KPGT Forum Recap, and What Does the Board Do?

Last night's Candidates'g Forum hosted by KPGT was well attended, and I am glad there are more people paying attention to the condition of our school board, because it impacts our entire community.  Because we are so close to early voting (it starts on Monday), I will recap in a less thorough way than I did the Rotary Forum, in the interest of this space and your time.  That won't really start until tomorrow, as I've been dealing with a plumber all day.  <sob>

Also, FYI, Mrs. Blackman and Mrs. Majors have answered the questionnaire posted by the Taylor Band Boosters, so now all candidates have responded.

Before I get started with the recap, I wanted to share this article from Great Schools about How to Choose a School Board Candidate, and in particular these paragraphs on What They Do:

• Somewhere in between the agendas, public comment sessions and resolutions, school boards make a number of important decisions. School boards establish a vision for the community's schools. They have to set up and maintain an effective, efficient organizational structure for the district that lets the superintendent and administrators manage the schools, teachers teach and students learn.
• They are responsible for hiring and evaluating a superintendent, evaluating and adopting policies that affect all schools in the district, serving as a judicial and appeals body when conflicts go unresolved, monitoring and adjusting district finances, and managing the collective bargaining process in the district.
• A school board has a symbolic role as well. The behavior it shows off in the meeting room, the rapport among school board members and the relationships that members have with teachers and administrators in the district all add up to the climate of public education in a community. Whether healthy or dysfunctional, a school board has a heavy influence on the spirit that characterizes a community's impression of its school system.

I hope everyone who is voting thinks about this as they make their decisions.  I think it is telling that Neal Howard said, in response to a question about which policies the candidates would like to change, was that the Board's policies need penalties for bad behavior.  He said the "shenanigans of Washington" have come to Katy, and we would suspend students who behave as board members have been behaving.  I find this so sad because in the past, the Board has been able to adopt rules and expect them to be honored.  Now, that does not seem possible.

More specifics on the forum to come...