Sunday, March 14, 2010

A SCPR SERIES: VOLUME 2 - IS THE LAKE BOARD OF EDUCATION POISED TO PUT "GOD BACK IN THE LAKE SCHOOLS?" SOME ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS BY A LAKE SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER

Back in December, 2009, the storied Lake backing of God fell apart.  The Lake Board of Education (BOE), by a 5 - 0 vote, "temporarily" (the members say) took God out of the school district's mission statement because of a complaint by a local resident through the Freedom from Religion Foundation which is located in Madison, Wisconsin.  The complaint was lodged in August, 2009.

Lake juniors Mackenzie Michalk and Alex Looney ("the pro-God group") have formed a group to contest the December, 2009 vote.

At the February, 2010 regular Lake Board meeting, the pro-God group mustered 91 supporters to advocate that the Board re-install the belief in God language in the mission statement.  But to no avail.  The Board refused to act in February and every indication now is that the Board will not make any change, if ever, until after the system has reconvened its Strategic Planning Committee (which generated the mission statement - in the first place - back in the 1990s) to reconsider the matter in the context of getting a sense of the Lake community.


Board member Ken Brott appeared at a "the pro-God group" meeting held at the Stark County District Library (Lake Branch) on Thursday night (March 11th).


The meeting was called to marshal supporters to come up with ways and means to bring out "the pro-God group" supporters en-masse to the March 15th Lake Board of Education regular board meeting.


Even if "the pro-God" group successfully brings out its supporters, will it make any difference?


Apparently, not.


Board member Brott told the SCPR on Thursday that the Board has already decided that the God-value language will remain excised from the district's mission at least for the time being.


However, the SCPR believes that the language will not be reappearing in the mission statement in the foreseeable future.


Why is that?


Because Brott in his appearance before "the pro-God group" made statements that indicates to The Report that the Lake Board has fully considered the pros and cons of - in terms of inviting litigation - reinstituting the contested language.

So is there any point of " the pro-God group" showing up?

Probably not, unless, of course, the mission is not to effect a change but to convince the Board that "the pro-God group" is representative of the Lake community and therefore ought to be heeded over the longer term.


The Report has put together a video in Q&A (framed by yours truly) format of Brott interacting with "the pro-God group" to provide SCPR blog readers a sense of why the Lake Board of Education will not be acting to undo the Board's December, 2009 decision anytime soon.


Question 1 - Why did Brott appear at "the pro-God group" meeting?

 

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