Friday was the application deadline for the Tucson Unified School District superintendent position, soon to be vacated by John Pedicone on June 30. Looking through the online brochure for the job posted by PROACT Search, the company commissioned to conduct the national search, it doesn’t seem like a bad gig. A district with 82 schools and “a long history of excellence in student and staff performance” in a city with 360 sunny days a year and “a diversity of cultures, architecture and people”? Sure, there’s a mention of the court-ordered desegregation plan and that due to the district’s “geographic location and large size, there are significant challenges that are currently being addressed,” but that’s probably true everywhere, right? The sort of “experienced, visionary leader” that’s bound to emerge from this process will probably be psyched to tackle those obstacles.
Well, at least we have to hope one leader emerges. The job description asks a lot of the applicant (there are eleven bullet points in the “professional skills and abilities” section, from “a strong commitment to and record of raising student achievement for all students” to “ability to create collaboration and community involvement”) but barely manages to find anything sellable about the district itself. An opening with Atlanta Public Schools, hosted by the same recruiting company, at least throws out there that they’ve been “educating some of Atlanta’s most notable citizens” for more than a hundred years, but that’s subtle compared to the pitch made by the El Paso Independent School District, which ended its application process on the same day as TUSD. Sure, in El Paso, they’ve also been educating “future generations,” etc., etc. Plus they’ve got a whole list of successes already in progress:
The district offers a variety of instructional programs including Magnet programs for the academically advanced, career and technical education for those who are interested in exploring different professions, a two-way dual language strives to achieve high academic excellence and dual language proficiency, and special education programs for those with specific needs in regard to education.
Sure, there are certainly great things happening in TUSD, even beyond University High, or at least, I’d have to imagine so. During his press conference back in March (“John Pedicone: ‘The Community Needs to Get Behind This District,'” The Range, March 20), John Pedicone accused the community of creating a negative perception of the district, saying that we collectively need to “stop making it kind of cool to make TUSD fail.” But you know what, if the district can’t come up with a sales-pitch to convince a relatively small pool of potential hires to want to come here, maybe the problem isn’t the ill-will of a grumpy citizenry.
Frankly, I think I’ve earned the right to be dissatisfied with the service I’ve received from the district. My son just finished the sixth grade at a midtown school, and after a rough few years plagued by bullying issues in elementary school, this year has generally been a positive experience. Good teachers, a pro-active principal and a school that actually surprised me with the number of arts programs offered. Note the past tense used there: due to an apparent miscalculation, most of the arts classes are gone next year. Also gone? One of the two P.E. teachers, the librarian and one of the school’s counselors. Also, the principal is leaving for a career outside of education, which possibly isn’t TUSD’s fault, I suppose. But if I were him and heard all about all these cutbacks, including the idea that he’d have one counselor for 750 students, I imagine I’d be looking for another line of work as well. Conveniently, all of these cuts were announced after the deadline for open enrollment at most of the area’s other districts. So while the principal had time to get out, parents weren’t afforded that same opportunity.
Somehow the response to the threat of charter schools and access to tax-based scholarships for private institutions is just to keep cutting. However, when these cuts send another round of students to TUSD’s competitors, what will be left to eliminate?
Surely, it’s more complicated than just blaming uninspired, possibly incompetent leadership at TUSD, considering the Legislature’s more-or-less open war on public education in recent years, but what’s the solution other than to run for the hills, like Pedicone chose to do? I love the positive things happening in Tucson as much as anyone, but a hundred James Beard award winning chefs opening restaurants downtown won’t make up for a woefully-inadequate set of schools within the city’s largest district.
Hopefully, the candidates for superintendent don’t have school-age kids, because between the schools here and the district’s underwhelming sales pitch, it might be tough finding anyone willing to break the recent two-years-or-less trend as far as tenure in the job goes.
This article appears in May 30 – Jun 5, 2013.
The PE position and the ICE position are being restored (the Board has been informed) and I am (and perhaps other Board members) seeking some additional restorations at that school, based on the unique circumstances, including administrative errors, that have led into this situation. Your disappointment is justified.
Well said, Mr. G. — Sad to see our school, and district, slowly hacked to death.
Mr. Stegeman, while I appreciate that some of the positions might be restored, the idea that no middle school will have a librarian alone is so deeply insane (if you get to high school without learning how to research a topic and find information, you’re already behind the curve for today’s workforce) that a second PE teacher isn’t going to make me think TUSD has any sort of plan to be a functional school district in the near future. I’d be happy to be proven wrong.
I support librarians and hope that we can make restorations there too, if not this year then in a future year; but if only librarians are teaching students how to research a topic and find information, then we have other problems as deep as the ones you describe.
We’re getting off-topic a bit, but I meant that the axing of librarians is a symptom of a larger problem; in that TUSD schools are functionally making themselves less competitive with charters and private schools by offering less and less. I’m certainly aware there are other pressures, but other districts seem to be managing. I really don’t understand, as a TUSD parent of two starting this fall, why I should be loyal at all as a parent to an organization that seems to have no particular aim to get better or provide anything more than a bare-bones education to my children?
Okay Dan, you want comments…
As a high school English teacher (yes, in TUSD), I have to say that your op-ed piece leaves rather a lot to be desired. You sort of wander back and forth between general complaints that the language in the search company’s advertisement isn’t quite snappy enough, to more specific gripes about what’s happening at your kids’ school, including the fact that the principal is leaving for a career outside of education — “which possibly isn’t TUSD’s fault, I suppose. But if I were him and heard all about all these cutbacks…”
Yes, it’s not a particularly easy time to be an educator. It’s especially difficult to be an educator in TUSD, these days, since the rabid right has declared war on TUSD (led by Tom “I don’t actually know what MAS does — never seen any of the classes, myself — but I know it MUST be racist; just ask my friend Bill O’Reilly” Horne). If you want to see how ugly this particular war continues to be, peruse the comments posted on the AZStarnet site every single time TUSD is mentioned even briefly in any of their reporting.
Go on, I dare you.
Yes, it sucks that funding has been cut to the extent that we’re having to close schools, lay off teachers and library staff (as an English teacher, it absolutely KILLS me to lose library staff). Collapsing classes in art and PE is a horrible idea, as is bumping up the average class size. Increasing the ratios of students to counselors and students to administrators is absolutely insane, of course; and did you hear about the cuts in office staff, groundskeepers and custodians?
But if you think this is just a TUSD problem, then you’re not even reading the pages of your own paper. Read Danehy’s column in the very same issue that contained this rant. The reason I’m being as gentle with this criticism as I am is because your paper has such a long history of providing in-depth coverage of the many issues we have to deal with in our district — all while trying desperately to raise student achievement in spite of the “slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” (obligatory Shakespeare reference to prove that I really am an English teacher) that our detractors continue to hurl in our direction. If you REALLY want to understand all these complex issues, you could always offer to treat Mari Herreras to lunch — I’m sure she could explain it all to you (I highly recommend her latest look at the whole desegregation mess).
You have every right to be frustrated with what’s going on in our district. I see Mark Stegeman’s comments on this thread — ask him if he’s happy about any of these cuts. Ask John Pedicone if HE’S happy with them. Ask the 187 teachers who were laid off. Ask the classified staff who are being laid off. Ask any of us who are “lucky” enough to keep our jobs how happy we are about having to say goodbye to colleagues we love and respect, pick up the slack caused by their absences — all without the help of those so-called “non-classroom” employees upon whom we’ve always been able to rely for support.
But what you’re really not entitled to do is write the general “pissed off parent” rant. You’re the editor, not a “guest columnist.” You have a responsibility to reflect a broader, better informed view of the complex issues you’re trying to address when you write.
Or, at the very least, act like you’ve read your own paper.
The problem is NOT that the district is too stingy, nor is it a lack of enthusiasm or desire on the part of teachers and others to provide your kids with a high-quality education. We’re busting our asses to do the best we can for your kids IN SPITE OF everything our glorious legislature is trying to do to us.
As far as snappy language designed to make the district more appealing to potential applicants, do you really think this helps?
“Sure, there are certainly great things happening in TUSD, even beyond University High, or at least, I’d have to imagine so.”
As a matter of fact, Dan, there really are great things happening in TUSD. I could give you several examples from just my school — and I’m sure other TUSD teachers would be more than happy to talk about all the great things they’re doing at their schools. Maybe some day, someone in the media will notice. Perhaps someone in charge of a newspaper, or something…
Longtime Reader: Believe it or not, I’ve received quite a bit of positive response, from TUSD employees and parents, no less. In fact, Mari edited the piece (and perhaps she was just sucking up to her boss, I’ll accept that as being plausible) and she felt it was on point.
Yes, the legislature is a real problem, by all means. However, there are other districts in this state, even in this city, that are managing far better. I think you might be reading something into my column that isn’t there. I completely understand why the principal of my son’s school left not would I dispute that the teachers in his school or in other TUSD schools are doing the best they can. But, if you think that there isn’t a leadership issue at all, possibly due to the near constant turnover in the superintendent position, but also due to the fact we just have some people in positions at 1010 that just shouldn’t be, we’re going to just have to disagree.
I can accept all of the above if you can accept what I said about the right-wing war on TUSD. My basic point is that whoever takes on the job of superintendent is going to be caught between a rock (the legislature) and a hard place (the ongoing deseg. litigation), while constantly ducking the incessant handfuls of mud being slung by TUSD’s many detractors (that’s what Pedicone was talking about in the quote you used).
If you’re mostly upset with suits at 1010, I’m still with you. We do amazing things for our kids — often in spite of 1010.
If you’re suggesting that I reacted because I’m tired of hearing the district used as a handy scapegoat for everything that’s wrong in the entire world — fair enough. I am.
Finally, as an aside: please forward my e-mail address to Mari Herrera. I have a strong desire to ask her about some things I’m being tasked to do next year that I’d rather not discuss in a public forum. (Meaning that if YOU won’t buy her lunch, I will).
Thanks for the reply.
Longtime reader, always available. You can reach me at mherreras@tucsonweekly.com … keep reading.