Queen Holds Court

Deep in the bowels of the Concrete Palace behind the multiple locked doors the EVIL Ones convened a meeting of the unholy coven. Around the table sat the Queen herself and the mini-me Wanna Be Queen. They drummed their fingers on the table and looked disapprovingly at the drones who sat cowering in the corner. Things were not going well in the Overachieving School District.

Their plan to fire the IAT director and blame everything wrong in the district on him was not working as they planned. They miscalculated the brains of the worker drones, they actually could think for themselves. The Queen slapped her hand on the table and roared, “Why did it not work! They should be praising me by now!” The Wanna Be Queen twisted her hands and sheepishly stated, ”Oh Queen, it will work out, let me fire a few more in IAT and they will soon see the light!” “Not quick enough!”, screamed the Queen, “The Board should be showering me with praise by now!” She threw her crown onto the table, “The plan is not working, they are seeing through the smoke!” She fell back into her chair and put her hands together, “A new plan must be devised. I cannot let them learn the truth.” The drones scurried away to their work cubicles like cockroaches in the light. “Let them not question the power of the Queen……..”

Sounds like a Stephen King novel? If we could be so lucky…. No this is real life; the names were changed to identify the guilty. The school district continues its downward plunge. The amazing thing is that the newspaper has failed to catch on at all. The changes going down border on ludicrous but they go unnoticed since they are usually done in secret by the board hoping that nobody notices.

What ever happened to the open philosophy of the district? Though many did not agree in years past with the changes made at least they were mostly in the open and available for discussion. Now unless you have the code to the secret vault you will never find out until it comes crashing down on the employees. In the past few weeks many employees were given their walking papers and positions eliminated (Of course none from the Queens inner core) without a word of discussion by the board. Of course who would really know? The real decisions are made at the semi-secret Friday morning board meetings which conveniently are held at a time when most parents, employees, and the media cannot attend. The first Thursday meetings are the “media events” with all the back slapping and the robotic smiles that bleed “everything is ok.” I’m surprised they don’t have a bubble machine spewing out happy bubbles so all the TV audience can be assured that it’s a wonderful place. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain pulling the levers…….

So instead of closing underused schools the Queen and her Merry Band of Board Members are trying to boost the populations by secretly trying to rezone the district. One big problem with this philosophy, they actually have to tell the parents what they are doing and that just won’t work. The citizens of Danville may be naïve but they are not totally stupid. They know where their children ought to go to school. As soon as a few complain loudly this will go away and whoever suggested it will be banished to the nether regions. They don’t want to face the obvious, a school or schools need to be closed to save money and operate the district on, perish the thought, a sound financial basis. But no board member has thought of that yet, they can’t slap anyone on the back about closing a school!

Lets see what else is being done in secret. How about dismantling the vo-tech program, getting rid of the only staff person looking after its interest, and completely obliterating the adult ed program? Didn’t read about any of that in the paper have you? Schools are being asked to do with less and less while the central office suffers no loss of power. What about curriculum people who only add loads of paperwork on teachers? How about a human resource department that has more people then ever yet still can’t get licensing straight? How about support personnel being quietly eliminated while the central office doesn’t lose as much as a paperclip?

But not all is lost. In the last few weeks people in Danville are beginning to wake up. Moves are afoot to unseat the entire group of incompetent board members coming up for election next year. They are finally seeing the light. Now if council would ever wake up and see how the city money is being wasted then things would really change. If these events were to come to pass the Queen indeed would be wringing her hands in the Concrete Palace.