I’m a new voice to speak about public education in Miami-Dade and I can say without a doubt: We are in deep trouble! Over the past few weeks, the Miami-Dade School Board has been trying to cut $264 million dollars from next year’s budget. This is ugly and there is no way to do it without hurting our children’s education. I find it interesting that rather than blame the state legislature for choosing to cut the schools’ appropriations for the first time in modern history, Renier Diaz de la Portilla chooses to shoot the messenger and dance around the problem.
To me, a public school advocate who follows the issues, Dr. Rudy Crew has done a fine, though not perfect job as our superintendent. He tackled our most difficult schools, created the Zone and actually improved performance. This was a difficult task and an expensive one.
Renier and some of his School Board compatriots, such as Ana Rivas Logan, seem unable to say anything negative about the Tallahassee cabal led by House Speaker Marco Rubio who brought us this budgetary disaster. It was Rubio who rejected the Senate’s bid to increase revenues through various fees that would have averted budget slashing.
The legislature’s own economists warned that if this is the route taken, the economic downturn in Florida will be deeper and last longer. Speaker Rubio refused to hear this, and now our brave school board rather than denouncing some of their Republican compadres in the House prefer to scapegoat one of the best superintendents in the country.
Watch what the Broward board does. They don’t have the political ties that prevent them from speaking out about the awful budget choices made by our Representatives in Tallahassee.
Watch this blog for more on what is really happening to our schools! I am stoked to finally have a forum where I can tell the truth!
20 comments:
I'm glad you've found a place where you feel comfortable speaking out. That's an important step.
I fully agree that the disaster brought upon our schools lies solely at the feet of the legislature. They created this mess. They pushed tax cuts, promising to "hold education harmless." Yet, here we are with huge cuts that need to be made.
So let me ask you this:
Doesn't the School Board have an obligation to make those cuts?
Even if they pressure the legislature — which they should — into re-examining the budget during a special session, don't they have the obligation to prepare contingency plans also?
Not that I like the plans they're making any better than you do, but if this is the budget they're forced to work with, what would you do differently?
I, for one, would find a way to keep Gifted programs. Cutting support for the brightest students is horribly unsound policy.
As citizens who are concerned with our schools' funding, there are two things we need to do to correct the problem:
1) Present and promote a clear alternative budget outlining the costs. There's a lot of research that'll have to go into this, but it's a vital component to building credibility and making our case.
2) Put pressure on the legislature to revisit the budget and fix the mess they've made of our state's education. That's where I and other candidates and elected officials are focusing. But you have as much power here as we do.
Start building coalitions. Use the built-in networks at schools to start: PTAs. A number of these school board members are up for re-election as are all the legislators (who aren't term-limited, like Rubio). Put the pressure on those elected officials, especially here in Miami-Dade.
This can't be a party-line fight if we're to truly succeed. The words Democrat and Republican shouldn't mean anything when we're talking about the promise of our kids' futures, but you'll need both on your side to make a difference.
Do you think there is a racial divide on support for Crew?
Genius:
I have to disagree with your assessment of Rudy Crew. He has been an absolute failure. Just read the Herald's story today about the school district's analysis that the School Improvement Zone is a joke, not to mention the the exposes I have written about Crew's administration in the past year. It is easy to blame his school board opponents for not directing their anger at the state legislature, but when the superintendent refuses to even consider other options other than his own ideas to cut the budget, you have to start wondering whose interests is he really looking out for? Spend some time at these budget meetings and take a closer look at what he is proposing and you will soon realize that he is protecting his bloated bureaucracy at the expense of the students of Miami-Dade County.
I did not write this blog. I posted it only. It was written by a Guest Blogger, Mom 4 EDU. I do not know enough about the school board to have an opinion, that is why I asked a person who follows the board to write.
I value your feedback Frank and thank you for writing.
WOW praising Rudy Crew?!?? If he was such a "public school advocate" he could have opted to start with budget cuts in his own salary and then trickle all the way down to the janitors, cafetria workers, teachers assistants, and bus drivers, who are the lowest paid employees. Or how about forego his annual bonus?
Give me a break, this guy is a total selfish joke and an insult to our community.
And it is so obvious that there are definite "racial ties" when voting. Not only for the Blacks, but the Hispanics as well.
I know many people who work for the school system who went from being 12 month employess to 10 month employees over night. And to make matters worse they do not have the option to spread their paychecks over 12 months like teachers do, so for the next 6 weeks they will receive no income. How do you call that fair?
Crunched budgets offer opportunities to reassess where you are wasting money. That's about the only thing you can say that is positive. From there, it goes down hill.
Rudy has taken too many days off. that affends me. He has missed too many meetings too, evidently. I was there when Marta Perez talked about that.
There are too many administrators. In one year, school system went from 200 to 400. What is up with that? The ratio is too top heavy.
Cuts should come top down, not bottoms up.
I think there is a lot of political grandstanding. It was like a food fight. I laughed when I read that here on the blog site, because that is the perfect explanation of what happened at the School Board meeting. That meeting ended up more like a sleep over (meeting ended after 2:30 AM).
Like Genius, there is so much I don't know. It would be great to talk more about school system here on the blog. Did Crew inherit an impossible situation -- maybe. Did we get screwed in Tallahassee -absolutely. Does Crew care -- I don't know. I think he is concerned with his book, personally. I don't see passion there. Maybe he ran out of passion before he got to Dade County.
I am not able to hit Rudy at this time, but I do believe he must cut his own remuneration prior to hurting the very poorly paid schoolteachers. He can also get rid of the bloat in administration first.
Mom is way off base as far as the School board and Crew are concerned. Sure the Florida legislature has decimated the public school system for the past 10 years, but it was an obvious frontal attack on our public schools, under the Jeb Bush administration,both financially with corporate tax credits and vouchers, as well as the FCAT scheme, and Marco Rubio was committed to continuing Jeb's legacy. And certainly Charlie Crist has to share some blame by touting the Amendment One tax reforms, promising to hold education harmless- where is the uproar against Charlie- he lied to us!! And funding for education will continue to be reduced over the next year or two until the ecomomy turns around. However, Rudy Crew shares equal blame- he had built a Bloated empire, all focused on building a national profile for himself. It's never been about the children, never a focus on meeting their potential- it's been all about Rudy. He enjoyed the support , more like a rubber stamp, from the majority of the school board until recently. Broward county on the other hand, has balanced their budget, as have other districts. It's been a farce to see how they are trying to balance this bloated, top heavy budget. They will have to take an across the board cut to everyone and everything at this point. Rudy has held his administration harmless and gone after the most vulnerable- shame on him and on any board member who continues to support him.
Sorry for the mix-up Genius. The only thing I will add is that Crew was brought here by some of the most politically influential people in Miami-Dade who don't always have the community's best interests at heart; guys like Joe Arriola and Mitch Madique.
Wow! I didn't expect so much comment! silly me. I particularly like Mr. Caderin's comments. Of course, he is right. This is where we are and we must deal with it. It is difficult when between 75% and 85% of the budget is salaries. I have seen breakdowns of the emplyees and we are no longer top heavy with administrators, if we ever were. The idea that Superintendent Rudy should voluntarily take a pay cut should be considered by him as a gesture of solidarity with his teachers and other employees. But recognize, that is all it would be, a gesture.
This is the Superintendent that three years in a row has made Miami-Dade County Schools a finalist for the Broad Prize for Urban Education out of 100 districts. This is the most prestigious national recognition in urban education. It is given for great performance and improvement in student achievement while reducing gaps in ethnic groups and income groups.Miami Dade Public Schools have been in the top five for three years in a row. And those folks do their homework.
It has to be noted that few researchers would place much credence on the results of the first year of a new program, especially one as difficult and many faceted as the Zone. We have already seen that Edison High Schoolreached FCAT passage for the first time thanks to the Zone. A huge step!
I cannot tell you precisely where the cuts should be made. I kind of agree with Mr. Caderin regarding not cutting Gifted, because we don't want to chase the middle class out of our public schools. That is part of the conspiracy. More about the conspiracy later!
and Paul Cejas, etc.... Crew got a home for free. What a crock of you know what.... Amazing, and now lots of school employees getting pay cuts are at risk of losing their homes, while this fat, acerbic, cherubic, Chubby Checker lookalike keeps rocking and rolling and making and spending oodles of money on the backs of the employees that are in the trenches.
Example: why does the school board need to spend close to $100 million for an efficiency software
program (paid to Delloite, Touche). Teachers need to teach well (the 3 R's) not fast. This software is for corporate America, not a school system. And with employee cutbacks, who the hell is gonna run the software. This is just one example of Crew's money pissing. Could he be getting some type of payola here through his son, who is in software?
Its a sad state of affairs in the school system.
How can the Board support this man and the things he does.
FCAT scores on the rise? Yeah, right! (askew maybe) Rudy has done a superb job marketing himself as an excellent superintendent because he has higher aspirations in Washington D.C. as the nation's Secretary of Education.
Correct me if I am wrong. K-12 Budget in Florida will be $18.4 billion in 2009.
Number of students +/- 2,500,000
Average spending per student appx $7,500 per student
Wow, we are getting close to private school tuitions. They do not seem to be complaining about budget cuts.
the big money is for the software--millions of $$$ for ERP--MDCPS is a service oriented organization, not a factory. Keep in mind that if the above calculations are correct, all the money is not going for students...
You education people are intense!!
When you get a 20% decrease in pay from one day to the next, "intense" is just one of the words you can use. God damm right we are pissed!!!!!!!!!!!!!! How would you feel?
Certainly what is going on here is not the fault of the teachers. It is due to less money coming from Tally and to a bigger extent, the Crew administration mismanaging money locally. If he were such a great administrator he should of seen this huge shortfall coming, he should have planned for it, and we would of been ready for it. He has kept spending and spending, and now wants to cut educators pay. What a concept: screw those that do your dirty work, Crew and his cronies get the glory and recognition, and of course the dollars, and life goes on.
Maybe what should happen is for the State B of E to get involved setup an emergency task force or board to take full and financial control of the district and oversee its operations until it pulls out of this disastrous economic and dire situation. I wonder how Crew would react to this. Educators are upset, and with reason!!!
Ned, well said! Let's see what happens in the special meeting tomorrow...
I'll tell you whats gonna happen: They are going to fire more people; transport, cafeteria, custodian, teacher aides, etc. Raises will not be honored, even though they are contractual. This is pathetic...Its a bloodbath!!!
Yet Crew can't be fired because his contract says that if he is, the board has to pay him $700k. Well ok then, offset his severance pay with his gross mismanagement (to the tune of millions) and we can see that he owes MDC school board tons of money. Tit for Tat. And if this does not work then the attorney that reviewed this contract for the school board should be sued and fired, or hung.
What are the odds that Rudy Crew will not be at tomorrow's meeting?
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