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It's not a high bar to beat, at least here in New Jersey. Nearly all of our school boards are non-professional, non-compensated elected officials, and a large

It's not a high bar to beat, at least here in New Jersey. Nearly all of our school boards are non-professional, non-compensated elected officials, and a large percentage of Superintendents started their career as gym teachers. The net result is schools that hire hoards of consultants to try to meet professional standards, but fail anyway, while spending vast sums of tax payer dollars. Covid funds earmarked towards bridging the learning gap from closed schools during the pandemic are spent on fancy laptops, new athletic facilities, sound systems for auditoriums. Absenteeism is skyrocketing, and teachers are not only not encouraged to enforce discipline, they're actively told to let out of control students slide. Social promotion is on the rise, and standardized test scores are tanking. We finally gave up in my local district and ended up paying a fortune to send both our kids to private schools. After an initial many-months-long struggle to catch up with their new private school classmates (because of the public school deficits), they are both doing much better. Money well spent, but I still send taxes to an ineffective district that spends money like water, and where educational value is dead last in their priorities. They even introduced a course in Graphic Novels at the high school this year, while 75% of kids fail standardized science testing, and 60% fail in math.

ecshafer 3y ago
New Jersey also has the system of Magnet schools at the county level, which have some of the best high schools in the country (high technology highschool, middlesex academy for math and science, union county magnet school, etc). They reasonably require tests and maintaining of discipline. Discipline is key to having effective schools, and if either students or parents are undermining it, schools can't be effective.
nameless912 3y ago
It remains extremely strange to me that we have our school boards be largely totally non-professional laypeople in the US. Obviously there's no absolute requirement that you be a "professional" for almost any elected position in the US, but school boards are one of those situations, like judges and comptrollers, where it seems like there should be some basic qualifications for running. Especially because many of the folks elected to school boards are either 1) crazies with a bone to pick with a specific teacher/administrator/school or 2) moderately ambitious ladder climbers hoping to launch their political careers without having to work too hard.
mrguyorama 3y ago
Are you voting out the bad and ineffective actors in your local school system?
- Scubabear68 3y ago
  We are trying. It is very difficult though, the most effective people don’t want the job, and the Board pushes “feel good” politics on everyone, and they do the best they can to hide bad news (although sunshine laws thwarts that if you know how to dig and where to look). Use of software like Board docks makes finding info 10x harder as well, what a steaming pile of crap that is.

ecshafer 3y ago

New Jersey also has the system of Magnet schools at the county level, which have some of the best high schools in the country (high technology highschool, middlesex academy for math and science, union county magnet school, etc). They reasonably require tests and maintaining of discipline. Discipline is key to having effective schools, and if either students or parents are undermining it, schools can't be effective.

nameless912 3y ago

It remains extremely strange to me that we have our school boards be largely totally non-professional laypeople in the US. Obviously there's no absolute requirement that you be a "professional" for almost any elected position in the US, but school boards are one of those situations, like judges and comptrollers, where it seems like there should be some basic qualifications for running. Especially because many of the folks elected to school boards are either 1) crazies with a bone to pick with a specific teacher/administrator/school or 2) moderately ambitious ladder climbers hoping to launch their political careers without having to work too hard.

mrguyorama 3y ago

Are you voting out the bad and ineffective actors in your local school system?

Scubabear68 3y ago
We are trying. It is very difficult though, the most effective people don’t want the job, and the Board pushes “feel good” politics on everyone, and they do the best they can to hide bad news (although sunshine laws thwarts that if you know how to dig and where to look). Use of software like Board docks makes finding info 10x harder as well, what a steaming pile of crap that is.