Chutzpah Personified: CCSD's Taj Mahal

Even Brian Hicks knows its wrong. [See Wednesday's P&C.]

Spending $76,000 on renovations to the administrative offices of the Charleston County School District? Why not, Superintendent McGinley would say. After all, we have the money just lying around unspent.

Meanwhile, it becomes obvious that CCSD Board chair Chris Fraser doesn't know Roberts Rules of Order or how to follow them or doesn't care about them because he takes his marching orders from elsewhere.

Oh, that's right. He's the voice of the Metro Chamber of Commerce, I forgot.

Why should anyone care what shenanigans were pulled to get the item back on the agenda for a second vote? What we should care about is who voted for this deaf-and-dumb-to-the-taxpayers decision. I'll list them for you.

Chris Fraser, Chair 452-9245

Elisabeth Ann Oplinger 406-6685

Craig Ascue 884-6862

Cindy Bohn Coats 529-2457

Chris Collins 813-0616

Toya Hampton Green 723-7831

I'm sure they'd love to hear from you.

Unauthorized CCSD Renovations Plow Ahead

What part of "no" doesn't the administration of the Charleston County Schools understand?

Late last month the CCSD School Board refused to authorize the funding of renovations to its Human Resources Department at 75 Calhoun, citing other pressing unfunded needs. The job is estimated at $140,000.

Yet here they are in January going full steam ahead.

McGinley & CCSD Board Putting Students at Risk?

The list in Tuesday's P & C of "waves" of CCSD school construction financed by the one percent sales tax deserves a Bronx cheer.

After years of alarm concerning seismic deficiencies leading to the transfer of students from five schools and massive busing of same, Superintendent McGinley and the Charleston County School Board have decided that further exploration of seismic problems in other school buildings can be safely put off until some later date as yet unnamed. Apparently, the only Board member to object was Mary Ann Taylor. Chris Fraser, the Board Chair, has some 'splaining to do.

Either an earthquake is imminent, or it's not. Fraser and the Board can't have it both ways.

Charge McGinley with Crime if Frierson Closed

Should Frierson Elementary School on Wadmalaw Island be closed so that CCSD's Superintendent McGinley can get a raise next year?

Well, that's just about the level of thinking going on in the Charleston County School District these days.

City Financially Rewards Private School?

It's for a good cause, providing a high-quality education to the children of the poor. It even assuages the conscience of Sherman Financial Group, one of the worst offenders in the cut-throat debt collection world. It's called Meeting Street Academy. [See previous discussion in this blog.]

However.

Should the City of Charleston have spent almost $5 million to purchase property for building the school? Could the City Council not come to an agreement with the Charleston County School District to use one of its old properties that is just lying around going to waste, adding to CCSD's expenses but not income?

Or is the City Council now encouraging a parallel universe of alternate schooling that bypasses its discredited school district?

What happens if Sherman Financial Group decides to get out of the school business and sell the school? Do the new private owners get the sweetheart deal too?

How Does CCSD Attorney Earn Salary?

Is it fending off Freedom of Information requests?

To support its challenge to paying for classroom buildings and transportation for public school students who attend charter schools, the Charleston County School District has hired Derfner, Altman & Wilborn, a firm that knows more about constitutional law, according to John Emerson, CCSD's attorney.

Anyway, he's too busy to do trial work "because of the time commitment involved."

Or is he unqualified?

Or is he being paid $145,000 + (starting salary in May 2008) for part-time work?

Facts Speak Loudly on Busing

Isn't Alabama the state that always saves us from being last?

South Carolina has just arranged to purchase 11-year-old school buses from Alabama. These must already have 100,000 miles on them.

PUNCH LINE: to replace SC buses that are more than twice that age.

Meanwhile, CCSD does its bit in driving up demand.

Sore Loser Rex on Education Funding

He didn't win his bid for governer, not even close. Now he's leaving office as SC's Superintendent of Education. You noticed how much it improved on his watch, didn't you?

Jim Rex has been quite vocal in recent weeks regarding the shortcomings of those who won. Today's latest gripe was about losing federal funds.

As one SC senator pointed out, we need to clean up the mess created by miserably written bills passed in the Congress. Did they read them before voting? Probably not.

You lost, Jim. Give it up.

Preparation Essential to Burke's AP Success

At Burke High School's much-touted AP Academy, only one of 103 AP exams resulted in success last year. Very sad for the students, but hardly surprising.

Preparation for Advanced Placement classes starts in middle school if students have a hope of being successful in gaining college credits. Say what you like about the faults of Advanced Placement, the fact remains that no amount of bluster and spin by local superintendents can sway the results: either the students qualify according to this national standard, or they don't.


Why the Charleston County School District's efforts at creating the AP Academy at Burke High School should have cost $200,000 is something of a mystery. Are these expenses for additional teachers, new books and materials, or training for teachers? Thanks to CCSD's lack of transparency, we'll never know. However, it is not a mystery why only one out of 103 tests were passed.


The number of dollars dedicated to AP will not guarantee success. No amount of money will compensate for poorly prepared students facing the rigors of such courses. Not the most inspired teaching and/or dedicated studying will compensate if students are too poorly prepared entering the course. No books or materials will make up the gap between what should have been learned prior to the course and the actual AP course content.


Poorly prepared students will learn in the AP course, just not enough to qualify on a college level. Success on the AP exam does not require brilliance; it requires a certain level of competence entering the course and rigor and student dedication during the course. With more than a dozen years of AP teaching under my belt, I speak from experience.

CCSD for its own propaganda purposes started at the wrong end of the horse with Burke High School's AP Academy. At the latest AP prep should begin in the seventh-grade at Burke's feeder schools. Such preparation will require a Pre-AP track (gasp!), an anathema to the politically correct like Superintendent McGinley.

Then the question becomes, does she want a successful program at Burke or one just for show?

Refurbish the Taj While Teachers Furlough?

As if we didn't know where the priorities stand at 75 Calhoun, the Charleston County School District offices, Superintendent McGinley made it crystal clear Monday night with her request to double the amount being spent on renovations with another $135,000.

Do you think she's surprised at the controversy that arose? Maybe it was just a test to see how far she could push the new board members.

In other news. . . almost $100,000 per school will be spent on "surveillance and access-control technology," taking our local tax dollars and adding to them our federal tax dollars.

Does that strike you as a tad expensive? Don't you wonder who gets that contract?

Vagueness on High School Diploma Credits

Instead of ranting against the reporters at the P&C, for a change I must take issue with one for the Associated Press. Never mind that the state legislative beat remains uncovered by our local rag.

A prefiled bill for the next House session creates a two-tiered diploma for South Carolina. One track would require 24 credits for those planning on college, and one require 20 credits for those not. Ostensibly, this is a cost-cutting measure, although it may turn out to be good policy.

So far, so good, as far as reporting goes.

But wait. Which four credits are deemed unnecessary by this bill? Nary a word. Is this a secret, or does the reporter (Seanna Adcox) show a remarkable lack of curiosity?

You decide.

75 Calhoun at Fault; Not CCSD Principals

Are they too protective of their jobs to say so?

Why should CCSD's high school principals track the movements of students who graduated from their feeder middle schools so that they can calculate graduation rates? This information should be supplied by the district administration. They are the ones who know who was in CCSD eighth grades!

Still, it is remarkable that only one-third of students from feeder schools for West Ashley actually graduate from that high school.

Funny. That was about the graduation rate for St. Andrews 50 years ago when school attendance was not required.

CCSD: No Teachers' Advice on Test Scores

A yearly survey by the Charleston Teacher Alliance has discovered that the majority of its responding teachers do not want to be judged by a single multiple-choice test of their students. So reports the P&C in Saturday's edition.

The Charleston County School District has not seen fit to conduct its own survey of all classroom teachers whose students take such tests.

Why not?

Speaker Harrell: Transparency Starts in CCSD

What a great idea House Speaker Bobby Harrell has: require public colleges in South Carolina to post all expenditures on line--transparency!

WAIT! Doesn't that idea sound familiar?

Of course. The same was proposed for CCSD by David Engelman when he was a member of the Charleston County School Board. They were going to "look into it," although 75 Calhoun anticipated too many problems and expenses would probably be involved.

Yeah, right.

The Case of the Disappearing Students in CCSD

Greg Mathis Charter School has 80 students enrolled, but last when visited only 33 were in attendance. What is the per pupil cost of running the school?

What's wrong with this picture?

CCSD's Future Virtually Empty?

Friday's P&C article on the growth of virtual schooling in South Carolina should be a quiet reminder to the Charleston County School District: maybe, just maybe, "big box" schools are not the wave of the future!

Kobrovsky Appointed to State Board of Ed

Larry Kobrovsky, former CCSD Board of Trustees member and recent thorn in the side of Superintendent Nancy McGinley, has been appointed to the State Board of Education.

Kobrovsky says he's interested in seeing better discipline in the classroom.

Go Larry!

Well, Why Didn't You Ask For a Break?

The Charleston Teacher Alliance's latest survey of Charleston County teachers hits on one of the more demeaning aspects of a classroom teacher's job: lunch duty.

Anyone who has taught full-time in a K through 12 environment knows the frustrations of days spent without opportunities to visit the restroom, much less have a few quiet minutes to himself or herself for mental and emotional rearmament. What other profession requiring a college degree would accept these working conditions?

Superintendent McGinley's response can be summed up as, "Well, now that I know how you feel, maybe CCSD can do something about it."

One more little fire to put out.

Chamber of Commerce Takes Over CCSD Board

They've finally shown their true colors: electing Chris Fraser as chairman of the Charleston County School Board of Trustees guarantees that the Chamber of Commerce now controls the actions of the CCSD Board.

Chris Fraser's connections to the Chamber of Commerce are well known, as were those of his predecessor from the Chamber of Commerce. In fact, it would not be a stretch to claim that there is a seat reserved on the Board for a Chamber of Commerce representative. Perhaps Fraser's taking control was payback for the Chamber's taking the initiative to spearhead the Yes4Schools campaign to pass the sales tax increase.

What most taxpayers do not know, since it was done by sleight-of-hand, is that the Yes4Schools campaign run by the Chamber was funded by part of the $40,000 given by CCSD to the Chamber for its Education Foundation.

This was an illegal move by CCSD to fund the campaign under the radar because it was forbidden from using its own budget.

That's right. Your tax dollars at work.

P.S. The four newly-elected members have performed predictably so far, including Craig Ascue, who rapidly caved to the Superintendent's wishes when it came to a vote. Maybe he will figure out what's really going on, given time.

McGinley Ready to Pat Herself on the Back

Fresh off her win on the sales tax increase, the Charleston County Schools Superintendent, Nancy McGinley, has decided that the taxpayers are in a spending mood.

How else to explain her adding to Monday's agenda a proposal for a $15,000 salary increase and extension of her contract? (Well, of course it could be a stratagem to see if the newly elected members will be lapdogs.)

What has the superintendent done besides raising our sales taxes to merit an increase?

• She has read the paper and discovered that CCSD suffers from a lack of literacy;


• She has played hopscotch with principals and assistant principals until no one is sure who's at what school any more;


• She has closed five schools so that she can brag about improving the district's track record in meeting NCLB;


• She has increased busing exponentially and eliminated neighborhood schools;


• She has consulted with Chicken Little and discovered that the San Francisco earthquake is coming to Charleston; and


• She has stonewalled a proper audit of district spending or the transparency of putting district expenditures on line.

For this we already pay nearly $200,000 per year. What a joke.