At the regular Greenville City Council meeting last Tuesday concerned citizens, state representatives, and county officials came before the board to discuss the recent failing assessment of the Greenville Public School District and what, if anything, the mayor and council are doing about it.
Representative Willie Bailey said he was sick when he heard that Greenville had an F rating in the statewide accountability rating for 2023-2024.
“There are 144 school districts in Mississippi with two failing districts, when I heard the news about that, I just knew Greenville was not going to be a part of it,” Bailey said. “But lo and behold, Greenville was right there at the bottom, I got sick when I heard that, and I can’t rest and I have not rested since then.”
Bailey said as the city fathers and mothers the council and mayor were responsible.
He then reminded them that when an industry comes to a community the first thing they do is access the schools.
“If you have failing schools they don’t even look at you,” Bailey said. “I’m concerned because I raise hell down there at the legislature, and I won’t have any legitimacy with the legislature when I raise concerns about the conditions and standards of education of the state if my district is an F.”
Bailey said usually when a district is failing it’s because of lack of money, but that was not the case with Greenville.
“Greenville has more money than any other district around them, so it ain't about money,” Bailey said. “Representative John Hines and I talked to the superintendent, and we talked to the state department of education. But in the meantime, attorney Erick Hawkins and Pastor Frank Hall came and met with the city council because they knew what we now know, that you have a lot to do with it.”
Bailey said if the mayor and council members felt like they didn’t have anything to do with the schools then every one of them needed to resign because the children of the community wouldn’t have anyone to fight for them if the council didn’t fight for them.
“We can talk about that school board all day long, but that won’t fix it,” Bailey said. “It has to start here because if the school has an F, guess what, there are a lot more coming, this community has an F, and the city fathers have an F too.”
Pastor Frank Hall said he wasn’t there to place blame on any one entity, that he was there to ask what could be done to fix the problem.
“The old cliche it takes a village to raise a child, I think it does. It takes all of us,” Hall said. “I volunteer in the school district, in fact, I’m a member of the steering committee to make things better and I work with Dr. Monroe. I’m willing to do what it takes.”
Hall said there are a lot of factors in turning the district around, but the council needed to do something.
“You, the powers that be, I appeal to you, let’s do something,” Hall said. “No one should be placed over our children that doesn’t have a profound interest in educating our children. There is no place for politics in raising our children.”
Hall said after talking to teachers in the district and seeing for himself, that some of the buildings are not conducive to learning. He listed things like mold growing in the halls, paint peeling off walls, lack of air conditioning, and a closed gymnasium.
Hall closed out his time at the lectern by saying it had been suggested to him that the school board be elected rather than appointed,
“I have talked with some of the legislators and they said it was a possibility, it can happen,” Hall said. “I don’t know if that’s a solution, but that’s some accountability if we go that route.”
Willie Griffin, the Washington County Board of Supervisors attorney, said he had 35 years of experience as a school’s attorney and for the council to surrender their duty to appoint school board members was not a good idea.
“Elections are nothing but popularity contests,” Griffin said. “You’ll end up with the same problem you have with an appointed board, a popularity contest.”
He recommended the council create a commission or committee made up of retired educators, business owners, community activists, and parents whose job it would be to carefully select and vet prospective board members. Because the council and the mayor don’t have the time it takes to find quality people for the job Griffin said.
“When you don’t have the time to properly vet school board members, you get what we call friendship, kinship, and relationship appointments,” Griffin said. “It’s bad for business, and it’s bad for our children.”
District Three Supervisor and President of the Washington County Board of Supervisors Carl McGee said there wasn’t a lot of time to make something happen.
“If the state comes in here tomorrow, the first thing they’re going to do is remove that school board,” McGee said. “This council has interfered too much. You picked your friends and didn’t pick the best people to put down there, and now we’re paying the cost. There is nothing about GPSD that says stability. Look how many superintendents you’ve had over the last 15 years. That's because of this council. It’s not because of bad superintendents. That school board has failed, and you all have failed.”
McGee said if he were the mayor, he would find out legally what it would take to dissolve the board and do what Griffin recommended, use a committee of people who care about the education of the community’s children to select a new one.
“We can't compete. I don't care what we do on the board of supervisors. This district has failed and here we are so many weeks later, and all you want to do is talk. It’s time out for talking. We need some clear decisive action with a clear plan and a clear vision to get this educational process turned around. Stop sitting on your hands, stop interfering when you shouldn’t interfere, but now somebody needs to take some action, ” McGee said. “The community is in trouble. You’ve got to take some action. Stop playing. Stop trying to hurt somebody's feelings. If I asked this council today what the strategy to address education starting tomorrow, but I'm not going to ask you that. You all have a job to do, and these people don’t have time to wait. They need something to happen real quick. You can’t be afraid. This is about business, it's about survival, it's about being competitive. Right now GPSD is not, good luck.”
Sheriff Melton Gaston Sr. said he was there representing the Sheriff’s Department, the citizens of Washington County, and his grandchildren in the public school system, and he was concerned about what was going on with the kids in the community.
“I think the city needs to get involved in it, and we’ll see if we can get involved in it,” Gaston said. “I think all of us parents need to get involved in it too. I’m invested to do whatever I need to do to help the city council and the school board.”
Representative John Hines, who was driving from Jackson to attend the council meeting still hadn’t arrived, so Mayor Errick Simmons thanked everyone who spoke to the council, and addressed a few of the ideas put forth.
“We’ve heard you loud and clear, and the council will consider whether the board should be elected or appointed,” Simmons said. “We will take all of the comments under advisement and confidently move forward in the best interests of our children but also of all of you.”
Minutes later Hines arrived at the meeting and was allowed to interrupt the CEO of the Washington County Economic Alliance, Justin Burch’s presentation to the council.
Hines said the problem with GPSD is one of inconsistency.
“We’ve had 8 superintendents in 10 years. I don’t know of any business that could run like that,” Hines said. “So we have a problem with governance and leadership.”
After talking to school board members and the superintendent, Hines said Dr. Janice Monroe gave him a document that showed the school ratings over the last 8 years.
“2023-2024 F, 2022-2023 C, 2021-2022 D, 2020-2021 F, 2019-2020 F, 2018-2019 F, 2017-2018 D,” Hines said. “Now that’s strictly on the school board, and who they have chosen to be in charge of this district.”
Hines said he was embarrassed by those accountability reports. Hines pointed to Burch and said we have a guy trying to bring businesses to this community, and supervisors trying to provide opportunities.
“What we’re leaning on is the GPSD, because that’s where our workforce comes from,” Hines said. “I don’t know about you, but if your house is tore-up from the floor-up, I know you don’t want an F-rated carpenter working on your house.”
No Fortune 500 company is going to come here, Hinds said, and wanted to know who from the F-rated school district would be able to operate the new $1.2 billion powerplant.
“This isn’t a reflection on Dr. Monroe, because she inherited this, and this was garbage before she got it,” Hines said. “If you want to sit in those seats, you have to take the good with the bad and address them both.”
What was truly disheartening Hines said was the silence coming from the council about the district's failure. But when there is something good they would speak up about that without hesitation.
“You all ain’t said nothing publicly, you’ve had private conversations, we all have,” Hines said. “But publicly we need to fix this district, and the community needs to know we can.”
Hines said almost all of the elementary schools in the district have an F rating, which means the children aren’t reading.
The statistics show that if your child can’t read by third grade the likelihood of them becoming criminals goes way up Hines said, and he received reports from all of the area’s colleges that show the children that graduate from GPSD schools and go on to college have to take remedial courses because half of them can’t read either.
“I don’t know what your desire is, but the community calls I’ve received means a change needs to take place,” Hines said. “Dr. Monroe inherited this, and is overwhelmed with it, but we’ve had a consistent school board for the last 10 or 15 years, except for one or two people, and they’re garbage. The folks that were on there, don’t bring them back because they were garbage too. The proof is in the pudding. So if we’re going to do new folks, let’s do all new folks, because ineffective leadership is ineffective leadership, and garbage is garbage. Thank you for your time.
At the end of the meeting, the council gave their perspective on what was said about the failing district.
Ward One Councilman Al Brock said he shared the feelings of the community, and the council was going to see what they could do, because regardless of anything else Greenville needed to keep moving forward.
Ward Four Councilwoman Lurann Thomas-Kingdom said she thought the council chambers should have been filled with parents, grandparents, and families to show their concern for our children.
“Because charity starts at home, and spreads abroad, at least that’s what I was taught,” Thomas-Kingdom said. “I believe the children are our future, and we love our children.”
Ward Five Councilman Dr. Bill Brozovich said he feels like the council has a responsibility to do something about the school board.
“I know we put them on there and then we say can’t do anything, and we can’t,” Brozovich said. “But we can have meetings with them, and with these guys that were here.”
Brozovich said he liked the idea Griffin suggested because a committee would have time to interview candidates for a month or two and not just one day like the council does.
The Greenville Public School district board of superintendents held a meeting on Thursday.
On Friday after the meeting, Drew Newsom, the president of the GPSD board issued a statement regarding the city council meeting.
“The GPSD board of trustees is very well aware of our accreditation status. Every board member is personally invested in the success of our school district,” Newsom said. “We already have plans and people in place that will help secure that our district is on the right track to success.”
At the end of that meeting Thursday the board entered into executive session.
After about 30 minutes the board clerk called GPSD superintendent Dr. Janice Monroe, into the meeting.
The entire session lasted more than an hour and at the end of it, Monroe left without a word.
