Archive for the ‘Edumication News’ Category

Photo by Mark GrahamRon Price​Earlier this month we outlined Lewisville-based Delcom Group's $40-million breach of contract claim against the Dallas Independent School District, which was filed after the district suddenly and surreptitiously yanked its board-approved contract to give classrooms a high-tech makeover and went with second-place finisher Prime Systems out of Houston. Delcom alleges that the DISD backed out of the contract only after Delcom turned over to the district its propriety designs, which were then handed over to Prime. The suit also alleges that the district rationalized its reasons for killing the sealed deal by claiming it had received information from an anonymous John Doe, who ratted out a Delcom employee with a long-ago felony on his record involving some stolen fishing equipment.Well, this morning Delcom's attorneys filed a second amended petition in which it names that John Doe: none other than former DISD trustee Ron Price, who spent much of this '06 Observer cover story insisting he was not ethically challenged. Price is now named in the suit, as is Prime President Hsiangpin Michael Chang. The suit now alleges that Chang "contacted Price to assert Price's influence with the employees and Trustees of DISD and to intentionally interfere with the formation of the relationship between DISD and Delcom."According to the complaint, Price contacted interim Superintendent Alan King, then the chief financial officer, and Price's one-time challenger Bernadette Nutall and told them about the Delcom employee. This was in mid-May, before the May 27 board meeting at which Delcom's contract was OK'd by the trustees. But shortly after Michael Hinojosa resigned in early June, alleges the suit:One of King's initial moves as Interim Superintendent was to again direct [Gary] Kerbow [the district's director of purchasing] to investigate the Delcom employee's felony, but this time without any input whatsoever from Delcom. Indeed, the District kept secret the fact that it was internally "investigating" Delcom even as the two parties were working together on an expedited basis in order to have as many classrooms outfitted with Delcom's plan, structure, and design of the Digital Classrooms project by the start of the 2011-2012 school year. The internal investigation consisted of felony conviction documents provided by Ron Price to Bernadette Nutall and internet printouts from various websites purporting to outline Delcom's organizational structure. King and Nutall in fact never intended Delcom to implement its own design, even though DISD had in fact already awarded the contract to Delcom.DISD policy is not to comment on pending litigation, though I have asked if King will comment. And attorneys for both sides are, at this very moment, at the George Allen for a hearing. Updates forthcoming. Till then, this morning's filing follows.

​[Update at 4:53 p.m.: As far as the district is concerned, Carla Ranger has not formally resigned because has not delivered "written notice, signed by the Board member, to the presiding officer of the Board," per resignation policy. An email is not considered a resignation letter. There will also need to be a special election to replace her, per policy. Policy also says she could remain on the board till her replacement is in place.]I was just on the phone with Dallas ISD spokesman Jon Dahlander about this last-second meeting called for Tuesday evening by the school board; the lone item on the agenda involves possible changes to the election cycle, the result of Dallas County Elections wanting DISD to move elections to November rather than May. (But in which year?) When I was talking to Dahlander, Schutze sent me this note just posted to Carla Ranger's website:Board of Trustees Dallas ISD Dear Trustees: Via this email, I am today submitting my resignation as District 6 Trustee effective on the earliest date of Board acceptance. It is my hope that the Board will appoint a replacement until the next regularly scheduled election date. Immediate acceptance and appointment of a new Trustee prior to the September Board briefing would be appreciated. Thank you. Carla Ranger District 6 TrusteeI imagine it has something to do with what happened last night. More to come.Update at 4:26 p.m.: I called trustee Edwin Flores, who reps District 1 and chairs the personnel committee, for his response. He had no idea Ranger resigned. "How do you know?" he asked. When I told him, he said: "I should have guessed."

​After our back-to-back items about redistricting last night -- one involving the city of Dallas, one concerning the Dallas Independent School District -- I received a missive from Bill Betzen, about whom Anna wrote a couple of weeks back as his proposed map for the city's new council districts worked its way through the Redistricting Commission. Bill's no stranger here, of course, but after participating in the city's extraordinarily transparent process and watching how the DISD handled redistricting (with attorneys, at a handful of poorly attended public forums, behind closed doors, posting to an "illustrative" and altogether unclear website), he had a few thoughts on the subject.I asked if we could share them here, he said sure, absolutely. Because, as he explained, "The more the public becomes aware of the contrast between DISD and Dallas City Council redistricting, the more they will understand redistricting and how it should be done. Expanding that knowledge benefits us all!" Jump for his thoughts.

Holsey Hickman at this evening's DISD meeting​Speaking of contentious redistricting ...A little while ago, the Dallas Independent School District board of trustees was treated to its own redistricting drama courtesy the public speakers lined up, for the most part, behind trustee Carla Ranger, who has accused board president Lew Blackburn of wanting "to take by force" several schools -- among them Wilmer-Hutchins Elementary School, Wilmer-Hutchins High School and Clinton P. Russell Elementary.Ranger's furious that a last-minute map -- one sent to trustees only last night, hours before tonight's proposed vote to send it to the Justice Department for preclearance -- moves those schools and five other campuses and facilities out of her District 6 and into Blackburn's District 5. Among those who spoke on Ranger's behalf: NAACP Dallas Chapter president Dr. Juanita Wallace, former Dallas Area Rapid Transit board member Joyce Foreman and Rev. Holsey Hickman.Foreman was particularly harsh, referring to the board president as a "tyrant" who has "used your gavel, your tongue, your position to push Mrs. Ranger and attempt to shut her down. ... And we all know how that works. You can ask Robert Mugabe, Kim Jong-Il, Saddam Hussein, [Josip Broz] Tito, Idi Amin. They all fall." Big applause; some laughs too. Foreman also brought up long-lingering allegations that Blackburn lives in Grand Prairie and suggested he run for a school board in Tarrant County.Wallace, last seen speaking at the "Justice for John" rally and protesting flow control, spoke about how there's "a movement in Dallas to roll back the progress made by civil rights." Then Hickman got up -- hoping, perhaps, that maybe Blackburn would try to have him escorted out of the room. Again.

Photo by Mark GrahamThis plan would have come in handy 14 years ago, right, Yvonne?​Speaking of the DISD board of trustees' meeting agenda for Thursday night ...Here's an item of interest: Consider and Take Possible Action to Approve Amendment to Board Policy BJCG (Local) Superintendent Retirement or Resignation (First Reading), which was initially on the consent agenda but has since been pulled for a chitchat. Why? Well, for the first time ever, the Dallas ISD board will decide what to do if the superintendent should ever quit suddenly or simply vanish into another dimension and there isn't time to name an interim superintendent. Says the proposal: "The Chief of Staff shall assume the duties of the Superintendent until the 'Interim Superintendent' is selected by a majority of the board."Hard to believe, but the district's never had a plan of succession. Never really needed it -- because, say, when Michael Hinojosa all of the sudden said he was going to Georgia earlier this year, the board had plenty of time to interview interims, including chief of staff Claudia Rodriguez. Well, that's not true. There was this one time ..."We did run into this in 1997, when Yvonne Gonzalez suddenly resigned on a Tuesday night," says district spokesman Jon Dahlander, who was there at the time. "Then the board was trying to figure out who was next, and they were thrown into this tailspin. In the case of Hinojosa, it doesn't apply because he gave the board plenty of time. But they may not have that luxury next time."

Photo by Patrick Michels​Drove by Davy Crockett two weeks ago and espied the still-up sign noting that the Dallas ISD was taking bids on the city-designated historic landmark, which turns 108 this year and was the oldest school in use when the district shuttered it in January 1989. We've written about the property plenty, beginning in February 2010, when we noticed its sad state of disrepair; at the time the district said it had no plans for the building, most recently used as admin offices. Anyway.That sign reminded me: Bids were due to close June 3. I'd meant to see how that turned out, but I didn't have to look far: Thursday the board of trustees will vote to sell nine "surplus properties" to the highest bidders, and Crockett's among the properties on the sale list. Says the spreadsheet, Good Signature Management was the sole bidder, submitting an offer of $239,000 (which is quite a deal). Last year, the district had been showing the building to nonprofits, most of which didn't think it viable as a redo on their budgets.Not sure what developer Ken Good plans to do with the property, which is protected due to its designation; several messages have been left. DISD spokesman Jon Dahlander, who's got his hands full at present, says he'll ask building officials what they know about the would-be new owner's intentions and get back to us. I've also left a message with Preservation Dallas exec director Katherine Seale, who, coincidentally, is among the panelists taking part in the Historic Preservation in Dallas chitchat at the Dallas Center for Architecture tonight at 6.Update at 2:46 p.m.: Seale says "we at Preservation Dallas think this very positive news, and probably one of the best decisions they could have made with the school" -- referring, of course, to DISD's decision to part with the property. "DISD has not indicated any interest in that building in many years, and it wasn't mothballed the way it should be, and DISD is not in the business of historic preservation. We applaud them for taking action on this and selling the property so somebody else can do something with it."Says Seale, used to be she'd get calls about old Parkland; then, the Statler; then, 508 Park. All of them in recent years have come off the most-endangered list thanks to new owners. "In the last year and a half, Davy Crockett has become the No. 1 call of concern from our members," she says. "This is good news."

Photo by Patrick Michels​Drove by Davy Crockett two weeks ago and espied the still-up sign noting that the Dallas ISD was taking bids on the city-designated historic landmark, which turns 108 this year and was the oldest school in use when the district shuttered it in January 1989. We've written about the property plenty, beginning in February 2010, when we noticed its sad state of disrepair; at the time the district said it had no plans for the building, most recently used as admin offices. Anyway.That sign reminded me: Bids were due to close June 3. I'd meant to see how that turned out, but I didn't have to look far: Thursday the board of trustees will vote to sell nine "surplus properties" to the highest bidders, and Crockett's among the properties on the sale list. Says the spreadsheet, Good Signature Management was the sole bidder, submitting an offer of $239,000 (which is quite a deal). Last year, the district had been showing the building to nonprofits, most of which didn't think it viable as a redo on their budgets.Not sure what developer Ken Good plans to do with the property, which is protected due to its designation; several messages have been left. DISD spokesman Jon Dahlander, who's got his hands full at present, says he'll ask building officials what they know about the would-be new owner's intentions and get back to us. I've also left a message with Preservation Dallas exec director Katherine Seale, who, coincidentally, is among the panelists taking part in the Historic Preservation in Dallas chitchat at the Dallas Center for Architecture tonight at 6.Update at 2:46 p.m.: Seale says "we at Preservation Dallas think this very positive news, and probably one of the best decisions they could have made with the school" -- referring, of course, to DISD's decision to part with the property. "DISD has not indicated any interest in that building in many years, and it wasn't mothballed the way it should be, and DISD is not in the business of historic preservation. We applaud them for taking action on this and selling the property so somebody else can do something with it."Says Seale, used to be she'd get calls about old Parkland; then, the Statler; then, 508 Park. All of them in recent years have come off the most-endangered list thanks to new owners. "In the last year and a half, Davy Crockett has become the No. 1 call of concern from our members," she says. "This is good news."

​The Annie E. Casey Foundation just released KIDS COUNT, its annual report on child well-being in every state across the U.S. One of their grantees, the Austin-based Center for Public Policy Priorities, put the report for Texas on its website on Wednesday: The State of Texas Children. So how are the children, anyway?We took a look at the data, both in Dallas County and statewide, and it doesn't look great. In 2009, says the report, 24 percent of children in the state were living in poverty, even though only 17 percent of the overall population is below the poverty line. Teen pregnancy's up in Dallas County almost 15 percent since 2000. We've got the third-highest teen birth rate in the country, in fact, just behind Mississippi and New Mexico. The rates of low birth-weight babies, premature babies and infant mortality are all up here as well.​According to Texas KIDS COUNT director Dr. Frances Deviney, though, Texas hasn't really gotten much worse overall than it was in 2000."Our overall ranking in comparison to the rest of the country is about the same," she tells Unfair Park. Not that that's really something to crow about, considering where we were then. "We've stayed in the bottom third, varying a bit here and there."But the report's not all bad news: Child death, teen violent death and juvenile crime arrests are all down both county- and state-wide, which I'm sure we can all get behind. High school attrition rates are down, and kids enrolled in Head Start and similar programs have seen a healthy bump. But as federal Education Secretary Arne Duncan pointed out during his appearance on Bloomberg Television today, Texas still has a pretty embarrassing high school graduation rate. (Even critics like Time's Andrew J. Rotherman, who is accusing Duncan of needlessly messing with Texas, still can't find much better to say about our education system than "although schools in Texas are no great shakes, they're hardly the nation's worst." Lofty praise, that.)

​The Annie E. Casey Foundation just released KIDS COUNT, its annual report on child well-being in every state across the U.S. One of their grantees, the Austin-based Center for Public Policy Priorities, put the report for Texas on its website on Wednesday: The State of Texas Children. So how are the children, anyway?We took a look at the data, both in Dallas County and statewide, and it doesn't look great. In 2009, says the report, 24 percent of children in the state were living in poverty, even though only 17 percent of the overall population is below the poverty line. Teen pregnancy's up in Dallas County almost 15 percent since 2000. We've got the third-highest teen birth rate in the country, in fact, just behind Mississippi and New Mexico. The rates of low birth-weight babies, premature babies and infant mortality are all up here as well.​According to Texas KIDS COUNT director Dr. Frances Deviney, though, Texas hasn't really gotten much worse overall than it was in 2000."Our overall ranking in comparison to the rest of the country is about the same," she tells Unfair Park. Not that that's really something to crow about, considering where we were then. "We've stayed in the bottom third, varying a bit here and there."But the report's not all bad news: Child death, teen violent death and juvenile crime arrests are all down both county- and state-wide, which I'm sure we can all get behind. High school attrition rates are down, and kids enrolled in Head Start and similar programs have seen a healthy bump. But as federal Education Secretary Arne Duncan pointed out during his appearance on Bloomberg Television today, Texas still has a pretty embarrassing high school graduation rate. (Even critics like Time's Andrew J. Rotherman, who is accusing Duncan of needlessly messing with Texas, still can't find much better to say about our education system than "although schools in Texas are no great shakes, they're hardly the nation's worst." Lofty praise, that.)

On campus, as it is in the real world: Two news operations became one.​You can't swing a mace and chain around Observer HQ without hitting someone who knows what it's like to fight in a real newspaper war. That Buzz fellow worked in San Antonio back when the Express-News toiled against the Light. Schutze and Wilonsky are both veterans of The Dallas Morning News's fight with the long-dead Dallas Times Herald, a battle they recall with wistful nostalgia typically reserved for people much, much closer to death. The rest of us, we have no idea. We think a news war is climbing in our little block-quote machines, gunning them to 88 and doing some half-ass riffing on our perceived enemy's half-ass riffing. Observer v. D, Deadspin vs. Grantland, Scocca v. Smith -- they're all shorts-and-shirts walkthroughs compared with the battles waged in cities until the 1990s, when the two-paper town went the way of the newsroom whiskey cabinet. The kids at SMU, they don't know, either. But for the last few years they've been getting a little taste of what it's like to scrap for scoops, making themselves crazy over a fight that didn't mean anything to anyone but themselves, to whom it meant exactly everything. Now that war is over too.