Missed a spot

Ok, well, yeah, while I was sleeping, I missed a spot or two of Wednesday's regular meeting of the Board.

I really don't have time to fully devote right now -- birthday parties and housecleaning and laundry and the like...but I do STRONGLY RECOMMEND catching tonight's re-broadcast; I know I will.

On deck is discussion on the Irving building reutilization...WHICH I believe I've already said was brazenly lifted from a proposal I WROTE for the Irving Village Community group and Johnson Heating and Plumbing, and submitted to the District in response to their RFP a year ago.  The District ended up rejecting all of the proposals, wasting everyone's time; then all of a sudden, there's Mike Poore, presenting to the Board what a great idea it would be to start a vocational school at Irving (!).

Indeed, it is flattering and the source of much bemusement to see so much of what I'd envisioned for Irving taking shape.  But -- someone correct me if I'm wrong -- the remodeling at Irving took out the metal shop and the wood shop that came part and parcel with the building; the existence of those two rooms provided the very substance of the proposal to establish a building technical trades program at Irving.  I'll tell you what -- Rick Johnson is a man of high integrity, and the program he had envisioned for Irving was just perfect, all the way around, and I've always thought it was stupid of the District not to have partnered with his outfit to make this part work.

The proposal also suggested that the remainder of the building be used as a community center.  By becoming a resource for the community, it could have helped the people there heal from the closing of Irving Middle School -- because believe me:  the people in that area ARE still hurting over it, and will for a long time.  The community center portion of the proposal would have also offered some rental revenue; after all, there's the auditorium, the stage, tennis courts, cafeteria, computer rooms, etc.

I mean, the building was already all set up for it -- so there was no need for capital improvements.  DUH.

But having the tendency to take a good idea and make ONE GREAT BIG GIGANTIC HAIRY EXPENSIVE MONSTER out of it, the District, No Doubt, is finding that chewing all it's bitten off is gonna be one challenging mouthful. 

The price of gluttony.

I dunno...but I'm not at all sold on the the Achieve K-8 or K-12 program there -- why is the District so sure, and so ready to sink SO MUCH money and time and effort and retrofitting in something so uncertain?

It's called fixing what isn't broken.  YOO-HOO, you know what was a sure thing, School District 11?  Irving Middle School, and the kids who went to it and the families that grew from it and the neighbors who benefitted from it; yeah, not the kind of big money-maker like the District is always chasing after...but the regular, bread and butter kind -- you know...THE SUSTAINABLE KIND.

The meeting ends with the defeat of Jan Tanner's repeated suggestion to rejoin the Coalition for a Thorough and Uniform Colorado Public Education System.

Will write more on this later.