Hillsborough schools screw up — and April Griffin is pissed about it
October 29, 2007 at 3:02 pm by Wayne GarciaHillsborough School Board member April Griffin is unhappy again about the district administrators who work for her — and who work for the taxpayers, come to think of it. Griffin has sounded off on her blog about two recent screw-ups as follows:
I shouldn’t be discussing these things because they will most likely come before the board. But I feel I owe the public a sense of my feelings on some things that have happened in the past week and we don’t have a board meeting until November 6th.
She is not happy with the recent revelations at Middleton High, where a teacher is accused of having sex with a special needs student and where another student who tried to report the relationship was suspended. That whistleblower student has a lawyer who intends to sue.
As a parent and a school board member I am appalled by this teachers violation of her students’ and the public’s trust. I am also very upset that a student who stepped up and did what we are constantly trying to teach our children to do was punished.
I hope the rest of the school board feels the same way I do and does not make excuses for this horrible situation and steps up to the plate to ensure this never happens again.
The second foul-up involves the school system’s habit of hiring consultants without a bid. This case hit the Tampa Tribune on Friday in a story that detailed how the district hired a consultant for $54,000 to push wellness. Griffin wrote on her blog:
Some of our administrators may not care about how your money is spent, but I do and I am highly upset at this situation. You have frequently heard me talk about culture change and how desperately it is needed. This is precisely one of the reasons I ran for public office… .
