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Everything’s FOIAne's avatar

It’s time. It’s time for the board to resign en masse. It’s time for the administration to turn over to a group of people that actually knows what they are doing. It’s time for the reasonable/rational Evanston tax payers to stop being bullied by a group of people that shouts “Racism! Inequity!” at views that are counter to their beliefs.

I urge readers of this blog to write/call the school board and demand change. This group of people has completely mishandled the finances of the district, choosing to ignore challenges staring them in the face while focusing on coming up w land acknowledgment statements, non-academic curriculum and justice circles causing a mass exodus of students and families (of which my family was part of).

There is not one sector in the country where people could individually and collectively screw up their duties and responsibilities so poorly and remain in their positions, keeping the status quo. Look at those building maintenance costs! Look at enrollment! Look at our costs! Look at all of Tom’s exceptional, meticulous reporting on the missteps along the way!

It’s clear. Change is needed immediately to avoid even more damage. Please demand it.

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Tom Hayden's avatar

I don't know - not much going to change until next election in 2025 and even then, it's not clear that the voters of Evanston really care that much about moving the needle on this subject. The best we can do is to keep beating this drum and hope the Board starts paying attention because this is serious fucking business.

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Everything’s FOIAne's avatar

The fact that the story is already pushed down on the RT landing page and that the story only has 6 comments tells you pretty much everything you need to know. Incredibly frustrating.

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Tom Hayden's avatar

That's how the cookie crumbles .. but that doesn't mean things can't change. I've met most of the current board members and they are mostly good people who want to do the right thing but 1) I think are getting a lot of misinformation from the district administration and 2) have political objectives that may not always line up with fiduciary success. I think we have the ability to influence both of those things but especially #1. I know my reporting has driven some changes.

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Penny's avatar

lolz. The RoundTable is such a strange site. About 80% of it is written by high school and college kids with a smattering of PR pieces for local businesses. The actual news articles get lost in the mess of other stuff.

It doesn’t help that they don’t really edit their pieces. I find Larry Gavin’s 20,000 word treatises on MAP scores useful but tedious.

I am sure for most readers it is easy to skip over most of the essential stories and info since it exists in a large pool of superfluous stuff that few people have time to wade through.

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Tom Hayden's avatar

Journalism in 2020s is about story telling more than it is analysis

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Brian's avatar

They censor comments pretty hard there imo. It was revealing how many comments and the content they/Duncan allowed on this one for example though https://evanstonroundtable.com/2023/12/13/police-investigate-antisemitic-graffiti-found-at-haven-middle-school/

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Tom Hayden's avatar

To be fair: They do much less censorship than Evanston Now. I also do a lot of censorship too

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