DaytonDailyNews.com

Stebbins: LeMaster can’t attend graduation

By selliott | Friday, May 9, 2008, 04:52 PM

Mad River school superintendent Mike Eaglowski ruled today that convicted sexual felon Christopher LeMaster cannot attend graduation. Eaglowski said the district needed to send a message that LeMaster’s conduct will not be condoned by the school district.

Many GOTB commenters urged the district to take this action earlier this week.

So, readers, are you satisfied with the district’s response?

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Our old friend surfaces in Memphis search

By selliott | Thursday, May 8, 2008, 11:25 AM

James A. Williams

When the news broke last week about Dayton Superintendent Percy Mack was a candidate for superintendent in Columbia, S.C., we talked a lot about whether he had been job hunting or not.

Mack insists he was not looking when Columbia’s search consultant called him, but he said he was frequently contacted by districts searching for superintendents. Just since the start of the school year, Mack said, he was contacted by districts in Wisconsin, Louisiana and Tennessee but did not respond. That’s because, Mack said, he only wants to work here in Dayton or at an urban district close to his native Georgia.

To make the point, he got out a letter he received from Memphis schools asking him to apply for superintendent there. Memphis is a huge district with more than 100,000 kids and superintendent there is a high profile and well-paying job. Mack argued if he were really just trying to springboard out of Dayton to a better job he certainly would have applied in Memphis.

Well, yesterday Memphis named its five finalists. Mack is not one of them, but guess who is? Yep, our old friend James A. Williams.

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Top educator job hunt, cont.

By selliott | Wednesday, May 7, 2008, 09:57 AM

(Gerald Dawkins, Percy Mack and Craig Witherspoon, the three candidates for superintendent in Columbia, chat prior to a community meet-and-greet Tuesday.)

All three candidates for superintendent in Columbia, S.C., including Dayton’s Percy Mack, participated in an awkward-sounding joint meet-and-greet with the public Tuesday and then interviewed with the school board. It was hard to get any feel for how they were received from the story in the State, Columbia’s newspaper.

Meanwhile, The Fordham Foundation’s Ohio Gadfly newsletter waves a fond farewell to Susan Zelman, Ohio’s superintendent of public instruction who is looking to move on after clashing with Gov. Ted Strickland. The Gadfly calls Zelman “ornery, strong-willed, and mercurial, in addition to very bright, boundlessly energetic, and quite creative.” Fordham says Ohio will miss “Dr. Z” and warns of danger on the horizon as Strickland pushes his education agenda.

(Image credit: The State newspaper)

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Dayton schools require union wages

By selliott | Tuesday, May 6, 2008, 09:10 PM

The city schools will require construction companies building its new schools to pay union wages going forward — for now.

The board voted unanimously to add language to is bidding requirements at its meeting tonight. The wage rules will apply to the next three schools. The move left non-union contractors — some of whom have worked on the district’s prior projects — miffed.

“We’re very disappointed,” said Kathleen Somers, president of Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc., of the Ohio Valley, a non-union contractors group. “That vote tonight cost taxpayers a lot of money unnecessarily.”

School board President Yvonne Isaacs said the goal is to attract more local companies to the projects — companies board members hope will employ more local people and minorities to build Dayton’s new schools.

If the experiment works and the schools stay on budget, Isaacs said the rule will remain for the remaining nine schools still to be built.

“This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for Dayton and we want to make sure that we see the people actually paying the taxes have benefitted,” she said.

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Should LeMaster graduate after sex crime conviction?

By selliott | Monday, May 5, 2008, 05:57 PM

Christopher LeMaster

Over in Riverside, former Stebbins High School student Christopher LeMaster pleaded guilty last month to gross sexual imposition for having sex with an unconscious fellow student. The 16-year-old girl had passed out after taking drugs and drinking alcohol at party only to find out later that LeMaster, 18, had has sex with her and that pictures of her undressed and unconscious were circulating among Stebbins students at school.

The initial report of this incident came when the girl told a Stebbins guidance counselor that she thought she had been raped. LeMaster was arrested in late February and put on “home instruction” by the school district in early March. He admitted his guilt in court on April 3 and later was sentenced to five years probation.

The girl now is home schooled and told the judge in LeMaster’s case that she had to leave Stebbins because she was the subject of so much harassment from other students. So now, LeMaster’s family wants him to be allowed to graduate with his class at Stebbins next month and school officials says they are researching the legalities of the issue before making a decision.

I have a simple question for Riverside schools. Why was LeMaster not expelled after pleading guilty to a sexual crime against another student? He is a sexual felon now and the initial report of this incident came at school. How can he possibly be allowed to continue as a Stebbins student (even if he is instructed at home) after that?

Seems like if LeMaster had been expelled in April, this wouldn’t be an issue.

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Latest on the top educator job front

By selliott | Monday, May 5, 2008, 01:40 PM

Percy Mack and Susan Zelman

Here’s the lastest on job hunts by Dayton Superintendent Percy Mack and Ohio Superintendent for Public Instruction Susan Zelman:

In Columbia, S.C., the State newspaper reports that Percy Mack and two other finalists will visit Tuesday for a whirlwind tour and interviews. Reporter Bill Robinson gave readers there some background on Mack and the other finalists in a story today. Robinson also includes a Q&A interview with Mack and the other finalists.

Meanwhile, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reportsZelman is a candidate for education dean at the University of Oregon.

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Who will sing the alma mater?

By selliott | Sunday, May 4, 2008, 11:22 PM

(Ted Murphy with music students at Thurgood Marshall High School)

Ted Murphy wrote an alma mater for the new Thurgood Marshall High School, but he had no one to sing it at graduation.

Last summer’s budget school district budget cuts decimated the arts at the school once known as Colonel White School for the Arts, wiping out choir there along with other arts programs across the district.

Murphy, an elementary schools music teacher for 22 of his 34 years in Dayton, hung on until the Thurgood Marshall assignment came just before summer’s end. Murphy was one of the last two music teachers in the district to get an assignment and Thurgood Marshall nearly opened with no art or music programs at all.

Last week, a consultant delivered a largely upbeat report on the district’s operations nearly a year after a devastating levy defeat brought $30 million in cuts. Linda Recio of Evergreen Solutions said the schools made great improvements over six years.

But since last summer, teachers say the cuts placed a great strain on instruction that some fear will harm the district’s run of test score gains.

At Thurgood Marshall, Murphy said the challenge of rebuilding the music program in a new building has made this the best year of his career.

Even so, the kids and the school have suffered.

Just two years ago, Superintendent Percy Mack invited Colonel White’s robust and energetic marching band to perform at his convocation speech, lauding a young director named Jamie Shelton for reviving a program that had dwindled to 12 kids.

But Shelton departed for Trotwood schools in the cuts and several of his students left the district to follow. This fall, the band was back down to about 20 kids, if you counted every dancer, drummer and flag waver. The school can’t even afford to buy them updated uniforms with its new colors.

“That’s where I am right now, starting all over again,” Murphy said. “It has really disgruntled my kids. It was a strong program and they saw it collapse around them.”

Still, Murphy is hopeful. He has begun tutoring a group of students in choral performance and for graduation, he said, someone will sing the alma mater.

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