGinley's style. Too bad.

Berkeley CSD's Thompson About to "Get Outta Dodge"?

Perhaps the moment of clarity came when they issued a search warrant for Berkeley County Superintendent Rodney Thompson's computer. Or maybe when Amy Kovach, his communications director, received a second indictment.

At some point Thompson realized that the remaining two years on his contract with the county's school district would not be fun. Whether ultimately indicted or not, Thompson will leave a district that seems largely improved under his guidance.

This latest news punches another hole in all school districts' personnel meddling in referendums. It should send a clear signal to Charleston County School District Superintendent McGinley to be more careful in the upcoming tax renewal.

Oh, I forgot. She's safe because Board member and Chamber of Commerce officer Chris Fraser will do the dirty work.

Berkeley CSD's Kovach's Indictment a Travesty

Does anyone believe that Berkeley County School District's communications director Amy Kovach dreamed up on her own the district's support of the Yes4Schools campaign in 2012? Really?

It's a dirty not-so-little not-so secret in every school district in South Carolina that every possible asset is used to push approval of school referendums. I challenge you to prove otherwise.

Why pick on Amy? According to the news story,

Already accused of improperly trying to influence the outcome of an election, Berkeley County School District's communications director now faces a second charge related to the same 2012 Yes 4 Schools referendum.

Amy Kovach, 43, was indicted by a Berkeley County grand jury Tuesday on one count of forgery, a felony that carries a fine and up to five years in jail. 

"To say that I'm shocked would be a gross understatement," Kovach's lawyer, Jerry Theos, said after the indictment was announced. "The Attorney General's Office didn't advise me in advance that they were seeking an indictment. They have not provided me ... with a copy of the indictment. I have no idea what it would be based upon, but there is no evidence whatsoever to support the charge." 

According to the indictment, Kovach created a false, backdated invoice from the district to the Yes 4 Schools campaign in November 2013 in "an attempt to establish that she had intended to have public funds repaid to the county" that were spent on campaign materials. The invoice was for less than $10,000, according to the indictment.

Communities in Schools: Buying Good Press or Money to Burn?

In the past week or so, Communities in Schools (CIS), the much-touted nonprofit headed by Mayor Riley's sister, has purchased not one, but two, full-color two-page ads in the Post and Courier. If you've ever purchased even one full-page ad, you know these ads don't come cheap.

The purpose appears to be raising community awareness or raising funds or both. The website advertised takes you to a very professional website extolling the work of CIS and asking you to get involved.

Is this really an effective way to raise money assist students? Wouldn't one page be enough?

Mysteries.

South Carolina Education Association Meets to Denigrate School Choice

Who is the SCEA, and why is it making such wild accusations at a North Charleston meeting of a senate panel? It's a liberal organization that fulfills the part of a public school teachers' union in a state where there is no teachers union. And it's hysterical over the idea that a tax-credit bill promoting some minor school choice will pass the South Carolina senate.

How hysterical? Here's a direct quote from the president of SCEA, Jackie Hicks: "“This seemingly innocuous measure opens the door to subsequent pro-segregation laws diverting taxpayer money to the private sector.” This attitude matches up well with that of Joseph Darby, who believes that every move to support choice is really a Ku-Klux-Klan-like plot to segregate schools. No doubt Darby agrees with Eric Holder, who wants to take choice away from black students trying to avoid failing schools in Louisiana.

These people live in la-la-land. How much more segregated could schools such as Burke High/Middle and Charleston Progressive Academy be? Would you please take the beam out of your own eyes?

My favorite quote comes from Kathi Regalbuto, who reports herself as a "former Berkeley County educator and parent of children who attended public and private schools": she states that "private school vouchers are 'a retreat from our collective responsibility to educate our children' in public schools."  

"Collective responsibility"? Speak for yourself. You're not speaking for parents. Their private responsibility is to get the best education possible for each child, even if that means a private school. Make your own children guinea pigs, if you wish.

EdFirstSC put in its two cents as well. According to its leader, Drayton Hall teacher Patrick Hayes, the evil one, Howard Rich, of New York, is funding conservatives who support school choice. Maybe Hayes hasn't heard yet of Bill Gates and Eli Broad on the other side? And the League of Women [read: liberal] Voters agreed that Larry Grooms's efforts are designed to avoid "a free and quality public school system" in South Carolina.

Maybe these ideologues were in the majority at the meeting, but they don't represent the majority of parents.

Berkeley CSD Honors Daniel Island Commitment: Why Doesn't CCSD?

Imagine. Ten years ago the Berkeley County School District agreed to keep a K through 8 school on the property donated to it on Daniel Island. Superintendent Thompson recently was reminded of the agreement. That means that Daniel Islanders have won their battle, at least temporarily, to keep those grades on the Island.

Too bad that the Charleston County School District doesn't stand by its commitments in a like manner. The property that contains Memminger Auditorium, now used by the city for performance events, was given for the purpose of educating students in perpetuity. In fact, the remaining auditorium was built as part of the original Memminger School.

Let's hope there's more long-term honor in Berkeley County!

Should Daniel Island Control Berkeley School District

When all else fails, form a committee. That's the mantra of every school superintendent in the United States. Further, the effectiveness of that committee is inversely proportional to the number of committee members.

Thus, Rodney Thompson, Berkeley County School Superintendent, has formed a committee of at least a couple of dozen to study the problems of site selection and grade configurations that are on his front burner due to Daniel Island's threats to leave the county behind. The committee is so big, in fact, that it must be divided into two parts.

But wait! Daniel Islanders are not happy with its makeup. Given the parameters for membership, Daniel Island, with its desire for a pedestrian lifestyle, cannot control the outcome. As one resident put it, the Island's voice will be "muffled."

The attitude expressed by Daniel Islanders posits a philosophical question: is Daniel Island the "elephant in the room" that sits wherever it wishes, or is it simply the most well-heeled part of Berkeley County?  Should a relatively new community (one that did not exist 20 years ago) control the school district's policies? Thirty-four percent of Daniel Island School students do not live on the island even now.

We have a representative group of Daniel Island parents yelling, "We wuz robbed," by Thompson's self-serving implied promises to keep students on the island if parents voted for the bond issue. Now let's see if Thompson has the wisdom of Solomon.

I doubt it.

Schools Confusion on Daniel Island

Daniel Islanders are mad at the Berkeley County School District--and they're not going to take it any more. Therefore, more than 400 met Thursday night at the Bishop England auditorium to contemplate switching the community to Charleston County.

No doubt other aspects of life in Berkeley County annoy the residents, but what really stirred the hornet's nest was the belief that, if they voted for a tax increase for its schools, another school would be built on Daniel Island. Then the Berkeley School Board said, well, maybe it will be in Cainhoy. Residents see this as bait-and-switch, and they may be correct.

Yet leaving Berkeley for Charleston County is not the same as leaving the Berkeley County School District for the Charleston County School District! No one seems to focus on the parameters involved: will CCSD agree to build another school on Daniel Island? Will CCSD purchase the Daniel Island School from Berkeley County? Where will the money come from?

Where will students from Daniel Island go to high school? the already-overcrowded Wando or the nearer, and nearly empty, North Charleston High School? If a middle school is not built on Daniel Island, where will middle schoolers go? Moultrie (overcrowded), Cario (overcrowded) or Northwoods?

Perhaps the rising talk and indignation will be used to force the Berkeley County School District to put the new school on the island, the best possible outcome for those parents who want their children to walk or bike to school.

Busing, and as much of it as possible, is the preferred mode of transportation in CCSD.

Note to Daniel Island: Be Careful About Joining CCSD

Residents of Daniel Island are mad as hell, and they're not going to take it any more! At least that attitude emanates from the latest discussions over whether the "island community" should vote to become part of Charleston County.

First, new residents discover they're not in Charleston County, even though they're in the City of Charleston. So confusing! Even the local newspaper often forgets that they're in Berkeley County. That means that their students must find a surreptitious avenue into Charleston County's Academic Magnet High School, ride nine miles to Hanahan High School, or pay tuition to attend Bishop England High School, situated on the island where they can ride their bikes to school.

Second, speaking of riding bikes to school, the icing on the cake appeared last spring when, to relieve overcrowding at the Daniel Island School (K-8), the Berkeley County School District announced that it will build a new middle school. In Cainhoy. DI residents must have choked on their morning latte. "No biking to Cainhoy," they shouted. "It's not part of our island dream." Residents want a second school on Daniel Island.

These people need to become acquainted with CCSD Superintendent Nancy McGinley, who's never seen a neighborhood school she didn't want to destroy. Students will be bused in from all points of the compass. Further, though Berkeley County is well advanced in planning and financing a new school to relieve DI crowding, Charleston County would need to add the school to its next go-round of financing, postponing construction for at least five years more. If the idea is to bike to school, forgetaboutit!

Residents also need to review their geography: Daniel Island sits between the "north zone" (North Charleston) with its vacancies in many of its failing schools and the"east zone" (Mt. Pleasant) with its highly overcrowded (think Cario) successful schools. Where will the overflow from Daniel Island go?

From the Daniel Island School (as a reference point) to Hanahan High School measures about 9 miles.
From that point to overcrowded Wando High School is about 12 miles.

From Daniel Island to vacancies-a-plenty North Charleston High School is only 8 miles. Think.

Deja Vu on CCSD's Failing Schools

Burke. North Charleston HS. Stall HS. Sanders-Clyde. Burns.

"No Berkeley or Dorchester County schools were in this group," according to today's newspaper. Really? Don't you wonder why CCSD has the honor of five schools located on the peninsula and in North Charleston that have achieved the notoriety of the Palmetto Priority List? (Why, the list doesn't even include all of the failing schools that district administration has shuttered instead of improving over the last few years!)

Despite her training at and assistance from the Broad Institute, Superintendent McGinley has now proved she doesn't have the qualities and wisdom to "fix" the problem. Who else remembers the glory days when Sanders-Clyde made great strides in its test scores? Why, McGinley was so impressed that she made its principal head of two schools simultaneously. She supposedly had no clue regarding the scandal that finally came out of the closet--organized changing of answers on the tests. And the principal was allowed to escape to a district in North Carolina. Isn't it lucky?

What McGinley has managed to accomplish is new and/or expensively remodeled buildings that should be showplaces for learning. The building program has also been a boon to construction firms. Not to teachers.  Not to students. If a state-of-the-art building could fix these schools' problems, we would not be talking about them now.

P & C Geography Lesson Needed

Today's print edition contains all graduating valedictorians in Berkeley and Dorchester Counties, or so it claims.

Um, do they realize that Bishop England is in Berkeley County? Must be the same people who think Academic Magnet students from Daniel Island are residents of Charleston County.

Why No College Summit in CCSD?

Cross High School. Berkeley County. Eighty percent free or reduced lunch. Students from the small communities of Cross, Ridgeville, Pineville, Pinopolis and Sandridge. Forty seniors this year.

Where am I going with this one? Not where you would expect.

Named one of America’s Best High Schools by U.S. News & World Report in 2010.

Maybe its participation in a program named College Summit contributed to that recognition. To quote the P & C,

• At Cross, college planning starts in earnest during the spring of junior year, when students are encouraged to take the SAT or ACT. That way, they can meet early decision deadlines, which is Oct. 1 for many colleges.
• Most of the 40 seniors at the school have submitted at least one [college application by now].
• The seniors got a jump on the process thanks to a program called College Summit, a class they all take.
• “We lay out for them how to get into college,” said Seay, who teaches the College Summit program and is chair of the social studies department. “We want them to have a post-secondary plan, but this community is not a wealthy community and we find that some of them will turn down college to go into the military or get a job.”
• For that reason, all of the students also take the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery, the military’s admission test, and attend an annual career fair with local industry.
• “One of the things I love most about College Summit is that they are very persistent in making sure the students get what they need,” Davis said. “Although not all of the students wind up going to college, it has created a college-going culture here.”

Well, amen to that. Why not Burke or North Charleston High Schools?

CCSD's Top Cheater Story, No Letters

Fifteen out-of-county students will continue to attend the Academic Magnet and School of the Arts without paying tuition. One is a senior. Cheaters win again. You just need to have money to beat the system.

Aside from either lying about their addresses or school administrators' looking the other way, don't you wonder if any money or favors changed hands in CCSD? Who are these people who believe they are entitled?

After all, especially at the Academic Magnet that education should be worth at least $20,000 per year. A great deal for residents of Berkeley and Dorchester Counties, isn't it?

And, if you believe that not a single resident of Charleston County has written a letter about this cheating to the P&C in the last week, I have a bridge for sale in Brooklyn.

Concealing CCSD SAT-Score Drop

Yet again the P&C has proven itself not a news paper but a cheerleader for the area. Maybe we should call it the Pollyanna & Cheer?

The article reporting the drop in 2011 SAT scores for the Charleston County School District actually was headlined, "Berkeley County Sees Rise in SAT Scores." Clever.

It's the third year in a row that CCSD's scores have dropped. We can identify multitudinous causes for decline. However, it's the trend that should worry the School Board.

For how many years has Superintendent McGinley been responsible, either as academic officer or superintendent? When does the buck stop?

P&C Spikes CCSD Residency Problem

More CCSD lawsuits costing taxpayers more money.

A Berkeley County parent believes that her child should attend CCSD's Academic Magnet, tuition-free, and the district should be glad to have her. The parent deliberately purchased property in Charleston County so that her child could "qualify." However, attorney Gayla McSwain must not have the correct political connections, for CCSD told her that she could not pick which school in Charleston County her child could attend. Months ago, a Circuit Court judge agreed with McSwain.

Why did the P&C sit on this story? Good question, having everything to do with nefarious practices going on in the Charleston County School District for decades. Perhaps now that Janet Rose has retired she can be the goat.

Should we laugh at CCSD's attorney John Emerson when he says, "school leaders were aware before the start of this school year" that non-county residents attended magnet schools? How long before that, John? We could drag up Buist Academy and those residency shenanigans, I suppose.

Does the Academic Magnet turn away qualified students who live in Charleston County? Yes.

There is the answer to McSwain's suit. If her daughter wants to go to North Charleston High School in the district where the property is located, so be it. Meanwhile, magnets should be for Charleston County residents only. Period. This excludes all residents of Hanahan, Goose Creek, and Daniel Island, who all live in Berkeley County. Any students now in the magnet high schools from other counties who own property in the district should be charged full tuition. Future non-residents should not be accepted. If attendees move out of the district while at the magnet, they should be charged tuition.

You could almost be sympathetic with these no-good parents if they were poor, or even lower middle-class. Such is not the case. They're rich (i.e., McSwain) and well-connected (well, not McSwain!). They give money to the campaigns of Board of Trustee members who will see to their interests.

Who's going to stop them?

Great Program Also in CCSD Schools, Ken

Anyone reading Ken Burger's column in the P&C on Saturday must have been struck with the same thoughts I had: why don't schools do more of these programs? [See Another Day at the Office]

Burger highlighted his visit to Stratford High School's Virtual Enterprise classroom, part of "a national network of high schools, including 40 in South Carolina, that offer products and services to each other so students can learn the ropes of business." Stratford High School offers "an on-line grocery business" under its organization named Unlimited Possibilities. Students experience how a business virtually works by interacting with other virtual high school businesses.

Imagine that.


Turns out that the Charleston County School District has several of the 40 S.C. schools that participate in the program. These include James Island Charter, West Ashley, Wando, and Stall. We should hope that every high school in the district will offer this stimulating and educational program.

See Virtual Enterprises: U.S. Network for the full story on the program.

Superintendents Serve Up Pablum to P & C

If you're so young that you've never heard of Pablum, you may be wondering what it is; on the other hand, if you have ever tasted this old-fashioned baby food invented in the 1930s, you too would find it "bland, unappetizing, or with little content value"--its metaphorical definition today.

Precisely what is served up in recent interviews with CCSD Superintendent Nancy McGinley and Berkeley's Anthony Parker. [In Berkeley, Children at Center; Charleston Superintendent Prepares for Third Year]. You might suspect that the reporter either was afraid to ask pointed follow-up questions or didn't know what to ask. Instead, we find out that McGinley doesn't especially like to cook.

In any event, interested readers learn that McGinley's new "top priority" is "improving student literacy." Duh. I wonder where she got that idea. We all hope she's serious.

At least she was a bit more forthcoming about her recent trip to Houston, saying that "When I was asked to have a conversation to see if I might be interested in running the seventh-largest district in the country, I thought it was worth my time to give it some thought" [as I wended my way west on the airplane?]. That's about as close as she's going to get to admitting the trip was for a job interview.

Superintendent Parker wants to keep "put children at the center point" in Berkeley County. Well, that's a relief. We were worried that he would put them off to the side.

Truth or Rumor About Buist Acceptance?

Sources say that Buist Academy has accepted a student who lives on Daniel Island (that's in Berkeley County, for you dummies). The student has been accepted from the District 20 list.

Wasn't that nonsense supposed to have stopped?

Oh, well. It is a county-wide magnet. Who's to say which county?

The Real Story on CCSD Summer School

"Enrollment dropped from about 525 students last year to 185 students this year" is the REAL story about CCSD's 2008 summer school. [See District Might Try to Eliminate Summer School to Save Money.] That's in ONE year. So what gives?

I've reached the point where I don't really put much credence in how the P & C handles stories like this one, especially the numbers they contain. For example, did the district expect to have the same numbers as in the past, or did the district's offering of not even half as many courses (11 instead of 25) in high school cause the drop? Was it in the summer of 2007 that the $100,000 overrun occurred? If so, does CCSD expect a cost overrun again this summer, or was the overrun an excuse or result of bad planning?

The article says that this "might be the last year of summer school for elementary and middle schools." CCSD's solution is to allow enrollment in the next grade while remediating the student for the previous grade. So how is the student supposed to be successful in the (presumably) more difficult subject when the student hasn't yet mastered the previous one?

And if the number of students who enrolled this summer in high school courses was much lower than the district expected, what change does THAT suggest? You got it. The number of students who failed courses needed to graduate is down. Why, that MUST be a result of the superintendent's mantra that excellence is our standard. Not.

Also, how much do these online courses cost? Are they aligned with CCSD's course offerings? Having investigated online remediation for another school several years ago, I know that these courses can vary in quality from a joke to a rigorous learning experience.

Gee, I wonder why Berkeley County and Dorchester District 2 aren't having these problems.