McHenry County Blog

These comments by Huntley School District Superintendent John Burkey in the First Electric Newspaper stirred my memory:

Supt. John Burkey tells union leaders that ratification will be delayed.

“Last year I was amazed that we avoided it,” said Supt. John Burkey.

“This year it just caught up with us.”

He slammed a three-year union contract now ending that he said included a more than 5 percent raise this year “while everyone else only got 1.7 percent.”

So I asked a participant with a long memory, a member of the board negotiating team in fact, Larry Snow, what he remember about how contract negotiations went before and during the Huntley Education Association’s strike.

Here is his reply:

Larry Snow

“The 158 board voted on a last, best and final offer that had teachers’ salaries for years 2 and 3 determined by a cost of living increase formula.

“With Supt. John Burkey’s nod of approval, board members Tony Quagliano, Kevin Gentry and Kim Skaja voted to reverse the board’s vote, as Board President Shawn Green literally was a no-show at the final negotiation meetings.

“This made it a 3 – 2 vote in caucus to toss aside a decision to have teachers’ salaries in years 2 and 3 track a cost of living index.

“The union didn’t care that overspending might cause future deficits and cause teachers to be laid off in the future.

“Huntley teachers should only look to their own union officials for striking, now causing deficits and teacher layoffs.

“Teacher greed means teachers who aren’t tenured are the ones that are laid off and they are not a union vote majority.”

Want some history?

Here it is:

• Part 1 – Huntley Teachers’ Proposal: From Surplus to Deficit
• Part 2 – Huntley Teachers’ Proposal: From Surplus to Deficit
• Part 3 – Huntley Teachers’ Proposal: From Surplus to Deficit

Many public officials are in denial about how their own actions and non-cooperation add to the public’s mistrust of government and even disgust of government.

Public officials adopt either a public servant’s I’m-here-to-help attitude or a self-serving I-don’t-want-to-bother attitude.

John Burkey

I asked former Huntley 158 School Board member Larry Snow if he had seen a copy of the recently negotiated contract with the support worker’s union (HESPA).

It is before the Huntley Board of Education to be voted on.

Snow looked online in Huntley’s board packet and wasn’t able to find it. He volunteered to ask Supt. John Burkey for a copy of the contract. I said, “Sure.”

Snow negotiated the last contract with HESPA along with Burkey and Shawn Green.

While Snow was on the board there wasn’t another board member who put in more time getting the district financially on track and getting its accounting reported correctly.

In other words, Snow put in thousands of hours helping the district keep the district solvent.

Let’s see how helpful as a public servant Burkey was.

Here is Snow’s email to Supt. Burkey and above, Burkey’s response:

Subject: Re: BOE Agenda 8-19-10
From: Burkey, John
Date: 8-17-10 5:29 pm
To: Larry Snow
Burkey, John wrote:
I cannot email it now as it is not a public document until after the
Board approves it. It will be online after that.

—–Original Message—–
From: Larry Snow [mailto:lsnow@mc.net]
Sent: Monday, August 16, 2010 7:40 PM
To: Burkey, John
Cc: Fettes, Naomi
Subject: Re: BOE Agenda 8-19-10

Can you email me a copy of the HESPA contract that will be voted on at
the board meeting?

That’s pretty close to what I asked for myself and the reply I received from Public Information Offier Lori Woods.

While Burkey writes how he “cannot,” there is no legal prohibition preventing Burkey from providing the information because it is not a public document.

It is a decision on Burkey’s part how he “won’t.”

He can, but simply “won’t.”

While the proposed teachers’ contract was available on the internet on the District 158 web site, the support workers’ contract is not.

It’s a deliberate choice to switch from transparency to secretiveness.

Some superintendents choose to be uncooperative, as Burkey has, while insisting that residents and parents be cooperative.

Such unresponsive and uncooperative government is, frankly, unworthy of local government.

Cooperation on small matters or lack thereof turns people off.

Stakes are much higher in the national arena where the public’s trust is eroding in President Barack Obama. As a candidate he promised his would be the most transparent government.

He would not receive a passing grade on that subject today.

The choice in December is to sweep Illinois Dems out of office, not to save our country, but to definitely help save ourselves from unresponsive people in government positions of authority.

I understand plenty of union members have a copy of the contract, so why won’t the administration share copies with Snow and me?

If the district can post the last teachers’ contract online before it was voted on, as it did, it should matter of factly include the HESPA contract in the online board packet where it could be seen by taxpayers.

Putting that packet online before meetings puts District 158 out in front of most local governments, after all.

But, the District 158 board and superintendent can hardly brag about transparency when they won’t post the contract until it is too late for public input.

And won’t send out copies when requested.

The Moore family home.

There were plenty of political motives to change the longstanding agreement that Huntley 158 had which allowed Linda Moore and her family to live in the house she grew up in.

Linda’s family sold the school district the property that Huntley High was on and retained the right to live in the tiny house on the opposite side of Harmony Road. The house was 1,200 square feet; the hen house 350 sq. ft.

Linda Moore ran for school board. The political knives of existing school board members
came out.

She ran with Aileen Seedorf, who was the top vote getter. Board President Mike Skala narrowly lost (13 votes) to his running mate Jim Carlin. Linda Moore ran just one vote behind.

Skala’s friends on the board were ticked.

David and Linda Moore talk with former school board member Glen Stewart after he was appointed Chief Operating Officer of Huntley School District 158 by his fellow school board members.

Superintendent John Burkey appears to have begun a mission to generate negative publicity about Moore being in the house rent free and how this somehow was so terrible or unfair. Burkey certainly seemed glad to allow negative publicity and administrator remarks be directed at the Moores.

Apparently honoring an existing legal agreement is subject to interpretation when you have “free” legal services of the government at one’s disposal.

The Moore family farm barn and silo.

The district insisted on charging rent. The Moore’s simply moved almost next door, to another house they own.

Now the school district is about to authorize tearing the tiny house down, along with the hen house and barn.

The demolition cost will be over $44,000.

The district could have avoided spending the money.

But that would have meant allowing the Moore family to live in the tiny house. The Moores were responsible for the upkeep of the house and maintenance of the grounds. An old drafty house is expensive to heat in the winter. Paying what rent the district wanted made sense for one year as a transition, but it wasn’t economical to stay.

The kitchen was bright.

School board members knew that. They also knew it would be expensive to tear down the buildings. At the time, board member Larry Snow told the board that it would cost at least $20,000 to tear down the building and the board majority scoffed that it could cost this much.

More than $44,000 for demolition will be likely approved at July’s board meeting.

Not a penny of which, of course, will go toward improving the educational services of the students.

Johler Demolition will get to keep the boards after tearing down one of Huntley’s historic
barns. I wonder if paneling basements in barn boards is still in style.

School board politics and not wanting the Moore’s to live in the family house means one of
Huntley historic barns will get torn down.

The demolition bids can be found on page 8 at this link.

No thought of allowing a teacher who was starting out to rent the home, I guess.

= = = = =
Starting in 1842, the Williams family lived on the farm it purchased for $75. In 1942 Linda Moore’s grandfather, Louis Borhart brought the farm. The family moved next door two yea+rs ago.

Huntley High School

Huntley School District 158’s number two administrator Terry Awrey issued a

“Post Graduate Survey Report (Class of 2010)”

on what Huntley High graduates are doing after graduation.

It was addressed to Supt. John Burkey and all top administrators, including Dr. Mary Olson, Chief Academic Officer, and Chief Financial Officer Mark Altmayer.

It was also sent to all principals, who all report to the current associate superintendent.

The cover memo and report can be found beginning on page 62 of the 407 page of the board of education packet that was reviewed at June 3rd’s meeting.  You can find the document here.

As a reference point, there were 359 Huntley High graduates who got diplomas at the 2010 graduation ceremony.

So the first thing that may catch your eye or puzzle you is how this is at the top of the report:

“398 Seniors Reported”

One might think some kids didn’t graduate until remembering it is a post-graduation report.

And it’s not just a transposition error.

One could be excused for wondering whether anyone looked at the data for validity.

Having a board policy in Huntley requiring careful review of board reports apparently is a matter of subjective interpretation of what “careful” means.

I looked to see if the valedictorian’s four-year college, Michigan State University, was on the list of schools.

It wasn’t there.

I then looked at the list of four-year colleges and saw double counting with the same entry listed twice.

This seems to have been an easy to catch mistake, seeing how close together the duplicate entries are.

The accuracy of this report on educational outcomes of Huntley students is interesting.

The students can put any information on the survey about what their plans are.

There appears to be no apparent effort to verify or validate the information.

No matter how you might grade the quality of such a report, there’s one thing certain, no one will lose their job or get paid any less money because of the quality of work that was actually produced.

Could this be indicative of a low achievement work environment?

My prediction is that on Supt. Burkey’s upcoming evaluation by the entire board, the board majority will make sure he receives high marks for vision and leadership.

Will anyone be held responsible?

I can tell you the sloppiness in this report would not have been tolerated in the U.S. Bureau of the Budget when I worked there.

It seems like a responsible board of education would expect higher quality work from administrators who set an example for a district’s teachers.

This report is more relevant to teachers than most because it is about measuring and reporting students’ educational outcomes.

One final thing.

The year I attended grad school at the University of Michigan, my sister was at Michigan State. I loved kidding her about going to a party school, while the University of Michigan was, well, you know the rivalry. My sister had a legitimate reason for attending Michigan State. At the time, it was the only college offering an undergraduate degree in Special Education.

I do wonder why the student doing best at Huntley High is not going to Princeton or Stanford. Surely, he could get in, if he applied.

Few would come up with a solution to a possible (probable?) large cut in State Aid to Education for next year by spending an extra million this year.

Spending a million, so they don’t have to spend it next year.

That way next year’s budget won’t show a deficit. That seems to be the intent.

Now is the time school boards are guessing how much State Aid they will receive.

By shifting a million dollars of expenditures from next year to this year, it plugs a budget deficit of a million dollars for next year.

Unless an extra million of revenue miraculously appears the year that begins July 1st, the budget the year after that will be a million dollars short.

This is a one-year “fix” that Rod Blagojevich would be proud of. This one-year fix stuff is how the state got into the mess that now exists.

Eventually, the piper has to be paid. There must be a real cut in expenses.

This is what Huntley School District 158’s Supt. John Burkey recommended at last night’s Huntley School District Board meeting and the board majority approved the proposal.

Kevin Gentry congratulates a student at Huntley School District 158 board meeting prior to the budget discussion. To the right is seen Superintendent John Burkey and to the left is seen board member Paul Troy.

It’s unclear how the extra money will be spent.

Because it is money being built into the budgetary “base,” it will be a recurring expense, costing a million dollars next year, the year after that, the year after that, etc.

Plugging a recurring million dollar hole for one year, doesn’t make the recurring money gap go away.

Pushing back any decision of where to come up with the apparently needed (or at least desired) million dollars would suit the purposes of those up for election next year. Newly installed Board President Kevin Gentry’s term expires next spring.

How did the Huntley School District come up with the million dollars?

Last year Burkey and the board did an accounting trick which will make taxpayers repay more bond money in the future.

They stretched out bond payments.

That technique doesn’t produce real savings from reduced spending.

Another approach would have been to ask the teachers union to agree to reopen its contract and bargain for a somewhat lower salary increase for this year.

But, not leading by example was Controller Mark Altmayer. He didn’t offer to work for less than the $25,000 raise he recently got added to his base salary from $105,000. He now makes $130,000.

Just as it’s “good to be the king,” as Mel Brooks put it, it’s good to be a school administrator.

= = = = =

Picture is an outtake from Pete Gonigam, who publishes The First Electric Newspaper.

Salary hikes and lack thereof were the subject of a major Sunday Chicago-Sum-Times article.

That the question the Chicago Sun-Times asked last Sunday.

The answer?

Huntley School District strikers at the Harmony Road Campus

Teachers and health care workers.

Certainly teachers at Huntley School District 158. 18% on the average the first year of which we are in.

And staff at Huntley School District 158.

True, Superintendent John Burkey followed the example of some other Fox River Valley chief administrators in foregoing a salary hike this year, but he has received a $70,000 increase since he left his old job near Peoria, including $12,000 more this year than last year.

And Comptroller Mark Altmayer just got a $25,000 raise over the $105,000.

Since most health care employees don’t work for public entities, their salaries are not public information.

It took months to find out.

It seemed to me reasonable to ask whether Huntley School Superintendent John Burkey was “working” on the taxpayers’ dime for his junket (for which the district paid only registration) or on an officially recognized vacation, that is, using up some of his 20 days of vacation.

I wrote this story in early September.

John Burkey

When I first asked, this was the result:

“Information on how specific days by District employees are accounted for is exempt from disclosure per 5ILCS 140, Section 7(b), “information that, if disclosed would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy…(emphasis added)”

So, I asked again:

That reply, I admit was infuriating:

In response to the number of vacation days taken each month in FY09 and FY10:

“Information on how specific days by District employees are accounted for is exempt from disclosure per 5ILCS 140, Section 7(b, “information, that, if disclosed, would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy…(emphasis added)”

Let me offer a reason why vacation days might be relevant. What if you were a House Republican staff member and had been told to go help a state representative under challenge by “outsider?”

If someone called up the campaign office of the incumbent on the Friday before the election and the House GOP staffer answered the phone, should you—or I, in this quite real example—as a taxpayer have the right to know whether said staffer was being paid by taxpayers or the campaign?

(I never found out, despite the so-called Ethics bill that former Governor Rod Blagojevich bragged about signing, which, supposedly significantly, required legislative staffers to fill out time sheets for every 15-minute part of the day. I sued, along with Christina Tobin, and a loophole in the law—surprise, surprise—prevented us from getting copies of the time sheets.  That’s what a Cook C0unty circuit court judge ruled.)

In a new January Freedom of Information Act request filed after the new amendments went into effect, I asked again and, guess what, Huntley School District finally coughed up the information about Burkey’s China vacation.

Burkey did use vacation days.

June vacation time sheet (click to enlarge)

June-July vacation time sheet (click to enlarge)

Does that make you wonder why Burkey didn’t want to answer the question the first time I asked it?

And, now that we know the Supt. was on vacation, the next question is why the school district paid $900 for his registration fee?

“A total of $900.00 for the registration fee was paid using District 158 funds for Dr. Burkey’s trip to China. A copy of the registration invoice and board approval is enclosed.”

Cheryl Kalkirtz

The headline is from the third sentence of a January 7th letter of recommendation written by Terry Awrey.

He was Cheryl Kalkirtz’ boss while she was employed at Huntley District 158.

The entire letter is below.

On January 11th, Kalkirtz submitted a letter of resignation offering to end her employment on June 30th at the end of her employment contract.

On February 1st, Kalkirtz departed Huntley under circumstances one could describe as

• “unusual,”
• “mysterious” or
• “unexplained by the district,”

your choice of words or phrases.

Could it be a majority on the board of education and likely Supt. John Burkey didn’t think having “a proven professional” who “has earned the respect of the Administrative Team” was reason enough to keep Kalkirtz employed through the first year of her contract?

Or was something else at work?

What other on-the-job-performance-related qualities did Kalkirtz boss praise her for?

If you read the letter below (click to enlarge), you will see Associate Superintendent Awrey writing:

“I find her to be highly intelligent, motivated and committed
to the educational success of each and every child.”

This hardly seems like a list of reasons for Kalkirtz to be no longer employed.

Did Awrey have any reservations about Kalkirtz?

It certainly doesn’t seem so from what he wrote:

“I recommend Mrs. Kalkirtz without reservation.”

Of course, getting praised by the number two guy in an organization does have its limitations.  The basic  one is that one is not in charge.

So who decided that Kalkirtz needed to no longer be employed as a proven, well respected Huntley professional who is highly intelligent, motivated and committed to the educational success of each and every child?

Huntley principals and other administrators may take note how you, too, could be highly praised one day and be thought of apparently very differently soon thereafter.

The phrase “we would never do something like this” takes on a different meaning when you look at in the context of Cheryl Kalkirtz employment.

So far, no good-reason explanation has been advanced for why board members and Supt. Burkey didn’t allow Kalkirtz to finish her contract, which ended until June 30th.

Huntley has done so in the past for other next step higher up administrators.

What happened can probably be found filed in a locked file cabinet in the office of Lauren Smith, Director of Human Resources under “Employee Morale – Bad.”

How can you have so many fair-minded, public-spirited, caring, well-meaning individuals as top administrators and board members and have this happen?

Maybe someone can answer that question.

Join Huntley School District 158–where you can be exceptional administrator or employee one week and no-longer-employed a few weeks later.

Remember.

It’s all for the children.

Cheryl Kalkirtz at a town hall meeting on special education shortly after being hired.

The original opening sentence of yesterday’s Daily Herald’s article on former Special Education Director Cheryl Kalkirtz read,

“Recently released documents show a former special education director in Huntley Unit District 158 overstated her qualifications on her job application.”

For some reason, it changed to

“Documents obtained recently by the Daily Herald paint a contradictory picture of what transpired when a former special education director in Huntley Unit District 158 applied for her job last year.”

You might think this is the real reason behind Kalkirtz’ leaving Huntley School District 158.

Au contraire.

There is far more to it than an employment application, which Kalkirtz may not have personally filled out.

Apparently reporter Jameel Naqvi knows about Cheryl Kalkirtz’ resignation on January 11th, but you can’t tell it from the Daily Herald headline (which editors, not reporters usually write).  Here’s the original headline:

Ex-Huntley Dist. 158 special ed. chief pumped up job application

Here’s the revision:

Question Ex-Huntley Dist. 158 special ed. chief pump up job application?

What Supt. Burkey did comment on in the article relative to Kalkirtz’ resignation was,

“Burkey said the brief statement was the only letter Kalkirtz submitted.” (emphasis added)

If so, I wonder about this letter, which McHenry County Blog has obtained a while back:

It’s addressed to Superintendent John Burkey.

And to school board members.

Could it be that Burkey doesn’t read letters of resignation from top administrators?

Or doesn’t remember?

We know several board members received copies of Kalkirtz’ January letter of resignation, weeks after she had departed.  They were hand delivered to board member’s homes.

Apparently Burkey didn’t pass along Kalkirtz’ resignation letter, addressed also to board members, when Kalkirtz submitted it on January 11th.

If I were on a school board, I’d certainly want to see a letter like this.

Especially with all the controversy about Special Ed.

Below is Kalkirtz’ January 11th letter of resignation with print large enough print to read.

Burkey apparently begged Kalkirtz to stay with the district after she first met with Associate Superintendent Terry Awrey.

They two met with Supt. Burkey to discuss Kalkirtz’ resignation.

After imploring her to stay, Kalkirtz agreed.

A few weeks went by.

Days after Burkey got a new three-year employment contract approved by the board, Burkey apparently decided to have Kalkirtz leave abruptly, rather than her continue through the school year, as she proposed in her January 11th resignation letter.

It’s an interesting way to treat a professional who resigns and commits to finishing out the school year.

When you read the original letter, the Daily Herald’s headline comes across as quite a smear job on Kalkirtz.

Will the Daily Herald take Burkey to task for being less than truthful when he said there was only one resignation letter when there were two?

We’ll see.

The Daily Herald seems to be making a big issue about whether Kalkirtz was truthful.

Will they now hold Burkey to a lower standard?

Or ask why Burkey apparently didn’t check out Kalkirtz’ credentials before hiring her?

Superintendent John Burkey and Special Education Director Cheryl Kalkirtz in happier times.

Maybe Burkey did and thought that, if she were going to be receiving her endorsement soon, then that would be okay, as Burkey did with the Assistant Special Ed Directors who also were required by state law to have their endorsements when they took their jobs.

It looks as if Burkey recommended several people for jobs that required endorsements, got the board to approve them and, then, after Kalkirtz submitted her January resignation letter, singled her out.

After all, none of the people running Special Ed in any school district that belongs to SEDOM, the Special Education District of McHenry County, needs to have a Special Ed Director certification, because the SEDOM Director Kathy Wilhoit’s endorsement is sufficient.

If this isn’t what happened, Burkey can set the record straight the same time he admits there was a previous resignation letter.

When you read Kalkirtz’ original resignation letter below you can understand why Burkey might want to say the letter never existed.

You might also understand how it came about Kalkirtz departed Huntley.

There’s one thing administrators and board members should know about confidentiality clauses; they don’t apply to when the documents are already beyond someone’s control.

Lots of people with the district talked about Kalkirtz resigning when it happened on January 11th.  The grapevine gushed out news about it.

People outside of board members and administrators not only had a copy of Kalkirtz’ January 11th resignation letter, but other documents as well prior to any agreement being entered into between Kalkirtz and the district.

Below is the text of the January 11, 2010, resignation letter from Cheryl Kalkirtz:

January 11th, 2010

Consolidated School District 158
Board of Education Members
Dr. John Burkey, Superintendent
650 Academic Drive
Algonquin, IL 60102

I am providing you with this letter of resignation, upon the completion of my contract for the 2009-2010 school years, for your approval as I have selected to look for other employment at this time. I would like to cite some particular examples for my decision to not stay with the district, also offering artifacts, correspondence or concrete examples for my departure, as an experienced administrator who has persevered at a district with many changes or dis structure that was placed before her.

The bullet points as below, generally describe my reasons for not choosing to remain at District #158 next year:

• The administrative design for the Office of Special Services from day one has required a different structure, as experienced cabinet members could have prevented so much change, and even one assistant director’s resignation during this school year, as that administrator has still not been replaced.
• I started the school year, needing to rapport build with a new office staff, who I was encouraged not to trust, causing disharmony in our immediate office setting. Still, we grew as a family, office staff are extremely dedicated and loyal, and I have observed trustworthiness and professionalism.
• I would mentor 3 new assistant directors to oversee the district’s special education populations, with a disproportionate structure for supervision responsibilities. The cabinet has heard my ongoing concerns regarding themes of our office and has not always included me with problem-solving strategies.
• I have represented reports, to the best of my ability, with other cabinet members either changing reports on the fly or have been asked to change reports sporadically, without ensuring accuracy in the completion of reports that I would need to represent formally.
• Communications to my superiors, verbally or via e-mail, have not always been acknowledged, as a new administrator to the district, regarding decision-making for my department.
• I was unable to participate in staff development, or have a leadership role for Special Services staff to have Institute Day opportunities to meet throughout the year, as past practices periodically allowed for this. I was not even formally introduced to the district by my superiors at the district’s opening Institute Day, and neither was my new administrative team from the get go.
• Fiscal data has not been collaborative.
• Curriculum and assessments for special needs students have been authoritarian style versus collaborative, and I have found that the Curriculum Director has required my providing her with reports about curriculum and criteria for establishing curriculum for the near 1,400 students who we represent, versus recommending curriculum according to her expertise and background or being advised to adopt programs that may or may not be successful for our students, due to former animosity between herself and my predecessor.
• Caseloads and workloads for staff have been an ongoing struggle, as workloads for Special Education Staff became a legal requirement last spring into this fall with the state board of education, with my coming onboard to a new district. This fact has been a thorn in the office of Special Services throughout the entire year and relationship building has been limited during an average work day, as my administrative team has been limited for addressing many of the workload concerns. Finally, this winter, the district is establishing committees to follow through with workloads, represented by the Human Resource Office, respectfully.
• District wide initiatives, such as RTI that leads to special education eligibility, PBIS, action-planning, the District’s first Parent Advisory Committee for Special Education, managing data with different fiscal databases, and strengthening special education compliance without an IEP database, has been a difficult and unique process, with a redeveloped administrative Special Services Team and a strong need for more clerical support, when compared to the other offices in our district. Morale has been an ongoing concern, additionally. All of the points listed are important to me, as how I am publicly perceived as a public school administrator.

As I have touched upon several concerning areas, as listed, please know that my original enthusiasm and intended dedication has always remained sincere and proactive, amidst the many changes placed before my office and programs.

To turn so many known obstacles around in such a short period of time, also with directives from my superiors to change how we function as an office with so much frequency or lack of communication, administrative guidance has been unclear, limited toward me for opportunities to understand the direction of how leadership wants me to interchange with understanding future designs or new directions for the district via long term goals.

In conclusion, my predecessor, from what I have heard, experienced all of these concerns and articulated these similarities to her superiors during her tenure with the district.

Respectfully, I will miss the collaborations and relationships that I have developed through our district and our Special Education cooperative and I hope that the district learns from an experienced district level administrator who tried to positively persevere at a district that needs to reconsider their foundation for professional learning communities for all of their stakeholders.

Karen Aylward

I wrote about how Karen Aylward, now the top special ed administrator in Huntley 158, objected to having the meeting with special ed parents run five or ten minutes longer last month.

Ninety minutes. That was the time limit.

This month the Supt. John Burkey administration seems to want no misunderstanding whatsoever about strictly enforcing an hour and a half time limit for the Parent Advisory Committee meeting.

Pretty heavy handed about a 90-minute meeting that doesn’t allow for a question and answer period…unless it is specifically on the agenda.

Maybe the committee should be renamed the “Advise the Parent Committee” rather than the “Parents Advisory Committee,” inasmuch as administrators don’t want to listen to parents about something as simple as being flexible about when the meeting ends.

Fortunately the teachers of special ed students in Huntley are far more dedicated and less time rule obsessive than administrators.

Meanwhile Supt. Burkey likely feels it’s so unfair that parents don’t trust him or his administrators.

One summer, 2009, open-ended Special Ed Town Hall Meeting

Apparently Burkey has opted for the “containment” approach to parents.  A new model in community outreach, I guess.

As opposed to last summer’s Special Education Town Hall Meetings, where at least some school board members listened.

Common sense might dictate that, if an administrator has to leave promptly on a given night, he or she does that.

Huntley administrators leave board meetings early all of the time, so this would be hardly something new.

But this seems to be about more than just getting home to see the wife/husband and kids.

It’s about making the meetings as meaningless as possible, while being able to publicly tout the sincerity of how administrators are listening to parents…if only for a part of ninety minutes

Here’s the limitation on the meeting, which can be found here.

Any community member interested in adding items

to the agenda please contact kaylward@district158.org

(*Note- Our meetings will begin and end promptly

as scheduled, allowing staff and community to

respect professional and personal commitments.

“Please drive safely, everyone.”)