JEFFERSON CITY - Missouri’s education commissioner said she is optimistic that Normandy schools will have enough money to remain open for the coming school year, but the final recommendation will come from the district’s appointed governing board.
Commissioner Margie Vandeven made her comments after members of the state board of education strongly criticized the education bill now sitting on Gov. Jay Nixon’s desk. However, they stopped short of calling on Nixon to veto the bill. Board members were clearly upset about provisions that would allow increased enrollment in virtual schools, with public money paying the tuition. Nixon has said he would study the lengthy bill closely before deciding whether to sign it or veto it, like he did with a school bill last year.
The expansion of virtual schools is one of several provisions in the bill designed to give more options to students attending unaccredited schools. Board members said they are not opposed to virtual education, where students learning via computer, but they worry about how to make sure those schools are doing the job they are supposed to do.
Board Vice President Mike Jones of St. Louis worried that out-of-state operators could come into the St. Louis market and gain enrollment with techniques such as giveaways like pizzas or Cardinals caps.
Once students are enrolled, he added, districts “would have to write a check to somebody in Florida or Texas that nobody has ever seen.”
In an interview, Jones added this about virtual schools:
“It gives flexibility and access to students and teachers. But just to create an environment where you just send money anywhere in America and get on the computer and take a class — I mean literally it’s a license to steal, is what I’d call it.”
Board President Peter Herschend of Branson was equally negative about the provisions for expanded virtual schools.
“I am deeply disappointed that the education community did not have enough guts to get together and see to it that this didn’t happen. It did happen, and it is wrong," he said
“We ought not to be passive on this and just say 'I guess it just happened to us,'" he added. "We ought to be active in opposing this particular provision.”
But when the question arose about whether the board should pass a resolution asking Nixon to veto the bill, Herschend and others backed off.
Charlie Shields of St. Joseph, a former lawmaker who was elected Tuesday to succeed Herschend as president, said he wanted to make sure the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education doesn’t make itself unwelcome in upcoming discussions about how the bill will be implemented.
“Part of me says we need to be a little bit careful so we can be part of the solution in the discussion next year,” Shields said.
Herschend pointed to the board’s traditional stance of offering facts on legislation but not recommendations on whether bills should be signed.
“We have benefitted over the years of walking that narrow line of not getting on one side of a bill or another,” he said, “because you’re guaranteed to lose half of your support.”
The outlook for Normandy
On Normandy, Vandeven noted that it was just a year ago Wednesday that the board voted to create the Normandy Schools Collaborative, dissolving the old Normandy school district. She pointed out that the district has named Charles Pearson as its permanent superintendent, and said it’s time to refocus the discussion from whether the district can survive to how it can most effectively use its money to raise student achievement.
“They’re not interested in working in survival mode,” she said in an interview. “They’re interested in providing good opportunities for children. So we need to get past the discussion of do we have enough finances to survive and really talk about how we’re going to use those finances to provide educational opportunities for kids.”
Vandeven said that even though 544 students in Normandy are likely to transfer to other schools next year, the district’s cost-cutting plus efforts it is making to collaborate with other districts should help put it on firm enough financial footing to last the whole school year. She previously had said that if it didn’t appear that its budget was strong enough to survive the entire year, she would recommend that Normandy not open in August.
The final recommendation from Normandy’s appointed board is expected next month.
Election of officers
Earlier in the meeting, Jones – who has served as vice president of the board – said he did not want to serve as president because he did not feel he would be effective in dealing with the Republican-dominated legislature.
Instead, the board unanimously elected as president Shields of St. Joseph, a Republican who formerly served as the president pro tem of the Missouri Senate. Vic Lenz, a Republican from south St. Louis County, was elected vice president. He served as president of the Missouri School Boards Association from 2011 to 2012 and was most recently the president of the Lindbergh School Board of Education.
Jones said his decision not to become president of the board is purely his choice and that he wishes to avoid “crazy conspiracy theories” about why one of two African Americans on the eight-member board was not elevated to the top spot. He said he could be more effective advocating for students in underperforming districts if he was not president.
Noting that he is a “black, liberal urban Democrat,” Jones said it was important for the state board to have “the right person in the right place at the right time,” and Shields would fill that description. He noted that, along with Shields, board members Joe Driskill and Maynard Wallace also have served in the legislature, and their perspectives would carry more weight with lawmakers.
Instead of leading the board, Jones said he wants to focus on improving education for students in districts that are struggling. “I want to focus exclusively on these children” he told the board, adding that he would be “a committed adversary prepared to fight for as long as it takes.”
Jones’ comments were not the only ones that emphasized what the board needs to do for students in underperforming schools, where the enrollment is largely African-American. Representatives from schools in Caruthersville and Hayti, both in southeast Missouri, presented updates on how they plan to improve student performance.
In both cases, they stressed the need for early intervention and for personnel whose primary focus is not just managing their schools but stronger academic achievement.
During several moments of the meeting, Bill Monroe, a member of the elected school board for the St. Louis Public Schools, held up a sign that read “Black Lives Matter.”
