It was what one civic group leader called a “groundbreaking” moment at the Lafayette Parish School Board meeting Wednesday night when the board voted 5-3 to add to its superintendent selection committee a representative from the 100 Black Men of Greater Lafayette and the Lafayette Parish Public Education Stakeholders Council.
Board member Hunter Beasley proposed that a representative from each of the organizations team up with the nine board members in making a recommendation on narrowing down the superintendent search to 10 applicants. Once the board approves the top 10 applicants, the two reps from the civic groups will no longer sit on the panel.
Board members Tehmi Chassion, Kermit Bouillion, Mark Cockerham and Shelton Cobb joined Beasley in supporting the new additions to the committee.
“I’ve spoken at length with Mr. Beasley and other members of this board about the attempt to bridge the gap in the community,” 100 Black Men President Patrick Williams tells The Advertiser. “This is a groundbreaking moment. I’m an emotional guy, so my insides are shaking because I know how important this is.”
But Beasley’s proposal was met with some expected opposition from board members Tommy Angelle, Rae Trahan and board President Mark Babineaux. Their no votes offer yet another exhibit of a 5-4 split among board members when it comes to critical reform issues facing Lafayette Parish schools. Board member Greg Awbrey, who often sides with Trahan, Angelle and Babineaux, was absent.
Recent polls published in The Daily Advertiser further demonstrate the visible chasm on the board. When asked to complete a survey ranking the top 10 priorities for the school board, Angelle, Trahan, Babineaux and Awbrey refused:
Trahan declined to participate, saying she was too busy with work commitments to fill out the survey, which was e-mailed to her on Aug. 4, 10 days prior to publication. When told that a majority of other board members had made time to make public their priorities, Trahan replied, “That’s not the point. I bet they couldn’t walk a week in my shoes.”
In an e-mail response, Babineaux declined to participate, calling the issues listed “agenda-oriented” and “blatant propaganda.” He added that the list was not a “fair and accurate assessment of realistic expectations” for a superintendent, that many decisions are out of the board’s and the superintendent’s hands, that he strongly opposes charter schools, and that everyone is welcome to participate in the board-sponsored community forums and online surveys.
Starting at 6 p.m. Thursday at Thibodeaux Career and Technical High School, residents are invited to give their take on what they want to see in a new top schools administrator during the first of six public forums to be held at each of the district’s high schools. Click here to complete an online survey from LPSS.
Read more on the board’s search for a super here and here.
For more on the state of Lafayette Parish schools and the significance of a new superintendent, read The Independent’s May 11 editorial, “Help Wanted.”
MAY 17 Here's a column from James Gill, this time in the Advocate. Gill, who has jumped ship from the Picayune, writes about the absurdity of dueling polls in this post. The numbers are so wildly different, it is obvious that both sides are "cooking the books," he writes. In particular, he looks at Sen. Mary Landrieu, and how her recent actions in DC have been received by those polled. Gill's acerbic, amusing prose is a welcome addition to a paper so conservative as to be occasionally lacking in personality.
MAY 17 Blogger Tom Aswell continues delivering bombshells about the state education department and Gov. Jindal's education "reform" efforts. In this post, he reports that students in the Shreveport area have been signed up for a charter school without their knowledge or consent. Most interesting to Aswell is how this Texas-based charter (with ties to GOP types) got the personal student information it has, if the students didn't give it.
MAY 17 This post by JR Ball in the Baton Rouge Business Report is an interesting tongue-in-cheek look at recent Baton Rouge economic development efforts. Among the items he examines is the idea that gaining a Costco makes BR a "world-class city." (Really? All you need is a different brand of Sam's? MK!) This effort, and other recent ones, are all built on the taxpayer's back, with tax zones, tax incentives and tax rebates, Ball writes.
MAY 17 Blogger CB Forgotston is critical of the legislature's reliance on a revenue-estimating committee's decision to include projected tax amnesty income in this year's forecast. That's a problem, CB posts, because the deadline for these people to pay their taxes is June 30, 2014. So when do you think these people who haven't paid taxes in years are going to pay their taxes? Surely not before June 30, and that means the money won't be there for this year's budget, he argues.
MAY 17 Here's an interesting blog out of California by a Hollywood writer, attorney and academic named Brian Alan Lane. He blogs about higher ed, and was a whistle-blower in a scandal over false credentials. In this post, he takes aim at LSU's new top dog, King Alexander. It's convoluted and a little confusing, but it sure makes Alexander a lot more interesting than he was yesterday.
MAY 17 Blogger Robert Mann writes about the LSU Board's refusal to allow Dr. Fred Cerise to testify before the legislature about Gov. Jindal's plan to close down all the state's charity hospitals and dump the poor on the private system. It's hard to imagine anyone more qualified than Cerise to testify about that, so why would anyone try to prevent him doing so? Mann thinks it is because the powers that be aren't interested in hearing any truth about the plan.
MAY 17 This post on the Louisiana Sinkhole Bugle, a blog that notes developments in the Bayou Corne and Jefferson Island salt domes, talks about a proposed expansion of the salt dome storage under Lake Peigneur in Iberia Parish. Residents are working against it for several reasons, including two biggies: the sinkhole disaster in Bayou Corne and the continuing, unexplained bubbling on the surface of the Lake.
MAY 17 NOLA police arrested more people Thursday accused of either being involved in the Mother's Day shooting or hiding the suspect afterward, this Gambit story reports. The NOLA police chief said he suspects the whole thing was gang-related and throws out a challenge to the gangs: he's got informants now, he says, and he knows a lot more than the gangs want him to know. The people who live in the neighborhoods terrorized by gangs are ready to talk, he says.
Most Read
in case you missed it
Subscribe to this comment's feed