"Everybody wants to change the world, but nobody wants to help mom with the dishes."      P. J. O'Rourke

This statement is so true on many levels and I often have to apply it to myself. However, there is an opportunity for everyone to change their school district - run for school board.

 I did it and it was great. Now it is your turn. 

By Amy Hetzner

School Board member isn't running

Menomonee Falls - One of two School Board members with seats up for election next April has decided not to run again and wants to give somebody else enough time to run in his place.

"It's time for somebody else to step up and serve," said Ted Klumb, who has been on the Menomonee Falls School Board since 2005. "I would like it to be known as early as possible so more people would consider it."

Klumb, 53, said the demands of his job in commercial real estate as well as his family contributed to his decision to not run for a second term.

Don Eisenhauer, who has served on the board since June 2004, said he has not decided whether he will run for re-election when his term is up next spring. But he said Klumb had motivated him to make a decision earlier than he might have. "I've got to think about it over Thanksgiving," Eisenhauer said.

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Are there a lot of meetings? Yes but every board member wants to cut them back. I believe we could cut meetings by 50% and be even more productive. Maybe we will before my term is over.

Will it interfere with my personal, family or professional life? Here are the questions I ask myself when I feel like complaining about missing events:

Is it harder than a man or woman leaving their family behind to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan knowing that you may never see them again or at the very minimum for a year? Is it more of an inconvenience than saying farewell to your son or daughter while they serve their county so that citizens back home can participate in democracy and make their community and schools a better place when they return-if they return?

Am I trying to shame you into running for School Board? No. I am asking you to honor Vets by changing their world while they are protecting ours.

Help Mom with the dishes. Run for School Board.

Are we talking about the same enrollment problem that has been known for years and is the constant talk of almost every school district around the state, and most of the country with the exception of places like Naples, FL and Las Vegas, NV who are experiencing a huge boom in population?

Is enrollment down in the Menomonee Falls School District’? Yes.

Are declining enrolments a direct result of nationwide and local demographics? Yes.

Are we loosing some students to other districts? Yes. Other districts are loosing students to us as well.

Are they leaving because of our School Districts performance? Yes, some, but all School Districts have dissatisfied parents who for one reason or another move their kids. Believe it or not, some even move their kids over athletics. Our exodus of resident students dropped this year by about 50% if I recall correctly.* I hope that is because we are improving in some people's mind. Primarily, we are loosing students to home schooling, an excellent parochial school system (Lutheran and Catholic), virtual schools – in a word competition. *I have ammended my struck out statement, which was way off to 3%. Mrs. Taubenheim was correct in pointing this out and I am sorry for taking too long to point this out. I will provide the correct answer in the comments below.

Are we filling the gaps by adding more Chapter 220 and open enrollment students? No.

Last year your School Board passed a policy that capped all nonresident enrollment to 10% or less. Last month we voted that nonresident enrollment would be set at about 9.7%. Dr. Marty suggested that we continue to accept Chapter 220 students on a limited basis to send a message that we will support this program. After much research and thought, I absolutely support that decision, as does every board member. So we added 5 students and our overall nonresident population is still under 10%.

Will 4-K help with declining enrollment? Yes, of course. See the Brookfield 4-K debate here: http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=686040

What can we do to address the statewide enrollment problem? In my opinion, we need to improve our “customer retention” abilities. That is, we need to work harder to keep current resident students and parents dedicated to stay and grow the school district. (More on this at another time.) The Superintendent in Wauwatosa put a plan together to do just that. We also need to make the district more competitive against educational alternatives. Parents have many good choices these days. They can change their child's educational venue as easily as changing banks. When schools compete, parents and students win.

There are many things that make a community unique and special, but you never realize how few of them there really are until one goes away.

 Today "The Ranch" in Menomonee Falls became one that went away.   http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=685342

 "The Ranch" was a wonderful place, run by wonderful people, that did wonderful things for kids. For the rest of us it was a great place to visit while on a bike ride and expose our kids to animals, rural life and people dedicated to helping the less fortunate.

I don't know what will ultimately happen to the property. The folks at Curative Care Network have helped thousands of kids and will continue to do so. They said it was a financial decision. That is not true. It was a financial reality and they had to make a very hard decision so they could continue their overall mission of providing the best care for as many people as possible. Sometimes there are no good decisions to be made. Sometimes you are forced to choose between bad and worse.

Sometimes it is hard to be in the helping people profession.

Good bye Ranch. May you continue to serve people in new ways.

The public forum was held as planned. Over 25 great people attended including Board members Anne Weiland, Faith Vanderhorst, and Board President Kathy Shurilla. Dave Petroff, who has volunteered to help with School District communications, came to observe but offered valuable insight as well. A teacher came and was a great contributor to the meeting asking some tough questions and providing valuable front line information.

Thank you all for coming. There were a lot of great questions by citizens and some candid and informative responses by board members. I have invited the other attending board members to post their notes and/or thoughts on this blog when convenient. I would like to hear from those who attended as well.  Here are most of the issues raised in no particular order:  

What is happening with the Reconfiguration (restructuring of 9-12 High School) and how can the public get in on the process?  

What are the benchmarks for measuring academic performance in our (or any) School District?   

What is being done for the “middle” student who is not learning disabled or gifted but needs some type of tutoring to become proficient in a subject?  

What is the real deal with No Child Left Behind (NCLB) legislation? Do we get money from this program or is it just an unfunded mandate. Note: I think everyone in the room wanted more information about this. We need an impartial person to come to a public forum and give us the lowdown on NCLB. 

What is up with the Math program? Is it working or failing? Would a public forum presented to the public from the Math department be useful? Yes! was the unanimous feeling.

How do the Chapter 220 and open enrollment programs work? How does the School District get compensated for those students? What plans do we have for these programs? How do these students impacti our test scores? Note: Statistically, very little. More on this later.

Why isn’t more effort made to retain and recruit students within the district?

What is up with all of the days and half days off?

Why are we offering the minimum amount of teaching days/hours in our school calendar? 

What is the best way for the School District to communicate with parents? What is the best way for parents to communicate with the School District? Could the PTAs help with communications issues in their respective schools?

Why aren’t the children in 4K getting school information like other students?

Well, there you go. I may have unintentionally omitted some items due to the responsibilities of moderating the meeting but that is pretty much it.  I love meetings like this where there is a real desire to get information, debate issues and find solutions to improve the district.

Let’s do this again.  Thank you all.