Parents tell APS board to get act together

By Steve Visser and Leon Stafford

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Parents fear the Atlanta school board fight is jeopardizing their children's future by putting the accreditation at risk, which could cost students access to the HOPE Scholarship and admission to college.

“There is a lot at stake here. These kids are working around the clock to better themselves and make the school shine,” said Nancy Habif, who has five children in Atlanta public schools. “In the worse case scenario the kids who are busting their butts are not even going to have the HOPE Scholarship.”

The school board fight over who should be in charge makes the schools look bad to college admission offices and blocks good news such as Grady High School's mock trial team winning the Empire International contest this month, Habif said. “I don’t think a lot of people out there understand that its not all bad," she said Thursday.

Mark Elgart, the head of AdvancED, the parent arm of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS), sent a formal letter Wednesday to the school board warning that it is risking the system's accreditation because he contends last month the board illegally removed the board chairwoman and vice chairwoman who had been elected to two-year terms in January.

The letter said the board needs to take "corrective action" by Dec. 1  or AdvancED will make a recommendation that could start the lengthy process of removing the school system's accreditation, a penalty that would have far-reaching effects, from the ability of students to qualify for universities to a decline in property values.

Atlanta’s elected officials and business leaders reacted sharply on Thursday.

“Enough is enough,” Mayor Kasim Reed said. “I am deeply disappointed by the Board’s actions, which are severely undermining the best interests of our students by risking the accreditation of the entire school system.”

The board coup came on the heels of a CRCT cheating scandal in which some teachers are suspected of erasing wrong answers on the state standardized test for elementary and middle school students. Gov. Sonny Perdue has ordered a state investigation.

Leonard Andrews, a booster club member for Booker T. Washington High School, said the school board was mimicking the power squabble that resulted in SACS pulling the accreditation of the Clayton County school system.  "We put board members in there to serve students and not to serve themselves,"Andrews said. "It seems to me they are doing their own agenda and not the student's agenda."

SACS has been aggressive in its dealings with metro Atlanta schools. In 2008, Clayton County became the first school system in the nation in nearly 40 years to lose district-wide accreditation because of a dysfunctional school board. Since then, SACS has placed the school system on probation, but the district still struggles.

Following Clayton’s accreditation loss, 3,500 of the district’s 48,000 students withdrew from the district and enrolled in private schools and neighboring districts. The property values dropped, some businesses closed and some students struggled to get scholarships at private universities.

SACS is also reviewing 2,500 pages of evidence DeKalb County schools submitted in response to allegations of nepotism, conflict of interest, questionable procedure procedures and other ethical problems. SACS is expected to decide early next week if a full investigation into DeKalb’s accreditation is warranted. DeKalb is the state’s third largest school system.

Elgart's letter to APS followed a months-long squabble among board members. The discord started this summer, as members took a series of 5-4 votes that resulted in a controversial policy change and the selection of new board Chairman Khaatim Sherrer El and Yolanda Johnson as the board's new vice chairwoman.

The frustration that led to the change had been building for months, caused by what El said was poor communication -- among board members and with the public -- about an ongoing investigation of 58 city schools over possible cheating on state tests.

The policy change removed a requirement that the board must vote by a two-thirds majority if members wanted to replace a board chairman or vice chairman midterm. The change required only a simple majority to remove Chairwoman LaChandra Butler Burks and Vice Chair Cecily Harsch-Kinnane.

Both the board’s own attorney as well as an outside law firm issued opinions indicating the change was illegal. Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker earlier this month concurred.

Atlanta City Councilman Michael Julian Bond, who has advocated that Atlanta take over the school system, said the board’s infighting is a distraction from the district’s real problems, like the cheating scandal and struggling test scores.

He said SACS should be more interested in how students are falling through the cracks than parliamentary procedures that determine who controls the board.

“This musical chairs of what the board is engaged in is really a tempest in a teapot,” he said.

But for Jessica Gluck, whose two sons attend North Atlanta High School, even the threat of the loss of accreditation was deeply troubling.

"I'm scared," she said. "It is just very unfortunate that it has come to push comes to shove and in the end it is the kids who are going to end up short."

Staff writers Megan Matteucci and Kristina Torres contributed to this story.