Voters: Hold Your School Board Accountable

The Souhegan Cooperative School Board’s (SCSB) editorial comments (The Cabinet, Sept. 29) regarding the decision to remove decile ranking, and their subsequent posting to the Souhegan website, contain statements which leave some parents wondering if they participated in the same process. There are significant discrepancies between what actually occurred from these parents’ perspectives and what the SCSB is now presenting as “fact” and “accurate information.” These are too numerous to detail here, but readers should not be fooled into thinking that the SCSB is shining a thoroughly objective light on its own process.

This is of significant concern to taxpayers in Amherst and Mont Vernon, because their rights as taxpayers have been blatantly disregarded in this and several other recent decisions. The decile decision process is illustrative of how parents and taxpayers are excluded from meaningful and constructive participation in the school they are funding.

The Community Council is structured to represent the students of Souhegan High School. It allows them a valuable opportunity to self-govern the issues of daily school life, and is “purposefully student led” by design. In addition to 40 student and faculty representatives, there are also five adult representatives, appointed by the SCSB, to offer the viewpoint of citizens of the community. 

While this input may be beneficial to the process at the school level, it should never be mistaken as appropriate representation of the taxpayers. Taxpayers cannot vote at Council meetings, they do not have proportional representation, and they don’t even get to vote for their “community representative.” Furthermore, taxpayers are expected to be satisfied that these issues are being decided for them by students who are neither of legal age to cast a vote in a town election, nor to serve as elected representatives in town matters.

The SCSB has been entrusted by the taxpayers to decide certain public matters, but they have improperly been using the Council as a forum to decide them instead. This organizational sleight-of-hand has been used recently to bypass taxpayer objections on issues involving student safety, college selection, and thousands of dollars of theft. The SCSB significantly stretches the truth in their assertion that “Community Council presents their findings as a recommendation for the School Board to consider,” when, in practice, these decisions go into effect immediately upon Council vote. Any appeals of Council decisions by taxpayers go back to the Council for a second ruling (if they even deem it worthy) before being allowed to move on to the SCSB for further appeal. 

This process, obviously, can take several months. In the decile appeal, the first ever to make it to the SCSB, the members voted to uphold the decision even though the vast majority of parents present objected. Parents were limited to a paltry three minutes to voice their concerns and were threatened with removal if the chairperson did not find the comments appropriate. This is the “fair and thorough hearing” they are now bragging about. 

If the SCSB disagrees with this perspective, they cannot disagree with the outcome of events. There were absolutely no changes made to the original decile proposal as a result of parent or taxpayer input. The proposal passed intact and unchanged despite many clearly articulated objections. There was never an attempt at Council to conduct more research, answer objections, or involve the parents in a solution which would address their concerns. Compromises suggested by parents (and even some Council members) were repeatedly shot down by supporters of the proposal, who pushed an “all or nothing” approach. Only after months of continuous objections, two appeals, several letters, phone calls, and numerous meetings was any attempt at all made to answer to the concerns of parents of the community. This can hardly be called “responsive.”

This was not a constructive process, and it was not in keeping with the collaborative tenets of Souhegan’s founding. It was destructive, confrontational, and paints the Community Council, the SCSB, and the school’s administration in a very bad light, whether they choose to acknowledge it or not. Worse still, it teaches poor lessons to our next generation of leaders who were the student members of the Council during the process, because they were taught the value of the “power play” over the value of reaching a collaborative solution for the good of the entire community. Our country needs better for the future than emulating current Congressional politics.

The SCSB needs to recognize that issues of concern to students and issues of concern to taxpayers are different, and should be dealt with in separate forums. It is unfair to both taxpayers and students to be put in a position to have to face off against each other to protect their interests while the Board sits on the sidelines. Taxpayers elect school board members, and we expect to be represented by them, not by high school students or faculty.

The taxpayers of Amherst and Mont Vernon should notify their SCSB representatives that they will not support the upcoming Souhegan Cooperative budget until 1) the by-laws are changed to limit the powers of the Community Council, and 2) the SCSB agrees to address taxpayer concerns at the school board level from now on. There is plenty of time to correct this before the budget is actually voted on, but we must fix this glaring discrepancy if we are ever to move forward in a more positive, collaborative manner for the long-term good of the school. We want this school to succeed for our children, and we want to be the “key collaborators” stated in the Ten Common Principles for the Coalition of Essential Schools. Write to your board member, be vocal at the board meetings, and stand up for your rights.  It is your money and your school.

Scott Gowell

Amherst

To contact your School Board:

Souhegan Cooperative School Board

P.O. Box 849

Amherst, NH 03031

603-673-2690

For individual contact info: http://www.sprise.com/schoolboard.aspx?id=1130