Re: FCPS = Incompetence
Date: December 23, 2009 09:50AM
Not So Fast,
I see many fine teachers, and an occasional fine school-based administrator. Unfortunately, I also see way too many administrators, both in the schools and especially at Gatehouse.
Dale has proposed to cut $5 million from central staff. His FY 2010 approved budget documents indicate that there are 1700 central staff paid just from the School Operating Fund, and hundreds more who are paid by other funds. FCPS spends over $400 million of its $2.2 billion budget on central headquarters.
Dale is only proposing to cut about 1% of his central headquarters budget for FY 2011. And the cuts he made in prior years to central staff just brought the total number of central staffers down to the level of five years ago. BUt somehow, in public meetings, Dale and his leadership team keep talking about how they're proposing to cut 5% this year, and have cut 15% or 20% in 3 years.
It's time for the public to get a more clear understanding of exactly what that $400 plus million/year is buying. We need carpenters and other trades to keep our schools maintained and repaired. We need the 20 or so people in payroll. But it's far from clear that we need over 500 central staffers in the "department of instructional services," especially when teachers say that this is the group that should be cut.
Not so Fast Wrote:
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> Before the name calling really gets bad, I would
> like to say that FCPS may have some fine teachers
> but I have yet to come across an administrator
> that was not incompetant and egotistic and on some
> kind of power trip. Thank God my kids are all now
> graduated and OUTTA THERE. All they want to do is
> kick out the marginal kids, coddle the
> immigrants/ESOL kids, and over praise the
> over-achieving students (be it academics or
> athletics) and protect those students at all costs
> from their insipid rules.
>
> I am an FCPS graduate (70s) We had 2000+ kids, 1
> principal and 1 vice principal. Both worked and
> did their jobs well. My kids HS had a few more
> kids - over crowded schools - and 1 principal who
> only shows his face at public events (try getting
> past their Gate Guard to speak privately to any
> FCPS prinicpal - you need an appointment made
> weeks in advance!) and a dozen plus administrators
> and each has their own incompetant assistant or
> assistants that when observed, apparently need to
> file their nails a lot.
>
> Don't even get me started about the robotic
> Attendance Office. Long after my kids were out of
> school, we would get the auto-call that our child
> had missed one or more classes...
>
> Take it a step further, and only a Michelle Rhee
> could get through that Gatehouse Central
> Administation office.
>
> So there needs to be a massive shakedown, starting
> from the overpaid tippy top right down to the
> assitant administrative assistant to the
> administrator.