After returning from vacation I sat down to read the accumulation of newspapers the neighbors had graciously saved for me. The papers were filled with stories about the beginning of school and how children all over the area were anxiously awaiting the first day of school. My own daughter was excited as she carefully chose what clothes to wear and what school supplies she needed. One story in the paper caught my eye about the AYP of the city schools. I am the first to admit I am not a mathematician I looked at the names of the schools that did not make the mark. By rough calculations the number of students at these listed schools was over fifty percent of the students in the district. So how could the district have passed AYP if so many students and schools did not make the cut? Voodoo math? Oh how this district can make figures dance! So school board what’s up? Are we playing fast and furious with the figures? Are the hands quicker then the eyes? More on this later……………
The blog has reached a new milestone! Over 8,000 hits have been accumulated on the blog. According to the list we have visitors from California, New Mexico, Michigan, New York as well as Virginia and North Carolina. Most amazing is we have several viewers from Poland, France, England, and South America! In addition the blog is now carried as a link on at least ten other websites and blogs. This has been only through the efforts of you, the readers. I have received immense support in the form of written information, documents, e-mails, and several photographs. Many who submitted photos may be annoyed that I only printed a few of the pictures. This is because some of the pictures contained individuals and students who had nothing to do with the problem identified and I did not feel correct associating them with the situation. Anyone who submits pictures in the future please try to adhere to these policies. Submit any article, information, pics, or documents to savetheschools2@aol.com.
Take note, the school board elections are only nine months away. Are there no brave souls willing to give the district a fighting chance? I know many employees who do an excellent job day after day. They need someone to be on their team, not the team of personal vendettas. For these people give some thought to running.
Here are just a few of the submissions I have received:
From someone lamenting the IT situation:
“The IT dept is a step child as you say and many stupid things have happened there……..” and “….that department is slowly becoming corrupted.
Another readers states:
“Many of us are eagerly awaiting your comments--as always! You'd be surprised how many out-of-towners (even across the country) read your blog!!! Witty, entertaining, and unfortunately, truthful."
From a frustrated employee:
“All they know how to do is to keep their heads above water. They lost the only forward thinking employees they ever had. I'm sure if you continue to probe, you'll find even more skeletons in that closet. “
It is comments like these that keep the blog moving forward. One cannot sit by and let it happen and not say or do anything. The students and the parents deserve better. The beginning of the school year is a happy occasion for the students. Lets make the future just as happy.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Tales From The IT Crypt
As promised this blog will focus on the IT department at DPS or as its referred to “Tales from the Crypt”. The name evolves from the point that the IT department has been buried in the bowels of the Concrete Palace never to see the light of day. It has become the “red headed stepchild” of the administration banished because of real or alleged problems.
Again from the beginning it has been a fiasco. After investing tens of thousands of dollars in the old Schoolfield complex just a few years ago (new AC, new carpeting, upgraded electrical, generator, etc.) the Queen decides to rip it up and transfer it to the Concrete Palace. The former IT head strongly opposed the move which of course sealed his fate and his future. The reasons were very valid since the city ran the fiber optic lines to the Schoolfield site specifically for DPS. But alas the Queen closed the complex so the department had to be moved.
So the department was moved into a space that is roughly half of their former location. The IT techs are lined up in cubicles that appear to have been designed by a very frustrated prison designer. The setting and design smacks in the face of all management principles intended to get maximum productivity. Though warned by the IT head the location was insufficient for the thermal load of the servers the Queen went ahead with her mandate. No sooner had they moved in then the servers overheated and suffered multiple failures. Again the never ending checkbook came to the rescue. A HUGE AC unit had to be added to cool the server rooms- just as they were warned but let’s not ever listen to the people that know!
The next step in the dismantling of the IT department was an assault on its budget. The slash and burn group decided that technological advancement was not in the school district’s future. Why? It was because money was needed to support pet projects of the Queen and her court of merry jesters. Not that the IT department did not need some trimming and tweaking but such surgery requires careful evaluation not wholesale slashing and burning. Thousands of dollars were cut from the budget and funneled to other departments to pay for pet projects. As a result the equipment replacement schedule of DPS started to suffer.
As complaints began to surface the Queen, as usual, began looking around for a scapegoat. Well who better then the IT head? So the palace ax fell on the IT director. On what grounds? A vague case was manufactured accusing the director of taking parts (instead of dumping them on a parking lot) for personal use, and their favorite accusation “working on private ventures on school board time”. No chance was given to the head to defend himself against the accusations; they dismissed the employee while he was out on medical leave! (Can we say coward?) And again the school board supported the decision like sheep. At the same time they put another employee on “revolving door human management”. Despite similar accusations as the IT head this employee was put on leave, brought back, fired, rehired, and put back to work. As has been the habit with this administration employee rights take a back seat. The Human Resource department is about as effective as Kate Gosslin’s birth control pills. IT department employees were threatened with termination if they discussed any of the issues in the department.
As if this wasn’t bad enough the Queen reached into her bag of “stupid ideas” and pulled out the ultimate crappy idea: make the assistant superintendent head of IT! No matter she lacks: a) experience in IT management, b) credentials to run such a department, c) a personality. How completely clueless can the board be?
So what has been the result of these decisions? From school sources the computer programs at the schools have been decimated. No plan of replacement or updating of labs has been developed, no long term plan exists, and the morale in the department is at an all time low. More resumes are being printed at the IT department then anything else. Anyone who could leave has done so for greener or more professional pastures.
To walk into the IT department resembles a visit to a penal institution. The long faces remind you of people serving time. It reminds a visitor of an episode of the “Twilight Zone”. At any minute you expect Rod Serling to step out and tell you its all a dream. The only problem is that you wake up and realize it’s for real. Who will free the prisoners?
Again from the beginning it has been a fiasco. After investing tens of thousands of dollars in the old Schoolfield complex just a few years ago (new AC, new carpeting, upgraded electrical, generator, etc.) the Queen decides to rip it up and transfer it to the Concrete Palace. The former IT head strongly opposed the move which of course sealed his fate and his future. The reasons were very valid since the city ran the fiber optic lines to the Schoolfield site specifically for DPS. But alas the Queen closed the complex so the department had to be moved.
So the department was moved into a space that is roughly half of their former location. The IT techs are lined up in cubicles that appear to have been designed by a very frustrated prison designer. The setting and design smacks in the face of all management principles intended to get maximum productivity. Though warned by the IT head the location was insufficient for the thermal load of the servers the Queen went ahead with her mandate. No sooner had they moved in then the servers overheated and suffered multiple failures. Again the never ending checkbook came to the rescue. A HUGE AC unit had to be added to cool the server rooms- just as they were warned but let’s not ever listen to the people that know!
The next step in the dismantling of the IT department was an assault on its budget. The slash and burn group decided that technological advancement was not in the school district’s future. Why? It was because money was needed to support pet projects of the Queen and her court of merry jesters. Not that the IT department did not need some trimming and tweaking but such surgery requires careful evaluation not wholesale slashing and burning. Thousands of dollars were cut from the budget and funneled to other departments to pay for pet projects. As a result the equipment replacement schedule of DPS started to suffer.
As complaints began to surface the Queen, as usual, began looking around for a scapegoat. Well who better then the IT head? So the palace ax fell on the IT director. On what grounds? A vague case was manufactured accusing the director of taking parts (instead of dumping them on a parking lot) for personal use, and their favorite accusation “working on private ventures on school board time”. No chance was given to the head to defend himself against the accusations; they dismissed the employee while he was out on medical leave! (Can we say coward?) And again the school board supported the decision like sheep. At the same time they put another employee on “revolving door human management”. Despite similar accusations as the IT head this employee was put on leave, brought back, fired, rehired, and put back to work. As has been the habit with this administration employee rights take a back seat. The Human Resource department is about as effective as Kate Gosslin’s birth control pills. IT department employees were threatened with termination if they discussed any of the issues in the department.
As if this wasn’t bad enough the Queen reached into her bag of “stupid ideas” and pulled out the ultimate crappy idea: make the assistant superintendent head of IT! No matter she lacks: a) experience in IT management, b) credentials to run such a department, c) a personality. How completely clueless can the board be?
So what has been the result of these decisions? From school sources the computer programs at the schools have been decimated. No plan of replacement or updating of labs has been developed, no long term plan exists, and the morale in the department is at an all time low. More resumes are being printed at the IT department then anything else. Anyone who could leave has done so for greener or more professional pastures.
To walk into the IT department resembles a visit to a penal institution. The long faces remind you of people serving time. It reminds a visitor of an episode of the “Twilight Zone”. At any minute you expect Rod Serling to step out and tell you its all a dream. The only problem is that you wake up and realize it’s for real. Who will free the prisoners?
Monday, August 10, 2009
Ramblings from the Peasants
Well I have received more response from the computer dump picture then just about anything else. I guess a picture is worth a thousand words! Interesting that it was immediately cleaned up and the stored mulch is now being sent out to schools. I really hope this is not falling back on the maintenance department. From what I have seen this department is the only one that seems to function relatively well. I guess not being in the Concrete Palace allows their brains not to be sucked dry. I wonder what kind of cuts they have had to endure? I wonder how they keep their sanity while the queen and her court hand down ridiculous edicts?
People have suggested that I am hitting my head against a wall and that nothing will change. Maybe not but at least I can say that council and the school board knew it but chose to do nothing. Let them live with the scarlet letter of shame for knowing and turning a blind eye to the problem. How many times do you have to shove their face in it before they respond? Has no one on either board have a backbone? When the whole district blows up not one of them better dare go on the record saying “I never knew…….”.
There is another interesting blog to look up. Its www.fixdanville.com . This extremely interesting site points out the many things that need to be fixed in Danville both in public and business locations. Take a look at send in your own nominations.
Don’t start lining up for jobs at the white mill just yet. As a skeptic I will wave the flag when they start moving dirt and actual construction gets under way. I wonder how they come up with the employment figures and salaries without a known tenant? Is this another example of “goosing the figures” that the city administration is so famous for?
Let’s look at the Yorktowne factory. The employment there never reached anywhere near its projections. The same is true for Luna Technologies. The politicians constantly quote the “7,000 jobs have been brought to Danville”. That’s PROJECTED jobs. How many are actually on the ground and filled? Not anywhere near that number. I would suggest the city stop using questionable numbers that never come to be. Who do they think they are, the school board? Oh that’s right, they only release numbers at their third Friday morning “special meetings” not at the televised first Thursday public meeting. Not to say the Friday meetings are not open to the public. Everyone can attend a 7:30 AM meeting on a Friday. Oh gosh, I forgot, some people have real jobs! Wouldn’t it be something if a lot of people started showing up at the Friday meetings? Jeez, they would have to change their meetings to Wednesdays at midnight………
Well school has started for the year round students. I guess the Concrete Palace monsters are slowly awakening from their summer slumber and looking around like bears yawning from a deep hibernation and saying, “What can we screw up now? Who can we eat? “ Stay out of their way! Remember council members, don’t feed the bears! I look forward to the start of another athletic season at GW. Any bets on when the first screw up will occur without an athletic director? Won’t take long I imagine…….
So brace yourself oh weary citizens, the monster is at the trough. Only time will tell what they slop out onto the floor.
Tune in next time for “Tales from the Crypt-or the IT Department” Send in your subjects and information to savetheschools2@aol.com.
People have suggested that I am hitting my head against a wall and that nothing will change. Maybe not but at least I can say that council and the school board knew it but chose to do nothing. Let them live with the scarlet letter of shame for knowing and turning a blind eye to the problem. How many times do you have to shove their face in it before they respond? Has no one on either board have a backbone? When the whole district blows up not one of them better dare go on the record saying “I never knew…….”.
There is another interesting blog to look up. Its www.fixdanville.com . This extremely interesting site points out the many things that need to be fixed in Danville both in public and business locations. Take a look at send in your own nominations.
Don’t start lining up for jobs at the white mill just yet. As a skeptic I will wave the flag when they start moving dirt and actual construction gets under way. I wonder how they come up with the employment figures and salaries without a known tenant? Is this another example of “goosing the figures” that the city administration is so famous for?
Let’s look at the Yorktowne factory. The employment there never reached anywhere near its projections. The same is true for Luna Technologies. The politicians constantly quote the “7,000 jobs have been brought to Danville”. That’s PROJECTED jobs. How many are actually on the ground and filled? Not anywhere near that number. I would suggest the city stop using questionable numbers that never come to be. Who do they think they are, the school board? Oh that’s right, they only release numbers at their third Friday morning “special meetings” not at the televised first Thursday public meeting. Not to say the Friday meetings are not open to the public. Everyone can attend a 7:30 AM meeting on a Friday. Oh gosh, I forgot, some people have real jobs! Wouldn’t it be something if a lot of people started showing up at the Friday meetings? Jeez, they would have to change their meetings to Wednesdays at midnight………
Well school has started for the year round students. I guess the Concrete Palace monsters are slowly awakening from their summer slumber and looking around like bears yawning from a deep hibernation and saying, “What can we screw up now? Who can we eat? “ Stay out of their way! Remember council members, don’t feed the bears! I look forward to the start of another athletic season at GW. Any bets on when the first screw up will occur without an athletic director? Won’t take long I imagine…….
So brace yourself oh weary citizens, the monster is at the trough. Only time will tell what they slop out onto the floor.
Tune in next time for “Tales from the Crypt-or the IT Department” Send in your subjects and information to savetheschools2@aol.com.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
The Big Charade
So the sleeping giant DPS has been quiet this summer? Oh if that were only true. No the morons in motion can’t seem to leave well enough alone. The school board must have had another retreat where the topic was “How Can We Really Look Like Morons This Summer?”. Well it didn’t take long for that collective mind to have their administrative clones stick their foot in crap again.
In the interest in the taxpayers of Danville the concrete palace administrators ordered that computers be updated in some schools because gosh they were four years old! Perish the thought of elementary students working on anything that isn’t the latest piece of computer gear. Never mind the fact that they mostly only do word processing and internet searches that can be handled by any basic machine. No in their infinite wisdom they swapped out perfectly good computers with the latest from Captain Billy’s Wiz Bag. Of yeah I forgot that that department (IT) is being run by that nobel prize winner Dr. O. If she only thought beyond the end of those glasses it would be a miracle. Ok so the computers are replaced so what do they do with the removed perfectly good computers? Why just dump them in the middle of the maintenance parking lot! Go by and look for yourself.
In the interest in the taxpayers of Danville the concrete palace administrators ordered that computers be updated in some schools because gosh they were four years old! Perish the thought of elementary students working on anything that isn’t the latest piece of computer gear. Never mind the fact that they mostly only do word processing and internet searches that can be handled by any basic machine. No in their infinite wisdom they swapped out perfectly good computers with the latest from Captain Billy’s Wiz Bag. Of yeah I forgot that that department (IT) is being run by that nobel prize winner Dr. O. If she only thought beyond the end of those glasses it would be a miracle. Ok so the computers are replaced so what do they do with the removed perfectly good computers? Why just dump them in the middle of the maintenance parking lot! Go by and look for yourself.
There in a pile on the parking lot are computers, printers, and monitors! Can’t miss them they are right next to the 25 or so 800 lb bags of rubber mulch that have been sitting there for over a year. Hmmm maybe we could have sold them, donated them to neighborhood centers, or given to Goodwill. No, we can just piss away taypayers money by dumping them in the rain! If this isn’t a criminal act or malfeasance I don’t know what is!
Ah but we aren't done yet. Remember all the money spent on "magnet" eye candy throughout the district. Remember this was all spent ($8 million) under the watchful (not) eye of the Concrete Princess herself, the Grand Wizard Sue Davis. Well all the fanfare about these great new labs, decorations, exhibits, etc has died down and now the truth comes out. The stuff was crap, pure and simple. The district ,under the magnet director , sent all their business to Thayer and Associates (without competetive bidding), a design firm without engineers or architects, to design these monuments to incompetence. The result? Inferior subpar exhibits made out of inferior materials that began to break down within months of purchase. So now 7-8 years later where are all these bells and whistles? Gone....for the most part. One of the costliest projects ws at Glenwood School with its "animal habitats" and menageries. Glenwood, after killing off most of the animals, had all their habitats, displays, and eye candy torn out and dumped! Where? You guessed it at the maintenance building. I bet the guys there are getting real tired of being a dumping ground. So what else? Oh the big fanfare that went into the Woodrow Wilson exhibits and the "libratoriom" that was build is now, this summer, being quietly dismatled and trashed. Why? Simple fact it never worked as a media center! Too much fluff and no stuff.
So school board members before your next slap on the back meeting I would suggest you take a look at the money you have wasted because the buck stops with you. And the citizens of Danville, listen carefully. That sound you hear? That is a giant toilet being flushed as the districts money goes down the drain. Councilpersons, are you listening?
UPDATE 8/5/09
Within three days of posting these pictures the entire pile of computers has been removed according to an inside source at the concrete castle!
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