An Open Letter To Members Of The County School Board - And Response (3)

  • Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Members of the Hamilton County School Board,
On your agenda for April 22 is the reconsideration of a vote on March 18 in which future Pre-K students were given automatic Magnet status at Normal Park Museum Magnet. At the meeting on March 18 there was concern that these parents had followed the rules in place, paid a $300 deposit, and now are losing their space at NPMM. Although I feel for the parents in this situation and believe that an implied contract has been breached, I believe the Board made the correct decision regarding this issue. The reality of Pre-K admission at NPMM is that it has been corrupt since day one. The so called “lottery” system for admission has never been transparent and been a tool for the leadership of NPMM to pick and choose students.

The idea that someone can pay $5,000 and gain automatic entry into the most desired magnet school in the Hamilton County system is not only 'unjust' but I believe illegal. I am asking this board not only to put an end to this practice once and for all, but that an investigation into past admissions be put into place. I am willing to put $5,000 toward an independent audit of the Pre-K admission system at NPMM.

The true injustice here is not that 12 families got caught up in an unethical practice, but that a whole community of mostly poor and minority students promised they would be zoned for NPMM got shafted through lies and misinformation. It just proves that if you take hundreds of parents, whip them into a state of panic talking about portable classrooms and overcrowding, feed them bad information about how the school is bursting at the seams, personally attack any detractors, have them call Board members repeatedly reading from talking points (enclosed), you can sway the opinion of otherwise intelligent people. The facts are:

· NPMM is not overcrowded; it is at 66% capacity.
· There are four vacant classrooms at the lower school alone.
· There never were the 115 students in the proposed annex to the NPMM zone.
· Adding in-zone students would not cause the use of portable classrooms, but only decrease the number of magnet spaces available.
· People have been buying their way into NPMM for years.

As elected officials you make difficult decisions on a regular basis. Many of those decisions are unpopular. Many affect people’s lives in a negative way. It is these decisions that determine one’s character. Every once in a while you are given the chance to correct an injustice. This is just such a case. I am asking the board to honor your original decision to include the Hill City Neighborhood into the Normal Park footprint and unite North Chattanooga under one neighborhood school that represents the diversity of the neighborhood as a whole.

Jim Crooks

* * *

Thank you for coming forward about some of the improprieties surrounding Normal Park. I'm sympathetic to the 12 families too. But when the Hill City community and others asked to speak at the last School Board meeting about the Bell/Spears Avenue controversy, they were denied. It's insulting that one group can address the School Board but the other is locked out.

George Ricks talks about integrity and keeping a promise. But then he votes against keeping the School Board's promise to Hill City. Here's some friendly advice Mr. Ricks: lead by example.

A lot of people complain about the state of Hamilton County's public education system. Typically, the school system blames the parents. That's true to some degree. But I think it's time we considered the management too.

As for Normal Park's political goon squad, the truth is a lot stronger than your fear tactics. So go ahead and sling mud at Mr. Crooks. He's a good man. And you're just disgracing yourselves by attacking him personally because he happens to own land in Hill City. He owns more elsewhere.

Charles Bikas

* * *

Mr. Crooks and Mr. Bikas,

Gosh, I wish my son's preschool in 1997 was just $5,000 at the Ashland Terrace School that guaranteed my son placement at the school.

Throwing racial bombs at our North Chattanooga neighborhood and the magnet schools seems to be your favorite past time. I have counted at least 15 times your group has called our North Chattanooga neighborhood and the magnet schools racist. Hello, you live in our neighborhood, and are fully aware that we are working class folks.

Shame on you fellows for using NAACP as your weapon of choice to change what are really zoning complaints and investment property issues. It absolutely makes me sick that you try to capitalize on the backs of real racial discrimination. You guys were noticeably absent when the rest of us were working on closure of three of the most impoverished demographics in Hamilton County, just 2.5 years ago. Where were you then?

Neither of you knows what real discrimination of impoverished children looks or feels like, how dare you treat an NAACP complaint like a party favor.

April Eidson

* * *

Ms. Eidson,

Was the preschool on Ashland Terrace a public or private preschool? I wish my husband and I could have afforded any type of preschool for our children.

Macel Holloway
Signal Mountain

* * *

Jim Crooks has made several allegations concerning the Normal Park lottery without any evidence. The idea that the magnet admission to the Prek-K has been manipulated to “pick and chose” admissions is unfounded and inflammatory. One is left to wonder how his opinion has been shaped by the fact that he owns eight properties in the area that was recently zoned for Normal Park.

My son attends Normal Park. We moved to this zone after not winning the lottery. There are many other families like mine, and this is one of the reasons that the enrollment has grown. Jim Crooks claims that the school is only at 66% capacity; if this were true then there would be no reason to deny magnet admission to the 12 families who were planning to attend the pre-K. I know one of those families – they live one block from Normal Park Upper, a school you can see from their front yard. People park in front of their house for Normalpalooza. They were also told that they would be zoned when the zone increased. Since they weren’t, they got through during the call-in for the lottery to attend pre-K. Like other parents, they were willing to work extra to pay for pre-K with the promise that magnet admission was linked to pre-K attendance. They took their child out of their current pre-K because of that promise.

Quality early child care in Chattanooga is rare. Wait lists are long. It is now too late to get a child enrolled for next fall. This is the result of a broken promise that has nothing to do with income level or race or the other things that Jim Crooks is insinuating.

The real issue here is why is Normal Park so sought after? Why is it that over 500 families applied for the magnet lottery? Why is it that so many families have moved to the zone that the population has grown so much more than expected? It is clear that someone who owned property that was zoned for Normal Park would stand to make a lot of money, but why can’t other schools in Hamilton County do the same sorts of things that Normal Park is doing that parents are attracted to so much that they are willing to pay more for that property?

Statements that the desire to have one’s children attend Normal Park has to do with race or bias are unfounded. Frankly, the fact that Normal Park has some diversity is one of the factors that many parents are seeking out – there are many other school zones in Hamilton County that are homogeneous that one could move to if that is what they are looking for.

Darrell Meece

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