Teaching Tuesday: Here's what your "reform" has brought

(Welcome, Rox Populi readers! This post may confuse you if you don't know Milwaukee school politics. Currently, our school board has a majority that supports Milwaukee's private-school vouchers, in part because the daily paper calls them "reformers" and national pro-voucher groups flood Milwaukee with money every election. I also recommend last week's "Teaching Tuesday" if you get the chance.)


Drunk with power, the "reform" wing of the Milwaukee Board of School Directors has decided to silence the opposition:

This month, newly elected board President Kenneth Johnson sent out two memos telling board members to limit themselves to two speeches on any issue at monthly board meetings, and to limit those speeches to two minutes apiece. [. . .]

Member Jennifer Morales loudly protested the memos last week at a board meeting, and in an interview, she argued that the constrictions would stifle the democratic process. [. . .] "On a body of nine people, it seems really ridiculous to say we can't have as much opportunity to speak as we need to."

Morales sent a letter to Johnson last week, slamming his proposal to limit members to two speeches.

"I believe that the board is capable of reducing the length of board meetings," she writes. "However, this should be accomplished through self reflection by each member on whether a particular comment (and its length) adds something meaningful to the discussion or merely prolongs it."

Johnson replied with his memo that says he also planned to cut speeches off at two minutes. "None of this is anything I invented. This is all in the board rules," he says. Johnson points to a clause limiting members of the public to two minutes in their speeches, and he says the same should be applied to board members.

I just don't even know where to start with this. Yes, it's infamously true that board meetings often last until the wee hours of the morning, but when we're talking about the governance of the state's largest school district, it doesn't seem unreasonable that debate should take time. It's not enough that the public--parents, students, teachers, community folk--get cut off at two minutes; now the "reformer" majority wants to silence those whom the public elects to speak for them, as well.

It's not enough that "reformer" Johnson was elected without debate, and it's not enough that "reformer" Johnson played the worst kind of petty politics handing out committee assignments (it's just coincidence, I'm sure, how Danny Goldberg, enriched by the district's "innovation," now chairs the "Innovation/ School Reform" committee). Now "reformer" Johnson wants to stick his fingers in his ears and pretend that no one exists but those who hold the same opinions as he does. I guess he does have good role models for this sort of thing in Madison Republicans . . .

The very newspaper reporting this tyranny gushed over the "reformers", repeatedly. I wonder if this abrogation of democratic principals would change their opinion on the "reformer" wing of the board? Or is that too much to ask?

Anyway, here is the contact info for the board. And, yes, those are home numbers. Be nice. Your focus should be on Johnson, Dannecker, Horton, Spence, and Goldberg.

And, if you'd like, let the paper know what kind of "reform" they have championed.

[UPDATE]: My LTE.