Awards: Part 2

George Scott Reports Education Awards

Katy I.S.D. School Board Member of the Year:(Tom Law disqualified from consideration)

ACCEPTING: Robert Shaw

 This was the hardest decision of all.  The Katy I.S.D. Board is comprised of six elected people (seven technically) who bring a plethora of accumulated weaknesses to the table every time they meet.  How does one look at these folks and conclude: “this one is ‘everyman’?”

In the end, Robert Shaw’s brand of irrelevance was determined to be clearly superior to all of the others. He is genuinely worthy to represent a Board that has yet to find its intellectual light switch.

Katy I.S.D. Administrator of the Year

ACCEPTING: Dr. Elizabeth Clark - Chief Academic Officer, Curriculum and Instruction

Dr. Clark is a lovely person and a delight to visit on a personal level.  Even after three decades of perfecting the process of being an obnoxious jerk, I still have tinges of guilt mocking people that I genuinely like on a personal level.  However, duty calls.

Dr. Clark is in a profession where its leaders would not recognize a genuine process of accountability if it jumped up and shouted ‘boo’ right in their faces.

Curriculum officers live in an artificial world sort of like that depicted in the Jim Carrey movie “Truman.” Accountability to the modern curriculum executive in public education has degenerated into platitudes captured in a Power Point presentation.

The sad thing is that if Supt. Alton Frailey were not a typical superintendent, he would let Elizabeth conduct a video recorded interview with me.  The results of that interview would do more to explain to parents the dilemma confronting public education than anything the Texas Education Agency or Katy I.S.D. has ever produced.  Together, we could walk parents through a linear trail of issues, options, potential solutions and pitfalls.  She and I have had enormously constructive and interesting private conversations for years.  Never once have those private conversations degenerated into anything other than a respectful exchange.  We don’t agree on much; we agree on much. I wish that superintendents such as Frailey would allow the green curtain to drop ever so briefly.

However, with a superintendent who controls a flawed message and a school board that does not know enough to know what it does not know, such a constructive discussion of issues awaits.

We give Dr. Clark this award as a representative of an entire industry of curriculum strategists.

KMAC. Professional Learning Community.  Differentiated Instruction.  Team Teaching. You name it.  If the Pied Piper ever thought about it, Katy I.S.D. and Dr. Clark have done or are doing it.

What do they all have in common?  They are strategies or programs designed to improve student academic performance by making the delivery of curriculum more effective.

Yet Katy I.S.D. has no process in place that evaluates the success of these expensive and time-consuming initiatives in the context of improved student academic performance.

There are two categories of energy: potential and kinetic.  In the world of public education curriculum and management, administrators such as Dr. Clark have never met a ‘potential’ they would not put in motion – and the results or lack thereof be damned.

Katy I.S.D. Business Organization of the Year

ACCEPTING: Katy Area Economic Development Council

This group endorsed a Katy I.S.D. bond issue before there was a bond issue.  Such picky-picky technicalities should never intrude into an organization’s dedication to ‘shilling’ for its landlord.

To give context to this award, let’s turn to the dictionary:

Pathetic: So inadequate as to be laughable or contemptible. 

Disgraceful: So bad or unacceptable that it is something to be ashamed of.

Katy I.S.D. Watchpuppy Group of the Year

ACCEPTING: Katy Watchdogs

Tom Law.  What else is there to say?