My thoughts move to the future. I will not be seeking reelection for a third term.

For six years, I watched some board members not accept their status as representing a minority viewpoint on the big ideas discussed and voted on by our governing board. I believe every board member to be too ambitious, that is the nature of politics, but some board members became tempted by the prospect of becoming the sole leader of the governing board that they blinded themselves to recognizing the wolves in sheep’s clothing that you find lurking in the shadows of ambitious politicians.

It is an old adage, beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing, but in my stretch to find a metaphor that best describes the motivations of a few citizens in our school district, none seemed more appropriate. An aside here: let me warn anyone wanting to enter the political arena to beware those citizens eager to sing your praises as a wolf wearing sheep’s clothing. In other words, do not be eager for praise from incompetent judges as from competent ones. These wolves in sheep’s clothing will try to sing your praises to win you over to their selfish persuasions, but the wolf will be unmasked when you concern yourself with honoring what is in the best interest of children, by the baseless hostility, bullying, and political intimidation tactics attempted to sway your decision-making processes.

Now, back to my ambitions, and their aim. When elected to the governing board for the first time in November 2002, I quickly realized that there was a status quo mentality in our administrative, governing board, and teacher leadership cadres. Our academic achievement and expectations was dismal to any type of statewide or national correlating data. Our budgetary process was a mess, and even though leadership was discussing this problem, they were playing the blame game of inaction and in dire need of a change agent and doer to provide leadership on how to correct the problems with managing our school district’s budget. The district had a top down collaboration style where a small group of parents, teachers, and administrators held backroom meetings to make deals to decide the fate of the district without any regard for district governing board policy. Their belief was because we can do it, we will do it, with no thought to data driven decision-making or already ratified Governing Board Policy that carries the weight of state law.

Every thing was done with smoke and mirrors, the smoke being their own ambitions, the mirrors, their own egos. A change was needed, my vision born.

My vision for the district, since my election as Governing Board in 2002, became three fold:  The raising of academic standards and expectations throughout the school district, a fiscal budgetary responsibility to manage the money inherit in super/hyper growth so as not to put the district in financial trouble when growth money stops, and to create a collaborative approach to our decision-making that builds a sense of community among all constituency groups; to provide an opportunity for each constituency group to educate the other about its interests and needs; and to reach consensus on shared interests among all self-interest groups and the Governing Board.

I acted on this vision for our school district with supreme determination, dignity, and ingenuity to accomplish these goals. I believe that after six years of this effort, when most of my political capital has been spent, I need to step aside.

Historical reflection will judge the merits of my success in this endeavor; however, I believe much has been accomplished over the past six years under my leadership. The reality of our school district is that the raising of academic standards and expectations is occurring at an astonishing rate.  Our budget is strong and solvent, and we continue to increase the amount of money going into the classrooms.  We continue to modify and improve our collaboration process to include more reliable and valid information to help drive our decision-making process.

I am looking forward to the contemplative relieving of my district leadership experiences to deepen them. I look forward to this as promising a more profound enjoyment than the original experiences themselves, and one less mixed with pain.