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In an encouraging twist, the Wilkes-Barre Area School Board’s recent meetings resemble a buzzed-about dance club on opening night – bodies mashed in the main venue and a line stretching out the door.
Not since district officials adopted a school dress code have so many people shown up – and spoken out – regarding matters of public education in Luzerne County’s largest city. This time, the overflow crowd is due to the board majority’s decision earlier this year to eventually consolidate two of the district’s three high schools.
If that’s the topic it takes to revive citizen participation in a district sorely deserving of public scrutiny and input, so be it.
School directors wisely agreed Monday night, after a resident’s urging, to relocate future public sessions from the district’s administration building to a more accommodating space. Beyond disapproving of the obvious seating shortage, attendees rightly noted the acoustics in the board room can be horrible – with the directors’ comments often drown out by the drone of an air-conditioner.
Big turnouts at Luzerne County school board and municipal meetings admittedly inspire those of us who work in newsrooms; it’s what democracy is supposed to look like. Citizens everywhere, but especially in corruption-tainted Northeastern Pennsylvania, continually should strive to keep their elected officials under the microscope. And that requires showing up at the forums where public business gets decided.
To those men and women taking the initiative to be at Wilkes-Barre Area’s meetings this year, bravo. Keep up your commitment.
To the vast majority of district residents who don’t participate, we ask: What will it take?
One might have hoped that multiple corruption-related arrests and guilty pleas of school directors, as occurred here starting in 2009, would compel people to take greater interest in board meetings. Or the scales might have been tipped by an increasingly diverse student body guided by a lily-white faculty. Or the decades-long slide in several school buildings’ conditions. Or rising school taxes. Or hirings influenced by nepotism. Or any of the other egregious behavior that has happened in this district.
Regrettably, until the dustup over consolidation, the board’s meetings typically were sparsely attended, the air punctuated by only the clicks from a reporter’s laptop keyboard.
Let’s hope the current debate over Coughlin and Meyers high schools inspires continued public participation; much can be gained if area residents further involve themselves in not only where, but how, the district provides educations and other opportunities to its students.
These board meetings needn’t be adversarial. Adults on both sides of the school directors table simply need to better communicate, giving each other some credit, understanding and, when required, more space.