The United States department of justice has ruled that the El Paso Independent School District elected board will be replaced by one appointed by the Texas commissioner of education.
I shared my thoughts about this in Disenfranchised.
This ruling came out the day early voting for new school board members started. How much more damage can the Texas Education Agency (TEA) inflict on us?
How many people decided not to run for election because of the fear that this would happen? Running for office takes time, effort, and money.
How many people will not vote now because they see it as a waste of time?
What will happen to the candidates that do get elected on May 11? How long will their lives be on stand-by as they wait for the TEA to relinquish control?
I might be able to understand this if the TEA replaced a board early in it’s term. Here it is obvious that the people we elected did a poor job. Are they trying to tell us that the current candidates are poor choices also? Does this ruling mean that El Pasoan’s are not qualified to vote?
Has anyone considered replacing the State Board of Education since the TEA twice investigated the school district and found no wrong doing? To what extent did their failures make our situation here worse?
The TEA has already appointed a monitor for the district. She has sweeping powers including, as I understand it, the ability to overrule the school board. What else does the commissioner need?
This is a blow to liberty and to the republican form of government. Fighting this in court would take time and money. I fear that no one will step forward to the task.
I cannot see how the courts would allow this to stand. Then again, I could not see this happening either.
Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty
Cato
elpasospeak 
I don’t disagree, but we would not be in this mess if we had not had a corrupt school district administrators and incompetent, ego-maniacal (and possibly corrupt) board members who failed to provide proper oversight. If they were honorable, they would have stepped aside long ago, which might have allowed us to deal with this locally.
Given the dismal local turnout for most elections, I doubt seriously that very many people are going through the mental gymnastics you describe before deciding if they will vote.
For all the time and space that the local news media has dedicated this never-ending story, the stories of the victims — the students — has received relatively little attention. It’s all about the board, which just simply feeds their own sense of self-importance.
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I totally AGREE with removal of the EPISD School Board! It’s too bad it took so long for the Justice Department to act. Counter-suits by school board members may have been a cause.
If the voters could have removed the Board, I strongly believe they would have done so. (Is there anyone in El Paso who thinks they’re done a good job???)
Even though we’re close to school board election time, not all the Board members are up for re-election. We’re stuck with 1/2 of this incompetent Board for another 2 years. I’m not sure the new Board members could fix the problems as quickly as the Board of Managers who won’t have 1/2 of the current board to hold them back.
I only regret that State Law requires that School Superintendents have their degrees in Education. Many other cities have had their “mess” cleaned up by someone from outside the education field.
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El Pasoan,
I agree with you on the removal of the board, but requiring the School Superintendent to have an education degree is not the issue. It’s a matter of finding and hiring the right candidate. I’m a little tired of the implication that business people are the only people who can solve problems and clean up messes. The very idea that those in business think that they are so much more qualified and capable and the “smartest guys in the room” is why the the world of business has its own messes that were created by supposedly qualified people with MBAs and degrees in finance. Does anyone remember Enron, the financial markets crash of 2008? Need I add to the list? If you’re logic is correct, maybe we need to send in some math teachers to clean up Wall Street.
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El Pasoan and Casual Observer,
The requirements to become a superintendent in Texas effectively require that you be a career educator.
This is from the TEA website:
To become a superintendent, it is necessary to enroll in an Approved Educator Preparation Program. Contact the approved program of your choice to find out the specific requirements for that program.
To be eligible to receive the Standard Superintendent Certificate, you must:
must hold (sic), at a minimum, a master’s degree from an institution of higher education that is accredited by an accrediting agency, as recognized by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (outside source);
hold, at a minimum, a principal certificate or the equivalent issued under this title or by another state or country;
successfully complete an approved superintendent educator preparation program and be recommended for certification by that program;
satisfactorily complete an exam based on the Standards Required for the Superintendent Certificate.
While I agree with Casual Observer that proper management can come from people with many disciplines, it is disappointing to me that in Texas you must essentially be a career educator in order to become a superintendent.
Brutus
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Eric Holder was not about to further embarrass his pals Barack Obama and Arnie Duncan and their abysmal failures when it comes to education policy. Plus like everyone else, from the USDOE, the TEA and the local cabal, they consider El Paso and its children, expendable. Face it. No one gives two cents about a bunch of Mexican children on the border, not Elliot Shapleigh, not Dee Margo, not Commissioner Williams and not the liberal Obama administration (unless votes were at stake).
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