Thoughts (with More Forthcoming) on Issues Related to the Superlative Contributions of Tracine Asberry as a Member of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education---- and the Ignominy of Rebecca Gagnon, Kim Ellison, and Nelson Inz

I have been on this planet for a long time, and along with a lot of other spectacles on my visual screen I have seen many a school board meeting.  Tracine Asberry is the best school board member whom I've ever witnessed. 

Director Asberry has relentlessly addressed the first, most fundamental goal facing decision-makers at the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS), which is to deliver a quality of education at least high enough to have children of all demographic descriptors academically achieving at grade level.

To watch Asberry and Eric Moore interacting is as close to a thing of beauty as one could ever reasonably hope to see at a school board meeting.  Moore has until recently been MPS Director of Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Accountability;  as I understand the matter, he has now been elevated to the position of MPS Chief of Accountability.

 

But isn't it a sad statement that if we just got students to grade level in math and reading we'd be leaping in the aisles?  What about true excellence with the implementation of a knowledge-intensive curriculum across all grade levels in all classrooms throughout the K-12 years---  with a genuinely excellent teacher in each and every classroom? 

I may go to my grave in the effort to make that happen, but I am as resolute about waging that struggle while I still roam the earth as were Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, Ida B. Wells Barnett, Mohandas Gandhi, A. Philip Randolph, Martin & Malcolm, Gloria Steinhem, and Cesar Chavez about the causes for which they committed their lives (and in the case of Steinhem the cause for which she is still committed).

The delivery of truly excellent education to all of our precious children is the goal for all who understand the nature of the Second Stage of the Civil Rights Movement, the foundation on which everything else depends.

It has been my honor to have witnessed Tracine Asberry in action.

Asberry's courage and tenacity won her the enmity of leaders at the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers, who turn DFL legislators and many school board aspirants into sycophants.  I have checked and cross-checked sources that say that MPS Board of Education current members Rebecca Gagnon, Kim Ellison, and Nelson Inz supported the DFL-MFT establishment types against Director Asberry and against Director Josh Reimnitz in the recent school board election of 8 November.

Thus have the latter three earned themselves a position of ignominy to be recorded in my nearly complete book, Understanding the Minneapolis Public Schools:  Current Condition, Future Prospect, in my Journal of the K-12 Revolution:  Essays and Research from Minneapolis Public Schools, and on my television show, The K-12 Revolution with Dr. Gary Marvin Davison.

Rebecca Gagnon, Kim Ellison, and Nelson Inz have much for which they should be ashamed.  In time I will explain how what they represent goes to the core of what is wrong with the insidious DFL-MFT endorsement process, and the nature of the cowardice and disregard for the students of the Minneapolis Public Schools that that system and these three lackeys represent.

In the meantime, let us laud Tracine Asberry for her courage and celebrate her during her last two appearances for awhile, those at the meetings of MPS Board of Education, this coming Tuesday, 13 December, and then the Tuesday of 10 January 2017.

Tracine Asberry is very likely one of the ten best school board members to found in these less than United States. 

She is not replaceable in her current position---  but she will exercise her talents in behalf of the young people about whom she cares deeply anywhere she goes.