Counterattack!

Cutting Bully Columns

UPDATE 5:05 PM Friday:
See Comment at 5:02 PM today from Bart Hollander, Catherine Sanderson's husband.

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Catherine Sanderson, as usual, hit a nerve with last week's column in the venerable Amherst Bulletin questioning the glowing evaluation the Regional School Committee bestowed upon Amherst School Superintendent Maria Geryk by highlighting those inconvenient truths about the high cost of education in Amherst with mediocre MCAS results, currently the most failing in over a half-dozen years.

This week's Amherst Bulletin has not one but two columns ganging up on Dr. Sanderson, written by three-out-of-four remaining Amherst School Committee members. Interestingly not a peep from any of the four hilltown committee members who presumably were as offended as the Amherst members. Or maybe Amherst has thin skinned public officials--especially now that Catherine Sanderson and Steve Rivkin are gone.

How dare she point out the rosy report was penned by a Pelham School Committee member with a spouse working under the Superintendent!

Massachusetts public officials--both paid and volunteer--are held to a higher standard. It's not called "conflict of interest", it is called the "appearance of a conflict of interest". Kind of like in criminal cases the evidence must prove "guilt beyond a reasonable doubt" vs. civil cases were it is a "preponderance of the evidence."

And having your volunteer spouse critique your highly paid boss clearly has the appearance of a conflict. The state, however, offers a simple solution: disclosure. You know, that thing called transparency--which we see very little of in Amherst.

Some might even argue appointing a high school student to the school committee smacks of an appearance of a conflict. Although we're told by reporter Nick Grabbe that the teacher was joking, newly appointed school committee member Solomon Goldstein-Rose was greeted with "I'm teaching my boss now" by a teacher at the High School on Tuesday.

Yeah, and you damn well better not give him too much homework!

Both columns use the same lame excuse town officials have relied on for 25 years protecting the Cherry Hill Golf Course: Wait until next year. Katherine Appy even manages to throw in liberals favorite boogeyman to blame, President Bush.

Yes, it takes time to turn around a big ship in a sea of molasses. But other nearby towns navigate in the same sea and seem to do as good a job in a far more cost efficient manner. As President Kennedy once said, "A rising tide lifts all boats." And Amherst has a rising tide of red ink.

Neither counter column answers that nagging question of why our cost per student is by far the highest in the area at $16,413 per student while state average is $13,055. Is it too much to ask why we don't get average adequate yearly progress when we pay 20% above average for our system?

Indeed, nobody likes a critic--especially when they're right!

President Biddy Martin Presents

Amherst College President Biddy Martin (speaking extemporaneously)

Perhaps it was the home field advantage, speaking from the comfort of a newly refurbished historic inn, or the friendly audience of local business and civic leaders--the "usual suspects" at an Amherst Chamber of Commerce event--or maybe her lifelong background in higher education...but more likely all of the above, as this morning Amherst College President, going on seven months now, Carolyn "Biddy" Martin gave an engaging fireside chat to a receptive audience of 86 smartly dressed men and women at the Amherst College owned Lord Jeffery Inn.

First and foremost, President Martin wanted to dispel the outdated notion (from back in the day when Emily Dickinson was putting quill pen to paper) that Amherst College is an elitist, blue blood private school for the privileged. She cited the telling statistics that over half the current enrollment are a combination of international students and students of color and almost one-quarter are eligible for a PELL Grant .

She highlighted her background at Cornell and the University of Wisconsin-Madison which are both "land grant" institutions expected by charter to serve the local community. And so it will be with Amherst College, where the fortunes of the town and the college named after the town are so deeply intertwined.

Ms. Martin's short list of top priorities include hiring new faculty in the current competitive market. The education boom of the 1960s swelled the ranks of professors, who are now retiring in droves. While competition from demanding Asian colleges and universities for liberal arts professors only adds to supply problems.

She proudly pointed out the new $200 million life sciences building, which will require the next four or five years to complete and will be second to none on a national scale. One unusual component (at least for a liberal arts college) will be an "incubator" for the study of entrepreneurship. Not a space for business start ups, like at UMass or Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, but a center for students to learn about the social value of starting a business.

Coincidentally enough fellow Amherst resident Donna Kelley, associate professor of entrepreneurship at Babson College, made national news last week for a major study she co-authored on women's entrepreneurship encompassing 59 economies, that found American women have greater fear of failure than American men when contemplating business creation.

Precisely the problem education can rectify--the earlier the better. Kelley also recently co-taught a Junior Achievement course at Amherst's Crocker Farm Elementary School, where her daughter is a student.

When the new Amherst College science center opens sometime in 2017, the four-story, 220,000-square-foot building will be the largest structure on campus, and an impressive trophy to attract new faculty and students.

But expensive new bricks and mortar buildings are not the only means for dispensing higher education--at least not in this digital age. Ms. Martin pointed out the importance of distance learning online as a cost effective adjunct for face-to-face communication, where maintaining an 8-1 student teacher ratio is costly. A lesson the Amherst public schools could stand learning.

If anyone in the audience harbored any uncertainty about the first female president in the 190 year history of the college, they left the Dickinson Room with those doubts dispelled.

Amherst College is in confident, able hands.

Occupy the Trolley stop

Trolley Station on North Pleasant Street, built 1911

Those who fail to appreciate history are doomed to retweet it.

Last week I asked UMass director of campus planning Dennis Swinford about the current status of the quaint brick trolley waiting station (now recycled as a bus stop shelter) and received this ominous reply: "The Massachusetts Historical Commission issued a ruling that the structure can be demolished after photo documentation and measured drawings are prepared and submitted to the Mass Archive."

In other words, the bulldozers are already warming up.

Retired Professor Joseph Larson, a historical preservationist on a mission, recently pegged the cost to save the station at $75,000...down considerably from the original lone quote UMass received at $200,000.

Considering the Amherst flagship campus has witnessed an unprecedented construction boom over the past ten years, averaging over $100 million annually, that new quote to save a healthy piece of history comes to less than one-tenth of one percent--an even more startling statistic than the Occupy mantra centered on the 1%.

Original Trolley Barn Cowles Road North Amherst, built 1897. One year demolition delay expires 7/28/12

Second Trolley Barn, now Amherst DPW, built 1917

A brief history of the local Trolley by Jonathan Tucker

Busy Super Bowl weekend for AFD

Hobart Lane's much maligned dumpster

Not to confuse anyone with the headline, because the on-campus revelry did not seem to add much of a burden to the Amherst Fire Department above and beyond their "normal" hectic routine for weekends in a "college town."

The dumpster at Hobart Lane, scene of 30 previous fires before a perp was recently bagged red handed (currently no longer enrolled at UMass) was again the scene of wasteful, destructive fires late Friday and Sunday evenings. As Chief Nelson points out, when AFD responds to such a nuisance fire that ties up resources so they can't respond instantly to a "real" emergency.

And notice once again a cluster of ETOH (passed out drunk) calls late Friday early Saturday once again tied up ALL our on-duty resources, leaving the entire town (and regional towns who rely on our EMS) under the protection of the volunteer Student Force.

And in spite of their impressive capabilities, not a super situation.

Party House of the Weekend

96 Montague Road, North Amherst

In spite of issuing a $300 noise ticket to a party house at 144 Glendale Road, a classic middle class neighborhood in South Amherst and another one to an apartment dweller at 165A Boulders a classic early 1980s apartment complex also in South Amherst the winner this week is a party house that received only a written warning early Sunday morning (2:20 AM) and then a return visit by APD later that morning (11:10 AM) for a follow up verbal warning.

According to APD narrative: "Spoke with residents at #96 Montague Road regarding a large party they threw last night. Neighboring residents had beer cans and bottles strewn in lawns and mailboxes were knocked down or missing. Residents were advised of guests behavior after they had been served alcohol. Residents stated they understood."

Yeah, let's hope.

144 Glendale Road, South Amherst

I fought the law, and the law won

Chanting and cheering, a throng of UMass students confront police clad in riot uniforms Southwest 10:40 PM

It was then the police horses showed up

And the crowd quickly dispersed

Going up?

In case you wondered why Jones Library employees were greatly concerned over the new Personnel Procedures Manual that the Personal Board worked on for three years because it seemingly increases the day to day managerial powers of the Library Trustees (i.e. micromanaging), consider this:

Jones Library Trustees President Sarah McKee ordered the elevator closed until further notice after an elderly women became temporarily stuck, then pushed every button on the panel in frustration (except for the alarm button) which did not help the situation. After making a scene she managed to get out unscathed.

An elevator technician came the next day, tested the machine and deemed it fine. About two years ago Ms. McKee had the elevator shut down for months awaiting a new panel, even though a state inspector had deemed it fine.

The Jubilat/Jones Reading Series occurred this afternoon in the Trustees Room, 3rd floor. I guess poetry aficionados also got their exercise.