To the Editor,
On July 11, our school board elected our 2017-2018 chairperson, Mrs. Peggy Wilkins Chavis. Not long after taking her position, she chose the chairpersons for the five board committees. This act occurs every year, at the beginning of each fiscal school year.
However, the ironic part with this recent occurrence is, each chairperson is of the same ethnicity — race. This should be easy to figure out. One of the chairpersons is a good choice, considering his occupation deals directly with money on an everyday basis. One of the most important committees is being chaired by the same member who was quoted who said the board “break policies all the time.” Why would a great leader appoint a person to be chair of a committee when that person doesn’t respect policy?
According to Policy 2123, each board member must fulfill the legal requirement to receive a minimum of 12 hours of training annually. Wouldn’t you know there are currently board members who are still short in this area? There is one board member who should have more than enough training in all areas because they have attended not one or two, but five national conferences throughout the United States during 2016 and 2107.
Once again, take a closer look at the makeup of the school board. You have past administrators and directors on this board, yet neither of them are even a chair of a committee. You have three women on the board, one cannot serve on any committee because she herself is the chairperson, yet neither of the other two women are chair of any of the committees. Let’s take a step further back in the past, this hasn’t ever occurred in the past 35-plus years, where you didn’t have a minority as a chairperson of any of the committees.
Where is the fairness and transparency? Regardless of the race, we need competent people to chair these committees.
Our ship is sinking fast. Not only do we not have a captain, the lifeboats have floated away. The children are left on the ship with only a few life jackets. Who decides who will be saved and who will drown?
Rachel Reeves
St. Pauls