Give Six. On a daily basis, six connections with each student will be made by school district staff which affirm, encourage, compliment, and otherwise single out individual students for special attention constitute this initiative. Introduced at the meeting of the Clover Park School District Board on the evening of February 22, Superintendent Ron Banner said […]
Tillicum
Letter: Not Going Down
Like the nearby pictured green leaf stubbornly standing in a swirl of dirty water, a man of courage and conviction changed the course of history at 4 am on February 24, 1807. On that early morning, the English House of Commons abolished the slave trade by an overwhelming majority of 283 to 16. This occurred […]
Letter: Fear, Dragons And Courage
Fear is a dragon. For many it takes shape as public speaking, snakes, spiders and mysterious sounds, and for others the imagined actions of gargoyles and dragons. Confronting that dragon takes courage. Dr. Calvin Rooney knew something about this. A fictional character in Clive Cussler’s 1986 best-selling novel, “Cyclops,” the good doctor is on a […]
Letter: Bowed, But Not Broken
As the victim read her impact statement in the final stage of a sentencing, a young man in the courtroom bowed his head. His pencil rolled off his notepad and dropped to the floor. As new and inexperienced news reporter, his beat had been to report on crime, cops and courts. But not today; this […]
Letter: The Key To Trust
The case of the Titanic illustrates how often failures result more from a succession of omissions and missteps than one big mess-up. Like the Titanic, the Clover Park School District Board of Directors is navigating treacherous waters and there have been recently what appear to be a succession of omissions and missteps. According to researchers, […]
Letter: Censorship and the CPSDB
Censorship is understood to be the suppression of speech, public communication, or other information, on the basis that such material is considered “inconvenient.” At the February 8, 2021 Clover Park School District Board meeting, Director Paul Wagemann asked his fellow board members to amend the December 21, 2020 meeting minutes to include his comments. In […]
Letter: Silver Dollars, Gum Wrappers And Hard Work
When I was a youngster, occasionally my grandfather would give me a silver dollar. Collectors’ coins today, these silver minted gifts now serve as part of my recollection of lessons he taught me. One of those lessons involved gum wrappers. Growing up poor, many of us in our community wanted to go to a weeklong […]
Letter: What’s Going On?
According to recently released public disclosure documents, Deb Hansen, President of the Clover Park Education Association (CPEA), solicited from association’s members their signatures on a template she provided that would be sent to the Clover Park School Board in advance of their January 11, 2021 meeting. The letter – to which CPEA members could sign […]
Letter: The CPSD, Emails and Groupthink?
A Public Disclosure Request for “all emails and correspondence and board meeting minutes related to Paul Wagemann’s alleged ‘crack the whip’ comment” netted 86 emails that are carbon copies. In these mass-produced emails that supposedly find School Board Director Paul Wagemann’s “crack the whip” comment “racist and absolutely unacceptable,” there is only one difference that […]