A parents group asked New Haven’s new deputy schools chief for a meeting a month ago to discuss the ambitious reform campaign he’s overseeing. The group’s still waiting.
Garth Harries (pictured), recently hired to helm New Haven’s school reform drive, said Monday night he had been unaware of the request from Teach Our Children (TOC)
Harries was noncommittal when shown the letter from TOC. He said he is still learning the who’s who of the district. He said he was unaware of the role, sometimes including a confrontational approach, that TOC has played in recent modifications to the district’s bullying and discipline policies.
“No snub was intended,” said schools spokeswoman Michelle Wade.
Mayor John DeStefano and the Board of Education have embarked on an ambitious remaking of the school system. The mayor has made it the centerpiece of his reelection campaign.
The TOC letter, written by parent leader Nancy Carranza and dated July 9, offered Harries four separate dates for a meeting.
Wade said that Harries was not even officially on the job at the time.
Carranza, in a phone conversation Monday, said that she hadn’t yet heard from Harries. The point of the meeting, she said, would be specifically to have him give “detailed information for his ideas about parents.”
TOC’s and Carranza’s letter thanked and quoted schools Superintendent Reggie Mayo for assuring them that they would be included in the process “from the inside to the outside.”
Mayo and DeStefano did hold a forum on the reform initiative for city non-profit groups, which TOC did attend. Harries was unable to be there.
Harries, Mayo, and the mayor have briefed teachers, aldermen, principals, the business community, and other groups with a stake in the reforms. They have repeatedly said they plan to emphasize transparency and engagement in their reform drive.
Will parents be part of that “transparency” and “engagement”?
Now TOC is asking to be granted a separate briefing. In a letter responding to a July 22 Independent article entitled“Some Parental Non-Involvement is OK, Too,” TOC parent leader Nilda Aponte wrote, “There is no excuse for not involving parents in decision-making.”
In a conversation before Monday night’s Board of Education Administration and Finance Committee, Harries said that he has requests for meetings piling up on his desk, several inches high.
Harries was asked if activist parents such as TOC’s members would have a role in major decisions, such as a change of principal, or in the reconfiguration of a school. Harries said he is only in the beginning of his efforts to fill in the plan’s blueprint.
Harries added that everything at this point is still on the table.
He repeated how impressed he was with the outreach to the community, including parents, that he’d found so far in his first month in the district. His interest was in communicating with what he called “a broad range of parents.”
He added that he hopes “to listen to everyone.”
As for TOC and the Board of Ed having been at loggerheads in the past, Harries spoke of the “advantage to being an outsider.”
Schools spokeswoman Wade said board officials are meeting with TOC this week on an issue of growing concern to them: the access to schools and school meetings for parents who speak English as a second language.
Wasn't this guy supposed to hit the ground running after he left the NYC BOE position? We're spending a substantial amount of tax dollars to have him tell us that he's got a lot of requests for meetings? I'm all for settling in to a new job, but I'd hope for more substance from him even at this early stage in the reform process, also known as the time before the stimulus money arrives to "save the day."