We Can Do Better

It felt like sitting down to a great meal and finding someone's tooth in it, or like getting to know someone then hearing him or her make some racist remark. 

I was pleased with the election results. We needed a more progressive governor; and when I talked with Michelle Lujan Grisham I liked her immediately. 

Thursday I read that Stan Rounds was under consideration for Secretary of Education. That sparked memories of spending many hours looking into many complaints about Rounds, the superintendent of schools here until mid-2016. 

There are complaints about most anyone with any power, anywhere.

But most of what I'd heard about Rounds checked out. He was a “my way or the highway” type; and his way appeared to involve appointing or retaining too many employees for the wrong reasons. One apparent example was MacArthur Elementary while his fiancée was employed there.

He also seemed to bristle at the very idea a newspaper columnist might be investigating him. Teachers and administrators were fearful of talking with me – sounding like workers at private companies I investigated as a lawyer, and like Doña Ana County sheriff's deputies more recently. The fear level shouldn't be so high in a school system.

Rounds has his fans. Folks seem to either love him or hate him. Some think he'd be a great choice for secretary of education. Others say he'd be the worst choice ever. 

I can only say that for a lot of the people involved in education in Las Cruces, there'd be a huge whoosh as the air went out of their enthusiasm for the new state administration.

I called school board member Maria Flores to ask how likely a Rounds appointment was. She didn't know. I asked for her thoughts on the position. “I'm looking for a visionary. Someone who would take us into a new model with a more progressive and more inclusive view. Education is not a business. It's not about making money. It's about teaching students and showing them how to be successful in the world. I don't think that is his vision.” Ms. Flores also taught for a couple of years during Rounds's tenure.

Flores makes a good point. Personal failings aside, no one could accuse Rounds of being a visionary. He's an administrator. An accountant. Even if all the complaints I heard about him were bogus, he just isn't what we need in this position now.

I don't know who else is under consideration. I'd want someone who was experienced as a teacher, had some overall vision for education here, had a demonstrated record of leading others and listening to them, tended to maintain control without unnecessarily hurting morale, and was responsible as to budget. Most of those are not Mr. Rounds's strong points.

I also looked back at my own columns [see links below]. Those confirmed that many sources gave consistent accounts of Rounds's alleged favoritism and bullying. As I wrote then, “I've also heard the fear in people's voices, a fear that has no place in a well-run organization. One person, declining to comment, said that the walls had ears, adding that someone could be listening outside the door. 'I can't afford to lose my job for answering your question.'”

Would Rounds's management style torpedo morale in the PED – as it reportedly did here? I don't see a pressing need to take that risk.

                                                   -30-

[The above column appeared in the Las Cruces Sun-News this morning, Sunday, 16 December 2018.  It also appears on the newspaper's website and on KRWG's website, and a spoken version will air during the week on both KRWG and KTAL, 101.5 FM (www.lccommunityradio.org) ]

[Hate to rehash old problems; but these were recent (less than three years back), were obviously relevant, and reflected his character and a management pattern and practice -- not an atypical moment of inattention or an accident.  (And I held back on one point, one that particularly appalled me personally, because the source, whom I know and trust, would be immediately apparent if I wrote what he told me.)  Searching Stan Rounds takes you to this set of earlier columns mentioning Rounds, including:

Dodgeball Anyone? [26 January 2014] concerned morale problems at Desert Hills Elementary;
Teachers Allege Favoritism and Bad Management [7June2015];
Are Bullying and Favoritism Undermining Las Cruces Public Schools [12June 2015].

The "Bullying and Favoritism" post starts:
 

There's apparently a bullying problem within the Las Cruces Public School District: many employees say Superintendent Stan Rounds shows extreme favoritism toward folks he likes but has many others “very scared.”
This column is based on extensive conversations with people who will go mostly unnamed because they fear retribution from Rounds. I've found many folks convincing. I've noticed consistency among accounts from different people in different schools and in different positions. 
I've also heard the fear in people's voices, a fear that has no place in a well-run organization. One person, declining to comment, said that the walls had ears, adding that someone could be listening outside the door. “I can't afford to lose my job for answering your question.” 
Many allege that Rounds's favoritism torpedoes morale. They complain of his favoritism toward his fiancée Kathy Adams and her family. 

Several teachers and administrators complained about kids seeing the Superintendent and his fiancee in "public displays of affection," but I doubt that did any harm to the kids.  Probably humanized the guy.  If I recall my boyhood, it would have been quite amusing, and we'd have all crowded to the window to look, but no harm done.

Rounds also appears in an August 2014 column , the second of two columns concerning the poor treatment of a beloved and apparently quite competent teacher falsely accused of "inappropriate touching" of a fourth-grade girl. The first column -- A Sad Story - Part I -- doesn't mention Mr. Rounds by name.  Those two columns tell a sad story about a tough problem.  The charges were apparently concocted by the child because she was in trouble over something and wanted to distract school authorities; ultimately the charges against the teacher were all dismissed; and I'd sure not have written about the fellow's innocence of the charges unless I'd become damned sure, from all the evidence, that he hadn't done any such thing.

In the school's defense, that's a tough problem to handle, and a sensitive one; there's a duty to protect kids; but at the same time a close examination of the school's internal handling of the situation seemed to show that the school had leapt to the wrong conclusion and mishandled confidential hearings.  A fairer hearing could have and perhaps should have uncovered the same evidence that led the D.A.'s office to dismiss molestation charges.  I can only hope the school system learned something from that episode.  

The months following a January headline "Las Cruces Schoolteacher Arrested, Charged with Molesting Students" (with the usual unappealing mug shot) were hellish for the teacher and his family.  However, this story is only marginally relevant to Mr. Rounds.  In my view, he didn't conduct school business properly, but in a tough situation; and KVIA's sensationalist handling of the thing border on viciousness.]

Bottom line: Rounds brings some serious baggage to a candidacy for an important state position in education.  Choosing him would be a hint of "business as usual" and would appall a lot of the folks who dealt with him in Las Cruces.]

Are Bullying and Favoritism Undermining Las Cruces Public Schools?

There's apparently a bullying problem within the Las Cruces Public School District: many employees say Superintendent Stan Rounds shows extreme favoritism toward folks he likes but has many others “very scared.”

This column is based on extensive conversations with people who will go mostly unnamed because they fear retribution from Rounds. I've found many folks convincing. I've noticed consistency among accounts from different people in different schools and in different positions. 
 
I've also heard the fear in people's voices, a fear that has no place in a well-run organization. One person, declining to comment, said that the walls had ears, adding that someone could be listening outside the door. “I can't afford to lose my job for answering your question.” 
 
Many allege that Rounds's favoritism torpedoes morale. They complain of his favoritism toward his fiancée Kathy Adams and her family. 
 
The JUMP (Joint Ungraded Multi-age Program) story is a beautiful one that turns sad. Teachers from JUMP (and LEAP) speak with true excitement about the teaching they did. The idea was to work with kids who might otherwise be held back because they couldn't read, using a creative combination of new technology and ideas as old as the one-room schoolhouse to improve kids' academic performance.

It seems to have worked. Teachers describe a very non-traditional classroom where a second-grader would be helping a kindergarten kid make her letters and another student would be reading to a row of stuffed toys along the wall. “They thought they were playing. They didn't even know they were learning.”

But they did learn. Not by rote, either, but by good old-fashioned creative teaching. My understanding is that by year's end these kids – from the most difficult socio-economic backgrounds and with the poorest histories of reading and study – had gone from “They'll have to be left back” to above-average among their peers.

But Mr. Rounds's personal motives got in the way. He made Ms. Adams the instruction specialist, although she was not particularly qualified. There was an interviewing process in name only.
Barbara Hammond, an experienced teacher who interviewed for the position, says there were applicants far more qualified than she or Ms. Adams; but she says it was clear that the administration had someone in mind. Ms. Adams, whom she likes, even tried to warn her, urging her (before the selection was made) not to be disappointed. An early teacher in the JUMP Program stated that Ms. Adams was by far the least qualified candidate for the position.

Once installed as instruction specialist, and later principal (though she'd never been an assistant principal, so far as I know), Ms. Adams pressed her ideas on the teachers and invoked Mr. Rounds's name to up the pressure when she didn't get what she wanted. According to some teachers, she forced the group to use methods that didn't fit what they were trying to accomplish. Teachers who'd gone to work joyfully began having a very different experience. 
 
I'm told that most or all of the teachers in JUMP (and LEAP) filed extensive grievances this past year about Adams; but since the grievances go only to her supervisor, Mr. Rounds, getting a fair hearing has been difficult. 
 
There have also been extensive complaints about JUMP (and LEAP) getting goodies other schools and departments don't procure so easily.

Regardless of whether there's serious bullying and favoritism, I'm wondering about the ethics of Rounds making decisions to spend significant chunks of public money on his girlfriend. How can he be expected to make those decisions in an unbiased way, purely in the school district's interest, as the law requires? We all know love makes things awfully complicated.
                                                         -30-

[The column above appeared in the Las Cruces Sun-News this morning, Sunday, 14 June and will appear later today on KRWG-TV's website.  It's the second of two related columns.  The first  primarily discussed MacArthur Elementary.  The comments people posted in response to that first one were interesting.  A couple of additional individuals with experience at MacArthur echoed what I'd been told; and one (who apparently joined the "blogging community" this month just to comment negatively on my post) defended principal Ragan.  Privately, someone I know who left before Ms. Ragan's tenure took issue with my favorable reference to her predecessor Mr. Stuart, and said he too was a bully.]
[Meanwhile, several people have asked me why Mr. Rounds is not on administrative leave pending the reported investigation of LEAP.  He told me he hadn't been told what it's about.  That suggests that the board may not trust him and that he may be a target of the investigation.  That does lead one to wonder why he should not only be still in the office but reportedly scheduling interviews for the outside investigators.  But since the Board also doesn't tell me what's going on either, I can't begin to answer anyone's questions concerning Mr. Rounds.]

[These sorts of columns are draining to write, and this one was all the more so because I was revising it well into the week -- while recovering from a full hip replacement operation I had Tuesday morning.  (btw, if you may need such an operation, let me note that after having had two hips replaced within the past 12 months, plus a little investigation, I could not recommend Dr. Brandon Broome in El Paso more highly.  He seems excellent; I recovered quickly and fully from the first operation, and this one seems to have gone well too; other people I know have also had good experience with him.  He's in El Paso.  Charles Brandon Broome.)  

It's draining to deal with people who are scared and stressed.  It's draining to deal with people who put their hearts and souls into something -- whether it's being a sheriff's deputy or teaching kids -- and are getting unnecessarily abused in a work-place where it's clear that speaking out could be a career-ending move.] 

[I've worked in a variety of situations, and have never understood the mentality that demands maximum personal credit for everything good, while rinsing oneself clean of blame as frenetically as Lady MacBeth.  I always felt that folks who spread the credit around fairly were more appealing and ultimately more effective.   I tried to do that when I supervised people.  And I worked more comfortably for people who supervised me that way.

Here, from the NBA because it's on my mind, is a great example.  Game four of the championship finals.  Golden State Warriors, favored, fall behind two games to one in the best-of-seven series, knowing no team has ever come back from a 3-1 deficit in the finals.  The Cleveland Cavaliers, led by Lebron James, are winning, partly by slowing the game down and partly because Lebron is unstoppable.  

Suddenly in Game 4 the Warriors change their starting line-up, starting aging former all-star Andre Iguodala in place of seven-foot center Andrew Bogut, playing 6 foot 7 forward Draymond Green as center, and putting Iguodala on James most of the time on defense.  They "went small" to speed up the game, risking loss of a bunch of rebounds to the taller Cavs.  At least for the moment, it worked.

Head Coach Steve Kerr readily admits that the suggestion came not from him or his top coaches, and not from a star player, but from the low man on the coaching totem pole, a 28-year-old  video assistant.  But Kerr accepted it and gave the kid full credit.  As one commentator put it, "It's rare to see such an open and supportive environment in the NBA, as head coaches are often afraid to be overshadowed by their assistants. In Oakland it seems no one is afraid to speak their minds."

I thought of the Las Cruces Public Schools, where several knowledgeable people have told me that Stan Rounds will often pick a relatively unqualified candidate for principal over a better-qualified candidate who won't ask inconvenient questions.  (There's some anecdotal support for that view, but it would be hard to prove how accurate it is, particularly since personnel records are rightly confidential.)] 

[Ugly things continue to happen at the Las Cruces public schools.]

Teachers Allege Favoritism and Bad Management

            Is MacArthur Elementary a case study in how a superintendent's favoritism can harm a school? Several present and former teachers and staff say it is.   

            Soon after Kathy Adams, Superintendent Stan Rounds's fiancée, was hired at MacArthur, Terry Stuart, MacArthur's very capable principal, moved to Central Office, and  inexperienced Karla Ragan (then Ruiz) replaced him.  

            Ragan had briefly been an assistant principal.  Often it takes an assistant 2-3 years to become Principal.  Rounds says there's no set requirement.

            Once Adams started there, Rounds frequently visited MacArthur.  (“Day and night,” said one person.  Another added, “Mr. Rounds said, 'I love this school.  It's my favorite school.' Then the day she left, no more.”)

            District employees spoke similarly of Rounds's presence at the LEAP Program when Ms. Adams ran that.  “He was there pretty much every day, unless he was traveling on business,” said one source.  Staff and students even complained about public displays of affection, including hugging and kissing. 

            Rounds notes that he helped in designing the program, and that “my frequenting the school may have been more likely because of the design elements.”  He declined to comment on student complaints, but said “It could be that I might have held her hand on occasion as we walked from place to place, but I don't think that's inappropriate.

            Rounds confirmed reports of an investigation of LEAP, but said the Board hadn't advised him of the precise subject.

            Of MacArthur, I heard two very different portraits.

            Numerous sources say Ragan bullied and harassed experienced staff into leaving and that complaints or grievances were “swept under the rug” by Rounds.  Another said a grievance against Ragan would be “professional suicide.  Even if you won, you lost.”  

            The school experienced high turnover.  “The year I left, thirteen of us left.  It was scary being there.  I knew I could lose my job for nothing,” said one teacher.  During Stuart's ten years, few teachers left except to retire.  “We were a family,” one said.  Another said stability is particularly important to a school in a lower socio-economic area.  A third said the school “just fell apart.”

            However, Rounds says that under several objective measures, notably student academic performance, MacArthur has improved significantly under Ms. Ragan's leadership.

            Was the principal jettisoning teachers whose experience made her nervous -- or spotting serious flaws other principals had missed?   She viewed some people who had lengthy and good records, including national board certification, as very bad teachers.  When one teacher remarked that she'd never been evaluated so low, Ragan reportedly said Stuart hadn't known what he was doing.

            There's certainly discontent at MacArthur.   Teachers allege extreme favoritism and “just plain meanness.”  They say that Ragan, perhaps because of her inexperience, felt intimidated by more experienced teachers; and several said, in various ways, that she lets her favorites get by with things but lowers the boom on folks she doesn't care for.   A grievance letter from former teacher Maribel Villalobos accuses Ms. Ragan of “threatening and/or bullying tactics” and of insulting and biased conduct.  Others say Ragan made insulting remarks or demeaned them. 

            Villalobos (who'd taught for thirty years “with never even a 'needs to improve'”) was suddenly placed on a Growth Plan in May 2013.  (“Usually improvement plans come in the fall, when there's time to help someone improve,” one teacher said.)     

            Others dared not speak up publicly about alleged mistreatment.    Others left because they felt that working under Ragan was unpleasant.  Several said she'd let her favorites get away with anything, and lower the boom on non-favorites for trivial offenses or asking inconvenient questions.

            Based on what I'm hearing, I'd urge someone to take a closer look at MacArthur. 

                                                            -30-

[The column above appeared in the Las Cruces Sun-News this morning, Sunday, 7 June, and will appear later today on KRWG's website.]

On Tuesday's School Board Election

There's a school-board election set for Tuesday, February 3^rd.

Is anybody still reading?
 
I hope so. Whom we choose is important – even if we don't have kid or grandkids in the Las Cruces Public School System. Not only do these folks decide how to spend a bunch of public money, they help determine the educational climate here, which has a bearing on business and quality of life for everyone.

I won't tell you how I'm voting. (My blog post today will explain that, and give reasons.) I can tell you that National Education Association, which doesn't precisely make endorsements, “recommends” Maury Castro in District 4 and Ed Frank in District 5 as the strongest candidates.

I do want to discuss some issues, and some thoughts on how to decide whom to vote for.
Bonnie Votaw, whose retirement from the Board creates a District 4 race without an incumbent, publicized an interesting set of questions for candidates recently – and I'd endorse her questions and add an important one she omitted. (I'll reprint all her questions on today's blog post.)

My additional question is how the board member will approach the relationship between the Board and its hired Superintendent, Stan Rounds. 
 
In all situations with a board and a CEO or manager, public or private, the relationship between the two is an important and often difficult issue. Here, the Superintendent must give fair consideration to the Board's wishes, but the Board should not unduly interfere in day-to-day business. Transparency – Superintend to Board and, except in personnel issues, Board to public – is important. So is the Board's continued alertness to whether the Superintendent is acting properly. Too often a superintendent, who knows day-to-day operations best, can intimidate a Board.

I don't claim sufficient knowledge to say how this Board should regard this Superintendent; but I do think the issue is one of major concern. The recent snow snafu (in which Rounds was criticized, whether deservedly or not, then responded by claiming consultations with other agencies which the other agencies appeared to deny) is but the most recent of several actual or perceived issues deserving a frank discussion. 
 
I hope the Board monitors Rounds closely. I don't presume to say what the results would or should be.

Votaw's initial questions focus on a candidates position on the current policy on state-mandated standardized testing questions, as well as the use of student test-scores as a major element in teacher evaluations. 
 
I think this area is a key issue. The very idea of “teaching to the test” isn't ideal pedagogy. A key factor in successful instruction is the teacher-student rapport, which “teaching to the test” undermines. Standardized tests also: (a) tend to disadvantage students from unusual backgrounds; (b) cause significant and counter-productive stress on teachers and students; and (c) fail to maximize a teacher's chance to really make a difference with students by responding to the specific needs and interests of a class or student. 
 

Votaw also noted that “several of the candidates are affiliated with different political organizations” and would ask, in essence, how those affiliations would affect a candidate's judgment as a board member and commitment to the best interest of the kids. I can only applaud that question. 

Discussions in classrooms or the Boardroom should feature open discussions, a courteous but candid clash of ideas and facts – not a rigid and redundant reiteration of different ideologies.

I guess I'd add this question too: “What's the best evidence that you'll make decisions based on fair and thorough examinations of facts, not on your general political viewpoint?” 

 

Please do vote; and perhaps investigate a little first.

                                                                   -30- 

[The column above appeared this morning, Sunday, 1 February in the Las Cruces Sun-News.  I also wrote a blog post this week, which specifically discusses some reasons I wouldn't vote for Troy Tudor.    You can reach that one by paging down past the next few paragraphs or by clicking here.  ]

[For the record: I would vote with great enthusiasm for Maury Castro in District 4.  He's a modest, thoughtful, capable man.  To the extent I've observed him, he's shown good judgment,.  He has  extensive relevant experience.  I also learned this week that he worked in the mines for 14 years, going to school at night, earning his GED, then bachelor's, and then master's degrees in educational psychology.  I never worked underground in the mines, but I'm pretty sure that doing that every day and then going to school afterward takes an unusual combination of intelligence, diligence, and dedication.  He's a guy who's experienced "real life" but appreciates education profoundly and has both academic knowledge and a quarter-century of relevant experience.  You ask him a question about the local schools and he gives you an intelligent and thoughtful answer.

You listen to Troy Tudor, you hear a generalized answer or a quick retreat to his political ideology.  He sounds more concerned about business than children.  In fact his position as Chamber of Commerce VP creates a major conflict-of-interest. His alleged conduct in the lawsuit mentioned in the earlier post could raise questions about his respect for law, for his neighbors, and for his own word.  He doesn't appear promising material for a constructive and thoughtful school-board member.  Maury does.

There are two other candidates in that race.  Paul Blevins, whose been involved in the school advisory committees where his kids were in school here, clearly knows the local schools and is dedicated to them; but judging from his answers to KRWG's questions, he sounds a little too comfortable with the predominance of standardized tests, and with how things are currently going.  I'd vote for him ahead of Tudor; he seems like an awfully nice guy; but I don't see him helping to bring change and significant improvement. Paul Garcia also sounds well-meaning and somewhat knowledgeable; as with Blevins, I'd vote for him over Tudor; but Maury Castro seems the best of the four.]

[In District 5, I will vote for Ed Frank.  
I don't oppose Connie Phillips as I oppose Troy Tudor.  She's served on the School Board for some time.  I'd vote for her against a lot of possible challengers. She's dedicated and well-meaning.

I think Frank, a 39-year teacher, will bring to the Board a teacher's knowledge of schools and students.  He is also dead set against the horrible over-use of standardized testing in our schools today, and I have confidence that he'd do what he could, within the law, to bring change.  

Two of the system's big problems are (1) over-use of counter-productive standard tests, combined with the inappropriate use of those to evaluate teachers, and (2) a need to adjust the relationship between the Board and the Superintendent.  (I understand that the former problem involves a state mandate.)  Without singling out Dr. Phillips for blame, both problems have gotten worse during the past few years, as far as I can tell.  Dr. Phillips seems a good person, but as one observer put it to me, "She's too passive."   Adding Mr. Frank to the Board would add a member who seems more likely to bring effective change where it's needed.]
    .


 

Dodgeball, Anyone ?

Our radio discussions frequently return to a critical problem with education: parents need to care, parents need to participate.

But what happens when they do? 
 
Some years ago, concerned parents resuscitated the parents' group at Desert Hills Elementary School. They organized and ran several large-scale fund-raising events. They were deeply involved in what went on at the school. 
 
The group reportedly did a lot of good. Members raised funds and helped teachers, students, and staff. “It was becoming a family,” said Gena Castillo, who headed up the group.

Then Desert Hills got a new principal, Liz Gonzales, whose people skills allegedly weren't strong. One teacher recently told me that but for the parents' group, she'd have transferred.
Turnover rose dramatically: formerly, one or two of 74 teachers/staff left each year. One teacher was told when she arrived, “You're awfully lucky. People never leave Desert Hills.” Now turnover is more like 18 of 74 – with a few departees reportedly stating they'd have stayed but for Ms. Gonzales.

The school's warmth and unity have reportedly disappeared. 
 
Ms. Gonzales's management style is an issue. During the spring and summer, parents tried repeatedly to get a meaningful response from the school administration. They met with two people from H.R., then Steve Sanchez, and ultimately Superintendent Stan Rounds. They say they got no satisfaction at any level. Almost everyone promised to get back to them. No one really did.

Then on August 5, Ms. Gonzales sent out an email announcing that the Parents' Group was being disbanded, but would be “folded in” to a new School Advisory Committee (“SAC”). She created the SAC without following District rules and regulations. (She reportedly said the School Board or Superintendent Stan Rounds had authorized an exception.)

Regulations state that within the LCPS District, to start an SAC the principal should solicit candidates, announce an election, and hold the election by the end of the academic year. Ms. Gonzales should have started by Spring 2013, to create a democratically-elected SAC for the 2013-2014 academic year. Instead, she created her own.

The SAC is meant to provide outside advice to the principal. By appointing her own rather than having parents vote, Ms. Gonzales undermined the chance for such independent advice. 
 
SAC's are meant to encourage parental involvement in policy matters. The existing group was highly involved, and knowledgeable. The principal placed none of its members on her new hand-picked SAC. 
 
Ms. Gonzalez also allegedly retaliated or tried to retaliate against parents and faculty who spoke up about her. At one point she reportedly demanded a list, with contact information, of all parents who'd attended a certain meeting of just parents. She told teachers not to talk with parents about internal matters at the school. She told a teacher who'd openly criticized her that the teacher would get a “marginally effective” rating under Professionalism on her evaluation, but backed down when the teacher pointed out how that would look. She allegedly offered to raise another teacher's evaluation if the teacher would contradict others' accounts of the problems at the school.

Morale at the school is said to be lower than ever. Superintendent Stan Rounds spoke to the teachers at a special meeting in mid-December, and said his assistant Liz Marrufa would be there to help fix the problems; but one teacher said Ms. Marrufa has been to the school only once since that meeting.

I've never been inside the school. I have no idea who's right. 
 
But whoever's right (or if each side's testimony contains some truth), a serious issue is the apparent failure of the school administration to address these problems candidly and productively. “We just want to be heard,” one parent told me.

Beneath the surface lie other issues, some very serious, that I'm not yet in a position to discuss in a meaningful way. (I invite teachers or parents with useful information to contact me.) 
 
And I'm hoping to discuss with Mr. Rounds some of what he said to the Desert Hills teachers on December 12^th, and what follow-through has occurred.

Two things happened as I was writing this column: a parent spoke about this issue to Tuesday's regular school board meeting; and Ms. Gonzales provided a great example of just what parents had complained of in the way of non-responsiveness.

I called. She called back. She very politely said nothing substantive. She asked that I call back at a certain time the next morning. I did. Didn't get her. I called twice more. No call back. That evening I got a call from Eric Montgomery, a parent new to Desert Hills. He's on the new SAC. He knew nothing about the issues I'd been interested in, but said that the SAC was accomplishing good things and always seeks additional parental involvement.

However, he hadn't even heard of the December 12^th meeting or the serious problems discussed there by Rounds, which suggested the school hadn't disclosed to the SAC things the old parents' group had known.

Dodgeball, anyone?
                                                             -30-
[This Sunday column appeared in the Las Cruces Sun-News on 26 January, 2014.]
[Writing this column, I'd have preferred to hear from Ms. Gonzales her views on these issues.  Even when I spoke with Mr. Montgomery, who seemed like a concerned, candid, and well-intentioned parent, I urged him to point out to Ms. Gonzales that I was interested in presenting a balanced column; but she never chose to present her side, or even call back to explain that for some reason she shouldn't or that I should talk to someone else or whatever.  Frankly, she started sounding a whole lot like the non-responsiveness that  others had described to me.]
[I do know that one issue that helped create or deepen the rift at Desert Hills was the handling of the suspension of a fourth-grade teacher accused of sexual misconduct.  He was reportedly very popular with his students.  While it's not clear that anyone questions his suspension, the students (who saw him there one day and gone the next, with no explanation whatsoever, not even that there were legal issues administrators weren't allowed to explain yet) were understandably unsettled.  (So were some teachers.)  According to one source, Principal Gonzales was surprised to hear that the teacher's disappearance troubled the students.  If true, that would seem a symptom of being insensitive or out of touch with her students.]
[In any case, there's reason to suspect that there are several interesting stories here that demand to be looked into.  I'm particularly interested in the specific causes (and results, if any) of the December 12th meeting Superintendent Rounds had with teachers at Desert Hills.]

Will the Field of Dreams Become a Field of Nightmares?

NMSU and the Las Cruces School Board are each considering making the same costly mistake: replacing grass with artificial turf in the Chihuahuan Desert.

One expert termed NMSU’s plan “absolutely ridiculous.”  The likely rationalization is that the Sunbelt Conference requires it.

The School Board was to meet Friday to discuss the same idea.

Although debates continue over safety, third-generation artificial turf solves some of the problems posed by the earlier versions; and proponents claim the artificial turf would save water.

But the overwhelming weight of evidence says artificial turf on the Field of Dreams would be very expensive, pose serious health and injury risks, and might not even save water.  Any water savings would be offset by environmental problems.

It would cost around $1 million to install artificial turf, which would have a ten-year life-expectancy.  Some money would come from the state; and proponents say the school district could make up the difference with rental fees.  I have my doubts that in a community this size rental fees would suffice.   Further, after ten years the school would need to put in new artificial turf.  Once a community replaces grass with plastic (killing living organisms in the subsoil), a natural field can’t be grown on the site without years of soil remediation or complete subsoil replacement.

Proponents may not realize the maintenance costs.  Despite the marketing ploys of artificial turf manufacturers, synthetic fields require additional infill, chemical disinfectants, and drainage repair and maintenance.  A recent Michigan State University study put typical annual maintenance costs for artificial turf fields from $13,720 to $39,220, with costs for natural fields ranging from $8,133 to $48,960.  A University of Missouri turf specialist concluded that over 16 years it would cost $33,522 to maintain a natural soil-based field, $49,318 for a sand-cap grass field, $65,846 for a basic synthetic field, and $109,013 for a premium synthetic field.

Even the purported water savings could be illusory, particularly in our climate.  Surface temperatures of artificial turf go way up on hot days – as high as 200 degrees Fahrenheit on one 98 degree day.  A study at Brigham Young found the temperature of its synthetic turf practice field 37 degrees higher than air temperature.  Proponents argue that games can be played at cooler times – but in early autumn in Las Cruces, that’s tough.  Cooling off the field takes a significant amount of water.

Even more serious are health and injury risks.  “Turf toe” and “turf burns are familiar terms to professional football fans.

Studies, including the NFL’s, show that while the numbers of injuries are similar with both surfaces, artificial turf leads to more serious injuries and longer recovery periods.  The NFL’s Injury and Safety Panel concluded that certain serious knee and ankle injuries occur significantly more often in games played on artificial turf.

Too, at least one study showed that artificial turf increased MRSA risk.  Turf burns often lead to antibiotic-resistant skin infections.  (MRSA stands for methicillin-resistant staphylococcus areus.) A study of the St. Louis Rams found eight players with MRSA, all resulting from turf burn.   Three studies among Texas high school football players, conducted by the Texas Department of Health Services, also found a conneciton between artificial turf and these infections, although the studies were too small to establish a statistical link.  NFL medical liaison Elliot Pellman said, “The turf burns themselves are just the kind of minor skin injury that MRSA can exploit.”

Bernd Leinauer, a turf expert at NMSU, pointed out that artificial turf retains bodily fluids because there are no microbial communities to take care of viruses, and fields must be sanitized frequently for health reasons.  In addition, black carbon nano particles can occur in crumb rubber infill material – and some cancer experts consider these particles as dangerous as asbestos.  Tires contain benzene, formaldehyde, and other harmful substances.  Heat and use break them down into a fine dust players inhale. Each field contains tens of thousands of ground-up tires.

Leinauer also said that where water use, maintenance, and cost were key issues, natural turf should be used – in our locale, Bermudagrass.

There are reasons professional leagues have moved away from artificial turf.

In major league baseball, nearly 40% of teams once had artificial turf.  It started in 1966 with Houston’s Astrodome.  By 1970, six of 24 stadiums, including San Francisco’s Candlestick Park, had the stuff.  During the 1970's teams were ripping out natural grass to install artificial turf.   In 1982, with the installation of artificial turf in Minnesota’s new Metrodome, 10 of the 26 teams had the stuff.  Then teams started removing it.  Only Toronto and Tampa Bay still play on artificial turf.

In U.S. professional football, artificial turf remains more common, despite players’ complaints, but in the football we call soccer, artificial turf was outlawed, although there’s some talk of looking into the latest artificial-turf developments.

I hope that before this column appears the School Board will have voted down artificial turf or tabled it for careful study.

These are KIDS we’re talking about.  They have decades of life ahead of them.  Injuries are part of sports; but why increase the likelihood kids will suffer serious injury playing high school football?  Why expose them to unnecessary health risks, just because artificial turf looks neat and pretty?

  -30-
[The foregoing column appeared in the Las Cruces Sun-News this morning, Sunday, 9 June, 2013.  It was written before the school board met Friday morning, but appeared after that meeting.]

        The school board meeting Friday morning was kind of pathetic.

        Few people even seemed to know the issue was under consideration.  Only two spoke: the expert quoted in the column, Bernd Lanauer, and myself.  I had earlier sent the board-members a copy of this column, along with a link to a nine-minute video anyone interested in the subject should watch.

        The board showed no interest in what Mr. Lanauer had to say.  When school officials parroted industry marketing materials, and Mr. Lanauer offered to rebut some of the inaccuracies, the board was not interested.  

        As far as I can tell, the administration never had consulted the university, even though there were some world-class experts available there.  If I understood correctly, experts here were responsible for the natural turf on which two Super Bowls were played.  Certainly an unbiased fact-finder, trying to ascertain what might work for the Las Cruces Schools, would have located the nearby university and inquired.  

        But boosters and school officials wanted artificial turf.   As one of the officials pointed out, only two districts played on natural turf last year.   Board member Maria Flores immediately noted, "But our players are winning anyway!"  I thought of parents with kids who want to drink booze or smoke or get high or get tattoos or whatever because the other kids do.  "Because the others do it" isn't necessarily a great reason.  Now the kids have the Board of Education to cite on their side.  Sometimes you have to do dumb things to save face with the majority, I guess.
  
        One board-member made an impassioned plea to consider the kids who'd be playing on the stuff.  Another cited both the health/injury concerns and the inordinate cost to a school system already having troubles meeting its obligations.  Both dissented during the vote.

        Of the others, two seemed uncomfortable doing what they were doing, voting for the artificial turf.  One said that while the health concerns were "not non-existent," it seemed that "being pragmatic" required the board to approve the huge expense.
  
        Of course, it seemed pragmatic because the school officials briefing the board had decided what they wanted to do, and didn't really investigate facts and expert opinions that didn't fit their plan.