Don't 'Mess With' District 125's Success

After attending the Forum at Stevenson High School on Tuesday and listening to all the candidates for District 125 speak and respond to questions, I will be voting for all of the candidates in the United 4 Stevenson slate – Moons, Lubin, Roberts and Weisberg.

While I was initially impressed with each of the candidates and their desire to serve on the Stevenson school board, as time went on, I was left with few answers about the issues of the three challengers and even less information on what they proposed to do about them. Powell, Brady and Cardella asserted that the incumbents have not been financially responsible and promised, if elected, to bring our taxes down and cut spending in “non-critical” areas. But not one of them provided a single example of what they considered “non-critical” or how they would reduce spending while also promising to “improve academic ranking”.

Sunday’s (3/13/11) Daily Herald’s front page article on School District Finances listed Stevenson as one of the “fortunate few” to stay in the black despite a weak economy and unreliable state funding. So on the issue of Finances, the incumbents have clearly managed our tax dollars well and I trust in their ability, and Weisberg’s commitment, to continue to be financially prudent while maintaining SHS’s academic excellence.

The challengers also asserted that SHS’s academic excellence and rankings were declining, citing SHS’s failure to garner a Blue Ribbon Award. Either they don’t understand the flawed requirements in No Child Left Behind that have made attaining a Blue Ribbon Award next to impossible or they simply like the sound bite. Again, we heard no specifics on what they believe is causing any decline or how they propose to fix it.   

Year after year, Stevenson has seen improvement in student SAT scores and the number of students successfully completing AP courses and exams continue to rise, so again, clearly the incumbents and administration is doing something right and I trust in their knowledge and experience  to maintain and continue to improve the academic standards at Stevenson.                

The third topic repeatedly raised by the three challengers was Parental Involvement, advocating parental input in selecting curriculum and book choices. I believe a school’s function is to teach my children how to think, not what to think; to expand their horizons and open their minds to new thoughts and ideas outside the realm of their experience and even their comfort zone. Curriculum should be set by teachers and administrations, with knowledge of the state and national standards and the skill sets our students will need beyond Stevenson. Parental Involvement, to me, invites limitations and censorship of material some people may find objectionable. There are already choices for students and parents who object to or may be uncomfortable with specific reading material, so I am left to wonder: what are the real issues in promoting parental involvement in curriculum?

SHS is currently financially stable and academically excellent. It is visited regularly by teachers and administrators from around the country hoping to take home some of its successful practices.

Why, oh why, would we want to mess with that success? Please join me in voting for United 4 Stevenson’s Moon, Lubin, Roberts and Weisberg.

Sincerely,

Camy Gould

Long Grove