This is an open letter to the state education official who was kind enough to send a letter to our home last week:
Dear Dr. Elsie C. Leak:
If someone gave Nobel Prizes for impenetrable writing, I’d nominate your recent letter. Your command of educratese is superb. I have read it through several times and still haven’t the faintest idea what it is about or why you spent state money to mail it to me.
You must understand, Dr. Leak, that I’m not an illiterate or uncaring parent. As it happens, I scored over 700 on my verbal SAT and I graduated Phi Beta Kappa from a well-respected university. I have made my living writing – and reading – for decades. But I can’t make heads or tails of your letter.
It is notifying me that Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools “is entering Title I District Improvement under No Child Left Behind.” I even know what a Title I school is – and that my daughter’s school is NOT a Title I school! And still you’ve managed to baffle me.
Here’s what my buddy, Observer education reporter Pete Smolowitz, says the letter means: CMS has slipped into what’s known as Title I District Improvement status, because it did not hit federal benchmarks under the No Child Left Behind Act. Half the state’s school systems now fall into that category. CMS must now spend a certain percentage of federal money on professional development for teachers. Because of the change in status, the money can be used at a wider range of schools, not just the ones with the highest poverty rates.
Dr. Leak, you work at the N.C. Department of Public Instruction. You are associate superintendent of curriculum, instruction and accountability services. Whatever that is. You have a doctorate in education.
Did they teach you how to write this way in education school, or are you just naturally gifted?
Perhaps the work you do does not require clear communication. We, the taxpayers, can only hope that is the case, and that this letter is the only instance during your career that you will be expected to write anything, to anyone.
A word of advice, if you’ll permit me to offer it: Don’t ever even think of going near a job in the classroom. Those kids would eat you alive!