To the Editor,
I wanted to share a letter that I sent to the Bethlehem Central Schools Board of Education today about their vote concerning Lab School at the March 11th meeting: The results of the vote on the resolutions to pause enrollment in Lab School at the March 11th meeting are beyond frustrating.
You are a school board populated with lawyers, and I am disgusted by the pivot from the enrollment argument to the “confidential” matters that motivated your votes!
Anyone experienced with legitimate confidential information, from protected health information (PHI) to matters of national security, can tell you that a high-level summary or cutout justifying the decision that also protects the actual sensitive information is always possible.
I shouldn’t need to write letters chiding this board and reminding you that parents of students in this program are Bethlehem residents, taxpayers, and voters who are entitled to understand the reasoning and justification, if not the disclosure of the sensitive information on which it is based.
I shouldn’t need to remind and scold you for abdicating your oversight responsibility to a superintendent whose “expertise” with regard to this program (evidenced at a minimum by its failure on her watch) has proven nonexistent and her motivations questionable. I shouldn’t need to remind you that the public does not owe anyone in your position or hers “trust” based on that expertise, and we certainly don’t owe it once it’s clear that we’ve been misled and obstructed at nearly every turn.
No one should need to explain to Mr. Walston, a mid-career professional elected to a school board that the comparison of a public school program to a for-profit retail enterprise is utterly ridiculous. Or that it would be wise to reconsider questioning the legitimate expertise of Dr. McNay (a neuroscientist who by training and legitimate professional expertise understands how to interpret statistical data and who contacted the state school board association to gather their input) by suggesting that he is “comparing apples to oranges” when making an objectively fair point about educational program evaluation best practices.
I shouldn’t need to tell you what your responsibilities are as members of the Bethlehem Central Schools Board of Education. I shouldn’t have to write letters which suggest that abdicating in favor of “trusting expertise” is a cowardly abandonment of those responsibilities. I shouldn’t have to point out that asking for trust while you blatantly ignore over 600 signatures gathered on a petition, the lived experience of the very students you are here to serve, and expertise of families advocating against your decision is manipulative and unfair.
But here we are.
Release a summary of this “other” information on which the school board is basing its decision.
Amanda Tracy
Delmar
