“line-height: 13px; font-family: Verdana;”>For the first time in years, East St. Louis School District 189 is beginning to show glimmers of hope and progress with the arrival of Jed Deets.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Deets, former superintendent of Cahokia School District 187, was recently appointed by the State of Illinois as the interim superintendent of School District 189, and some would say that he has his work cut out for him.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>However, with a reputation as a highly competent superintendent for Cahokia (both fiscally and academically), Deets produced success for Cahokia in terms of exceptional results in the classroom and in unifying Cahokia’s parents and community leadership. That’s good news for ESL.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>And, facing a projected $18 million annual budget deficit, Deets has managed to hit the ground running with a combination of layoffs and cuts which are projected to erase that deficit entirely.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Most of the cuts are common-sense elimination of personnel and services, which ESL School Board members refused to implement due to the sad reality that many of the individuals were either relatives, cronies, “jump-offs,” “hook-ups” or so-called “consultants.”
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Those cuts combined earlier teacher layoffs with two rounds of job eliminations of noncertified or nonteaching positions. Some of the positions cut included teacher aides, custodians, and a director of security under whose watch 100 laptop computers were stolen from buildings with improperly installed surveillance cameras (he needed to go).
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>All told, approximately $18 million in debt was erased and this guy is just getting warmed up.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Deets also has announced that the state and local board have agreed on a six-point plan, including: improving programs in all schools, identifying specific needs for all schools, implementing a plan for school board member training, preparing a corrective plan for noncompliance to meet state requirements, adopting short and long-term fiscal plans and creating a facilities plan for the district.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>The only piece missing from Deets’ plan is a forensic investigation into corruption in School District 189.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>You see, the problem with ESL Schools is that between the last oversight of the district and the current one, many of the same board members (due to voter apathy and a healthy dose of, I suspect, vote fraud) have remained, only to return to their wicked ways as soon as no one was looking over their shoulders, thus the current state takeover.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Rumors have abounded for decades that, in ESL, many teachers and consultants “pay-to-play”, i.e., many pay in order to be employed, promoted or “hooked-up” with lucrative consulting contracts.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>That opens the door for kickbacks to the respective board members or superintendents who vote on such personnel and business matters.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Those rumors need to, either, be put to rest or investigated thoroughly with the guilty parties prosecuted and removed. That alone would restore a degree of morale and integrity to School District 189. And morale and integrity are priceless, especially in East Boogie.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Since the voters of ESL, for whatever reason, won’t solve the problem at the ballot box, this may be the only way of, at least, beginning to eliminate the individuals who are responsible for the problems which have plagued ESL schools for decades.
“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>I believe that Jed Deets is smart enough to realize that fact and I look forward to progress in this key area as well.
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“line-height: 115%; font-family: Verdana; font-size: 9pt;”>Email: jtingram_1960@yahoo.com.
