Dear Dr. Lewis,
It's Friday night at 11:00 P.M. and I just finished posting my political opponent's campaign announcement on my website (doesn't everyone do that?) when the phone rang with the caller id identifying the number as coming out of New Jersey. I quickly picked up the phone so to stop the ringing which I am sure would have woke up my wife if I didn't catch it before the second ring.
Who do you think was calling the Heneghan household at 11:04 P.M.? It was you, the DeKalb County School System, Superintendent, Dr. Crawford Lewis informing me via a robo call that Monday was the first day of school and that we should take our children's education seriously.
Thanks for calling Crawford, we do take education seriously and we appreciate the fact that my sons two teachers at Chesnut Charter Elementary School personally called the house this evening (at a reasonable hour) in introduce themselves to us. Kudos to these teachers and the staff at Chesnut.
Besides calling my home way to late in the evening, please allow me to inform you of another oversight made by the school system this week. I filed an open records request on Monday for design plans for the new school on Womack that is currently under construction and when I hadn't received a reply by this morning I called the project manager (Barry Booth) who was well aware of my request but he was not allowed to discuss the matter with me in any detail. I informed him that I wanted the electronic drawings or at this point I am willing to accept the paper copies but I would still like an official reply to my request and he said that he would convey the message. Yet I received no reply at all.
At one point in my conversation with Mr. Booth, he stated that the drawings were not final because there were still some minor tweaks being made. It was that point that I asked when does the community get to review the plans and suggest our own tweaks to the design and he said "What makes you think that we allow the public input on the school design?" I was floored at the comment and I immediately requested a formal reply to my open records request and hung up.
Mr. Lewis, I do take my children's education seriously, so much so that my wife & I are involved in many facets of their education, including the design of the facility where my son will be going to school next year.
If I had your home number, I would be tempted to give you a call right now to discuss the matter; but I guess I'll send you an e-mail instead and hope for a better reply than the one that Mr. Dale Davis & Ms. Pat Pope never sent.
If you could please talk to Ms. Pope and let me know when the drawings of the new 4th & 5th Grade Academy on Womack will be available, it would be much appreciated.
Thank You.
John Heneghan
John@JKHeneghan.com
770-234-0678
6 comments:
John: We got that call from Dr. Lewis at exactly 12:01 AM. Since we have relatives in New Jersey, our hearts nearly stopped when we saw the caller ID listing as NJ, considering the time and the fact that only calls about deaths and serious accidents come at that time from our long-distance relatives.
You all received "early" calls, our call came at 01:37 a.m.
Wow...no wonder it takes so long to build a school. Does everyone in the community really expect to provide input to the design of new schools? Isn't this why we have elected school board officials? Have you worked through Jim Redovian on this issue?
..."my sons two teachers at Chesnut Charter Elementary School personally called the house this evening (at a reasonable hour) in introduce themselves to us."
That's amazing!!! I have NEVER in my 13 years of DCSS involvement with my two children had a teacher EVER call to introduce themselves!!
And - Dr. Lewis is not to be trusted. I have had many conversations with him where he stated that he fully supported the vocational high school and planned to expand the programs -- only to have him 'suddenly' decide to sell the High School of Technology North (the South one still operates as far as I know) - to Perimeter College to trade it for land for this new Dunwoody ES.
It's SO sad that the State has declared it unlawful to start a new school system. If Dunwoody could rise up and TAKE their schools from Dekalb, they could have control of what would inevitably be the BEST school system in the entire state!
ps - I didn't get a phone call at all....
I have received quite a few e-mails regarding the late night phone calls, the worst story I heard was a 2:15 phone call to a family who also has a son serving overseas; they were very afraid to answer and then were livid to hear Crawford Lewis on the other end.
Yep, Jim is well aware of my concerns and those of others in the community including the DHA; but to date the DCSS has been unresponsive as to meeting to discuss the plans.
If you believe that the DCSS is doing the community a service by hiding the school designs, the traffic plans, the tree removal and landscaping plan; you’re sorely mistaken.
Unlike Peachtree Middle School who had a sitting PTA to give input, the new school has no one. As a future parent of a child at that school and possibly an elected official of this city, I believe the plans for a school which will open in one year from now should be made public. If the Peachtree traffic light fiasco taught us anything, it is that the plans should be published in advance for all to see so that they do not change as the project progresses.
In this case the DCSS did have a number of design facts regarding the school on their site and they removed them once I started asking questions as to why they removed all of the skylights that were part of the original design. The county talks a good game about building "Green" buildings but removed this feature and clearly states that the building will not be certified as being "LEED Certified" energy efficient.
As a concerned citizen, involved parent and active civic leader I have the ability and right to question my governmental leaders. The real question is why more people don't.
A LEED certified school building? Hey, so what that it may save county taxpayers a ton over the building's lifespan, and more importantly provide a healthier learning and work environment for students and teachers, with more natural light, better air quality, less VOC's, etc.
It would mean a little more work for DCSS administrators, and we can't have that, can we?
How many DCSS administrators are there on staff, and how many make well over $100,000 per year? Answers to both: A bunch and a bunch.
DCSS's new slogan is: We do "top heavy" better than anyone else!
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