Let’s talk about something Her Three Votes will grant to Superintendent Christina Kishimoto: closing a junior high school to *repurpose* it for Gilbert Classical Academy. We hear that the superintendency hasn’t even tried to keep it secret … they’ve been sending their minions around to schools and talking about Mesquite Junior High School closing as if it’s already a done deal. We’ll be watching the board meeting so see how it all works out. If something happens between now and the vote to close Mesquite Junior High School, Westie will update this post.
The Number One Goal of the GPS Governing Board is to give Gilbert Classical Academy a new campus. They’re funneling resources (that’s TAX MONEY) into a school that benefits 1% of the total student population of the district. What does this tell parents of the 99% of students about GPS priorities? What about the elementary classrooms that have far too many students? What about students at GPS high schools who are crammed so tightly into classrooms that at least one student is assigned to sit at the teacher’s desk because no more student desks will fit into the classroom? What about all of the resources for regular kids, gifted kids and [especially] special ed kids that have been cut? The GPS reply to taxpayers: “Nanny nanny boo boo – we got three votes, so you lose.”
This time, Gilbert Classical Academy is just sick and tired of waiting for a new campus, so it looks like they’re just going to throw out some *lesser* students and take over a campus for their own. Westie has many, many blog posts about how GCA unsuccessfully tried to take over Gilbert Junior High School a few years ago. This time, GCA advocates appear to have been smarter … they appealed to Superintendent Christina Kishimoto’s insatiable thirst for a *national reputation* and voila! This time, GCA wins all the marbles. Now if only GCA could figure out how to KEEP students in GCA until graduation, perhaps those students wouldn’t be so expensive compared to the other students in Gilbert Public Schools. Sheeeeesh.
Westie recently gave GPS Governing Board Clerk Jill Humpherys a chance to write a blog post about how gosh-darn HARD it is to figure out which campus should be given to GCA:
First, Silly Jilly Humpherys talks about the huge number of students who drop out as GCA Spartans each year: There are many parents who choose GCA as a junior high option and then move their child to a comprehensive high school. I don’t know why they choose to do this; I have talked with quite a few parents who do. It may be that they want the rigor of a classical education during the junior high years, but then they want the options that a comprehensive high school offers. Also, it is much more challenging to take all AP and Honors courses as a junior and senior than it is as a freshman and sophomore. I do not begrudge a student the opportunity to try a more rigorous schedule and then maybe find that they would do better with only a few AP or Honors classes.
Isn’t it a good thing that GPS has spent thousands of dollars buying new software to help the superintendency decide where the new boundaries will go? Once you start changing the junior high school boundaries to give the entitled personages at Gilbert Classical Academy a new campus, who knows where it will end? We all know that the remaining junior high schools will be overcrowded, of course. Maybe Superintendent Christina Kishimoto will decide to even out the overloads. Highland Junior High School already has a waiting list for out of boundary students. Maybe some of the newly reboundaried students will have to go elsewhere, like to Gilbert Junior High School. We can imagine the grumbling, along the lines of insults that parents and students from other schools hurl at GJHS students at athletic events: *ghetto school.* You would think Superintendent Christina Kishimoto and her minions are aware of that situation, since Westie has been hearing about it for years. Sheeesh, it’s not like the Town of Gilbert is urban, for heaven’s sake.
You can bet that promises have already been made for the construction and related contracts that will go out to loyal override supporting companies; elections have consequences. One consequence we can predict with great accuracy is that the *repurposing* will cost more than what the committee reported to the board way back when they were pretending the decision hadn’t been made yet. We expect the rounding errors to occur in increments of $100,000 each time there’s not enough money for something bright and shiny new for Gilbert Classical Academy and the handful of students who actually stick around until graduation.
To that end, inquiring minds want to know if Superintendent Christina Kishimoto and her daughter actually bought and paid for their tickets to the Cardinals game (scroll down to January 16th to see the photo). Same question for whoever took their photo — what are the odds it probably was Steve Smith, the Superintendent’s *alleged* boyfriend? No one would ask such questions if Christina Kishimoto had not squandered the trust of the Town of Gilbert, employees of Gilbert Public Schools and their friends and relatives in neighboring towns and cities. Now they want to know if voting for the whole override and bond was something truly done *for the kids* or if it was to benefit the folks and companies that contributed to the Political Action Committees for the override. Now they want to know if those contributors have become Superintendent Christina Kishimoto’s BFFs who want to make her happy and keep her entertained on their dimes. Those dimes and dollars will be derived, of course, from the massive contracting authority that Superintendent Christina Kishimoto is demanding. You know Her Three Votes will give it to her.
On another note, it is becoming quite the distraction for GPS employees to learn that Charles Stevin Smith, also known as Steve Smith, GPS Executive Director of Technology, apparently advanced his short GPS career to *Cabinet Status* through his errr…. *talents* in something other than technology. No one would be considering their options now that EVERYONE knows the way to get ahead in GPS is to bang the boss boink the boss have an *inappropriate relationship* with the boss. The words sex discrimination, hostile work environment and a few other ominous phrases are on quite a few tongues these days.
Let’s get through one more note about Christina Kishimoto’s minions in the White Castle: we’re looking at you, Chief Financial Officer Tom Wohlleber. Yes, Julie Smith is cute, personable and incredibly smart, especially about your realm of finances, but you’re being incredibly rude to address her as “Julie” during board meetings. This is especially true because you are so – ugh – obsequious with regard to DOCTOR Kishimoto and DOCTOR Santa Cruz. Westie had to explain manners to other GPS administrators for calling some board members by their first names. Those old farts folks are no longer employed by GPS, perhaps due in part to their open and obvious disdain for their bosses. CFO Tom Wohlleber, your bosses are ALL the members of the Governing Board, and Christina Kishimoto is just their vessel vassal employee. We’ll give you this one pass in the hope that you didn’t intend the insult you delivered to Governing Board member Julie Smith, which is now enshrined in GPS video archives.
Finale: note to Christina Kishimoto. You’re embarrassing everyone, chica, with your illiteracy. Try to remember, because we’ve seen this stupid mistake too many times: you do not form the plural of a word by adding *apostrophe + s.* Sheeeeeesh.
