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- This is coverage of some recently-released research on the state of the “institution” of elected school boards in the wake of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. If I were one of those elected school board members (imagine!) interviewed for the report, I think I’d be offended by this piece. It’s got to be some kind of misunderstanding to say that school boards were helplessly overwhelmed by their Covid-era responsibilities and “oh by the way, we don’t really run school districts anyway”, and also won’t the state please stop intervening and let us do our jobs “the right way”, whatever we say that is? If this inconsistent mishmash of thought is indeed an accurate presentation of how elected school board members are feeling about the gig right now, I am at a loss to understand how we’re supposed to take them seriously on anything they might say. (WYSO-FM, Yellow Springs, 4/14/25) No such surprises here: It’s impossible for me to take any of Ohio’s voucher grouchers seriously—especially the ones who like to go on the record. And this latest piece only confirms the utility of that position. I mean, I read every one of the 2,500+ words (!?), but you could probably stop well before then and get the gist. (Columbus Dispatch, 4/13/25)
- This is a piece about free universal pre-K in Toledo, which barely ever existed and now seems highly unlikely to continue even in that evanescent form. It was an effort by the nonprofit organization HOPE Toledo that never found the funding from corporate or community sectors to support itself. And if that name sounds familiar to you, you have clearly been reading these clips for too long. Yep. The seed money for HOPE Toledo came from former Frogtown resident and current Chicago marijuana entrepreneur Pete Kadens. In the margins of this piece, we also learn that Willie’s college scholarship program has also gone (very quietly, I might suggest) up in smoke. The last recipients were graduates of Toledo City Schools’ Scott High School Class of 2022, although the program hasn’t fully stubbed out its operations because the plan is for those kids and their families to be supported through graduation. After that, the whole thing will go poof. Sad. (Toledo Blade, 4/12/25)
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