Friday, March 30, 2012
By robert Guttersohn
Youngstown
State and local leaders were placed on the hot seat at Thursday’s ACTION meeting, where community members requested from them specific levels of commitment toward fixing the education system in Youngstown.
At the meeting themed “Save Our Children,” state Sen. Joe Schiavoni of Canfield, D-33rd, Youngstown Superintendent Connie Hathorn and Larry Ellis from the Youngstown Education Association sat at a table in front of a packed Elizabeth Missionary Baptist Church on the city’s East Side. ACTION stands for Alliance for Congregational Transformation Influencing Our Neighborhoods.
The requests ranged from micro-level fixes such as Hathorn’s commitment to holding teachers more accountable to macro-level changes like a commitment from Schiavoni to fight any attempt from the state to take funding away from public schools.
“We save our kids, we save our city,” Hathorn said, followed by the night’s largest applause.
Schiavoni promised by next year to pursue changing the formula for public schools, which the state Supreme Court deemed unconstitutional in 2002 yet hasn’t changed, he said.
“It’s criminal,” he said.
He criticized Gov. John Kasich’s administration for continually cutting funding to public education, forcing schools to “go out in your community and pass levies.”
He also called for an individualized teacher training system for specific schools.
“It’s not a one-size-fits-all system,” Schiavoni said.
“We will be watching you,” said the Rev. J. Dwayne Heard, president of ACTION and senior pastor of the church, to the state senator.
Ellis, who sat in for YEA President Willam Bagnola, criticized the academic distress commission that has overseen the school district after it fell into academic emergency, which he said has taken the control out of the district’s hands. This, he said, ties the district’s hands in trying to make changes for the better.
“I would question their investment in the city,” Ellis said.
A majority of the meeting was consumed by questions to and answers from Hathorn.
He challenged parents to be more involved in their students’ lives, saying there is a disconnect between the home and the school.
“The good news is education is a team sport,” Hathorn said. “The bad news is we’re not on the same team.”
He also challenged the teachers to be better communicators with parents.
“Don’t wait until the kids do something wrong to call home,” he said.
He said the district is proactive in changing the standards for teachers and has changed its assessment of students with early testing to catch when students are falling behind.
After promising to keep a watchful eye on all three leaders, Heard turned the pressure back on the community seated in the church’s wooden pews.
“Your level of commitment has to be as strong theirs,” he told the congregation.