New Pontiac Board of Education leader named
Tuesday, January 5, 2010
By DIANA DILLABER MURRAY
Of The Oakland Press
Of The Oakland Press
PONTIAC — Former vice president Gill Garrett is the new president of the Pontiac Board of Education.
In an quiet coup, former president Damon Dorkins was ousted from the top position Monday night as Garrett and two newly elected board trustees Caroll Turpin and Mary Barr easily took over three of the four top board positions.
Turpin, a district activist, is now vice president and Barr, a teacher, is now treasurer.
The three were both elected by a 4-3 majority of the board, with Garrett, Turpin, Barr and Trustee Robert Bass voting in their favor, and Dorkins and trustees Karen Cain and Christopher Northcross voting against them. Bass and Garrett have voted together on most issues in recent months, as they split from Dorkins.
Northcross, the longest serving member, was elected new board secretary.
The board voted in the new officers with no discussion and in interviews and public comments afterward, they all kept their comments on a positive level.
“I’m elated,” said a beaming Garrett, who was treasurer before he took over as vice president a little over a year ago.
“We’ve done a lot of good things these two years. It’s time to drill down,” Garrett said. “We still have some challenges.
“Mr. Dorkins did a quality job for the times we were in. My hat goes off to every past president” because it is a difficult position to hold.
Dorkins, who also serves with Garrett in the Pontiac Police Department, said, “I encourage Mr. Garrett in his role. I’ll give any support he needs.
“There are no ill feelings. We are in this for the same reason — the students. I wish them all well and I look for good things for the next year,” said Dorkins, who will remain on the board. He was sworn in for another four-year term by 50th District Judge Preston Thomas.
Barr was sworn in by her two brothers, the Revs. Keith and Frederick Barr, and Turpin was sworn in by the Rev. Drew Marshall.
“I believe in miracles,” Barr said after she was sworn in. “My main focus is academics and the kids. When students win, we all win,” she said.
Turpin said she feels “honored and blessed” that people had the confidence to put her in a position in which she has the opportunity to make a difference in the school district.
“It is all about the students and the people who support them. It has to be a holistic approach. I think we will do better and we can do better,” if everyone in the district and the community is on board with that goal, she said.
Garrett said his immediate goals are to look at the organizational chart and the number of people at the top as the board determines how to eliminate the district’s deficit and plan a budget for the next school year.
He plans on setting up new committees and will include parents, administrators and other representatives of the community on them.
In an quiet coup, former president Damon Dorkins was ousted from the top position Monday night as Garrett and two newly elected board trustees Caroll Turpin and Mary Barr easily took over three of the four top board positions.
Turpin, a district activist, is now vice president and Barr, a teacher, is now treasurer.
The three were both elected by a 4-3 majority of the board, with Garrett, Turpin, Barr and Trustee Robert Bass voting in their favor, and Dorkins and trustees Karen Cain and Christopher Northcross voting against them. Bass and Garrett have voted together on most issues in recent months, as they split from Dorkins.
Northcross, the longest serving member, was elected new board secretary.
The board voted in the new officers with no discussion and in interviews and public comments afterward, they all kept their comments on a positive level.
“I’m elated,” said a beaming Garrett, who was treasurer before he took over as vice president a little over a year ago.
“We’ve done a lot of good things these two years. It’s time to drill down,” Garrett said. “We still have some challenges.
“Mr. Dorkins did a quality job for the times we were in. My hat goes off to every past president” because it is a difficult position to hold.
Dorkins, who also serves with Garrett in the Pontiac Police Department, said, “I encourage Mr. Garrett in his role. I’ll give any support he needs.
“There are no ill feelings. We are in this for the same reason — the students. I wish them all well and I look for good things for the next year,” said Dorkins, who will remain on the board. He was sworn in for another four-year term by 50th District Judge Preston Thomas.
Barr was sworn in by her two brothers, the Revs. Keith and Frederick Barr, and Turpin was sworn in by the Rev. Drew Marshall.
“I believe in miracles,” Barr said after she was sworn in. “My main focus is academics and the kids. When students win, we all win,” she said.
Turpin said she feels “honored and blessed” that people had the confidence to put her in a position in which she has the opportunity to make a difference in the school district.
“It is all about the students and the people who support them. It has to be a holistic approach. I think we will do better and we can do better,” if everyone in the district and the community is on board with that goal, she said.
Garrett said his immediate goals are to look at the organizational chart and the number of people at the top as the board determines how to eliminate the district’s deficit and plan a budget for the next school year.
He plans on setting up new committees and will include parents, administrators and other representatives of the community on them.
New Leaders Needed to Transform Schools
by Leslie Wilson
by Leslie Wilson
The Race to the Top funds have created energies of hope and planning in education. Although not every Race to the Top formula will be honored with the first go round of dollars, states and districts have bridged partisan and other divergent views to focus on strategies to transform schools. Each state’s legislation had to address specific reform areas. One of the most important is that of leadership.
I’ve written about leadership qualities needed to lead new century schools with the engagement of education technology. Many experts have discussed how the education industry has been late to adopt technologies for systems, operations and instruction unlike that of business. The same is true for leadership shift – the skills and knowledge base needed to authentically transform schools.
In Sunday’s (January 3rd, 2010) New York Times, issue, the ‘Education Life’ magazine had an article about making college relevant and the ’10 Master’s of the New Universe’. The piece outlined ten master’s degree focus areas for the new world in which we find ourselves. One of those is ‘education leadership’. Laura Pappano gives examples of new degree programs aimed at different skills needed for an education system being ‘turned on its head’. I was elated to learn about these!!
The new programs focus more on MBA and policy matters than traditional school administrator curricula. Last September, Harvard Graduate School of Education launched a tuition-free, three year doctoral program in ed leadership. Think about this: it was the firstnew degree in this education school in 74 years! The program puts third year students into a partner institution (similar to medical schools’ practice) as interns who earn $65K a year. One goal is to attract individuals interested in public policy, law and business schools who care about school reform.
Robert B. Schwartz, academic dean of the Harvard ed school said that, “If you are going to be an effective leader, particularly in urban districts, you will need different skills than ed schools have traditionally offered. You need to be leading large-scale change, overseeing operations. You need some political skills.”
Other important skills needed for the new era of school leaders include: public policy, budgeting, fund raising, strategic partnering, and leading powerful culture change. Stanford School of Education’s Policy, Organization and Leadership Studies Program added a nine month program focusing on policy and business content.
Maintaining a focus on the mission of education to serve students and communities is paramount. Fusing that mission with a working understanding of policy, change cultures and business savvy are the recipe ingredients required for true reform work. To accomplish this, leaders need to consistently communicate regarding all aspects of the reform process, the research garnered to support the efforts while addressing the unique needs of each person in the process. That puts a very complex process into simplistic terms. Hence the need for training.
Leadership for technology-rich 21st century schools demands a holistic, dynamic approach. In ‘Leadership and Laggards-A State by State Report Card on Education Innovation’ (Center for American Progress, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and Frederick M. Hess, Director of Education Policy Studies at the American Enterprise Institute, November 2009), the authors say, “In our view, educational innovation means discarding policies and practices that no longer serve students while creating opportunities for smart, entrepreneurial problem-solvers to help children learn.”
Carol Bartz, CEO of Yahoo!, wrote in the November 2009 ‘Economist’ that to be successful, leaders in today’s barrage of information technologies, need to know how to navigate turbulent waters to make decisions and provide “unequivocal” direction for their constituents. She notes that hidebound management is the antithesis of leadership for today’s world.
Contrast her perspective of the dynamic leadership needed with that of the traditional education model and bureaucracy. Their differences, Bartz says, produce different results. For today’s robust technology education system to produce the kinds of citizens required, leadership must reform to match expected outcomes.
Where leaders of yesterday were predominantly in ‘manager’ roles, this century’s must be dynamic purveyors of the landscape, quick sailors on the rapid seas of information able to adjust, adapt and lead in a changing environment. They must be cogent decision-makers unafraid of making hard decisions in order to do what’s needed for citizens, students and community.
Leslie Wilson is President of One-to-One Institute (OTO), a national not-for-profit serving schools, districts, states and countries in their implementation of 21st century teaching and learning. She is co-authoring the national research initiative, Project Red (www.projectred.org). Ms. Wilson’s consultancy, Wilson Public Sector Consulting, LLC, serves the education industry. She holds a BS Ed and completed Ed Leadership doctoral work from the University of Michigan, Sp Ed Administration endorsement from Eastern Michigan University and M. Ed in Instructional Technology from Wayne State University. lesliew@one-to-oneinstitute.org
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