CMS board members, superintendent answer
questions about Comprehensive Review

Oct. 12, 2010

CMS Board Chair Eric Davis asked to meet with Forum participants. Speakers attending included Davis, District 3 board member Dr. Joyce Waddell, District 2 board member Richard McElrath, and Supt. Peter Gorman.

The material below represents most of the questions asked. For each question, all of the answers offered by the speakers have been included.

1. Opening statements

 Davis
 White

2. How does movie "Waiting for Superman" relate to Charlotte?

 Waddell
 Davis

3 Where are the documents relating to the Comprehensive Review?

 Gorman

4. How much federal Race for the Top money will come to CMS?

 Gorman

5. Why was the foyer of new Rocky River High left as raw concrete?

 Gorman

6. A child at Rocky River in Mint Hill reported having been bused in from West Boulevard. What gives?

 Gorman
 Davis

7. Set aside economic arguments: What are the academic arguments for creation of K-8 schools.

 Gorman
 White
 McElrath

8. Do cohort studies validate the money being spent on Communities in Schools, and why was there no broader input than CIS into dropout prevention programs?

 Gorman

9. Has economic downturn halted "strategic staffing" initiatives that gave excellent teachers a salary incentive to work at high-needs schools?

 Gorman

10. Have you studied the role that the absence of African-American history in the curriculum plays in poor performance and dropping out among African-American teens?

 Davis
 Waddell

11. Who will decide which schools to close. and why aren't CMS's best teachers teaching the children who need the most help?

 Davis
 Gorman
 McElrath

12. What plans are there for additional career and job training, and what companies are assisting?

 Gorman

13. Has moving away from nontechnical job training contributed to the dropout rate?

 Gorman
 McElrath

14. Doesn't research suggest that K-8s should be phased in over several years rather than the way CMS proposed to do it next fall? And will federal Title I money move with the children being moved to K-8s, and will you increase allotments for those children at their new schools?

 Gorman

15. By creating K-8s whole rather than phasing them in, are you sacrificing the children and the academic gains you want to see?

 Gorman

16. Why did board members abandon staff proposals to alter traditional magnets and Montessori?

 Davis
 Waddell
 McElrath
 Waddell

17. Did the board seek public-private partnerships to finance schools that might otherwise close?

 Davis

18. Will you encourage teachers to be trained in African-American history?

 Waddell

19. Why did you brush off the question about partnerships, and to close the academic gap, shouldn't CMS do a much better of high-achieving principals to low-performing schools?

 Davis

20. What is board's commitment to rebuild vocational training programs?

 Davis

21. How many minorities are in the superintendent's top level of decision-makers?

 McElrath

22. What is it about the criteria for school closings that explains why Lincoln Heights was not on the iist, and then suddenly was added to the list?

 McElrath

23. Will there be more multi-track (year-round) schools in the future? University Park parents don't want to be alone because finding child care will be difficult if very few children countywide are on that schedule.

 McElrath
 Waddell

24. CMS's discipline process is among the most complex in the country. Will you reconsider it, so parents can get their kids back in school getting an education?

 McElrath
 Waddell