At Monday night’s School Committee meeting (March 10), several audience comments caught and held my attention. Drawing on them, and on the experience of the past several months, I offer the following personal “closing statement” that I would like to have been able to pull together at the time, in the interest of best serving the education of Wayland’s children.
“The Loker community is owed an apology”
I am truly sorry that we ended up divided, as that was of course never my intent. While I knew that one neighborhood would end up disappointed, it was always my hope that there would be a mood of understanding and acceptance. The closeness of the decision would have made such an outcome at best a challenge; the course and speed of the process only aggravated the emotions already in play.
If I had the process to design from the start, would I have held off for a year? No, I would not. My decision-making has been driven from the start by the desire to approve the override and provide for the education of the Wayland Public Schools as a whole. Starting earlier, an option that information available to us last summer did not suggest, would have been the better path.
Am I satisfied that one neighborhood is bearing the weight of the reconfiguration. No, I am not. In my opinion, however, the only “shared” option—to its credit, offering an additional $180,000 savings above the selected configuration’s $400,000 savings—would have been the much more disruptive, and, from an educational perspective, not clearly preferable “grade level” model with K in one building, 1-2 in a second, and 3-5 in a third.
“Thinking that isn’t deep, isn’t thinking”
My 2007 Annual Town Meeting comment poorly characterizing one small aspect of the Happy Hollow/Loker comparison elicited the “isn’t thinking” remark. In isolation, fair enough. Unlike business decision-making that takes place behind closed doors, however, town government conducts its debate in public, in real time, and in the face of sometimes long gaps between events.
Responses to questions therefore take one of two directions: on-the-spot and sometimes flawed, or delayed and beyond usefulness. In this case, the School Committee might have noted the question (regarding its intentions for Happy Hollow), held a discussion at its next meeting, and … well, been left with no real way to communicate an answer, timely or otherwise.
Instead, I did my best to answer the question on the Committee’s behalf. My error, which I unhesitantly acknowledged, did not affect the decision facing the meeting at the time, nor did it affect my detailed consideration during the more recent school configuration deliberation.
"Are you proud?"
I approached this difficult decision openly, honestly, and with the best interests of Wayland’s children in mind. At each step along the way, I considered the available information and my understanding of the overall process and its time line. Whenever possible, I opted to adapt the process.
Over the past few months, I engaged with everyone who elected to weigh in. I thank those who took the fair and respectful tack, regardless of whether we agreed. I regret that some saw fit instead to sling vitriol and mischaracterization, to the disservice of the schools and the town. In the end, while I’m dissatisfied that we failed to uncover a more artful path to a destination at which I submit we were best served to arrive, I’m proud both of my own role and that of my fellow School Committee members for sticking to the high road in principled pursuit of a worthy and still very much attainable aspiration.
Thank you.
If you have any questions or comments, call me at 508-353-3175 or
send me email at dieffenbach @ alum.mit.edu.