Arkansas Blog

Swaim got beat tonight. I guess that means that more of my tax dollars will be used to pad John Waker's pockets and of course we all know that Watson will be a shoe-in. Apparently Watson and Mitchell are taking trips together at the tax payers expense. Then there was the $2000 transcript that Watson ordered for John Walker. $2000 of tax payer money. Watson has said it is no bodys business why she did that. What are Walker, Mitchell and Watson doing to attract white students back into the district? Someone should file a lawsuit over that. The Gang of 4 continues thier destruction of the LRSD. There is one more avenue to set those bozos straight. State funding should be cut off from the LRSD. It can be done! And the 15 million loan the state forgave the LRSD can be recalled. My state representative has already been contacted and he agrees that the LRSD needs to have its funding cut.

I suppose asking the Election Comission to update the website would be to much to ask.

Max writes: "As I've written in a column that had to go press before the polls closed, Anna Swaim seems the better choice".

Huh???? Then how about running your endorsement last week, Max? And you criticize Beebe for sitting on the fence for as long as possible?

ARK. BLOG: It pains me that you haven't been hanging on my every word. Sept. 13, I wrote, in assessing the candidates, that Daugherty's defeat could "change a destructive dynamic" and concluded:

"That leaves Anna Swaim...She has a strong record of community involvement ..supports collective bargaining...opposes merit pay..puts careful selection of a suiperintendent at the top of her priorities...This broad top priority as opposed to a parochial, zone-based view, worked against her in teachers union and Acorn endorsements, but it recommends her to those of us worried about the entirety of the district....She holds promise to be sorely needed swing vote."
etc.

Max,

As a chief judge at a voting precinct (though not today) I wanted to gently correct your statement that provisional ballots would only be examined if they could be decisive in the outcome. All provisional ballots are examined and those that come from eligible voters will be counted even if they don't affect the outcome. That's the law.

Provisional voters are those folks whose votes may or may not count, and they are sealed by the voter in an envelope and sent downtown to the Pulaski Co. Election Commission which then decides if the vote should count. For example, a voter goes to the polls, but is at the wrong precinct. For a vote to be counted a voter must vote at his/her assigned voting precinct. That vote at the wrong precinct would not be counted and the individual would be notified why their vote didn't count. For the record voters are redirected by poll workers to their assigned voting precinct, but some refuse to go to their correct precinct and insist on voting wherever they are even after being told their vote will be counted under Arkansas law. Go figure!

Anyone who is forced to vote a provisional ballot (for example, your name is not in the precinct voter registration book, your name is not in the county voter registration database, the records show you received an absentee ballot, etc.) will be notified in writing if their ballot was counted or not, and the reason why or why not. 'Nuff said.

Voters- don't wait until election day to check and/or fix your voter registration records. Election officials and poll workers are swamped on election day trying to process voters as efficiently as possible. That is the worst day of the year to try and get your voter records corrected. It is YOUR responsibility to make sure your voter registration records are accurate before you go to vote. That includes name changes, a new address or other changes to your voter records. You can access your voting record here in Pulaski County online and make changes, so there is no excuse.

ARK. BLOG: Thanks for the correction.

CORRECTION to the last line of my second paragraph: "even after being told their vote will NOT be counted under Arkansas law." Sorry!

Whatever the outcome, I hope lessons will be learned by all parties. Let me start the discussion.

Lesson 1. We all need to invest time and energy in developing stronger race relations. Perceived or real, we have a huge racial divide. Let's avoid resegregation seen in other Southern cities.

"To the victor goes the spoils"

Lesson 1. Don't play the race card unless it is in your favor
Lesson 2. Money doesn't always win

The outcome is not a surprise, but the somewhat narrow margin of victory is. Perhaps more people than I imagined are turned off by the facts that Daugherty has committed academic fraud by lying about having earned a Ph.D at Tulane when he was never even enrolled at the school, and that he owes the state of Arkansas more than $94,000 in unpaid sales taxes dating back to 2002.

I hope some legislator out there has been following this situation and will champion legislation in the next session of the Arkansas General Assembly to prohibit any person from running for, or serving on a public school board when he or she has failed to pay taxes due the state. That such a law does not already exist is unconscionable.

On a more positive note, the October 4, 2007, issue of Arkansas Times includes a list of changes Linda Watson, interim superintendent of the LRSD, would make if she had a "magic wand." The changes:

1. There'd be one teacher to every 16-18 kids. Reading Recovery, a literacy program would be implemented district wide.

2. There'd be a math and reading specialist in every school.

3. Extended day programs would help kids work up to grade level.

4. There'd be classes for parents on how to help their kids in school.

5. The LRSD would work with day care centers and pre-school programs to offer curriculum to help prepare kids for school.

6. Every 4-year-old would go to pre-school, and there'd be more pre-K centers like the one at Fair Park.

I find Supt. Watson's ideas to be very impressive, and I think they're attainable. The school board and the community should unite immediately in a major push to provide Watson the magic wand needed to implement her ideas. And, the sooner the better.

Lesson 3. Count on the folks who run the ADG and write the editorials to be politically tone deaf. They live on another planet, absolutely no read on the pulse of the community.

Did Daugherty win because he is black, or did he win because there are many who believe that he makes decisions based upon the interest of LRSD, students, and parents? Agreed that many may have voted for the color of his skin. There is an issue here that needs to be explored in LRSD. Where exactly did Roy Brooks take the district? Into the hands of the control freaks with money? Led by external influences and not internal influences?
Perhaps Mrs. Swaim will volunteer her expertise in communication and race relations to the LRSD board? Anyone want to bet on that?
Thanks, Micheal for working for the improvement of the children of LRSD. Perhaps when Kurrus, Fox, and Berkley realize advice from the "big business" folks doesn't translate to MOST of the LRSD parents, then there might be an increase in enrollment of white children. I dont see that happening for a while, do you?
Is this win a decisive message to Hussman, the Walton Foundation, etal? Pert near.
Many thanks Mr. Daugherty for your stand for the children.

durangokid, at some point in your life you need to step back and get in touch with reality. Considering school board races usually have considerably lower turnouts, this one is a prime example that not everyone believes what they read in your bible the Democrat-Gazette. I can't wait until the truth is told and the Democrat-Gazette and you have to eat crow. I think the worst kind of liar is someone who repeats a lie told by a liar. Congratulations you win the prize!

thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Max, not sure if you posted this or care to, but there's a great video on crooksandliars from the Stephen Colbert Report on Limbaugh's "phony soldiers" thing. It features Mike Huckabee, who condemns the censure of Congress because he says the government has no right to meddle in free speech, but then juxtaposes a quote of him condemning Hillary Clinton for NOT censuring moveon.org.

Here's my thoughts on the election :

http://pointsbypritt.wordpress.com/2007/10/10/the-people-not-money-win/

VOX POPULI

There wasn't a good choice for LRSD in this election. The racial split would endure, even worsen, were Swaim to win. Let us hope that things will settle down, pundits all around will relax and Ms. Watson will lead us to the promised land.

JD, as they say over at hogville, read more and post less. Max was ahead of you. Go to this link (provided in an earlier topic by Max) and scroll down in a little box until you find the Limbaugh vid:

http://www.comedycentral.com/shows/the_colbert_report/index.jhtml

Granamere, if you actually believe that Martha Hunt, chief legal counsel for the Arkansas Department of Finance and Administration, would lie about Daugherty's unpaid taxes; or that the registrar and other officials at Tulane, UAMS, and UALR would lie while setting the record straight about Daugherty's totally false claims; or, if you actually believe that an Arkansas Democrat-Gazette reporter would run the legal risks of twisting the quotes of those officials and write something they didn't say, then you are . . . well, by God, you are truly stupid, as SO many other bloggers on other threads have already said. Don't expect a response from anything else you direct at me, Grannie. I'm done with you. You're simply not worth the time or trouble. (Jesus, what a moron.)

Durangokid, isn't it sad that the election is over, and yet you still are slinging the mud. Its obvious when someone has lost an argument as they sling insults in place of logical reasoning. The election is over, the people have spoken, its time for us all to unite with this School Board and jointly be advocates for the Little Rock School System and most of all the kids!

The private schools won this one. We can expect over the next few months/years that public school parents black and white will try to find a way to extricate their children from the crumbling LRSD and get them into schools where they can learn something. This is the pattern repeated not only all across the South, but across the country. Even Central High will be threatened when, as we can expect to happen, Advanced Placement classes will be curtailed or eliminated because they encourage "resegregation". We're paying the price now for years of segregation, but a worse sin is what we allowed to happen to the public school system, mandating equality of result as well as equality of opportunity. We're just beginning to pay for that. No legislative body can repeal the Iron Law of Unintended Consequences. What a cruel joke.

durangokid's mind is so warped by his own sense of self-righteousness he doesn't see past his nose. He reads things that aren't there and professes them to be true. It appears his gods at the Democrat-Gazette asked Ms. Hunt a generic question about tax liens without being specific about Daughtery's to enlist a generic answer they could attach to Daughtery and publish without consequence. Talk about your morons!

If you want a good illustration of how polarized LRSD has become, look at the precinct-by-precinct results. The only precinct that was evenly divided was Pul Hts Presb where NOBODY VOTED! (?)

Every precinct was lopsided for one or the other. Apparently there is no middle ground.

As Casimer Pulaski observed, the only winners in this election are the private schools. When you get a result that supports a long-term incumbent on a deeply divided, autocratic board, you get a clear affirmation that the past is the future. The hostility will continue to escalate, now with a vengeance.

Since we have a strong, quality private school system, our public schools have become optional - now, more than ever.

If there was a ray of hope for community healing and unified support for our public schools, it is pointed somewhere else - not at this board.

Apparently, school segregation is the desire of the people and the people have spoken.

Democracy in action.

We have successfully returned to our 1957 roots, just without the troops.

The hypocrisy here is amazing which is also the reason that Swain lost. This was about equity and power. Don Keyhotay said that we have successfully returned to our 1957 roots, just without the troops", and he is right. Racial discrimination is about power, pure and simple, and not about equity. The white majority in 57 would not have had a problem with those kids either coming to school as janitors, to serve in the cafeteria or in some "special education class" off to themselves away from the other students. The notion that they would dare to sit next to them, work next to them and achieve as well as I or better is a concept that they can could not fathom. After all, weren't they taught at home and in church that blacks were inferior. The same goes for this board. The fact that the majority black board is asserting its legal right with all of their faults sends some folks over the edge. This situation is about what has happened over the past year. Who had a problem with Daugherty and Mitchell when others were in power and making decisions? Why were their no investigations prior to this past year's school board election? The NTL program was started in 05 and now Mitchell's involvement is illegal in 07? This investigation would have gone away if Swaim had won, but now you can expect to hear from "Dr." Holloway next week. Its going to be a full court press. If you can't beat 'em, criminalize them.
In 1958, they closed Central down. No we have folks talking about yanking funding from the district in 07 because the power structure has changed which could damage schools or hinder the education of all the students that we claim to care about, but I guess God is pleased with those motives.

Most intelligent people reading this thread wouldn't call it slinging mud, Drew. Rather, they'd view what I wrote as a statement of documented facts. Obviously, you and a few others here are in denial about Daugherty's misdeeds, or more likely, you simply don't care.

It's also obvious that your reading comprehension is severely lacking, since you don't remember that in my first post, I called for the school board and community to unite and support Linda Watson's ideas to improve the LRSD.

Some of these comments remind me when I was younger and when someone could not win in a game, they would get mad and they would leave and take their ball home. This election was more about ending the good ole boy system that our school system has been under. As Daughtery said some people talk about change and his winning just continues the change that started last October.

White people can't stop complaining about how black people just whine about their situation and don't do anything. However, let a group of black people get in charge and those same white people will scream that the world is ending.

I mean, come on, suck it up. We've oppressed black people for a couple of hundred years, and now we can't abide a black majority on a school board?

It is evident by this recent demonstration of support, Daugherty's constituents appear to be pleased with him. I believe Swaim would have been an asset to the board, too. Let the work begin....

The answer to the general state of public education in Little Rock, regardless of who would've won: Private School. And even then, only some of them. Elite, bourgeois, trite answer? Guilty on all of the above.

But the educational demands of the "Real workplace" outside of our little bubble here dictate that.

Widespread poverty, All-TV-All-The-Time, in most homes, especially at critical early year window to gain early literacy skills, and general teaching down to the norm of the class all mean your kid is getting an education that makes him/her employable at some point--probably, but less and less so for the top jobs/careers now and in the future, given the ground they'll have to make up even given they go to College. Just throwing that out there.

I have absolutely no problem with black school board members or green ones for that matter. What I want is to know that they are law abiding, tax paying citizens who can be good examples to the children they are charged with educating and not there to secure jobs for teachers, administrators and lawyers. If we want to lower class sizes and bring in reading coaches, we had better watch how they money is being spent day to day. Reckless spending will send educated people who have other options to seek alternatives for their children. The achievment gap is a nationwide problem, not just in LRSD. Until education and respect are valued in all homes, no amount of money we throw at it will change it. My husband and I both work full time and fight hard to make sure our kids know the value of learning and discipline. After working the afternoon in a LRSD middle school recently, I can tell you most kids I encountered were disrespectful and could have cared less about learning. Unitl the attitude is changed in many homes, the problem will continue.

honestone, I'm sure you're correct that Swaim would have proved to be an asset to the board. I think, too, that with your intelligence, common sense, and moderate view on matters of importance, YOU would be a great school board member. I wish you lived in Zone 2 and could be talked into running next time.

Durangokid stop insulting people. The election is over and as Honestone states the real work begins now. This is the critical juncture when we all come together and work together for the kids of LRSD. Otherwise you are no better than someone speaking of a time you didn't live in, singing Look Away Dixie, and not doing what you can do to improve the present situation.

Exactly my point. One of them anyway. Even good students are mired in a piss-poor learning environment. Joke relative to what it should be. Get out while you can. Save money elsewhere but get your kid in a private school for his or her long-term sake. Run, don't walk. Has nothing to do with this lection. Like that would help. Yeah, smaller class sizes, stronger this or that, blah, blah, blah, blah. Will never happen.

Don't let your kid go through life with the stigma of having to say to others in his or her adult life that he/she went to public school in Little Rock. Could be worse I guess. You could have to say some hell-hole rural county with a lower per capita income level across the board somewhere else or even the Delta.

Just throwing that out there. The rest of the tinkering we all hear so much about is not going to help much when you really think about it. It's the great debate that goes on and on while Rome is aflame,

my last post was in reference to tiredofbs post below:

>>until education and respect are valued in all homes, no amount of money we throw at it will change it. My husband and I both work full time and fight hard to make sure our kids know the value of learning and discipline. After working the afternoon in a LRSD middle school recently, I can tell you most kids I encountered were disrespectful and could have cared less about learning. Unitl the attitude is changed in many homes, the problem will continue<<

Drew Pitt,

Congratulations on your new found influence with the Little Rock School Board. Your influence with the gay and lesbian community had to have been what pushed Michael Daugherty over the top in winning the election. Michael Daugherty is truly indebted to you. Surely, you can use your new influence to obtain new benefits for the many gay/lesbian employees of the Little Rock School System.

Drew Pritt, I've come to the conclusion that you are a totally overeactive dullard, and I dislike having to apply a term like that to anybody, even somebody like you who is deserving of it. What I said to and about honestone was a sincere statement.

There is nobody, NOBODY, on this blog whose opinions and posts I appreciate and value more than honestone's. She and people like her would make outstanding school board members. With regard to you, why don't you take your 8 votes and crawl off into a dark corner somewhere.

Pritt publicly dogged Dr. (Fake Educational Credentials) Daugherty for not showing up at the candidate forums and then turned around and endorsed him. That says a lot about Pritt. I wonder if Dr. Mitchell will continue to call Daugherty, "Dr. Daugherty" during school board meetings. That will just add one more joke to that circus.

ARK. BLOG: The voters have spoken on Daugherty's credentials. There will be ample issues on which to hold him to account in the future. I think there's more profit in that -- not to mention seeking common ground for all elements of the district -- than looking back at past actions. I hope this isn't wishful thinking.

Max Brantley I don't always agree with you but I do agree with the spirit that the election is over and the people have spoken.

As far as you Durangokid, you are just that, a kid...a child. If not, put away childish things and ways, and be a man. Insulting people who disagree with you is a sure sign of ignorance if anything else.

They voted to say that guy has a degree? I didn't even know that was on the ballot!

ARK. BLOG: No, they voted for the third time (after the Ark. Times first reported it, which gave ghe information to the city attorney to pursue), that they want them as their school board representative regardless. It doesn't serve him well. Never did. But it's moost, from where I sit. The statute of limitations has expired. I could continue to insist that we say every time you post that you're a bought-and-paid shill for the Waltons, but what's the point. Situation isn't going to change.

The key to Swaim's defeat was the Arkansas Democrat Gazette's campaign, not only about the current race but about issues over the past few years. When stirred up, voters will arise on go to the polls with a certain revolutionary fervor in their eyes. And, the DOG certainly stirred up controversy and contention throughout the past few years, whether in secret backdoor deals or publicly in editorials against those who disagreed with them.
They railed against mediocrity yet promoted one of the most mediocre plans, merit pay, which has been failing at an alarmingly high rate over the past 150 years. They blatantly touted Roy Brooks as the reform-minded savior of the district yet ignored the true frontline workers, the teachers. They came across as nasty bullies who whined petulantly when they didn't get their way.
And the biggest flaw of all was that they could not hide their hypocrisy from the public. At times, it seemed as if they flaunted it. It seems they are oblivious to their own shabby role in this affair and will continue to remain so in many days to come.

Jake,

You are a very wise man, I couldn't have said it any better.

"Advanced Placement classes will be curtailed or eliminated because they encourage "resegregation". "

Count Pulaski, just one problem with your theory. More money is being put in to AP by College Board, Exxon, etc. to increase the number of minority students participating in AP. Not to take away the number of white students participating.

A new study showed that for disadvantaged students, private schools and public schools made no difference in whether they did well or not. What the study did find was that parental involvement was the key, whether in private or public education.
It's nature and nurture all rolled into one and it starts at home.

Thanks for the vote of confidence, durangokid; however, if I were female, I'd be one ugly woman--I would not even date me. Tiredofbs's experience at the middle school is the norm in many public schools: the lack of discipline is abysmal; adults are afraid to challenge inappropriate behavior; security guards are usually hidden in their safe havens; and the children are in charge.

All too often rules are relaxed to accommodate the negligent parenting skills of those who have abandoned their responsibility as parents; high expectations are suspended to appease parents and students who do not value their education; personal accountability is sacrificed to mollify those who may be offend by high standards and inflexible, well-defined goals. At the risk of appearing cynical, I am not sure those in power really want to see a change in public education---everybody's getting paid, the students are warehoused, secrets are protected, certain children are failing, the rhetoric is amplified----business as usual is not going to bring any measurable changes in public schools.

Doggone it, honestone! You've ruined my day. I would have sworn that way back there somewhere you referred to yourself in the feminine; and since then, I have been fantasizing you as this beautiful, brilliant, black sweet thing. Now, you tell me you're a danged GUY! Ah, well. I still think you're brilliant, and at the risk of infuriating Mr. Pritt, I still think you should relocate to Zone 2 and run for the school board. We need you and six more just like you sitting around the table.

Durangokid it doesn't infuriate me but rather encourages me. All should be involved in the political process more than armchair advising. Maybe YOU should run Durangokid!

Too funny, durangokid, too funny, but I needed the laugh. I am familiar with all the board members, save for Mrs. Curry, but I would not be offended by the infusion of some new blood, some fresh ideas, innovative insight, and different faces. A month or so ago, I assisted a student with his assignment, he could not divide whole numbers but was in the sixth grade. How is this possible? His repugnant behavior could be part of the answer, but I find it hard to believe a parent would allow this to happen.