May 1, 2017 – Treasure Coast, FL: As parents and adults we do everything possible to ensure that our children will be successful, with the most important thing being our children’s education, which is the responsibility of the entire community – the village if you will. Our children’s education starts at home as we teach them their first words, how to walk and how to have respect for others. And we try and teach them that bullying, intimidation and physical violence is never good.
That is why it is so disappointing to hear Port St. Lucie Mayor Greg Oravec say that he is “not scared to take off the jacket, roll up the sleeves, get out the brass knuckles and get serious” with what he calls the St. Lucie School Districts “lackluster performance”.
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School Board Vice Chairwoman Dr. Donna Mills has personally recruited 150 area individuals who come from all walks of like to participate in the School Districts Speakers Bureau program. |
Oravec, the onetime fired City Manager of Port St. Lucie who was either at the helm or the Chief Assistant City Manager when the city entered agreements and provided funding for failed projects like VGTI and Digital Domain costing the city hundreds of millions of dollars, and the Torey Pines project (also in Port St. Lucie) which recently lost millions in state funding for failing to create promised jobs, has shifted the responsibility for the city’s lagging economic growth to the easiest target – the school district.
And Oravec isn’t alone. Councilwoman Stephanie Morgan also blames the school district as does the Tea-Parties Cathy Townsend who sits on the County Commission and called the school district the “weakest link” stating that they (the schools), “don’t think outside the box”.
So, let’s just go ahead and unbiasedly lay all the facts on the table and let the public decide if it’s the school system that needs an overhaul or the politicians who we only happen to see when the media is around.
First and foremost, we need to understand that these politicians are clueless as to how schools are graded. And that is understandable – it’s not their area of expertise, it’s not the business they have spent their whole lives in.
Florida’s school grading system was created by former Governor Jeb Bush as both a political stunt and an economic boost to his family. Bush, the founder of the state’s first charter school – a public school run by a private entity that is funded by your and my taxpayer dollars – saw an opportunity to create a statewide standardized testing system to measure student outcomes and assign a letter grade to public school in Florida.
That test, previously known as the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test or FCAT, and now known as the FSA, measured a child’s proficiency in subjects such as reading, math, and science and other factors such as learning gains, end of course exams, graduation rates and others to come up with a school grade.
The idea was to identify schools that needed additional assistance, such as Bush’s Charter School which had a failing grade and was closed by the Miami-Dade School District several years ago.
But, like anything political, the system was and still is flawed. Schools are expected to hit a moving target set by the Florida Department of Education. The initial grading of the FCAT was contracted out to a company in which Bush’s brother, Neil, was a principal, earning that company millions of taxpayer dollars. But most importantly, the test results were the result of one day of testing that did not take into account any other factors from throughout the school year.
Schools that received A’s or improved their grade from one year to another were and still are rewarded financially, while schools that struggle and need the help the most were and still are punished.
Oravec, Morgan and Townsend are quick to blame the school system for the cities lack of growth and are throwing the county’s largest employer – one that has steadily maintained nearly 5,000 jobs – squarely under the big yellow school bus. Their uneducated statements are an insult and a slap in the face to the teachers and other employees of the district that have dedicated their lives to helping children.
Perhaps shedding some light on the true facts will help this trio understand that it takes time and the efforts of an entire community to raise up a school system.
For example, while the State’s high school graduation rate hovers around 85%, the graduation rate in St. Lucie County increased to nearly 89% (88.6) last year. And this despite the county having a poverty rate that is a full nine percentage points over the state average (67/76).
Our trio of bandits makes no mention that while the state as a whole saw 65% (according to the Tampa Bay Times) of its schools drop a letter grade in the 2015-2016, only 29% of St. Lucie’s schools fell a letter grade during the same period according to state data.
But the one variable that is not measured by any type of school grade is community involvement.
While I was at a breakfast last week to recognize men and woman that have given their time to talk with school children, telling their stories and showing them that there is a way out of the poverty and high crime rates that affect all of St. Lucie County I couldn’t help but notice that Oravec, Morgan and Townsend were nowhere in sight. Yet the Mayor of Fort Pierce, the Superintendent of Schools, the City Manager of Fort Pierce, school principals, business leaders, ministers and others all took time out of their day to attend the event at Fort Pierce Westwood High School.
The program which was created by School Board Vice Chairwoman Dr. Donna Mills has been years in the making as others have tried and failed to implement it. Known as The Speakers Bureau, Mills has personally recruited 150 area individuals who come from all walks of like to participate.
Before trashing our schools and berating our teachers, administrators, school staff and most importantly the children of this community Oravec, Morgan and Townsend should give what St. Lucie School’s Superintendent Wayne Gent calls the Greatest Gift - Time.
As Fort Pierce Westwood High School Principal John Lynch said – the people in this room are the “Rock Stars of Teachers of Children”.
Yet Oravec, Morgan and Townsend never heard those words – because they were not there, there were too busy rolling up their sleeves, taking off their jackets, putting on those brass knuckles all in an effort to do what they have been known to do best – intimidate others by bullying and picking fights!
