"The doors got closed to the grassroots"

APS to meet Monday on accreditation, contracts
[ajc] The Atlanta school board Monday will meet to work on issues related to restoring full accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. In January, SACS placed the district on probation for poor governance and infighting among members. The board is also scheduled to finalize new Superintendent Erroll Davis' contract. The meeting will be held from 5:30-9 p.m. in the Center for Learning and Leadership auditorium, 130 Trinity Avenue, Atlanta, 30303.

Mr Davis' contract isn't finalized yet? Aren't you supposed to do that before he starts working?

Am I the only person who doesn't understand why Atlanta Public Schools calls their downtown fortress office building the "Center for Learning and Leadership"? Even leaving aside that precious little of either is in evidence there. "The CLL building", employees call it, as if that makes sense. Shouldn't it at least be "the APS building"? "District Office" is what most other school systems call theirs.

I'm going with the simplest explanation: Deliberate obfuscation. The same reason, I suspect, they call their deputy superintendents "school reform team directors". We learned these words in teacher school, dammit, and we're going to use them.

Want Atlanta Public Schools To get Better? Get Involved
[East Atlanta Patch] A product of an APS education himself as were his children, [Atlanta City Councilman Kwanza] Hall said pioneers who moved in and revitalized many of Atlanta's in-town neighborhoods, shouldn't turn around and abandon the district now.

Even as a councilman, he said felt the same culture of aloofness from APS that other parents said they experienced.

But he said the district has no choice to open up now, giving parents and all who are interested in school improvement to give their input and help shape the district.

"The doors got closed to the grassroots and to change actually happening at a grassroots level," Hall said. "Now, in light of all the things that have happened, the door is back open; it's wide open."

Aloofness? Aloofness? It was undisguised hostility that I encountered when I wanted to know what was going on in what was supposed to be an open meeting at my child's school. I was told that my presence was not wanted.