| Opinion
Can Jenney's charm flim flap new
board? The little guy with the phony instant-on, instant-off,
made-for-TV smile and cold beady eyes may have his work cut out
for him as a new school board with less gullible members take policy
control this month. Already, like a good politician,
School Supt. Timothy R. Jenney, is scurrying around among personnel he
previously had no use for to see if they can now help him pave a way to
control what could be very demanding new members more interested in
improving the lot of the students and the instructional program instead of
his ever expanding administrative bureaucracy and empire building. He's
going around playing his Mr. Nice Guy, hat-in-hand, routine to lower
level administrators and blacks to see who knows who among the new
members. He is particularly concerned about former principle Emma 'Em'
Davis; educator, Dr. Lois Williams; and mother of multiple students, Carol
Weems. His modus operandi is to endear himself to board
members, psychologically test their strengths and weakness, capitalize on
them, and use educational voodoo jargon to make them look stupid if they
don't endorse everything he wants. Fortunately some of the
newcomers on the board promise not to be swayed. They promise to
make him justify, justify, justify and explain, explain, explain -
something the 'Terrible Little Dwarf (TLD),' as he's known to many of the
teachers, psychologically has difficulty handling. The
outgoing board, known for its rubber-stamp form of policy making, in one
of its last acts behind closed doors gave Jenney a thumbs-up, glowing
evaluation. This is the same board that allowed him to pursue a MBA
at Duke to the taxpayers' tune of more than $70,000 a year instead of
forcing him to accept a less expensive local school. The
old board took the action after Jenney made a case that he didn't have
enough education to do his job properly - leaving taxpayers' asking:
"Then why was he hired in the first place, if he wasn't
qualified?" The old board never replied (maybe why some were
obviously replaced). Maybe the new board will at least get
answers. And his MBA at taxpayers' expense is only greasing the skids that
may send him packing to new digs unless he changes his modus operandi -
and soon. See also:
Jenney
fetes outgoing school board with lavish dinner at taxpayer expense Jenney has record of
lavish spending @ taxpayers' expense - letters |