As always, this is great Tom. One company of his that nobody seems to discuss is St. Chi Enterprises, which he opened in Sept. 2020 to "purchase and lease real estate across the United States." What do we know about St. Chi's holdings? Given the concerns about gentrification associated with the new school in Evanston, you would think that it would be a no-brainer to disclose whether the national real estate firm he is operating on the side is potentially benefiting from the investment of public funds from the District.
On the "white supremacy" stuff. I was on the Zoom call that Fox picked up on in August 2020. I think it was one of the first times he had a quasi-public meeting. I distinctly remember him making the statement about allowing students of color to come back to in-person school first. I didn't care too much about the impact to my kids since we were in no hurry to send them back before they were vaccinated. But my immediate response was "you can't actually do that. It's against the law." This drilled home to me that the Board hired someone who was in over his head. I couldn't imagine previous superintendents Paul Goren or Hardy Murphy being so careless in that setting--even though Horton was navigating a very difficult situation.
I'm not sure how much Horton has actually grown on the job. It is hard to imagine him in charge of such a large district as they have in DeKalb.
Although I hope DeKalb hires him to get him out of Evanston, I have to admire the process they are undergoing when compared to how the feckless District 65 board undertook the Horton hire. Requiring candidates to account for their experience, qualifications, and character is essential. DeKalb may ignore citizen concerns and still hire him. But if/when things go south there will be a demonstrable record that the concerns were well known by the public and the board.
I just imagine how Evanston could have possibly gotten a better candidate if we had a similar opportunity to scrutinize the candidate before hiring.
Tom, I hope you continue this blog post-election. It would be very useful to try and get the board members on the record about how they intend to execute the next superintendent search. I did not see all of the candidate forums, so i don't know if Salem, Hernandez, or Wilkins were asked this during the campaign.
I saw Halperin defend the process recently on the District 65 parents facebook page by saying they wanted it to be anonymous to "attract the best candidates." Of course, this is illogical. They love Horton and he was applying all across the country in 2019 in public searches. Even though the board president claimed during the search that the candidates "requested anonymity", it is pretty much impossible to believe that this was the case with Horton.
Please, ATL friends, take all of this with a grain of salt. You will find Horton an agent of change. He will change test scores and readiness levels. He will change how your district funds projects and spends money. He will change the teacher/staff satisfaction. Lots of change. Well, considering the turmoil you’ve experienced, perhaps not. Horton is a great man. Just ask him.
Also, I had a friend who received one of the "your a white supremacist" emails in early Jan. 2021. Imagine the surprise when it was directed to a local newspaper to cover and instead of an article on that, we woke up to news of "hate crime"..... It was VERY CLEAR from the timeline that Tom presents above and from the EPD report that the so called "hate crime" to Biz's car was completely fabricated to avoid an apology and instead redirect the attention and double down on the narrative that the board was under threat. SUPER OBVIOUS. Read the police report. It's ridiculous. And, try and remember the last time a lesbian leader was under threat in Evanston...
Question - while I am super happy they are picking up your research, I am a little surprised they aren't honing more in on enrollment loss and bad achievement for Black/Brown students during Horton's tenure. DeKalb student population is 80%+ Black and Hispanic and in yesterday's AJC article, two of their board members said “Board members were most impressed with Dr. Horton’s innovative approaches that have consistently led to demonstrated success in dramatically improving student achievement for all students.". I just don't understand how they could say that. I have seen ZERO data that shows any student achievements. In fact, it's quite the opposite. So what info. are they relying on? Data from before D65? Any ideas?
As always, this is great Tom. One company of his that nobody seems to discuss is St. Chi Enterprises, which he opened in Sept. 2020 to "purchase and lease real estate across the United States." What do we know about St. Chi's holdings? Given the concerns about gentrification associated with the new school in Evanston, you would think that it would be a no-brainer to disclose whether the national real estate firm he is operating on the side is potentially benefiting from the investment of public funds from the District.
https://bsd.sos.mo.gov/Common/CorrespondenceItemViewHandler.ashx?IsTIFF=true&filedDocumentid=124077680&version=2
On the "white supremacy" stuff. I was on the Zoom call that Fox picked up on in August 2020. I think it was one of the first times he had a quasi-public meeting. I distinctly remember him making the statement about allowing students of color to come back to in-person school first. I didn't care too much about the impact to my kids since we were in no hurry to send them back before they were vaccinated. But my immediate response was "you can't actually do that. It's against the law." This drilled home to me that the Board hired someone who was in over his head. I couldn't imagine previous superintendents Paul Goren or Hardy Murphy being so careless in that setting--even though Horton was navigating a very difficult situation.
I'm not sure how much Horton has actually grown on the job. It is hard to imagine him in charge of such a large district as they have in DeKalb.
Although I hope DeKalb hires him to get him out of Evanston, I have to admire the process they are undergoing when compared to how the feckless District 65 board undertook the Horton hire. Requiring candidates to account for their experience, qualifications, and character is essential. DeKalb may ignore citizen concerns and still hire him. But if/when things go south there will be a demonstrable record that the concerns were well known by the public and the board.
I just imagine how Evanston could have possibly gotten a better candidate if we had a similar opportunity to scrutinize the candidate before hiring.
Tom, I hope you continue this blog post-election. It would be very useful to try and get the board members on the record about how they intend to execute the next superintendent search. I did not see all of the candidate forums, so i don't know if Salem, Hernandez, or Wilkins were asked this during the campaign.
I saw Halperin defend the process recently on the District 65 parents facebook page by saying they wanted it to be anonymous to "attract the best candidates." Of course, this is illogical. They love Horton and he was applying all across the country in 2019 in public searches. Even though the board president claimed during the search that the candidates "requested anonymity", it is pretty much impossible to believe that this was the case with Horton.
Please, ATL friends, take all of this with a grain of salt. You will find Horton an agent of change. He will change test scores and readiness levels. He will change how your district funds projects and spends money. He will change the teacher/staff satisfaction. Lots of change. Well, considering the turmoil you’ve experienced, perhaps not. Horton is a great man. Just ask him.
Also, I had a friend who received one of the "your a white supremacist" emails in early Jan. 2021. Imagine the surprise when it was directed to a local newspaper to cover and instead of an article on that, we woke up to news of "hate crime"..... It was VERY CLEAR from the timeline that Tom presents above and from the EPD report that the so called "hate crime" to Biz's car was completely fabricated to avoid an apology and instead redirect the attention and double down on the narrative that the board was under threat. SUPER OBVIOUS. Read the police report. It's ridiculous. And, try and remember the last time a lesbian leader was under threat in Evanston...
Question - while I am super happy they are picking up your research, I am a little surprised they aren't honing more in on enrollment loss and bad achievement for Black/Brown students during Horton's tenure. DeKalb student population is 80%+ Black and Hispanic and in yesterday's AJC article, two of their board members said “Board members were most impressed with Dr. Horton’s innovative approaches that have consistently led to demonstrated success in dramatically improving student achievement for all students.". I just don't understand how they could say that. I have seen ZERO data that shows any student achievements. In fact, it's quite the opposite. So what info. are they relying on? Data from before D65? Any ideas?