Standard-Examiner: Ogden District Won't Lose Accreditation Over Librarian Cuts, Says Official

Meanwhile, back at local level, some local School District mouthpieces don't seem quite so sure about that

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The Standard-Examiner is back at us with a followup to Weber County's Forum's 4/28/13 story this morning, now reporting that Ogden School District Superintendent Brad Smith's mass Ogden School District librarian/media specialist layoffs aren't half as bad as they appeared to be, from the perspective of Western Association of Schools and Colleges accreditation, at least:

"While many secondary schools in Utah have licensed teachers as media specialists, it is not a requirement by the state," said Tiffany Hall, K-12 literacy coordinator for the Utah State Office of Education. “It is one of the accreditation assurances, especially at the secondary level,” Hall said. “But it isn’t enough that the school would lose accreditation,” S-E reporter Rachel J. Trotter encouragingly reports in the full story linked below:

• Ogden district won't lose accreditation over librarian cuts, says official

Meanwhile, back at local  level, some of the local School District mouthpieces don't seem quite so sure about that:

“We knew it would affect [accreditation assurances with the media specialists], but we didn’t know exactly how,” Ogden School Board President Shane Story readily admits.

“We will make sure the high schools make their accreditation requirements,” the same initially clueless School Board member nevertheless faithfully assures us.

Deadwood?

Okay. We get it: The Ogden School District is facing a funding crisis, a situation that we can blame not only on our ridiculously tight-fisted Utah Legislature, but also onto the Ogden School Board's gross financial mismanagement itself.

Yes. There's a chance that among the other multiplicity of factors influencing the granting of accreditation, the fact that Ogden Schools officials decided to apply the meat cleaver to media-specialized school librarians might get ultimately lost in the accreditation shuffle. And yes: The situation is clear; hard choices need to be made. Despite an ample amount of "blame" to spread all around, the Schools Superintendent and the Board of Education need to seriously cut some deadwood somewhere; but why throw under the bus the leading edge, technologically-savvy librarian/media specialists, we ask?

And speakin' of deadwood, check this out.  There are no fewer than forty-one (count'em 41) Ogden School District administrators who annually pull down salaries in excess of six figures, according to the wonderfully ever-informative utahsright.com website:

• Utah's Right to Know - Salaries - Ogden School District

OSD Administrator Payday

Hell's bells, people, Ogden Schools Superintendent Smith, whose accumulated Utah classroom teaching experience doesn't encompass even one single day of his pitiful and pathetic professional life, banks an annual Utah taxpayer paycheck (with perqs) is that is even in excess of the salary of our esteemed Utah Governor Herbert, ferchripesakes.  So go figure.

Something to think about when we consider Ogden City Schools budget cuts, wethinks.

And what say you, O Gentle Ones?