BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

[TuNnL]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

I see I will have to explain this to you, so let me make this short and sweet: the eye-opening revelation was that according to Anapuni, Karen Knudsen appeared “a little clueless” to her. THAT’S IT. PERIOD. The rest of her post did not apply to my comment. Including the part about the Knudsens being related.

You, however, for some strange reason not known to man, somehow connected my comment to apply to the Knudsens relationship. Maopopo? Do you understand now?

Geez, maybe you should re-read this in the morning.

[damontucker]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

I see I will have to explain this to you, so let me make this short and sweet: the eye-opening revelation was that according to Anapuni, Karen Knudsen appeared “a little clueless” to her. THAT’S IT. PERIOD. The rest of her post did not apply to my comment. Including the part about the Knudsens being related.

You, however, for some strange reason not known to man, somehow connected my comment to apply to the Knudsens relationship. Maopopo? Do you understand now?

Geez, maybe you should re-read this in the morning.

You crack me up sometimes tunnl...I love your thoughts on some things...

nothing like a quick edit to ...well em.. never mind

Manoa

[anapuni808]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

For both of you - yes, I was impressed with Greg Knudsen. It was just her - she seemed very inept in running the committee meeting. But that is just my initial impression of her. I certainly don't know her & I'm sure she would not remember me - there were about 30 people at the meeting. It was the Education Committee meeting at the Dem. State Convention back in May. Maybe my impression was wrong - too much to discuss in too short a time? The committee meetings were kind of intense and there were some, shall we say "challenging" folks there?

oh well, its all water under the bridge now.

aren't we starting to drift a bit off topic

[anapuni808]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

Being "paid next to nothing" is not volunteer work? Even so, then just what is their pay, perks, health and retirement benefits that would entice someone to want to be on the BoE?

I think most who run for BOE office have the best interests of Hawaii's children at heart. and honestly want to do the right thing.

There is a difference between a "volunteer" and an elected official - and the pay scale doesn't really factor in to the distinction. BOE members have to run for office - volunteers are just that - volunteers. They do it for free, for love, for issues that matter to them , all kinds of reasons. I "volunteer" a lot - and I've done a lot of hard work for the groups I belong to. I'm a volunteer with my civic club (although I was elected to office twice), I chair one committee and belong to another at the Council level of civic clubs. I was a volunteer at `Iolani Palace giving tours for 5 years, I volunteer with Democratic party. and so on. No body elects us or pays us for any of this. I know many who go out and do hard physical labor to preserve historic and sacred sites. and I'm sure most folks on here are volunteers of one kind or another.

But - we aren't elected by the general public in a state run general election. and Manoa, I agree with you - the elected Student member of BOE SHOULD be able to vote. Maybe that is something that can be changed through the legislature. I'm going to be asking about that to whoever becomes my new Rep.

[craigwatanabe]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

I see I will have to explain this to you, so let me make this short and sweet: the eye-opening revelation was that according to Anapuni, Karen Knudsen appeared “a little clueless” to her. THAT’S IT. PERIOD. The rest of her post did not apply to my comment. Including the part about the Knudsens being related.

You, however, for some strange reason not known to man, somehow connected my comment to apply to the Knudsens relationship. Maopopo? Do you understand now?

Geez, maybe you should re-read this in the morning.

TuNnL...give Manoa a break there was probably rum in his birthday cake

I really think when the board comes up for re-election the focus should be squarely on who voted to to oust Jim Shon.

With Dewey Kim's resignation and the subsequent release of Jim Shon, one can pretty much understand that the powers that be in the BOE simply don't like or want public charter schools to thrive. WHY?

I believe charter schools provide the framework for an autonomous network of school boards that can function without the need of the BOE. Or more simply stated: Success of charter schools is more evidence that the DOE needs to be decentralized.

Failure will ensure the DOE will continue to provide lacklusture educational performance in our public schools and students.

Party politics? Well who supports decentralization and who doesn't? That answer will derive the answer to the question: Who supports public charter schools and who doesn't.

[anapuni808]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

This week's Honolulu Weekly had an interesting letter to the editor and the following is a short exerpt from one of the letters:

"....Fixing education is all that we can do to help this matter. I like tall blondes as much as the next person, but Karen Knudsen has accomplished absolutely nothing for not one, two, three or four years but 14 years....."

It seems I'm not the only person in town who has a poor opinion of her.

The complete letter is on pg. 3 of this weeks issue.

[SouthKona]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

You didn't know? that the knudsens were related?
I thought it was public knowledge by now?

I did not know this, and it perhaps explains why one time I had a lengthy problem with the BOE and got a lengthy non-response from Mr.K's office.

[anapuni808]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

During the meeting I attended, they tried to pretend they were not married but it did slip out when Mr. started making some comments and Mrs. had to own up to it. Very funny - but very disturbing that there is this relationship between a board member and their communications director and they attempted to hide it from everyone in this meeting. I don't care how nice Mr. K is or how good he is at his job - its a conflict and one of them should not be there. It may be commonly known at DOE/BOE levels but in the community at large, I don't think its so common.

[TuNnL]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

Anapuni, I fully understand your logic in making this assertion. However, I have to tell you there are so many of these “Greg and Karen”-style relationships in our state bureacracy, you would have to fire about 30 percent of all state workers to be fair. Personally, I see nothing wrong with this relationship as long as they are not trying to hide it. You seem to think they are, but have not provided any evidence. Unless you can prove Greg is giving Karen preferential treatment, there are no rules or regulations that would prohibit this type of situation.

[damontucker]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

ah be gawds... I hate it when I have to back tuNnL up with something...

Hawaii is the capital of nepotism...

Oahu it's not that bad... neighbor islands... you don't get jobs unless you know somebody or have some pull....

(well not literally...)

However, Hawaii is so small that if you prevented ohana from working with eachother... you might not be able to fill certain positions.

I think it's kind of honorable of the knutsens to take such a high interest in Hawaii's DOE and I would never pin anything on any members of the BOE for things that fall short at all levels of DOE.

Watch this Anapuni... just because you got me thinking... I'm gonna start a whole new thread on Nepotism and jobs in Hawaii... let's see where this goes?

Hugs..

Manoa

[damontucker]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

http://lilinote.k12.hi.us/STATE/COMM...b?OpenDocument

[craigwatanabe]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

http://lilinote.k12.hi.us/STATE/COMM...b?OpenDocument

It's sad that the BOE had to censor what should be public documents. I mean what's so important about their pubic service that cannot be scrutinized by the public? If there are damning words in those documents then it should be available for viewing.

Hiding portions of those minutes is damning in itself and places a level of mistrust among those board members.

[damontucker]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

It's sad that the BOE had to censor what should be public documents. I mean what's so important about their pubic service that cannot be scrutinized by the public? If there are damning words in those documents then it should be available for viewing.

Hiding portions of those minutes is damning in itself and places a level of mistrust among those board members.

Remember that we do have some new incoming board members... hopefully it will be a fresh start!

[GeckoGeek]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

Hiding portions of those minutes is damning in itself and places a level of mistrust among those board members.

It appears to me that it has to do with privacy issues. Just because the board acts on it doesn't mean that Jim has his rights to privacy in HR matters waved. If you read the attachment it's quite clear who made the motion and how they voted. The actions of the board is public. Everything else that could possibly give hints as to the reason has been redacted.

[TuNnL]

Re: BOE fires charter schools’ Jim Shon

...If you read the attachment it's quite clear who made the motion and how they voted.

What’s far more interesting to me, is that Board member Cec Heftel is not recognized as having participated in the final vote. Even to abstain. Was he in the bathroom? Or did he run for the hills, not wanting his name associated with a controversial decision?