Introduction
A Review of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education During Academic Years Extending from 2014-2015 through 2021-2022 into First Semester 2022
In the “Introduction” to this edition of Journal of the K-12 Revolution: Essays and Research from Minneapolis, Minnesota, I present the history of membership on the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education from the time I began my intensive investigation \of MPS in the summer of 2014, before noting the favorable developments that occurred in the 8 November 2022 election, which then becomes the major topic for consideration in the articles that make up the bulk of this edition.
A Review of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education, with Iteration as of Academic Year 2019-2020--- KerryJo Felder, Bob Walser, Siad Ali, Kim Caprini, Nelson Inz, Kim Ellison, Josh Pauly, Jenny Arneson, and Ira Jourdain--- Assessed as Particularly Incompetent and Politically Tainted
The iteration of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education that prevailed before the elections of 3 November 2020 was the third that I have witnessed since my investigation into the inner workings of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) began in August 2014.
At that initial stage of my investigation, the composition of the school board was as follows:
District 1 Jenny Arneson
District 2 Kim Ellison
District 3 Mohamud Noor
District 4 Josh Reimnitz
District 5 Alberto Monserrate
District 6 Tracine Asberry
At Large Richard Mammen
At-Large Carla Bates
At-Large Rebecca Gagnon
Gagnon and Arneson, while proving to have strong ties to the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) and the Democrat-Farmer Labor (DFL) Party that undermined their effectiveness and promoted a good bit of dissembling, did impress me for their grasp of policy detail. Mammen was affable if given to rambling and frequently self-serving commentary; both Mammen and Monserrate clearly also had political connections to the MFT-DFL cohort. Mohamud Noor, who came onto the board after a contentious meeting in which he was appointed to replace a member who had died in office, was even more brazenly ambitious politically. Kim Ellison (still on the board in academic year 2019-2020, as is Arneson) also has deep ties to the MFT-DFL; she enjoys high name recognition due to her surname and association with former husband Keith Ellison.
The most positive forces for change on that school board were Carla Bates, Josh Reimnitz, and Tracine Asberry. Bates was erratic and garrulous but clearly cared about students. Reimnitz, a former Teach for America member, had pulled off an upset of an MFT-DFL backed candidate. Asberry was the most courageous of the members of this formulation of the MPS Board of Education; her interaction with Chief (actually, in those days, Executive Director) of Research, Evaluation, Assessment (REAA), and Accountability (at that time, more accurately just Research, Evaluation, and Assessment [REA]) Eric Moore were the best moments I have witnessed in my five years of observing MPS Board of Education meetings. Asberry would ask close questions, politely insist on answers, and ask why she was always seeing the same dismal results year after year.
In the aftermath of the school board election of November 2014 Nelson Inz (District 5), Don Samuels (At-Large), and Siad Ali (District 3) replaced Monserrate, Mammen, and Noor (none of whom ran for reelection) respectively. These were improvements. Inz had not yet manifested his traits as a political hack. Samuels was very consciously unaffiliated with the MFT and therefore not backed by his own party, the DFL (which does not endorse outright but does so through its MFT proxy). Ali was not as baldly political as Noor, more affable, and more focused on students--- although he, as in the cases of most of the rest of the board, has strong ties to the MFT-DFL cohort.
In the election of 2016 Reimnitz and Asberry were narrowly ousted. Reimnitz was replaced by Bob Walser in District 4 and Tracine Asberry was replaced by Ira Jourdain in District 6. KerryJo Felder also came onto the board to claim the District 2 seat that Kim Ellison had vacated to run for an At-Large seat (Bates did not run for reelection). Then in the aftermath of the election of 2018, Kim Caprini and Josh Pauly came onto the board; Samuels had opted not to run again, and Gagnon was defeated.
The composition of the MPS Board of Education, then, as of January 2019 was as follows >>>>>
District 1 Jenny Arneson
District 2 KerryJo Felder
District 3 Siad Ali
District 4 Bob Walser
District 5 Nelson Inz
District 6 Ira Jourdain
At Large Kim Ellison
At-Large Josh Pauly
At-Large Kim Caprini
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The elections of November 2016 and November 2018 were disastrous, except for the favorable development that Gagnon was ousted.
The loss of Bates (who, remember, did not run for reelection), Reimnitz, and Asberry in 2016 constituted a turning point during the time that I have spent observing the board. These were three independent voices whose votes did not parrot MFT-DFL stances. The departure of Asberry completely changed the character of those evenings when student academic proficiency was at the forefront of discussions; no one since has convincingly demonstrated driving concern over the ongoing failure to move student academic proficiency rates above 25% for African American, American Indian, Latino-Latina students and those on free/reduced price lunch.
The political nature of the school board came into sharp relief during the 2016 election. Nelson Inz specifically endorsed Walser over Reimnitz. Gagnon endorsed Jourdain over Asberry. And Inz, Gagnon, and Ellison all aggressively recruited candidates to run against Reimnitz and Asberry.
Then came the 2018 election, with the prospect that the independent candidacy of Sharon El-Amin, a well-known Northside business owner and involved parent, might prove winning. In the end, though, MFT-DFL backing of Caprini and Pauly was too telling. The biggest news from the election was the ouster of Gagnon, a generally politically astute actor whose calculations had gone awry:
Candidate Name Number of Votes Percentage
Kim Caprini 86,739 33.84%
Josh Pauly 73,994 28.87%
Rebecca Gagnon 48,567 18.95%
Sharon El-Amin 47,000 18.34%
To understand the power of El-Amin’s campaign, one must understand the political dynamics at work in this election for the two At-Large MPS Board of Education seats:
Caprini and Pauly were endorsed by the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT), which in turn is allied with Education Minnesota, the second most powerful political lobby in Minnesota, capable of spending levels only topped by the National Rifle Association (NRA). Caprini is a well-known parent and community activist in North Minneapolis, but Pauly is a largely unknown presence, a teacher of short tenure at Sanford Middle School who is now a professional in a South Minneapolis-based non-profit. Pauly gives indication of caring about issues pertinent to the homeless and the dispossessed, but he has none of the community involvements of Caprini and El-Amin, none of the heart and soul understanding of key community issues in the manner of El-Amin, and none of the political savvy of Gagnon. Pauly had a slim campaign of his own initiative: His victory was entirely the result of MFT support, with its member network, phone banks, and enormous publicity-generating capacity.
The matter of Gagnon’s political savvy is ironic, given that she committed a number of fatal political errors in the months leading up to the election of November 2018. In the wake of the 2016 elections, Gagnon’s star was on the rise. She had gained a good deal of cache for her long chairing of the MPS Board of Education Finance Committee. She was well-connected to many school board groups across the state and nation and formally served as member in many of these. She was conniving but diligent, undergirding her political maneuvers with a thorough knowledge of the public school establishment and the issues considered important by that establishment. She was elected chair of the board, albeit soon offending enough fellow members to lose a subsequent election to current chair Nelson Inz.
Then when MPS financial woes became fully apparent, she was implicated in those miseries via the financial tanking of the district on her watch as finance committee chair. Next she showed her disrespect for gifted MPS Finance Chief Ibrahima Diop by taking the lead in restoring $6.4 million dollars to funding for high schools with the most affluent populations, after Diop--- one of the very best-trained, consummately well-educated school district finance chiefs in the nation--- had worked with Superintendent Ed Graff and the other chiefs over many months to craft a budget that put the district on a course toward structural balance.
Gagnon sought Democratic -Farmer-Labor Party endorsement for a legislative seat and was set to exit the board; but when she did not secure the endorsement, she retreated to another run for an At-Large seat. But by this time, Caprini and Pauly had received the endorsement of the MFT/DFL cohort for which Gagnon had long served as sycophantic go-fer.
The MFT/DFL political machine went into its powerful motion once perennial candidate Doug Mann was eliminated in the August 2018 primary and the above four candidates had progressed to the general election.
Thus, we have the context for Sharon El-Amin’s strong performance. Those of us who campaigned for her did so to win. Ms. El-Amin was at that time the head of the North Polar (North High School) parent group, is a community activist who twice a month prepares 100 meals for those in need, for many years ran the successful El-Amin Fish Shop on West Broadway Avenue, and has been involved in multiple community organizations and issues. Husband Makram El-Amin is the imam of Masjid An’nur mosque on Lyndale Avenue North; wife and husband have deep connections to the Muslim community in general and the Somali contingent specifically. El-Amin’s natural base of support is expansive and deep; the last of four school board candidate forums in this 2018 election season brought forward a crowd at the University of Minnesota community engagement center at 2100 Plymouth Avenue North (across from the Minneapolis Urban League) that was overwhelmingly and vocally expressive in support of her candidacy.
Sharon El-Amin went up against a canny and seasoned political rival in Rebecca Gagnon and two endorsees of the powerful MFT/DFL machine. She and Gagnon together received 21,573 more votes than did Josh Pauly. El-Amin ran just a fraction behind Gagnon; the two ran essentially even, garnering 18.34% and 18.95% of the vote respectively.
That Sharon El-Amin ran such a strong campaign is testimony to a level of genuine public backing unmatched by Pauly, certainly, but also unrivaled by Caprini and Gagnon.
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Moving left to right across the lineup seated on the raised platform at meetings of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education during fall semester of academic year 2019-2020 one found eleven people who regularly deny to our children the education of excellence that is due to students of all demographic descriptors.
At far left was KerryJo Felder, who represents MPS District #2 covering North Minneapolis. Her concerns are focused on building and athletic field conditions, equitable distribution of resources, Full-Service Community Schools, and securing a vocational center for location at or near North High School. She has no understanding of knowledge-intensive education and is ever hampered by her ties to the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT)/ Democrat-Farmer-Labor (DFL) cohort. Felder will be a member of the board until the election of 2020, at which time we must have a candidate in place to replace her.
Next, moving left to right next to Felder was Bob Walser, the silliest and most trivial school board member I have witnessed during my five years of following developments at the Minneapolis Board of Education and, further, in my half-century of viewing similar spectacles in public education. Walser represents District #4, including Bryn Mawr, toney Lowry Hill, and the communities around Uptown. He hails from the Walser auto-dealer family and is a total tool of the MFT/ DFL. He often spouts the education professor jargon that I detail especially in part Three: Philosophy. Walser is a hippy-dippy white liberal type who is clueless as to the academic aspirations of students and especially the needs of students from families facing dilemmas of poverty and functionality. He frequently references Deborah Meyer, who along with such folk as Alfie Kohn, Ted Sizer, and Jonathon Kozol appropriates the name “progressive” and mumbles the education professor speak dating to John Dewey, William Heard Kilpatrick, and Harold Rugg in the 1920s. This is the doctrine that has inflicted such knowledge-poor education on our students for at least forty years. Walser’s seat is up for reelection in 2020; he must be defeated.
Next you would observe Kim Caprini. Caprini grew up on the Northside but mostly attended schools other than those of the Minneapolis Public Schools, including Ascension and Benilde-St. Margaret. Her two children, though, did attend MPS schools, and for many years Caprini has been a participant in various parent involvement activities. But her comments as a member have been a disappointment. She shows every sign of being the lackey of the MFT-DFL cohort that characterizes this iteration of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education.
Next moving left to right school board attendees one saw Nelson Inz, who most abhorrently of all had no opposition for a seat that was up for reelection in 2018. Inz represents District #5, east of I-35 in South Minneapolis); he is the third most objectionable member of the MPS Board of Education, for which he serves as chair, having ironically defeated the second most objectionable member (Rebecca Gagnon) for that position last January 2018, and having endorsed the very most objectionable member (Bob Walser) in the latter’s defeat of incumbent Josh Reimnitz in the November 2016 election. Inz is a Montessori-trained former bartender who now teaches in a Montessori charter middle school. Inz has a habit of inflicting silly banter on his audience and gives every indication of being bought and paid for by the MFT/DFL.
Seated moving left to right from Inz one peered at MPS Superintendent Ed Graff. Graff came from over fifteen years in Anchorage, Alaska, where he was a teacher, administrator, and superintendent. His record there was academically abysmal, even as he touted the same Social and Emotional Learning formula that has served as one of his major initiatives at the Minneapolis Public Schools. Three and one-half years into his tenure at MPS, there has been no improvement in the academic program; any potential for improvement will come from his masterful slimming and rationalization of the Davis Center (MPS central offices, 1250 West Broadway) bureaucracy and some unexpected epiphany regarding the need for knowledge-intensive curriculum and thorough teacher retraining for the delivery of such a curriculum. Such an epiphany is absent from the MPS Comprehensive District Design that he now touts.
Next to Graff, moving left to right, one saw Kim Ellison, a former vice-chair and current clerk of the board; as clerk, Ellison headed the Policy Committee and kept time limiting Public Comments speakers to three minutes (or to two minutes on those nights when numerous people have registered to make comments). Ellison is a former alternative school teacher (at Plymouth [Christian] Youth Center]) and was formerly married to Keith Ellison, former member of Congress, Vice-Chair of the national Democratic Party, and winner in the 6 November 2018 contest for Attorney General. Kim Ellison mostly listens, speaking (in a very soft voice) only to make a point that she deems germane. But her comments never go to the core of any of the central dilemmas preventing officials and teachers at the Minneapolis Public Schools from imparting an excellent education to students of all demographic descriptors. Ellison does not seem to grasp the problems pertinent to curriculum and teacher quality, forever impeded in the latter by her firm ties to the MFT/ DFL establishment. Her seat was up for reelection in 2020; we must work toward her defeat.
Next one saw student representative Janaan Ahmed, whose term began in January 2019 and ended in December 2019. Ahmed brought an impressive record of achievement and participation to her role but has not been discerning in her comments. She gave impression of being in synch with this terrible assemblage of board members, either as a matter of deference or agreement. Either way, Ahmed made little contribution to board meetings, failing conspicuously to address low student academic proficiency rates, knowledge and skill deficient curriculum, and poor teacher quality.
Seated to the right of Ahmed was Jenny Arneson, the treasurer who presided over finance committee meetings. Arneson has abundant mastery of detail pertinent to finance and many other matters of the system as it is in the Minneapolis Public Schools; she also grew up in Northeast Minneapolis, attended MPS schools, and has copious knowledge of her community. But, as with all adult, voting members of this iteration of the board, Arneson has close ties to the MFT-DFL cohort that prevent her from addressing the ills that plague the district.
Finally, at the end of the row moving left to right the attendee one saw Ira Jourdain (representing District #6), the first American Indian to serve on the school board. Jourdain seems to have a more elevated ability to process adverse commentary than do most other board members, but he gives many indications of being impeded by his MFT/DFL association.
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Analysis of the Members of Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education as of academic year 2019-2020 as to Specific Nature of Culpability, in Order of Offensiveness
#1 >>>>> District 4 Member Bob Walser >>>>> The Silliest and Most Offensive of a Motley Crew
Bob Walser is the silliest, most offensive member on this and any school board that I have witnessed during my half-century of observation. This iteration of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education is by far the worst that I have witnessed during my particularly close six-year scrutiny of this motley assemblage.
Walser is a disaster.
Walser was among the group recruited by Nelson Inz, Kim Ellison, and Rebecca Gagnon to run for the MPS Board of Education in 2016. Gagnon eventually got caught in her political manipulations and was ousted in 2018. Inz remains as District #5 (South Minneapolis, east of I-35) representative and board chair; Ellison as one of three At-Large members. Inz, Ellison, and Gagnon recruited candidates friendly to the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) to run against the independent voices of Josh Reimnitz and Tracine Asberry (the most assertive actor for better academic results); and for the At-Large seat vacated by Carla Bates.
Walser, who represents the toney areas of Bryn Mawr, Lowry Hill, and Linden Hills, is a salient example of that creature who assigns to himself the appellation of “progressive” on matters pertinent to preK-12 education, thus a participant in a sordid history traceable to Teachers College at Columbia University. Consistent with the various strands of this ideology, Walser rails against objective assessment of student performance and spouts the jargon of putatively child-centered education.
The most stupid verbal fodder spills from Walser’s mouth:
Two recent whoppers demonstrate the facile, grating nature of this lamentable school board creature:
>>>>> At one meeting that involved the fate of middle schools versus preK-8 schools in the district, Walser wondered why we have middle schools and asserted that we have only had this type of student grouping since the 1950s. In making this comment, Walser demonstrated the typically shallow nature of his reading and research. He had apparently come across a reference to the advent of the middle school (grades 6-8), which did from the 1950s mostly replace junior high (grades 7-9). But Walser’s reference maintained that grouping at the level of the middle grades did not begin until the 1950s. In fact, the first junior highs appeared in 1909.
>>>>> At the September meeting of the MPS Board of Education, Walser mentioned during the final, tortuous comments that members make on the cusp of each meeting’s adjournment that he had attended a number of community meetings lately and found the comment of one African American mother especially moving. Walser said that she identified the problems of the Minneapolis Public Schools as grounded in the northern European approach to education taken by the district.
I have been deeply embedded in the African American community for forty-eight years:
African Americans do in public forums occasionally have recourse to the same jargon of “cultural relevance” and “cultural competence” with assertions of Western bias as do hippy-dippy white liberals of the sort that my radical leftist inclinations find abhorring. But face to face, I never hear such jargon. When African American parents, the largest familial contingent in the New Salem Educational Initiative, come to me in behalf of their children, their plea is in essence, “Please impart to my baby the mathematical and reading skills that the district of the Minneapolis Public Schools fails to render, along with strong college preparatory knowledge sets that MPS does not deliver.” They
trust and know that I have a strong grasp of European-based culture and history and also the traditions of Asia, Africa, African America, and a bevy of other ethnicities. What they want for their children is the best education that can be had, so that those precious young people can be the vanguard that leads the family forth from cyclical poverty and centuries of abusive history.
Armchair white liberals of the Walser type are offensive to most African Americans. They sense that those who shout adoring phrases from afar are frauds, full of condescension and paternalism. Bob Walser has offended most African Americans in positions of leadership at the Minneapolis Public Schools. They know a fake and a patronizer when they encounter one.
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In any case, the approach taken by the Minneapolis Public Schools is not northern European, except inasmuch as it is through British conveyance that a curriculum consisting of knowledge gathered from the entire globe was delivered to American colonists and thence to the fledgling United States of America. The knowledge thus conveyed came prominently from southern (not northern) Europe, China, India, and from the Muslim empires of the Umayyad, Abbasid, and Ottoman dynasties. The best contemporary masters of modern curricula are students of South Korea, Taiwan, and Singapore. Note the absence in any of those references from the last two sentences of anything identifiable as northern European.
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Bob Walser is the silliest, most intellectually trivial board member I have witnessed on the MPS or any other board of education.
#2 >>>>> District 5 Member Nelson Inz >>>>> The Spectacle of the Political Hack as Board Chair
Nelson Inz was elected to the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education in November 2014 and reelected without opposition in November 2018. Lack of opposition to call Inz on his corrupt ineptitude demonstrates public disinterest in, and misunderstanding of, the chronic deficiencies of preK-12 education.
Inz is a former bartender turned teacher who has located professionally in several different school systems during his five years on the MPS Board of Education. After Rebecca Gagnon quickly offended enough of her fellow offenders to turn the majority on the board against her as chair, Inz began his stint as chair in January 2017.
By that time, Inz had joined Kim Ellison and Rebecca Gagnon in recruiting Ira Jourdain and Bob Walser to run against Tracine Asberry and Josh Reimnitz for the District 6 and District 4 seats respectively. Asberry was a particularly effective advocate for academic progress who would closely question Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Accountability Chief Eric Moore when he would deliver the latest bad news on student academic achievement; Reimnitz, a former Teach for America participant, was also an independent voice. Jourdain and Walser were recruited to do the bidding of the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT). Gagnon specifically endorsed Jourdain; Inz endorsed Walser.
Endorsement of Walser, the silliest, most offensive school board member I have ever witnessed on this or any other board, conveys much about Inz’s personal judgment. He is a political hack who harbors the same ambitions as do Ellison and Gagnon, neither of whom has been able to realize goals for exalted political futures. Inz describes his endorsement of Walser over Reimnitz as the action of a “team player.” There were many of those in the regimes of Hitler and Stalin; they abide in the administration of Donald Trump today.
Before the Public Comments phase of every meeting of the MPS Board of Education during his stint as chair, Inz read the following protocol:
The MPS Board of Education values public comment
and input at board meetings to inform our decision
making and provide information and insight into
what is happening throughout the district.
If you did not sign-up ahead of time, there are sign
up sheets on the table where you entered, near the
meeting agendas. We will close sign-ups 15 minutes
after public comment begins. Each person wishing to
address the board will be given 3 minutes and the
clerk will let you know when your time has expired.
Individuals will be called up in the order in which they
signed up to speak. Please approach the podium, if
able, and state your name, area of the city you live in,
and connection to Minneapolis Public Schools.
To ensure we are modeling constructive public
engagement for our students, we ask that if you wish
to address the board, you observe the following:
· Address your comments to the Board Chair
and not to individual Board directors, staff,
or the audience.
· Refrain from personal attacks, swearing,
abusive or threatening language, or other
disruptive behavior.
· Respect those around you and do not hold
up signs that block the view of others—
please do not bring signage to the podium.
· Do not discuss employee or employment
related issues, as public comment is not the
appropriate venue to raise such issues.
· Refrain from referring to a person by name
or position.
· Making accusations and derogatory
statements about employees is not
appropriate.
This is a time for the Board to listen so we will not be
responding to comments or questions posed. If you
have a question that requires a response, please
submit it to the Board’s Executive Assistant in the
back of the room. Thank you.
This protocol was appropriately read by the political hack that Inz is but was not of his authorship. The protocol was written by Ed Graff and Rebecca Gagnon (when the latter was briefly chair), because I was regularly citing specific Davis Center (MPS central offices, 1250 West Broadway) staff members who were not doing their jobs and also taking to task particular board members. The protocol is written as a shield from criticism of central office bureaucrats and MPS Board of Education members and makes mockery of the opening claim to value public comment. Board members now know that I have so many venues for issuing my views that the Graff-Gagnon ploy was an exercise in futility; but the protocol does have an inhibiting effect on some speakers.
The current iteration of the MPS Board of Education is composed of politicos heavily indebted to the MFT for electoral backing.
These corrupt board members are cowards who hide behind metaphorical embankments that they have devised to shield them from criticism.
That the board ever opted for Nelson Inz as Hack in Chief is telling.
The public must become better informed and in doing so show Inz out the Davis Center door with Bob Walser and the others.
#3 >>>>> District 2 Member KerryJo Felder >>>>> Fraudulent Claimant to North Minneapolis Leadership
Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education member KerryJo Felder represents District #2, encompassing North Minneapolis. She was endorsed by the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) for her winning candidacy in November 2016. She also has firm ties to the Democrat-Farmer-Labor (DFL) party that looms behind the MFT front powerfully to influence the outcomes of school board elections.
Thus, Felder is a political hack doing the bidding fo the MFT/DFL cohort, as is the case for all nine members on this unfortunate current assemblage of the MPS Board of Education.
Felder has children in Northside schools and was active at MPS sites and at board meetings many years before she ran for a seat. She had an unsettled childhood and adolescence, mostly growing up in South Minneapolis. Her personal accounts allude incoherently to an academician father who held a doctorate--- and to a life of poverty as a youth. Also in her shadowy background is a young adulthood spent for many desultory years in a lifestyle lacking firm vocational articulation in California.
Those South Minneapolis and California sojourns do not denote a firmly rooted Northsider.
Felder has little connection to the North Minneapolis of the Phyllis Wheatley Settlement House, W. Gertrude Brown, Harry Davis, Bertha Smith, Marion McElroy, Larry Brown, the Edmund Cohen Community Center, old Sixth Avenue, North High School in its academic heyday of Jewish and African American composition and friendship, or even to the more recent influence of the Way and Opportunities Unlimited (where Syl Davis, Gwen Davis, and Spike Moss held sway) and the City, Inc., as a successor to the Way.
And yet Felder projects an image of herself as a Northsider out to claim resources for MPS schools that have been previously denied investment for buildings, athletic fields, and academic programs by comparison to sites and programs in other areas of the city.
But Felder is a fraud, as a claimant to firm Northsider status, and as an advocate for the schools of North Minneapolis.
She is a corrupt politico with very little knowledge of the history and philosophy of education.
Felder is a particularly objectionable member of the MPS Board of Education for pretending that she is an advocate for academic quality in what she abidingly refers to as “my schools” for “my Northsiders.”
When confronted with student reading, mathematics, and science proficiency rates at North High School that are less than seven percent (7%) and ACT scores averaging 15.7, Felder has no comment. When she is told that there are classes at North that are so out of order that teachers have quit teaching, she utters not a word. When Felder is told that an English teacher pretending to teach The Autobiography of Malcom X has absolutely no knowledge of that towering personage, she sits silently and never thenceforth addresses the problem. When told by Hispanic parents that the pre-K-5 and preK-8 schools of North Minneapolis are failing, she gives appearance of the denial that is her wont.
KerryJo Felder is a fraud as pretender to firm Northsider status.
She is a corrupt political hack typical for a group that to a member is beholden to the MFT/DFL cohort.
Felder has no grasp of the history or philosophy of pre-K-12 public education.
And she is in immoral, neglectful denial of the rampant deficiencies of curriculum and teacher quality in the Minneapolis Public Schools.
Felder projects the image of a fighter.
#4 >>>>> District 1 Member Jenny Arneson >>>>> Astoundingly Stupid Statements and Multi-Year Ineffectiveness Obligates Her to Resign from the Board of Education
District 1 (Northeast and Southeast Minneapolis) Jenny Arneson is an enigma:
Arneson is the hardest working of the members on the current Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education.
She is a courageous person who appears to be triumphing over a very serious case of lymphatic cancer.
Arneson is a masterful accumulator of factual detail on many aspects of the inner working of the district, notably information pertinent to her Northeast Minneapolis stomping grounds and items relevant to current district finances. She also was an adept chair during her term of service in that position, a knowledgeable manager of meetings per Robert’s Rules of Order, a skill that stood her in good stead during fall 2020, when she was chair of the finance committee.
But three moments impel me to assert that Arneson should resign, along with fellow MPS Board of Education members KerryJo Felder, Kim Ellison, Kim Caprini, (yesterday, if possible) Nelson Inz, and--- day before yesterday, if miracles abide--- Bob Walser.
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In the spring of 2016 a forum sponsored by the League of Women’s Voters unfolded at Bryn Mawr K-5 school. This forum offered one of the very few chances for audience members to ask open-ended oral questions; that is to say, there was none of the usual scripted nonsense, such as questions having to be written down on slips of paper and then vetted for posing to members of the board. The MPS Board of Education then consisted of Arneson, Siad Ali, Tracine Asberry, Carla Banks, Kim Ellison, Rebecca Gagnon, Nelson Inz, Josh Reimnitz, and Don Samuels. Ali, Banks, and Reimnitz were not in attendance; Asberry arrived only very late. Hence, the members fully available for questioning were Arneson, Ellison, Gagnon, Inz, and Samuels.
Most of the questions from the audience were nondescript and had little to do with academics.
I by contrast posed a question that made reference to the opposing philosophies of education represented by the knowledge-intensive views of E. D. Hirsch and the student-driven curriculum advocated by Alfie Kohn; each of these views have roots in a discussion that began in the 1920s with William C. Bagley and William Heard Kilpatrick of Teachers College at Columbia University.
My question to the members of the MPS Board of Education in spring 2017 was:
“Given the description that I just gave you of the views expressed in Hirsch’s 1996 The Schools We Need and Why We Don’t Have Them and Alfie Kohn’s 1999 The Schools Our Children Deserve, do you favor Hirsch’s knowledge-intensive established curriculum or Kohn’s open-ended, student and teacher driven curriculum?”
Board members were tongue-tied and tried to have it both ways, articulating their views no better when I maintained that for clarity they had to favor one of these views over the other, because Hirsch and Kohn would agree that these approaches result in very different curriculum and pedagogy.
Jenny Arneson was as inept as the others in articulating any philosophy of education. She does not to this day reveal any coherent philosophy of education, a telling observation regarding a board member who is now in the midst of her ninth year on the MPS Board of Education.
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Arneson should resign for having not developed an internally consistent philosophy of education in nearly a decade of board membership.
Two recent statements further obligate her to resign:
>>>>> At an MPS Board of Education meeting in late spring 2019, Jenny Arneson noted, as part of her final report at a meeting of the MPS Board of Education (of the sort with which board members conclude each of their meetings) that her son had been accepted by his first choice for college attendance, Grinnell College in Iowa. She then opined that “This proves that every student at MPS is College and Career Ready.”
That statement was astonishingly stupid, given that fewer than thirty percent (30%) of students on Free and Reduced Price Lunch and those of several ethnicities who tend to fall in the Free/Reduced category are not proficient in mathematics, reading, or science; and that one-third (33%) of MPS students who matriculate on college and university campuses need remedial courses.
>>>>> At the Committee of the Whole meeting of Tuesday, 22 October, Arneson conveyed the essence of a conversation that she had had with a student who liked the idea of ethnic studies courses offered as alternatives to a United States history course, because the high school course is just a repetition of what students learned in a course focused on the same subject in grade seven. Arneson accepted the student’s view uncritically, thereby revealing appalling ignorance for a graduate of St. Olaf College, albeit in the academically undemanding field of social work.
The pertinent truth is two-fold >>>>>
1) The grade 7 course is typically taught via videos and through packets that students fill out in the absence of teacher-imparted information or comment and without class discussion. And unless students take Advanced Placement (AP) United States History in high school, the mode of teacher
disinterested, unengaging instruction evident at grade 7 abides also in the high school course--- and lamentably even in some AP courses, taught as they often are by knowledge-deficient teachers.
2) Limiting the number of United States history or any other courses in core subject areas should be determined only as a practical matter, since the number of such courses would be multiple if the amount of information to be conveyed were the determinant.
Perpend:
>>>>> Various American Indian groups, tending toward three hundred (300) in number, upon arrival of Columbus and subsequent Europeans---
>>>>> Impact of American Indians and Europeans on each other---
>>>>> the different ruling styles of Spaniard, Portuguese, French, and British imperialists---
>>>>> pre-slavery organization of agricultural labor---
>>>>> reasons for the economic appeal of slave as opposed to indentured labor---
>>>>> exact functioning of the slave trade, from the sale by Ashanti and Dahomey kingdoms of African human commodities to the Portuguese, French, Dutch, and eventually mainly the British shippers and traders---
>>>>> everyday slave resistance and occasional rebellions---
>>>>> Loyalists versus Rebels in the run-up to the American Revolution; the tough, extremely constrained options for African Americans in assessing potential for manumission via participation---
Now consider that I have not even arrived at the precipitating events and fighting of the American Revolution, the American Constitutional Convention, the replacement of the Articles of Confederation with the United States Constitution, or the first decade (1790s) of the new republic--- nor to the little matter of the two complete centuries (19th and 20th) that by definition reveal the bulk of events in the history of the United States.
Thus, Arneson’s comments regarding the repetition involved in two courses of United States history is appallingly stupid because
>>>>> the problem is not repetition but rather that students learn nothing of great substance in either course because of the approach to curriculum and pedagogy;
and
>>>>> on the basis of amount of information important for conveyance, even multiple courses could not impart all that there is to learn concerning American and United States history--- so that the decision as to how many courses to offer is a matter of temporal practicality: Repetition except as a matter of review as foundation for new learning is a matter of teacher inadequacy, not intrinsic to the abundant knowledge sets for mastery of American and United States history.
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For lack of a coherent philosophy of education after nine years on the board, and for the two starkly stupid comments tendered by her as given above, Jenny Arneson should lead Felder, Caprini, Ellison, Inz, and Walser out the door (or let the latter two lead, because the sooner the exit for those two, the better).
#5 >>>>> At-Large Member Kim Ellison >>>>> Tragi-Comically Silly Comment Regarding Alternative Schools as a Model for the Minneapolis Public Schools and Other Gaffs >>>>> Time for Resignation of Another Member Who Should Have Departed a Long time Ago
At the same Tuesday, 22 October 2019, Committee of the Whole meeting of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education at which District #1 member Jenny Arneson made her astonishingly stupid comment regarding the sequence of United States history courses in the district, At-Large member Kim Ellison chimed in with a remark of her own that, when taken together with her nearly decade of ineffective participation on the board, should induce her resignation and departure with Arneson out the Davis Center door.
After hearing Executive Director of Teaching and Learning Aimee Fearing and Chief of Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Accountability Eric Moore engage in double talk and jargon-infested presentation of an academic plan that has no hope of success, Ellison felt impelled to make a comment pertinent to Social and Emotional Learning (SEL). Ellison commented that Graff’s emphasis on Social and Emotional Learning resonated with her immediately because of her experience as a teacher at an alternative school. She did not mention the name of the school, but the school of
reference was known as Plymouth Christian Youth Center (PCYC) for a number of years, now rendered as Plymouth Youth Center (PYC) Arts and Technology High School. Ellison said that at her school there was a strong emphasis on teacher and staff relationships with students, with the implication that this produced student success.
Ellison is half-right but the half-wrong part reveals the abominable level of academic substance delivered at such schools. The City, Inc., and the Street Academy/Minneapolis Urban League High School were schools at which relationship building was touted; those schools are now
defunct. The Minneapolis Public Schools contracts with seven privately run alternative schools to provide academic and other services to students whom MPS failed to engage. Those contract
alternative schools are 800 West Broadway, Loring Nicollet, Menlo Park, Merc, PYC Arts and Technology (Ellison’s school of reference), Tatanka Academy, and Volunteers of America (VOA) High School. Academic performance for many years at these schools has stagnated at levels witnessed in the following aggregate results for academic year 2018-2019:
Percentage of Students Proficient at MPS Contract Alternative Schools
(Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment [MCA])
Mathematics
(52 tested)
2%
Reading
(32 tested)
22%
Science
(30 tested)
13%
Many more than 52 students are enrolled at these alternative schools, so that even the number (52) representing students taking the mathematics MCA fails to capture the number of students enrolled. But absences are high; on any given day, a small percentage of enrolled students actually are in attendance. There was also some formal opting out, as well as spontaneous refusal to take the tests.
Staff members at alternative schools do tend to build amicable relationships with students and to reach out to families with a persistence and compassion not prevailing in mainline MPS schools. In that sense, the overwrought term, Social and Emotional Learning, could resonate with Kim Ellison’s experience at PYC High School. That she would only mention this facet of the school, though, is telling:
I return to my abiding questions. Are the members of this constituent composition of the MPS Board of Education
1) ignorant;
2) in denial;
or
3) corrupt.
Accumulated evidence over five years of observation strongly suggests to me that the members of this board manifest all three qualities:
1) They are ignorant as to the history and philosophy of education in the United States and have little understanding of the components of an excellent education.
2) Given their fascination with their ability to attain membership by winning elections with the strong support of the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT), they are in denial on matters of curriculum and teacher quality;
and
3) They are corrupt political hacks who care more about maintaining their positions, in some cases for potential to spring from the school board to a legislative seat or other political position--- than they do about the academic sustenance of the precious students whose lives they disregard.
Kim Ellison is ignorant, in denial, and corrupt in making such comments as attend her advocacy of alternative schools as models for the Minneapolis Public Schools. She has made such comments and failed to identify the problems pertinent to curriculum and teacher quality throughout her near-decade of membership on the MPS Board of Education.
#6 >>>>> At-Large Member Kim Caprini >>>>> The Case of a Corrupt and Ignorant Board Member in Deep Denial
Caprini ran against Felder for the District 2 (North Minneapolis) seat in 2016, losing narrowly; she then ran successfully for an At-Large seat, with heavy Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT) backing, in 2018.
Caprini grew up in North Minneapolis but mostly attended non-MPS schools, graduating from high school at Benilde/St. Margaret’s. She has taken scattered post-secondary courses but does not hold a college degree; she has a background in culinary arts but now works in social service. Caprini has two daughters who have attended Henry High School.
Caprini has proven herself to be a corrupt politico that most typically describes members on this iteration of the MPS Board of Education, and she frequently betrays a woeful knowledge base,
generally and particularly pertaining to the history and philosophy of education. But her most frequent mode gives appearance of a person in deep denial.
She has proclaimed that her daughters got a “first-rate education” at Henry, by factual counterpoint demonstrating that she has no understanding of the constituents of an excellent education.
At board meetings during November 2019-January 2020, a contingent of Hispanic parents have cited woeful conditions at what they describe as “low-performing” schools attended by their children, calling for “priority enrollment” that would give their children better educations at “higher performing” schools. Public commentators have voiced other complaints, such as the turmoil frequently witnessed at and outside Harrison school attended by students with severe emotional disorders.
Board members by protocol do not respond in the moment to Public Comments but have ample opportunity to do so in the course of regular and Committee of the Whole meetings. Caprini’s response is impulsively reactive: She reflexively defends schools where wretched academic quality is most obvious, and she is in seemingly deep denial over conditions at Harrison. Concerning Harrison, Caprini correctly countered criticism with citations of good programs, such as those pertaining to culinary arts and music; but Caprini never concerns herself with the palpable and chronic turmoil at Harrison, and she has never addressed the abundant deficiencies in curriculum and teacher quality that describe not only “low-performing” schools but the classrooms of the Minneapolis Public Schools as a whole.
At-Large member Kim Caprini is a political hack and gravely ignorant as to the history and philosophy of preK-12 education.
Her most prevalent and manifest mode is that of the MFT sycophant in deep denial.
She should be shown the Davis Center door, following closely behind Bob Walser, Nelson Inz, Kim Ellison, and Jenny Arneson.
#7 >>>>> District 6 Member Ira Jourdain >>>>> Error-Prone, Philosophically Bereft, Politically Tainted
Ira Jourdain was suspect from the beginning of his tenure on the Minneapolis Public Schools(MPS) Board of Education for running against Tracine Asberry in November 2016. Asberry was the best participant that I have witnessed on this or any other school board. She did not have a clearly expressed dedication to the knowledge-intensive preK-12 education that I advocate, but she did manifestly care about fundamental skills in mathematics and reading. Whenever Chief of Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Accountability Eric Moore would deliver the latest round of bad news regarding MPS student academic performance, Asberry would ask detailed questions pertinent to plans for improvement. When Moore or others would offer double talk or pleasing promises, Asberry would ask why we inevitably get the same vows for future progress that we’ve gotten before but little of substance to warrant confidence.
Asberry made a nuisance of herself by not walking the party line of the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT)/Democrat-Farmer-Labor (DFL), calling failure as she did by that name, and implying that better instruction was needed. As detailed above, board members Kim Ellison, Rebecca Gagnon, and Nelson Inz acted at the behest of the MFT/DFL cohort to recruit opponents to run against Asberry and Josh Reimnitz. Inz endorsed Bob Walser against Reimnitz; Gagnon endorsed Ira Jourdain against Asberry. Both endorsees won narrowly.
Thus Jourdain is politically tainted.
He also is philosophically bereft, giving no evidence of any knowledge of the history of education or any coherent views of his own.
As a matter of particularly great irritation to me, Jourdain has stated that he signed waiver forms for his children (he has two, one in elementary and one in middle school, enrolled in the Minneapolis Public Schools) to opt out of taking the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments (MCAs); moreover, when he did this at a regular meeting of the MPS Board of Education, Jourdain looked out at the audience and advocated letting other parents know that they had the right to allow their children to opt out.
The MCAs are linked to the Minnesota State Academic Standards and are the most objective way of assessing student mastery of the standards. When students opt out in significant numbers, as they have done at Henry, South, and Southwest high schools, this vitiates the pool of students assessed and skews the accuracy of the results. Allowing and encouraging students to opt out is irresponsible.
Jourdain bears the political taint of MFT/DFL backing, he is philosophically bereft, and he is error-prone. Urging students to opt of the MCAs went beyond error to indication of political taint (the MFT rails against standardized testing) and philosophical waywardness.
Less clear was Jourdain’s voting with a 5-4 majority led by Rebecca Gagnon to restore $6.4 million dollars in funding that had been cut in a well-crafted budget emanating from Chief Ibrahima Diop’s Finance Division in spring 2018. Gagnon was putting herself in the service of her affluent constituency in Southwest Minneapolis (she occupied an At-Large position but counted voters in that area as key supporters); Jourdain voted with the slim majority roused by his campaign endorser and mentor Gagnon.
Jourdain, who respects Ibrahima Diop and eventually realized the error of his ways, later showed remorse for his vote. Also, Jourdain has expressed skepticism about the academic promises
proffered in the MPS Comprehensive District Design, now under review pending further public vetting and due for a vote in spring semester 2020. On a recent evening, he sounded some very Asberry-like comments of the “Haven’t we heard this before?” type.
The vibe of one who cares emanates from Jourdain’s vocal tone and facial expression. He has the unfortunate connection to the MFT, he lacks philosophical coherence, and he has been prone to errors. But Jourdain gives some evidence of improvement. If he can distance himself from the MFT/DFL cohort, develop a consistent philosophical approach to academics, and avoid major miscues of the type that characterized his votes especially in the first two years of his tenure, Jourdain gives some hope for improvement.
#8 >>>>> District 3 Member Siad Ali >>>>> Hail Fellow, Well Met Needs to Develop Diligence and Philosophy While Stiffening His Spine
Siad Ali represents Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education District #3. Ali is originally from Somalia, studied in India (where he obtained a master’s degree in business), and speaks Hindi, as well as Somali and English, at a high level of fluency. Ali gained election to the board in 2014 and was reelected without opposition in 2018. In his successful run, Ali replaced fellow Somali Mohamud Noor, who had gained controversial appointment when the previous District #3 representative died in office. District #3 is centered on the Cedar-Riverside area wherein a large Somali population resides. The district will for the foreseeable future most likely be represented by a member of the Somali community, with much discussion therein as to who will run for the position.
As is the case with all members of the current iteration of the MPS Board of Education, Ali has firm ties to the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT)/Democrat-Farmer-Labor cohort that determines most elections to school boards in Minnesota. Ali in fact works for Amy Klobuchar. He gives no evidence as yet of finding fault with either group in the cohort. Like so many, he appreciates the greater propensity of DFL politicians to provide generous funding for education, by comparison with Republicans, and to assume that more funding in the absence of meaningful change is a good thing. He does not understand or does not want to think about the deleterious effect that DFL administrations (e. g., Mark Dayton with his Minnesota Department of Education [MDE] Commissioner Brenda Cassellius; Tim Walz with his MDE Commissioner Mary Cathryn Ricker) have on enforcement of state academic standards and objective measurement via the Minnesota Comprehensive Assessments (MCAs).
Thus, Siad Ali bears the same taint of political corruption that is true of all members of this board. And he gives no indication of having any more knowledge of the history and philosophy of education in the United States than do the others. But he is an amicable, proverbial “Hail Fellow, Well Met” who professes love for everybody and seems to mean it. He does not do his homework very well to apprise himself of policy details, but neither does he make clearly lamentable judgements. In
support of the work of Ed Graff and especially Chief of Finance Ibrahima Diop, Ali voted with the minority to uphold the budget as presented in spring 2018, losing in the 5-4 vote to the contingent led by Rebecca Gagnon to restore $6.4 million that upon budget trimming had engendered opposition by affluent parents whose students’ high schools had been affected.
Although he has as yet to take meaningful action, Ali listens more empathetically than do most other board members to Public Commentators such as the Hispanic parents who have appealed for “priority enrollment” giving their children the option of attending schools perceived as “higher performing.” He also listens to my Public Comments and is the only member of the MPS Board of Education who still approaches me personally (and only one of three whose approach I would welcome). But in private conversation, Ali is a terrible listener who, despite understanding the main thrust of my advocacy for a knowledge-intensive curriculum and the paramount importance of academics, cannot get far enough beyond the MFT/DFL party line to digest cognitively my comments.
Ali should have done his homework, read tracts on the history and philosophy of education in the United States, stiffen his spine, and lend a more careful ear in assessing words of dissent and advocacy. Ali had a slight chance for becoming a more thoughtful and independent voice on the MPS Board of Education; that slight chance is more than could be assigned to Bob Walser, Nelson Inz, Kim Ellison, Jenny Arneson, Kim Caprini, and KerryJo Felder.
#9 >>>>> At-Large Member Josh Pauly >>>>> Some Potential on a Board for Which Slim Hope Must Be Considered
Josh Pauly resigned from thew MPS Board of Education in February 2022 and was replaced in a 7-2 board vote by Cynthia Booker
Josh Pauly was one of the At-Large representatives on the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education, along with Kim Caprini and Kim Ellison. He and Caprini won their seats in the election of November 2018 and took their positions formally in January 2020.
Pauly student taught at Southwest High School, substituted for a while at Lucy Laney and Bethune, and then taught social studies and AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination--- a minimally effective college preparatory program) at Sanford Middle School. He now works in social and community service while living in South Minneapolis. Pauly holds one of those easily obtained and insubstantial masters of education degrees.
In the election of November 2018, Josh Pauly ran in a four-way candidate race for two open positions. The other candidates were Caprini, Rebecca Gagnon, and Sharon El-Amin. Gagnon had out-connived herself and run afoul of the Minneapolis Federation of Teacher (MFT) /Democrat-Farmer-Labor (DFL) cohort. Gagnon ran essentially even with El-Amin, who has great respect and name recognition for her longtime North Minneapolis residency and business ownership, and for her marriage to the imam of Masjid Annur mosque, Makri El-Amin. Caprini also has longtime residency and parental involvement on the Northside, and she benefitted enormously from MFT-DFT backing in the citywide race.
But Pauly was a nonentity whom El-Amin would have defeated handily on the strength of name recognition and length of community service. Pauly benefited most decisively from the phone calls made, campaign literature, and door-knocking of his MFT supporters.
During the campaign, I did not find Pauly to offer much in the way of vision or program for change needed in view of the degradation that is the district of the Minneapolis Public Schools. His MFT/DFL backing did nothing to endear him to me. He seemed to have the inexperience of youth with little compensating vigor; and rather than offer youthful impetus toward change, he entered his position tainted by association with the MFT/DFL cohort.
There is much about Pauly that remains unimpressive:
He reads from a script anything of substance that he wants to convey before important votes or in making reports to other board members; he has little spontaneity or ability to express himself off-script, in the moment.
Pauly is tentative on matters of curriculum, teacher quality, or other items pertinent to the academic program at the core of the locally centralized school district’s reason for being.
And yet three observations give me very limited hope that Pauly has some potential to be some degree of a positive force on the MPS Board of Education >>>>>
>>>>> Pauly has not done any direct harm or said anything so outrageously stupid as have Arneson, Ellison, Caprini, or Inz; and certainly has uttered none of the insipid, offensive verbiage of Walser.
>>>>> He has a sense of when discussion is tending toward seemingly interminable banter and has been known to call the question or use other devices to move matters forward; he often seems particularly irritated with the propensity toward scattered verbosity of Felder or the baroque rhetoric of Walser.
>>>>> And most importantly, Pauly demonstrates a considered skepticism at the academic proposals in the emerging MPS Comprehensive District Design, notably asking Amy Fearing (then Department of Teaching and Learning Executive Director) and Chief of Research, Evaluation, Assessment, and Accountability Eric Moore (at a fall semester, academic year 2019-2020 Committee of the Whole meeting) how we can be sure there is anything new in this plan that will improve achievement or is in any way be better than what we have had for lo these many years.
As for Cynthia Booker, she has been a serviceable board member somewhat like Josh Pauley; her short tenure, which will come to and end in January 2023, had little impact.
On the Matter of the Student Representative to the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education
Student Representative Janaan Ahmed >>>>> One Major Bright Moment, But Mostly the Typical Wasted Opportunity
Janaan Ahmed was the student representative on the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education from January through December 2019.
Ahmed was the fifth student representative to serve. In order, with full calendar years beginning each January during which they served given in parentheses, the representatives have been the following: Noah Branch (2015), Shaadia Munye (2016), Gabriel Spinks (2017), Ben Jaeger (2018), and Janaan Ahmed (2019). Three of the student representatives (Branch, Munye, Ahmed) have been students at Henry High School; Spinks was a student at Edison High School, Jaeger at Roosevelt High School.
I have the same high expectations of these young people that I do for my students in the New Salem Educational Initiative. Each of the representatives has ultimately been disappointing to me as potential agents of change who have not seized the moment. These students all attend high schools at which the mean ACT score is approximately 16 (at the 20th percentile by national standards); at which major modes of teaching are to distribute packets, show videos, group students together for projects in the absence of contextualizing information, or send them singly to computers to seek
information on topics for which they similarly have little background knowledge; where teacher
burnout leads to long-term substitutes with tangential subject area expertise; and from which students graduate with insubstantial knowledge and skill sets and often need remedial coursework if attending colleges or universities.
And yet not one of these students has articulated the grave problems at her or his high school. Some had their moments of eloquence but to no ultimate effect. Jaeger in particular presented himself as an advocate for those student groups for which academic achievement has lagged; he did not, however, seem to grasp the fundamental reasons for the lag or to have any compelling suggestions for improved achievement.
Thus, Ahmed has been the typical unproductive student representative, rather than bearing particular culpability.
Ahmed’s most consistent point of advocacy has been to call for the change of name for Patrick Henry High School, on the grounds that Henry was a slave owner. This appeal jibes with the temper of our times, in which we change names while leaving historically mistreated groups still suffering from
various ongoing gaps in social wellbeing. The appeal in this case is also simplistic, as are most such entreaties. If one considers the American Revolution a positive occurrence (and there were Loyalists who did not, with Native Americans and African Americans having internally opposing views), then
Henry was one of the most forceful proponents of the break with Great Britain. Further, George Washington and Thomas Jefferson each famously owned more slaves than did Henry. As a leftist revolutionary, I view the hippy dippy liberal tendency to launch attacks on people out of historical context while failing to address injustices today unseemly and frequently infuriating.
Ahmed did have one bright moment, at an MPS Board of Education Committee of the Whole. Her incisive comment came when the subject of new ethnic studies courses came up. At issue was whether to offer these new courses as electives or as permissible replacements for core subjects such as United State history. Ahmed said that she has a passion for ethnic studies but that ethnic specific courses would be unnecessary if subjects such as United States history were taught as they should be, with that history as necessarily entailing the participation of multiple ethnicities in all past events.
Janaan Ahmed is an apparently very bright young woman whose ability and capacity for public leadership and engagement will stand her in good stead during her postsecondary life.
She contributed very little, though, to a regular board membership of adults who are variously ignorant, corrupt, or in denial. Those adults had great need of a an incisive, oppositional student force that Ahmed--- like her predecessors--- did not provide.
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Incompetence of Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Superintendent Ed Graff, MPS Board of Education Members, and Consultant Paula Forbes on Full Display at Saturday, 6 April 2019 Meeting
The incompetence of the current members of the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education and Superintendent Ed Graff were on full display at a Saturday, 6 April 2019, meeting led by correspondingly inept consultant Paula Forbes.
The meeting had scant public awareness.
This meeting had not loomed large on the calendar of the MPS Board of Education. Preparations for the meeting were, though, thorough enough that the services of Paula Forbes were secured to lead the meeting. Forbes has been an associate at Rider Bennett Law Firm and launched the office of the General Counsel at the Minneapolis Public Schools during the 1990s; she now has her own consulting firm that touts her expertise in education law and employee relations.
Ms. Forbes apparently learned little during her tenure with the Minneapolis Public Schools that she was willing to share candidly with Graff and members of the board. She began the 6 April meeting, which ran from 8:00 AM to 12:00 noon, by having Graff and the board members play with Leggos.
I kid you not.
The members of the MPS Board of Education and their $230,000 salaried leader were playing with Leggos at approximately 8:30 AM on Saturday, 6 April.
Ms. Forbes had Graff, board members, and board administrator Ryan Strack enthusiastically assembling Play Doh vehicles in teams of three, with the mandate to create vehicular objects that once propelled would travel at least 10 feet unaided. But, oh, surprise, surprise, at the midpoint Forbes notified that an additional requirement must be considered: The various colors of the pieces used in construction came with different price tags and the whole enterprise could not exceed $200 in cost. Oh, and then, my goodness, how astonishing, there came another bulletin in the last few minutes of the exercise (are you getting that this activity was purportedly demonstrating ability to respond to change, inducing examination of feelings regarding same?) Forbes notified the group that participants must completely switch goals, from vehicle construction to tower building: the group that constructed the highest tower would now be considered the winner.
After Forbes did conduct a more serious segment of the meeting, summarizing statute law in Minnesota pertinent to education, she put the group through another silly activity in which Graff, Strack, and board members were to stick notes on a wall that recalled changes in federal, state, and local education policy. Forbes tapped into a preferred activity of these board members: They love to stick notes on walls.
Most of this meeting was reminiscent of courses that I had to endure to get a teaching license; this was particularly true of the Leggos spectacle, which recalled an exercise that a great friend of mine in Texas and I still recall: One of those low-life campus presences known as education professors in one class session prevailed upon us to get in touch with our emotions by urging us to--- I kid you not--- “Feel the air--- shape it into little balls.”
But then Superintendent Ed Graff is entirely comfortable with such nonsense:
All of his professional training has come with a focus on courses in education. Graff’s highest degree is an online, insubstantial degree in education administration that he received while working for the public schools in Anchorage. Graff is an academic lightweight, with whom these equally intellectually and morally deficient members of the board are entirely comfortable.
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Recall that the district of the Minneapolis Public Schools features student mathematics and reading proficiency rates at less than 45 percent, with only 17 percent of African American and Native students demonstrating proficiency in mathematics. North High School students average a score of 15 on the ACT, while those at Henry score nearer the district average of 16 (still just indicative of middle school skill level, which means that many students in the public schools of Minneapolis [including a bevy of those who do graduate] have elementary school skill levels). Salient examples of the low level of MPS education abound:
Franklin Middle School students were given a whole Friday off in the aftermath of cold-weather cancellations to watch videos unrelated to courses; many classes at North High School are so out of control that teachers have given up teaching, even if they are among the few fully competent to render instruction in their purported fields in the first place; the preferred pedagogical technique of many teachers is to pass out “packets” (the word gives me cold shivers) for students to answer as the main means of instruction, absent follow-up teacher comment and class instruction.
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A Great Day for the K-12 Revolution >>>>>
Sharon El-Amin and Adriana Cerrillo Win Their Races for MPS Board of Education
For many years the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers (MFT)/Democratic-Farmer Labor (DFL) Party cohort has controlled the Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) Board of Education. That control was severely reduced with the victories of Sharon El-Amin over MFT sycophant KerryJo Felder in District 2 (North Minneapolis) and Adriana Cerrillo over DFL-endorsed Christa Mims in District 4 (Bryn Mawr, Uptown, and surrounding areas).
Here are the results of the November 2020 MPS Board of Education contests, with 100% of districts reporting >>>>>
Hennepin County
District: Minneapolis District 4 (SSD #1)
Candidate
Adriana Cerrillo
Votes
15,604 (49.9%)
Christina Mims
Votes
15,378 (49.2%)
100% of precincts reporting
………………………………………………………………………………………….
Hennepin County
District: Minneapolis District 2 (SSD #1)
CANDIDATE
Sharon El-Amin
Votes
13,777 (54.9%)
Votes
Kerry Jo Felder (44.5%)
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Electing Adrian Cerrillos and Sharon El-Amin to the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education on 3 November 2020
On 3 November 2020 Adriana Cerrillos was elected to the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education for District 4 and Sharon El-Amin was elected for District 2. The election of these independent voices for the best interests of students was of enormous importance.
District 2
Sharon El-Amin has served as head of the North Polar (North High School) parent group and is a community activist who twice a month prepares 100 meals for those in need, for many years ran the successful El-Amin Fish Shop on West Broadway Avenue, and has been involved in multiple community organizations and issues. Husband Makram El-Amin is the imam of Masjid An’nur mosque on Lyndale Avenue North; wife and husband have deep connections to the Muslim community in general and the Somali contingent specifically. El-Amin’s natural base of support is expansive and deep; the last of four school board candidate forums in this 2018 election season brought forward a crowd at the University of Minnesota community engagement center at 2100 Plymouth Avenue North (across from the Minneapolis Urban League) that was overwhelmingly and vocally expressive in support of her candidacy. In the 2018 campaign for an At-Large seat, Sharon El-Amin went up against a canny and seasoned political rival in Rebecca Gagnon and two endorsees (Kim Caprini and Josh Pauly) of the powerful MFT/DFL machine. She and Gagnon together received 21,573 more votes than did Josh Pauly. El-Amin ran just a fraction behind Gagnon; the two ran essentially even, garnering 18.34% and 18.95% of the vote respectively. That Sharon El-Amin ran such a strong campaign is testimony to a level of genuine public backing unmatched by Pauly, certainly, but also unrivaled by Caprini and Gagnon. Caprini and Pauly emerged with narrow victories for the two available At-Large seats in 2018. Now a seasoned political campaigner and with Northside affiliations much more deeply rooted that KerryJo Felder, El-Amin is poised to oust Felder from the District 2 seat.
District 4
Adriana Cerrillo has her own consulting business, “Radical Solutions,” and has made many appearances at the state capitol in St. Paul as an advocate for immigrants’ rights. She is guardian for her 11-year-old nephew, who attends Emerson Spanish Immersion Learning Center in the Loring Park neighborhood, where Cerrillo is on the site council and has agitated for improved quality.
Cerrillos’s advocacy for undocumented immigrants led her to a position on the Minneapolis Police Conduct Oversight Commission. Her activism moved her to seek the firing of a Chaska police officer accused of racial profiling; to help over 100 families — mostly families of color — navigate the local education system; and to family advocacy with the nonprofit Minnesota Comeback, now called Great Minnesota Schools, during 2018-2020.
On school policy, Cerrillos seeks “solutions” instead of suspensions; equality in funding, with diversity of curricula and staff; and therapists, health professionals, and all resources necessary for closing achievement gaps in all schools.
Cerrillo opposed the Comprehensive District Design (CDD) restructuring plan, which passed on a 6-3 vote in May 2020, asserting that the plan was more about reducing transportation costs than addressing inequitable outcomes.
Electing Sharon El-Amin and Adriana Cerrillos will decidedly abet the prospects for overhaul of curriculum and teacher quality at the Minneapolis Public Schools.
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Thus, there has been a highly favorable trend toward electing truly progressive candidates against those endorsed by the establishment entities in the Democrat-Farmer-Labor (DFL)/Minneapolis Federation of Teacher (MFT) cohort.
As the articles below in this edition of Journal of the K-12 Revolution: Essays and Research from Minneapolis, Minnesota detail, this trend continued in the election of 8 November 2022:
Sonya Emerick’s election over Kerry Jo Felder for an at-large seat will now bring to at least three and perhaps five board members capable of moving beyond education establishment modes of operation, toward support of the initiatives of Interim Superintendent Rochelle Cox and Senior Academic Officer Aimee Fearing to bring knowledge-intensive, skill-replete curriculum and teachers capable of imparting that curriculum to the long-waiting student of the Minneapolis Public Schools.
The MPS Board of Education membership that will be seated as of January 2022, in order of promise for change, is as follows >>>>>
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Adriana Cerrillo (District 4)
Sharon El-Amin (District 2)
Sonya Emerick (At-Large)
Abdul Abdi (District 1)
Fathia Feeryarre (District 3)
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Ira Jourdain (District 6)
Kim Ellison (At-Large)
Collin Beachy (At-Large)
Lori Norvell (District 5)
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In the following articles I detail the favorable developments witnessed at this current juncture in the composition of the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of education, most notably featuring the election of Sondra Emerick and the departure of current board members Nelson Inz, Jenny Arneson, Kim Caprini, and Siad Ali.
Article #1
Results of the Tuesday, 8 November 2022 Election for Seats on the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education
Observe that Collin Beachy ands Sonya Emerick, the top two vote-getters for the at-large contest will now be seated on the Minneapolis Public Schools Board of Education. Lori Novelle will be seated for District 5. Abdul Abdi (District 1) and Fathia Feeyarre (District 3) were unopposed and will also be seated.
At Large Vote Total (Percentage of Vote)
Collin Beachy 68,084 (33.06%)
Sonya Emerick 52,365 (25.43%)
KerryJo Felder 51,872 (25.19%)
Lisa Skjefte 31,941 (15.51%)
Write-In 1,686 (0.82%)
District 5
Lori Novell 19,774 (68.11%)
Laurelle Myhra 9,062 (31.21%)
Write-In 195 (00.67%)
District 1
Abdul Abdi 15,335 (98.01%)
Write-In 312 (01.99%)
District 3
Fathia Feeyarre 11,159 (98.29%)
Write-In 194 (01.71%)
