Some may accuse me of being biased when I chose to send my children to private school. I am a product of private school by way of New York City, but I remained objective in deciding what would be best for my children.  However, when I became a permanent resident of Jasper County, public school was definitely out of the question.  Don't get me wrong, I have relationships with people who went to Ridgeland Middle, Elementary, and subsequently High School, who have done well for themselves, but each remain agreeable on one fact, we learned, we passed, but it was difficult. 

The recent posting of the counties test scores are embarrassing and shameful.  Its easy to blame the environment for which our children are growing up in as a source of low grades, as well as inadequate books or supplies to enhance their efforts, and teachers who are just tired of having to be both the educator and disciplinarian;  but when this all crashes and burns, the look of the faces on the School Board are horrific surprise! Give me a break!  The School Board defiantly chants, this is "unacceptable, something has to be done, someone has to be held accountable!"  Well maybe its time to clean the board.

As an outsider looking in, I see a school board trying to "govern" a system, without taking accountabilty for themselves.  They have done a piss-poor job in selecting Superintendents to get our schools back in shape, and even after hiring is done, many people can account for the poor relationships between a superintendent and board.  It seemed when Mr. Taylor was hired as Interim, he had the guts to make the difficult decisions in trying to build this system up.  Was he met with opposition, I bet he was, but we will never know, because it abruptly ended due to personal reasons.  I hope this new Interim, not only has the guts, but a thick skin, because he is definitely walking into a war zone.

In the end, we all know something needs to be done.  We know we are losing our children, and our best efforts are falling by the waste-side.  We need a "coming together" of parents, children, teachers, and others in our community.  They are at the "bottom", but we can't clean them up with a dirty "top" -  overhaul everything and everyone in it. 

Signing,

itsonlymyopinion