SCPR "ELECTION 2009 SERIES (VOL 15): NORTHWEST SCHOOLS - APATHY PREVAILS, HOW LONG CAN THIS SCHOOL SYSTEM LAST?

Perhaps in a few years Northwest students will be a part of the Massillon School District or another close by district?

There are two elections for the school board this November.

First, there is a slate of three running for three full-term (4 years) positions.  There is no competition is this race.

Second, there are three candidates running to fill two "unexpired" terms.

Because there is no competition for the full-term positions, the SCPR is going to give short shrift to this part of the Northwest school board election.

The apathy/disgust is soooooooooooo strong in Northwest that the race includes a candidate (Beadle) who is a "home schooler" at heart.  He did appear at the Canal Fulton Library candidates night last Wednesday, but it seems as if he is a recent convert to the public school system because he says he has a "special needs" child.

As a taxpaying citizen, he certainly has a right to run.  But how committed, dedicated can a board member be when he has historically had no confidence in the public school system.  Also disturbing was his pleasure at being in a school district (Northwest) with half the property taxes of his former district (Copley - Summit County).

To the SCPR, the addition of Mr. Beadle is a sign that Northwest is headed toward public school oblivion in terms of how we identify the Canal Fulton, Clinton, Lawrence Township, New Franklin, North Lawrence and Wayne County (only a small part of the district) as being the Northwest Local School District.

There may be some hope for Northwest with at least one of the candidates for the "unexpired" two positions that three candidates are vying for.

Where does the hope come from?

From Nicole Metzger, that's who.

The SCPR was not impressed when the Northwest school board circumvented an "open to the public at large" application process to pick Mrs. Metger to succeed her husband who passed away recently.

Short-circuiting the public is a symptom of very, very deep problems with the the board at Northwest.

Notwithstanding, the SCPR's condemnation of the board for cutting out the public, it turns out that Nicole Metzger is "the best of the bunch" in the opinion of yours truly based on her presentation at the candidates night.

She owned up to the huge "lack of trust" problem that the Northwest school board and administration has and seems to have the spunk/etermination to deal with it as well as a forthright willingness to take input from the citizens of the district.

It is inspiring to see a person such as Nicole Metzger, who has gone through an excruciatingly difficult personal tragedy,  to apparently be the person who will redeem the public trust, if anyone can.

It certainly will not be Stephen C. Jones.  The SCPR's take on Jones, over the years of being familiar with him and his tenure on the board (broken for a period of time because he didn't get enough qualifying signatures for one election cycle), is that he is on the arrogant/dismissive side and thereby is likely a huge reason why the board has gotten in such disfavor with the board's constituents.

He reinforces the SCPR's take on him by, one, not appearing at the candidates night and, two, by not turning in answers to a questionnaire sent to him by The Repository.

While Victor Colaianni is questionable credentials to be a school board member, he has to be a better bet than Jones.  Colaianni will most likely be more attentive to Northwest's consumers of education that Jones.  However, the SCPR does have questions about his judgment.  Hopefully, he has improved.  He is a former member of the Canal Fulton City Council.

Here is a video of the Metzger and Colaianni presentations at the Canal Fulton Friends of the Library candidate night.

NORTHWEST SCHOOLS SERIES: VOLUME 2 - WHO RESPONDED TO THE SURVEY?

In order to repair its relationship with the Canal Fulton, Clinton and Lawrence Township community (CCLT), the Northwest Local School District (NWLSD) has a job to do making sure that CCLT folks are informed about the schools.

Most of the respondants to the Northwest Local Schools 2009 Community Survey (NWLS2009CS) conducted in June, 2009 feel they are informed about the local schools system.
But are they?

Area media have published numerous articles about the financial straits of the Northwest schools as a consequence of citizens' refusal to vote for operating levies for 10 successive tries and the Ohio Department of Education placing Northwest in its "fiscal caution" category of Ohio schools in financial trouble in July, 2008.
And yet as the following graph shows, nearly 7 out 10 survey respondents were "unaware" that Northwest schools were in financial distress.

Later in this series, the SCPR will show data from the NWLS2009CS showing that schools/citizen communication is not a Northwest school board and administration strength.

In the opinion of the SCPR, the only way the Northwest schools will make CCLT citizenry a "truly" informed body is for board members to "hit the road" and embark on a systematic and thorough person-to-person contact on an annual basis.

But will they do it?

Probably not.

Many if not most board members have an unrealistic take on the hard work that is inherent in being an effective board member. One of the hardest parts is finding a way (home visits, personal letters, e-mails, telephone calls and the like) to be in one-on-one contact with community members.

Numbers from this survey (which the SCPR does not believe incorporates much of the hard core resistance to a new operating levy and which the SCPR will publish in future volumes in this series), indicate a high amount of distrust of the Northwest board and administration from the "more school friendly part" of the CCLT community.

Unless and until the board makes a focused and continuing effort to get into a one-on-one dialogue with the community, the distrust is likely to persist and, perhaps, worsen.

Getting a levy passed in an environment of distrust in Northwest or in any school district very unlikely.

NORTHWEST SCHOOLS SERIES: VOLUME 1 - DID THE BOARD OF EDUCATION NEED TO SPEND $13,000 THEY DON'T HAVE TO FIGURE OUT THAT THEY HAVE A TRUST PROBLEM?

Recently, the Northwest schools decided it need to get out in the community to do a survey to document what almost certainly the board members already intuitively knew: Northwest schools have a community credibility problem.

So you have a school district on financial "life support" that somehow could did up $13,000 plus to learn what they already knew but did not get into the core of the opposition group of voters to the 10 time failed levies.

Over a period of time the SCPR is going to be slicing and dicing that survey for which the field work was done June 11 through June 13, 2009.

It might come to mind to SCPR readers that this series only pertains to Canal Fulton, Clinton and Lawrence Township readers of the blog.

But hold on a minute.

There are problems out there across Stark County with all of the 17 school districts. Jackson and Plain schools only recently passed "survivor" level levies. Soon they will be back for more. Minerva, Fairless and Norrtwest face immediate financial crises.

However, there are more waiting in the wings. Most likely all of the remaining districts with North Canton at the head of the list.

Lake schools have to be particularly nervous given the fact that they were bounced by the voters 70% to 30% on a school bond issue within the past year.

So all you readers need to be applying the lessons of this serious to your own school district.

BACK TO NORTHWEST.

To the SCPR, to get rejected by the voters in 10 straight elections is proof enough in and of itself to establish that the voters do not trust the judgment of school administrators and board members to take their word for it that more funds are needed to keep the schools afloat and that they will be spent judiciously and wisely.

The SCPR has scanned through through the "Northwest Local Schools 2009 Community Survey" (NLS2009CS) and over the coming weeks and, perhaps, months will go over the survey with a fine toothed comb.

What strikes the SCPR right out of the gate is how clearly "cherry-picked" the participants of the survey were. Obviously, this survey went in the main to school district constituents who support the schools election-in and election-out. Knowing him as yours truly does, yours truly can see from the make up the survey that Northwest superintendent William Stetler has the major role if not the only role in working with The Impact Group of Hudson, Ohio to put the survey together.

Stetler is a "pollyanish" type who is typical of superintendents these days who are more politician than they are administrator. No doubt there are strong political and public relations factors to getting school levies passed this day and age. However, it has come to a "political and public relations" approach because school administrators and board members have not stayed in close contact with the basic attitude of school district voters.

Also interesting is how The Impact Group describes itself, to wit:

The SCPR's initial take on this believed to be Stetler public relations/political based survey, is that it is not designed to get to the core of community dissatisfaction, but rather to finesse the matter enough to get a "survivor" levy passed.

Stetler really (in the opinion of the SCPR) wanted to try again this November to get a levy passed as witness by the calling of and holding of a special board meeting to air out reported "community interest" in going right back at it with a November effort even in the light a increased voter opposition in November, 2008.

But the Stetler "closet" (in the sense he referred to a phantom groundswell - noted by their absence at the August 5th "special" board meeting) effort failed and the board wisely decided to embark on a "rebuilding public trust" initiative before trying again.

The SCPR has already suggested a mechanism that the board (if they are up to a "roll of the sleeves" effort) can implement to really and truly turn things around in the school district so that passing levies will again be doable. Not easy, but doable.

The same can be done throughout Stark County. Alliance, Canton, Massillon, Jackson, Plain and Lake could be difficult because the populations are significantly larger than most Stark school districts but by employing focus, determination and persistence; even the larger school districts could really get into the nitty gritty of their constituents.

Even though is not impressed with the selected base of The Impact Group survey on the Northwest schools, in the coming time period the SCPR will be parsing the survey with an analysis of what it says about Northwest schools from a cherry-picked - on the whole - respondent group.

NORTHWEST SCHOOLS: CAN SCHOOL OFFICIALS RE-BUILD TRUST?

A major problem in Stark County these days, is the build up of mistrust by many of our citizens of Stark's local units of government.

Mistrust is all around us.

Canton and its mayor. Marlboro Township and its trustees. North Canton and some of its citizens. And Canal Fulton/Lawrence Township citizens and their schools.

To be sure, there are quite a number of other examples.

But you get the point.

As does board member Gindlesberger of the Northwest Board of Education.

Gindlesberger is quoted in The Massillon Independent piece No action means no Nov. levy for N'West (at yesterday's meeting [August 5, 2009], which was billed as an exploratory meeting as to whether or not Northwest should make another levy attempt in the face of ten consecutive defeats, as follows:

The trust issue is huge. It’s something that we may not even correct by May. We are not one community. We are two communities and we have to fix that.

Northwest will not pass a levy until it makes substantial progress in re-building trust. Superintendent Stetler can pontificate all he wants to, to wit:

What we are doing is verging on immoral. We can’t do this to our children just because adults can’t get along. We’re going to fight like heck to get an issue passed.

Gindlesberer appears to be, and hopefully the rest of the board is, way ahead of Stetler who talks about a "new strategy - a new offensive plan."

It is about trust and it is not about politically outmaneuvering the voting public as "Stetler talk" seems to suggest.

Let's see, there about 5,000 households in Canal Fulton and Lawrence Township. There are 5 board members. 5,000 divided by 5 equals 1,000. So if each board member were to take on being in touch (via e-mail, snail mail, home visits, telephone calls - whatever works for a particular household) with 1,000 households over the course of a calendar year, maybe just maybe, you would have the beginnings of re-building trust in the Northwest Local School District.

Over a five year cycle (by switching 1000 blocks), each board member will have endeavored to be in touch with each and every household in the Canal Fulton/Lawrence Township community.

Rebuilding trust would mean "really listening" to willing community participants. It would mean communicating the "partnership aspect of educating children" to the willing. It would mean a constructing "a climate of willingness to change my point-of-view in the context of rational, factually based dialogue."

The is a huge difference between the "rebuilding trust" model and the Stetler model of "finessing the voter for this election" model.

Board members will remain in the community. The superintendent is not likely to.

The will have continuing accountability, the superintendent will not.

In the news article about the August 5th meeting, there is way to much focus on the superintendent. He is a transitory figure. Stetler has already retired and rehired at Lake. He took a education job in Columbus based on his Republican political ties. When Strickland bounced the Republican, Stetler was history. That's how he ended up back in Stark County to the only superintendent job available to him at the time.

Northwest board members need to reassert control of their schools. The day of the "expert" superintendent fostered by the likes of Stetler and Lambes before him are gone forever. School superintendents are fast losing the public confidence because for the most part they are not community people but merely professional moving through.

So it is up to the abiding Canal Fulton/Northwest element to re-build trust: the local board of education members, that's who.

Can Northwest do it by February?

Probably not.

But today is the day for each and every member of the Northwest Board of Education to begin the challenging task of rebuilding trust in the Canal Fulton/Lawrence Township community!