UPDATE: Cheers to Brent Toellner for picking up the gauntlet I threw down the other day. It looks like the Star picked him up.
I don't know about you, but I thought yesterday's school board election was a real nail-biter. I didn't until late in the race when it became a referendum on John Covington's 'Right Size' plan.
Suburbanites I know had the impression that a majority of the district's parents were against the plan. I had the same impression. That raises the question: was the support for the plan really that small, or has the support grown in the month since it's unveiling?
The Mondale-esque trouncing that 'Right Size' supporter Joseph Jackson gave to 'Right Size' opponent Linwood Tauheed (68% to 25%) is suggestive of stronger support for Covington than anyone realized. The 4th school board district is the very heart of what people mean when they refer to 'the black part of town'.
In the coming weeks I'll be asking what does this victory mean? Was it a referendum on Covington as it would seem at first glance? Was it a referendum on Afro-centrism? Maybe it was just a referendum on Linwood Tauheed.
Whatever the case, yesterday was a good day for our city.
Posts
1 comments:
Casey,
You should know by now that the opposition is almost always more vocal and numerous than supporters are when open forums are held. As painful and inconvenient as it will be for many parents, they - and many other voters without students in the school system - appear to accepted the reality that this drastic step proposed by Dr. Covington was necessary for the survival of the district. I suspect that there was also a large measure of rejecting the existing regime and its petty politics and cronyism. There does appear to be some hope for the future of the Kansas City School District! InsideBub
Post a Comment