As time marches inexorably forward and we approach the New Year, I find it a good time to pause and reflect on where we’ve been, and where we’re headed, at the Antioch Unified School District.
As 2015 came to an end, we saw change come in double step, with the retirement of our Superintendent and the resignation of a School Board Trustee. Yet changes are nothing to moan over. Positive change should be welcomed and embraced.
As the voters so decisively indicated in the last election, a course correction was desperately needed. But, just as large ships at sea don’t turn easily, so it is with large bureaucracies; status quo driven inertia keeps them moving in old lanes, even when a change in direction is clearly called for.
Eventually, however, a ship will turn, and so it is with AUSD. With the addition of new Trustee Francisco Navarro to our board, we are seeing less divisiveness and a renewed sense of purpose. The general absence of friction allows us to address long-standing problems within the District.
Granted, positive behavior interventions, advanced placement class participation, overall high school graduation rates and career themed academy expansion are among the areas of district improvement. The fact is, though, that with all the initiatives that have been implemented over the last several years, we’ve seen little progress with our lowest performing students.
Our current Board does not find the achievement gap of English language learners, children of color, or low economic status acceptable; nor is it tolerable that 81% of our students fail to show proficiency in math. We can’t have two tiers, haves and have-nots. We must do better by all the 18,500 students in AUSD. All, after all, means all!
We have now begun the search for a new Superintendent; a critical step, since the person selected will most likely be at the helm of AUSD for the next several years. Bold leadership is clearly needed. As a Board, we’re committed to a selection methodology that ensures the local community has input in the process, and that the individual we choose to lead our district has the courage to take the necessary steps to effect the changes needed.
I grew up in Great Neck, Long Island, New York. As a child, I can remember people leaving notes by our front door encouraging us to call them if we ever decided to move. Why did they do this? Simple answer; because they wanted to buy into the area due to the quality of our school district. The quality of the education available made living in our community that desirable. That is my dream for Antioch…that it would become a city that people clamor to move to, because of the education their children can achieve. Quality of schools is pivotal in civic promotion, so having kids or not, we all want a great school system.
The first necessary step in effecting change is to recognize that you have a problem. As a board, we’ve done that and we are taking the steps needed to fix it. Our students, their parents, and our community deserve no less.
Walter Ruehlig
Vice President, Board of Trustees, AUSD
4 comments
Walter, it depends on what your definition of “positive” change equates to. Quite frankly, the AUSD board has become a joke and is going backwards, not forward especially with it backing down to the NAACP. The rules are the rules. If a certain amount of people are not following them, regardless of color or sex, expel them or discipline them.
I don’t care if your board is less divisiveness or somehow found a renewed sense of purpose, you are elected to make things better. It only took you how long since being re-elected to find a purpose. Good grief man.
We absolutely need more discipline in our schools and protection of our teachers from students and parents who choose to inflict bodily harm on the teacher. This district has gone backwards for several years and I see no end to it. Kowtowing to the NAACP and others is not the answer. It is pulling the district apart. You cannot keep everyone happy all the time and this district uses that as the solution to everything.
A positive article written by Board member Walter Ruehlig. We need more people like him who are not afraid to open their eyes and listen with their ears. As far as “knowtowing to the NAACP,” what evidence do you have to support such a broad sweeping generalization?
Dr. Gill and Trustee Barbara Cowan’s leaving AUSD is a sign of “positive change”? That there is now a “absence of friction and less divisiveness” implies that they were the cause. Let’s get it right Walter. Your election plays into Smith and Gibson-Gray’s control game.
A new superintendent “at the helm for several years” will only happen if he or she plays the board majority “micro-manage game”.
“Children of Color “in AUSD under Dr. Gill’s African /American Male Initiative(applauded throughout the State) was a positive focus in his plan. This was cut short by a board majority not on a freeway to success as Walter puts it, but now on the back roads.
Smith and Gray pushed Cowan to a point of no return with their back room ways and thus she left. Dr. Gill should have stayed at least until June, but the “flush” old guard found a huge amount of cash to push him out early, pay a interim superintendent at extra money and hire a mentor for this person. Think Walter what could have been done for minorities and low achievers with these funds.
You were on the board before and did little about “long standing problems”. What makes you think that your return is a magic bullet?
Comments are closed.