Well, I’ve pretty much recovered from whatever it was that was ailing me over the last week.  It was terrible.  Started off as a cold and fell directly into my chest which was full of crud for a week.  The coughing was so bad that my chest and back were sore from it!  Anyway, it seems to be on the decline.  I actually went for a low-intensity ride yesterday.

So, we had our “Education Forward” retreat awhile back and it ran from Friday afternoon to Saturday at about 1:00.  Retreats are always difficult things but I believe now as I do on any of these things: the only way to get people together on tough problems is to spend the requisite time together to reach a level of trust and understanding that makes this happen.  It’s a huge committement of time on behalf of the participants: the Board and Council members all have our day jobs, our normal meetings and then commit a further Friday night and Saturday morning to City business.

After some pretty hard work and after about 7 hours of meetings, the group came up with some general guidelines for the staff to work along in order to come up with a proposal to improve the schools.  Getting theses discussion going is always difficult and this time was no different.  The discussions were heated and, from time to time, rather pointed.  Change ain’t ever easy.

The proposal that staff will come back with – is  really the beginning of the next phase – a proposal from our staff professionals.  I do not know the timing of that right now – it’s up to the Superintendent and the Manager.  I expect we’ll see something in the next few weeks.  From there, the committee will take that proposal and start from there.

One theme that continues to recur is a unified communications infrastructure.  I agree with this notion, that we need someone whose job it is to manage the City’s (City, Schools & Public Safety) communications.  This office could also oversee the cable franchises and internal communications.  There’s just too much good stuff going on that nobody knows about and this would help that.

I’ll post back when we have a proposal.

Got this this morning from the Schools
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School Board appoints Dr. John Werner as next leader of Osbourn High School
   At its April 12, 2011 meeting, the Manassas City School Board named Dr. John Werner as the new principal for Osbourn High School. 

 Dr. Werner has served as principal of Clark County High School for three years.  Before going to Clark County he was assistant principal at Westfields High School, Fairfax High School, and Herndon High School all in Fairfax County.  Dr. Werner earned a Bachelor of Arts in History from George Mason University. He earned two Master’s Degrees from George Mason; one in curriculum and instruction and one in educational leadership.  He recently completed his doctorate in Educational Leadership from Nova Southeastern University. Dr.Werner will begin on July 1. 
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Dr. Werner comes from Clarke County HS which looks, at least from the data I can cull, to be quite different than OHS.  The state report card for that HS is here.  They appear to have an ESL population of less than 10% and almost no crime in the school.  Patch indicates that Clarke was his first Principal’s Post.  I haven’t looked into the other high schools he has been associated with but I’m concerned about the difference between Clarke and OHS but who knows – maybe they don’t have any crime *because* of him…:)  I hope he comes in and lights it up.  It’s only better for all of us.