Zucker Skewers ex-Supt. McGinley's "Excellent" Stats

Anita Zucker is no fool, and today's op-ed proves it.

Zucker is fully aware (unlike McGinley hangers-on) that, under the administration of Charleston County's ex-superintendent of schools, the haves prospered and the have-nots suffered. Not content to pat McGinley on the back for her gerrymandered excellent rating, Zucker analyzed the data.

So in CCSD 42 percent of low-income students read below grade level in the eighth grade.

So in CCSD 45 percent of black students read below grade level in the eighth grade.

These are horrendous numbers. Reading on the eighth-grade level is not rocket science.

Exactly what did the NAACP get for its undying support of McGinley? Headlines, perhaps, but no educational improvement for the black community.

Zucker even mentions considering the curriculum used at Buist Academy (International Baccalaureate) and Charleston Development Academy (Core Knowledge) as worthy of consideration for preventing this tragedy in the future.

Meanwhile, McGinley has rolled out her consulting services, no doubt hoping to grab some of those edublob dollars she was so adept at spending previously. Well, every district in the southeast would love to have these numbers, right?

Why Proposed CCSD Mt. Pleasant Magnet School Is a Bad Idea

No one can blame parents for wanting an academically-challenging elementary school for their children. Since the edublob has decided that tracking is discriminatory, many face either providing challenges at home or enrolling in private schools. Now the Mt. Pleasant community has proposed its own "Buist" in Mt. Pleasant. Though I could respond with evidence of how the presence of the Academic Magnet and Buist have damaged the Charleston County School District, one more eloquent than I made the case several years ago in the New York Times, of all places. As you read his analysis, think of its relevance to what exists in CCSD today.

FEBRUARY 10, 2009
Magnet Schools: More Harm Than Good?
By VICTOR HARBISON

Victor Harbison teaches civics and history at Gage Park High School in Chicago, where he also sponsors the school newspaper. In 2000, he became the first National Board-certified high school history teacher in Chicago and he has worked on several educational reform projects during his career. Gage Park faces the all-too-common challenges of an urban school: test scores are so low that only 8% of students meet state standards; only 47% of its students graduate; and 97.4% of them live in poverty.

"Given the recent economic news, it seems everyone wants to talk about the long-term impact of short-term thinking. Why not do the same with education and magnet schools? Think of the issues educators faced 30 or 40 years ago: Smart kids not being challenged? Academically under-prepared kids, most of them ethnic minorities, moving in and test scores going down? It’s completely logical that they chose a path to create magnet schools. But it was a short-term solution that has had long-term negative consequences.

"I take my students to lots of outside events where they are required to interact with students who come from magnet or high-performing suburban schools. What I see time after time is how my kids rise to the occasion, performing as well (or at least trying to) as those students whose test scores or geographic location landed them in much more demanding academic environments.

"On a daily basis, I see the same kids who do amazing things when surrounded by their brightest counterparts from other schools slip into every negative stereotype you can imagine, and worse, when surrounded by their under-performing peers at our “neighborhood” school.

"When educational leaders decided to create magnet schools, they didn’t just get it wrong, they got it backwards. They pulled out the best and brightest from our communities and sent them away. The students who are part of the “great middle” now find themselves in an environment where the peers who have the greatest influence in their school are the least positive role models.

"Schools adapted, and quickly. We tightened security, installed metal detectors, and adopted ideas like zero-tolerance. And neighborhood schools, without restrictive admission policies based on test scores, quickly spiraled downward — somewhat like an economy. Except in education, we can’t lay off students who have a negative impact on the school culture. That is why adopting such a business model for the educational system has been and always will be a recipe for failure.

"What should have been done was to pull out the bottom ten percent. Educational leaders could have greatly expanded the alternative school model and sent struggling students to a place that had been designed to meet their educational needs. Now, hundreds of millions of dollars later, we are no closer to meeting the needs of the struggling student, but the system has created collateral damage, namely the great middle, who are forced everyday to go to class in a school that is more unchallenging, unwelcoming and dangerous than it has to be.

"Imagine if pulling out the “bottom ten” had been the policy for the past 30 years. Neighborhood schools could have purred along like the go-go 90’s under Clinton and the students with the greatest needs, facing the greatest challenges, would have had millions of dollars in resources devoted to their education in brand new state-of-the-art buildings (with Ivy League-educated, amazing teachers, no doubt). Just imagine.

"Instead, the system as it is stratifies communities. By the time they graduate high school, many of the brightest kids already feel alienated from their neighborhoods; after all, they spend the majority of their day somewhere else.

"I look forward to the arguments defending magnet schools. They are legion and many are spot on. That is, if you can live with the idea of condemning the vast majority of students in your community to sub-standard schools. No one can rationally argue that they are a good long term solution to what ails schools in this country.

CCSD's Planning for Parking Fees a Joke

Evidently the reporter can't remember that part of the Memminger School property was sold off to the College of Charleston on a no-bid basis in April of 2012. Geeze, that's less than a year ago. What short memories we have.

Just think, that piece of property could have been used for parking. Instead, together with those from Buist, the Charleston County School District will spend almost $100,000 per year in parking fees for employees.

Speaking of Buist, district administrators, including Superintendent McGinley, wax poetic over the need for a gym and other spaces, expansion of the old footprint to bring the school amenities provided to other schools. That's the excuse for paying parking fees for Buist employees.

The reporter has also neglected to mention that parents in District 20 (downtown schools) proposed combining Buist and Charleston Progressive, another school being rebuilt at the old Courtenay campus only two blocks away. Several lower grades could have been assigned to the CPA campus and upper grades to the Buist campus, with the existing gym shared by both levels.

Oh, duh. That was just too logical, not to speak of putting a higher percentage of black students into the merged schools.

Here's one of those mathematical word problems:

The proceeds from the sale of the Memminger property went into the operating budget. The fees for parking come out of the operating budget. How many years will pass before the money gained from the sale will be exhausted by parking fees?

And another capital asset will have disappeared.

Theme for Mt. Pleasant Magnet at Whitesides?

To relieve overcrowding without offending any parent in Mt. Pleasant, Charleston County Schools Superintendent McGinley has a brilliant idea: create a magnet elementary school open to any resident of East Cooper. The school, unlike other magnets, will have no attendance zone and will be located at the former Whitesides Elementary in an almost all-white area of the town.

The idea neatly sidesteps the toes of Mt. Pleasant parents who want smaller classes in their overcrowded schools but want somebody else's child to change schools.

But what happens if too few parents sign up for an untested school not knowing what its student body will look like?  How many parents will be enticed by a "theme"? CCSD is taking chances with its overcrowding because Mt. Pleasant parents have clout. You merely need peruse McGinley's effusive praise of Mt. Pleasant in her op-ed: "There's not a town in America that does a better job of supporting high-quality public education than Mount Pleasant." "The town of Mount Pleasant should beam with pride that so many people want to reside within its boundaries."

As we used to say, "Gag me with a spoon." No, these parents need not suffer the closing of neighborhood schools and shuffling around of their children nor tolerate one ethically-challenged principal running two elementary schools, as downtown District 20 residents know so well.

Just try to imagine a theme created by administrators that will actually fulfill a desire of Mt. Pleasant's residents while resulting in an integrated school. McGinley knows perfectly well that what residents desire most is another Buist Academy located in Mt. Pleasant, an all-honors elementary, if you like.

Has anyone sensed support for a theme other than that one? In truth, most parents want their children to stay in the attendance zone they paid for and for the pesky newcomers crowding into the schools to go away.

CCSD Needs to Remember: All Students Count

Depressed that efforts to meet Vision 2016 goals in the Charleston County School District have sputtered, administrators want two groups of students excluded from the PASS statistics.

In other words, McGinley doesn't think that the progress of special needs students and second-language learners should count.  So why did she include them originally? Probably to comply with NCLB mandates.

If she wishes to do so, McGinley can get the percentages on the PASS for each of these groups quite easily. They still are a part of the school and community and should be treated as everyone else, including being counted in overall progress reports.

Stop playing around with the statistics, Nancy. Just because McGinley's percentage of failing schools looks better since five were closed doesn't mean those students are served any better. Neither would the boost to PASS scores from eliminating two groups of students serve them.

We all know who's being served.

Cut in CCSD Priorities Shows Hypocrisy of Seismic Policies

Remember the great earthquake that caused the Charleston County School District to declare Memminger and Buist schools (among others) as needing retrofitting and/or rebuilding? No, I don't either; nor does anyone alive. 

Such a happening in the last decade would have explained the haste to tear down schools that were good for more years of use, rather than the cynical thought that the Superintendent wished to keep contractors busy.  Now that the initial set of "earthquake-proof" schools is almost on line, the rush to fix others has disappeared,

At least that seems to be the case with the cash-flow problem presented to CCSD by a shortfall in the 1% sales tax for schools. Seismic evaluations will be postponed or even not done at all.

Come on, Nancy. At least be consistent.

CCSD Blames James Simons Community for Building Delays

Anyone paying attention knows that construction has been going great guns on the new Buist building slated to open next August. Neighbors have even complained regarding noise on the building site at night since March of 2012. Not so the three other District 20 buildings being seismically redone, in particular, not so for James Simons Elementary. While the new building is constructed, those students are getting up at 6 a.m. to be bussed to the old Brentwood campus near the intersection of Ashley Phosphate and I-26 and arriving home who knows when.

Now it turns out that Superintendent McGinley blames slowness at the Simons building site on its community. (You can't make this stuff up.) Any changes to original plans should be laid squarely at her doorstep, since she never listened to what the community desired in the first place.

And what caused the hurry at Buist? Those well-connected parents will raise hell if the school isn't finished on time; James Simons parents don't possess that amount of clout.

Will the delay hurt development of the Montessori program at James Simons? Well, it won't help.

CCSD's Secret Agenda on Buist and Magnet Admissions Policies. Really

You would think that, after all the complaints about the Buist admissions process over the last few years, the Charleston County School Board would be sensitive to its constituents. Wrong again.

The CCSD School Board has a workshop scheduled for Wednesday morning, time unannounced to the public, on magnet admissions processes and procedures. Even board members themselves are caught unaware of this agenda.

Sneaking another one by, are we McGinley?

Buist: Ready to Fill Vacancies or Not?

The Charleston County School District proudly announces that it will add 70 slots when the new Buist Academy building opens downtown next fall. Theoretically, enrollment will stand at 480, instead of the present 410.

Apparently no one seems to care that Buist already has many vacant slots in its supposed "410" number that remain unfilled despite its much-touted secret waiting list.

When it adds the 70 students, will it also fill its present vacancies? Will it continue to allow false addresses? Will these 70 students be spread over the four "lists" or  constitute a new list? Many questions remain unanswered.

Kusmider on Small Schools Points to Buist Academy

Funny how the Charleston County School Board of Trustees can't see its own irony and hypocrisy as shown in the following letter from Ted Kusmider, a District 20 parent, that appeared in last week's P&C:

      "Charleston County School District says they can’t rebuild an elementary school at Sullivan’s Island with a capacity of less than 500 students.
      "Funny. CCSD is rebuilding Buist Academy, serving kindergarten through eighth grade, in my backyard with a maximum capacity of 410 students.
      "To date, it is still not filled to capacity, despite hundreds on the waiting list. Yet there’s still no plan for expansion. When are the parents of Charleston County going to unite and say “enough of this nonsense”?

Maybe a few more lawsuits will focus its attention.

Closed-Minded Meyers Pontificates for CCSD's McGinley

We need a little communication once in a while to realize why it's such a relief that Gregg Meyers no longer sits on the Charleston County School Board. Recently, Meyers boasted in the P&C that Superintendent McGinley's long tenure has provided "continuity," a "new idea" in the district

Yes, continuity, but at what cost? McGinley's has been the least transparent and most ineffective tenure of all time. Her skill consists of puffing herself up at the expense of principals, teachers, and students. She even brags about how a lower percentage of schools are failing when she artificially created the drop by closing neighborhood schools. McGinley promised to track the affected students and show how the change benefitted them.

Seen any data yet?

McGinley has new ideas all the time--remember the A+ academy at Burke? These dazzle the public briefly, just like a firecracker, and then fizzle with little fanfare.
Keep in mind that Meyers opposes charter schools, despite his comments in the P&C that "charter schools have added helpful options for parents." He was behind the moratorium the district. In fact, years ago Meyers used his clout on the Board to create Buist and the Academic Magnet for his own children; who cares about everyone else's--let the rest of the chips fall where they may.
Meyers thinks candidates running for the school board should be asked if they support Dr. McGinley. Actually, I agree. Anyone new to the Board who mindlessly says "yes" is a potted plant and should be voted down.

Hampton-Green's "Service" Easily Forgone

In the beginning, Mayor Riley recruited Toya Hampton-Green, a District 20 resident, to run for a downtown seat on the Charleston County School Board of Trustees. She appeared such a promising candidate--a young mother with an interest in her local community and a law degree. However, as Green leaves the Board six years later, only the most ardent supporters of Superintendent McGinley mourn her going.

The most that Green ever accomplished on the CCSD Board was to get her children into Buist, a perk for Board members that mysteriously appears by lottery . Green made it crystal clear to her constituents downtown that she didn't represent them! District 20 was left without its voice on the Board. Seemingly, Green represented Green.

That the S.C. School Boards Association should hire Green as "director of policy and legal services" says more about the deficiencies of that organization than it does about Green's qualifications.

The P & C noted that she "often ended up in the same corner as [McGinley]."  That statement is false. Green never voted against any proposal from administration. Her mantra appeared to be "how high should I jump?"

Such slavish bootlicking will not be missed.

Burke's and NCHS's Failures McGinley's Fault

Regardless of her credentials from the Broad Institute (or maybe because of them), Superintendent Nancy McGinley of the Charleston County School District simply does not know what to do with Burke and North Charleston High Schools. If it weren't for NCLB, she wouldn't even care. As it is, that embarrassing time has rolled around once again: the threat of a state takeover.

Incompetence can be defined as tinkering with the edges of a poorly-understood problem and calling that success. Thus, in her latest statements McGinley points out how she has cut the number of failing schools in the district. True, by closing them. What does that prove?

Back in mid-June, McGinley gushed in an op-ed about how these two schools were really "dream-making 'opportunity centers."" She complains of the short-sightedness of those who think schools with unconscionably high dropout rates should be labeled as "at risk" or "failing." After all, she points out, some students do achieve and graduate!

Later in the month, NAACP vice-president Joe Darby echoed this drivel in a similar op-ed. He and the NAACP should be ashamed of themselves.

McGinley has had plenty of time to turn around these high schools; obviously she doesn't know how. If it weren't for CCSD Board members who follow her in lockstep, the Board would have voted her out of her position long ago. 

The person most responsible for the poor performances of both schools is the Superintendent. Prior to reaching that position, she was chief academic officer. Once named superintendent, she has appointed the district supervisors and the principals. They are her responsibility and she has blown it.

Whether the state takes over the schools, a private organization such as KIPP is called in, or these schools go charter, McGinley has shown she should not be trusted with the education of the students in and headed for these schools.

But of course Wando, Buist, and the Academic Magnet continue to do well. Apparently that is all McGinley supporters care about.

Buist Waiting List Housecleaning Overdue

Buist Principal Sally Ballard has retired. Now the housecleaning begins, especially in regard to its much bally-hooed waiting lists. CCSD Board of Trustees Chairman Chris Fraser has put forth the idea that perhaps methods of maintaining waiting lists for the districts' county-wide magnets should be standardized. Buist's bloated list stands out like a sore thumb.

Funny, isn't it? While Ballard remained principal no questions were raised, at least by McGinley supporters. Fraser does what McGinley asks him to do; therefore, Superintendent McGinley now wants to straighten out what has been a disgrace ever since Ballard took over the magnet school.

Makes you wonder what favors Ballard had granted McGinley.

At any rate, Buist's 2000+ waiting list is a mirage. Ballard's idea of how to fill vacancies is a joke: the old "delay, linger, and wait" routine. If waiting lists were not purged and parents did not need to apply again after kindergarten, don't you wonder what Ballard did with students who moved into the district afterwards? Added them to the end of the list? Not likely. The whole process was inept, tainted with cronyism, and corrupt.

Let's hope that while changing its method of keeping waiting lists Buist also sheds some light into the dark corners of how it fills spaces and why some spaces remain vacant.

Idiocy of Selling Memminger School Property

 Say it ain't so, Joe! Or should we say, Michael  (Bobby, that is)?
While Charleston County School District Superintendent Nancy McGinley promises great future enhancements ("global studies") to the District 20 Memminger Elementary campus now being adjusted to earthquake standards, the district's chief financial officer, Michael Bobby, is preparing the School Board to sell off part of the property.

Do these people talk to each other? Or is something more underhanded going on. You know developers would love to get their hands on this property situated in a prime real estate area not far from King and Broad.

Why would these non-natives in charge of CCSD care if a school named Memminger has been present on that site for over 100 years? Or that the gift of the property to the school district specifically provides for a school on the site? (see below)

CCSD has already allowed the sale of the original Memminger School auditorium after its "benign neglect" over several decades; now it will sell off the property on Wentworth that contains elementary classrooms.

Dectect a pattern?

And construction is moving so slowly. Why isn't the same construction moving slowly at Buist?


20 Beaufain St.

-- Memminger school, The first parsonage of St. Philip's Episcopal Church was built on this site about 1698. It was part of the Glebe Lands, 17 acres given to the minister of the Church of England in Charles Town and his successors in office "forever," by Mrs. Affra Coming, in 1698. The Rev. Alexander Garden, rector of St. Philip's and Commissary of the Bishop of London, opened school for black and Indian children on the GlebeGlebe St.). ln the division of the Glebe Lands between St. Philip's and St. Michael's in 1797, the southern portion, including the old parsonage, was conveyed to St. Michae's. In 1858, the Normal School, for the training of female teachers, was built on the site of the old parsonage. Charleston architect Edward C. Jones designed the large and impressive building which had an arcaded front portico and a high mansard dome. It was built by contractor Benjamin Lucas. The school was later named for Christopher C. Memminger, a leader in establishing Charleston's public school system in the 1850's, and Confederate Secretary of the Treasury in the 1860's. The City Board of School Commissioners bought the property in 1899. Memminger School remained a high school for girls until 1950, when it became an elementary school. This building was built in 1953.

(Smith & Smith, Dwelling Houses , p. 311-313; Wallace, p. 184, 464; Ravenel, Architects , p. 218; Rogers, Charleston in the Age of the Pinckneys , p. 91-92; McCrady, 2:245-247; Williams, St. Michael's , p. 48; Stockton, News & Courier , Aug. 5, 1972; Stockton, unpub. M.S.; Mazyck & Waddell, illus. 21)

What Lies Beneath. . . Buist?

Does history of the Charleston peninsula matter? Apparently not to CCSD's Bill Lewis and his boss, Superintendent Nancy McGinley.

How else to explain their treatment of the land upon which the Buist school sits? What if, indeed as is possible, that land reveals artifacts of early settlements of African-Americans, even of slaves?

We'll never know what history has been lost. The Charleston County School District has shown its disdain for the past from the beginning of its campaign to replace the old school building.

Nevertheless, we can ask questions. Alert observers of CCSD have plenty of them.

1. Work on reopening Buist in August of 2013 remains on track, in fact, at "full speed, damn the torpedoes" speed while the promised replacement of Memminger, James Simons, and Courtenay has ground to "dead slow," aiming at 2014 or later.
2. In the dead of night, residents near Buist have been awakened by noise of construction on the site. Working at night because?
3. Perhaps the removal of truckloads of excavated soil given to a member of the public and not examined for artifacts is easier then. For all we know, graves are being removed--they would just slow down the work.
4. Rumors abound of the pocketing of coins and even slave tags by workers involved with the pile and foundation work. No one thought there might be below-ground historical assets?
5. On the same topic, the area was part of the city's defense lines during the American Revolution's siege of Charleston before its surrender in May of 1780. Just sayin.'
6. If CCSD could order a seismic survey, why did it not order an archeological survey and recovery plan to be included in its original time line?
7. Did anyone consider using the valuable expertise of staff at the Charleston Museum? Why will CCSD not release its Board-ordered archeological surveys done before the work was started? Were Final Reports even made?

Let's face it--Memminger is also in an area that begs for archeological study.

Back in the 1950s the Charleston Historical Society banded together to save architectural gems in danger of destruction. Without its efforts, the old city of Charleston would be half the gem it is today.

There could easily be as much history below ground as what we see above, but the administrative structure of the Charleston County School District echoes Rhett Butler: "Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn."

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?

CCSD's Rose Doesn't Smell So Sweet

If the P&C was looking for empathy with retired state employees on pension in the great "how-are-we-going-to-pay-our-obligations" scandal here in South Carolina, it shouldn't have posted Janet Rose, retired CCSD "executive director of assessment and accountibility," above the fold. Why not a retired policeman or city employee?

Rose should be considered the poster child for cronyism in CCSD. Under her watch CCSD crafted its oh-so-transparent Buist lottery process and promised parents living on the peninsula that they could move away from District 20, the list their child was admitted on, as soon as their child's number was "picked."

Furthermore, the reporter thought it too embarrassing to ask Rose what her actual pension is. Far from the $19,000 per year average--which probably reflects many former police and firefighters. Of that you can be sure. Rose says that her pension is "only about half of what she earned." What she earned, unlike the poor peons who actually are in the classroom, was over $100,000 per year.

That means that she's getting more than most experienced teachers make per year or have a hope of getting in a pension.

This is the educrat responsible for allowing students who do not even live in Charleston County to attend CCSD magnet schools without paying tuition.

But we shouldn't be surprised to see her sob story on the front page. After all, these are the educrats favored by the editors of the Post and Courier.

CCSD's Meyers: Never Saw a Lottery He Didn't Like

Hold onto your seats. Exiting Charleston County School Board member Gregg Meyers has determined to leave his mark on the admissions process for every magnet school in CCSD.

Academic Magnet High School: this means you.

Meyers, meeting tomorrow, will railroad his CCSD Policy Committee into confirming a lottery process for any students in excess of capacity of any magnet program. With stars in his eyes and at one fell swoop, Meyers creates a Buist-style lottery for every popular magnet program in the district. No more merit-based admissions.

Remember? the old smoke and mirrors game for the favored few?

But wait! There's more!

The new policy will promote racial diversity by allowing the use of zip codes rather than race as criteria.

Let the jockeying for position begin.

You may now understand why Meyers has chosen to leave after this term. You may also understand why CCSD continues to violate open-meeting laws as it considers these changes.

No School Safe When CCSD Policy Committee Meets

Is it true? Is the Policy Committee of the Charleston County School Board about to pull a fast one on the Academic Magnet (AMHS)?

It's a well-known phenomenon that when something is working really well politicians want to tinker with it. Scuttlebutt has it that Gregg Meyers, knowing how well using his law office address worked to get his own children into Buist Academy on the District 20 list, now wants to create a similar structure for entrance to the Academic Magnet.

This marvelous system, virtually guaranteed to be finagled in like fashion to Buist entrance in days of yore, would use zip codes instead of four lists as Buist does. It would also use a lottery.

After all, why would we want only the best students to go to AMHS? Some of them should linger in other high schools to beef up their stats for Superintendent McGinley. Just think of the possibilities.

Meanwhile, Meyers has scheduled the next meeting of the Policy Committee for the last day of Rosh Hashanah, guaranteeing that any observant Jews will not interfere with discussion and offering to take the minutes himself while chairing the meeting, since the committee's secretary will not be there.

Love it.