Two Can Be As Bad As One

A little Three Dog Night to keep the home fires burning:

"One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
Two can be as bad as one, its the loneliest number since the number one"

***********

As I play keyboard critiquing of the local HCDS, cultivated on years of resentment to unprofessional treatment, every once in a while I wonder if I truly did experience more than my share of "isolated incidents".

How would one know they were isolated if one wasn't keeping track? I know I started keeping track after six years. I know for six years I gave benefit of the doubt many many times, continuing to trust that I was being dealt with professionally.

I think school administrators are provided the "isolated defense" strategy in Administration 101 through Administration 599 under "Strategies to Minimize Credible Critiques."

Somehow I missed this post until today:

"......April, do not believe any number the county gives you. They skew exams to fit their agenda and this will be no different. ...." (anon - March 22, 2008 12:51 PM)

So now there are at least two of us on record for questioning the reliability of numbers.

I will continue to label my posts, but I have frequently written about my perception of how HCDS relates to "numbers", and of course this article fed right into my perception.

It may or not have any bearing on the subject, but a previous principal would have first hand knowledge of how "numbers" are generated and recorded. Therefore, if there were any shenanigans going on, a previous principal should know how to ferret it out.

What should be concerning for all of us is at what point do those who are tracking numbers and relying on their reliability know if and when to decipher fact from fiction?

I have written about how a lot of my personal experiences with the HCDS was like looking through smoke and mirrors or playing a shell game, and "the nailing jello to a wall" difficulty in trying to obtain accountability.

I know I was "just a parent" and had no business complaining about how the system operated, but I do wonder while professional decisions are being made about how to manage the "x" largest school district and one that claims it is a national model for some latest accolade, who knows what the real numbers are?