By Antonio D. French
Filed Tuesday, July 18, 2006 at 11:38 AM
What did you find as auditor of the district and are you still the auditor? Labels: Interviews
How long will you be "interim" superintendent?
What do you think about the recent talk about a state takeover of the district?
What makes what you're doing any different than what Creg Williams was trying to do?
How will you alter Creg Williams' "strategic plan" and will you rehire the teachers that he fired?
Will you end or alter Williams'reorganization plan for some of the city's most troubled high schools?
How will you lure students from charter schools?
Only 4 of the 7 members of the board are here today. How will you help heal the rift that exists on the school board?
PUB DEF asked Bourisaw, who is the 6th superintendent in three years and the 2nd superintendent in the last 7 days, what can she say to parents who wonder about stability in SLPS?
What experience to you have that qualifies you to reforming this district?
A parent asked Bourisaw, because SLPS is at least double the size of any district you ever led before, not to mention it's urban and mostly poor and black, what makes you qualified to lead this district?
What are you going to do differently than Creg Williams to reform SLPS?
How will you work with the divided board?
You're taking a smaller salary than your predecessor, will your other staff as well? And how will you pay for your planned reforms?
When where you first approached about becoming superintendent?
18 Comments:
If she delivers, and from her citations, if they are accurate, it sounds like she might be able to do so.
I am not going to speculate, but if there are big gains in four years, then, well, I would be quite happy.
At the very least, I am quite excited. Lets see if that continues a few weeks after school opens.
7/18/2006 1:29 PM
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, yet expecting different results. Bourisaw will be another Hammonds, with Purdy still pulling the strings.
7/18/2006 1:39 PM
It is interesting that Veronica Obrien, in her introduction, said that Bourisaw led a district of 55,000 students--much larger than St. Louis. Sacramento Unified district is divided up into smaller sub area districts. Bourisaw was only area superintentent in one area with only 14,000 students. Hardly the same as 35,000 students. Further, the test scores in that district was at least the same as St. Louis if not lower and the state of California did take over quite a bit of the district just after Bourisaw left. She was there for less than 2 years so I doubt that she had a huge impact and I am uncertain as to the circumsances of why she left. It does,however,speak to her level of experience or lack thereof of running a district this size. Further, coming from Fox, the jury is still out on her ability to run a district with such a diverse population of students or her ability to understand their unique needs.
Creg came from Chicago and Philidelphia--much more similar to our districts population of students. Further he had a lot more experience. Oh well... Que sa ra sa ra Whatever will be will be.
7/18/2006 2:15 PM
Anon #2, Creg may have "come from Chicago and Philadelphia", but he was never over the entire District in either place. In fact, he was an area coordinator and a high school academic officer, but has never been a district superintendent until St. Louis, so don't do the same inflation of his experience that you are trying to discount with the new person.
7/18/2006 2:30 PM
Not only did this new board majority defeat an entirely African-American slate, but now they've replaced an African-American superintendent.
White liberals aligned with a largely white teachers' union will once again fail to empower our children of color.
7/18/2006 2:36 PM
Anonymous #2, thanks for the background. I too was shocked when I saw the size of the Sacramento district, which also includes 20,000 adult education students.
Did you by chance discover why she left the district to move to Imperial? I couldn't. The only post-1996 item related to her husband's censure by the California Bar, but that was in 2005.
7/18/2006 2:42 PM
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7/18/2006 3:15 PM
"Not only did this new board majority defeat an entirely African-American slate, but now they've replaced an African-American superintendent."
Hahahahaha!
And the "African-Americans" are running to the whitest governor ever for help! And sucking up to a lily-white, cypto-racist mayor.
7/18/2006 3:27 PM
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7/18/2006 3:30 PM
Great! This is all we need, more of the “I have to get even mentality” from racist black pigs (I shouldn’t have insulted the pigs). I hope your homeboys don’t mind you getting in their… You are the type of people we do not want in this neighborhood. It is rather obvious that you much rather have the street life instead of working with the youth to make them leaders instead of gangsters. Then again one of those succesful students will become a police officer and come back and arrest you.
7/18/2006 6:17 PM
As long as you're providing extensive close-up video, how about finding a reason to interview Sarah Steelman or Rachel Storch?
7/18/2006 7:04 PM
I concur Oracle.
7/19/2006 7:47 AM
I really think that the racism of North St. Louisians has caused this ordeal. Too many African American St. Louisans see Mayor Slay as "the Man" and oppose every policy position he takes, not on the merit of the policy, but on the skin color of it's advocate.
For too long, hacks like Sylvester Brown have divided our city on the basis of race and power.
Most recently we have seen the African American Community, vote down two leaders of the Black community, President of the Urban League, Jim Buford, and a member of the Black Leadership Roundtable, Darnetta Clinkscale, who ran on the platform of "Supporting Creg Williams," because they were supported by Mayor Slay. Nothing like dancing with the devil just to stick it to the man! Unfortunately, Creg Williams departure, and the demise of Floyd Irons is exactly what the Black community deserves. This doesn't affect all the honkys in South City, their kids are safe in private schools.
Maybe it is time for Northsiders to wake up and realize that the mayor isn't out to get them, nor is he trying to destroy the schools. He may just be looking out for all of us.
7/19/2006 7:58 AM
Slay, like many whites that THINK they are liberal, is willing to "save" our black students without involving their poor parents, caring what they think about his methods, or listening to them when they point out what is wrong with their plans. With friends like that...
7/19/2006 10:42 AM
As a teacher of these black students in St. Louis, I would like to ask you if you know about the "parental involvement" or the large lack there of? The only time I see these people is when they think that I have compromised their childs "blackness". Until I get more than fifteen parents at a parent/teacher conference that spans over two days, I will continue to do what I believe is correct to push my students forward.
7/19/2006 2:10 PM
Wish you could have asked Dr. Bourisaw if she still supports the expansion of charter schools and the "school choice" movement, and whether she sees her past support of school vouchers as undermining urban school systems like the SLPS.
7/19/2006 4:44 PM
At the press conference she showed bar graphs of how much better schools do in the regular city public schools as opposed to charter schools. She also said she wants to get those charter kids back to the regular city schools. Here whole press conference can be seen on this website on an earlier post.
7/19/2006 5:26 PM
What is the big deal on Floyd Irons as a coach How many of those players that he coached WHEN to college and GRADUATED in the years that he coached I bet no more than 10 GO TO HELL FLOYD and SHUT THE HELL UP Oh I heard that he is homosexual is that true
8/28/2006 8:54 PM
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