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Wednesday, April 21, 2010

The Power of the Self-deluded

Some years ago I had a friend who had been a school board member for over two decades. Through several conversations with her, I learned that school board presidents don’t have any more power than any other board member. Their duties are to sign checks so district bills can be paid, set the agenda, and run the meetings. Unfortunately, the Hickman Mills school board president believes her powers are far greater. For the first meeting of the new board, she tried to assign seats, like the board members are kindergarten students.


What she didn’t realize is that Debbie Aiman, who has been on the board for two years, didn’t want to sit in her ‘assigned’ seat. Instead, she wanted to sit in the seat ‘assigned’ to Darrell Curls, who was elected to the board last year. Mr. Curls didn’t appreciate that. He parked himself in the seats reserved for the audience and kept yelling that he wanted to sit in his assigned seat and Ms. Aiman had better move.


George Flesher, who has been on the board forever, offered to trade seats, but Ms. Mims, the board president, said he couldn’t do that, Ms. Aiman would have to go to whatever seat she had been assigned. With leadership like that, it’s no wonder the Hickman Mills School district isn’t doing any better than it is.


As hard as it is to believe, I’m told this arguing over who would sit where went on for almost 30 minutes with Mr. Curls sitting in the audience seats the whole time and Ms. Mims asking for a ruling from the school district’s attorney, as if where board members sit were a legal matter. I have to wonder why Ms. Mims believes she can or should treat the rest of the board members like kindergarteners and why she believes that is more important than actually being a good role model for the rest of the district. I also have to wonder if Mr. Curls, who wants to be elected to the house of representatives, would represent his district by acting as childishly as he did over where he would sit.


9 comments:

Anonymous said...

John Sharp and Cathy Jolly are mentors to Curls and Mims that can explain why SKC is such a mess.

Mr. M said...

I'm not surprised at this behavior. I've heard about the way those meetings are run. Parents have no voice in what happens there. Why they kept her as president is any one's guess. It's definitely not in the best interest of the school district. Curls is an embarrassment. You say he's running for a higher office. Lord help us. Look at who the board continues to keep as a superintendant. Isn't there anyone on that board that can see the forest for the trees? I've got to get my son to move out of there. My grandchildren deserve better.

Anonymous said...

I've never seen a president that was so confused, rambles on about who knows what and can't keep her place in a meeting. More people should go to the meetings just to watch. It's crazy.

Anonymous said...

I really didn't know. What does John Sharp have to do with it anyway.

Anonymous said...

I feel so sorry for the teachers. They don't respect any of them, only the supers favoriets. It should be criminal the way the treat the people who work there. My advice is DON'T DO IT. Flip hamburgers but don't work in that district.

Anonymous said...

Sharp has more than likely promised to get Curls elected as a state rep next year. They've become quite
buddy buddy. Mims is probably the same because she's already made statements about being in Jeff City in 2012.

It's amazing how people drink the Sharp koolaid and think nothing can be accomplished without his blessing; even more so if they want to run for public office.

Fearless Leader said...

I have some insider information about the Hickman Mills school board, too, and I can verify that John Sharp tries to throw his weight around with them, and he loves to play political games. When I voted in the most recent school board election, my selections were made with a preference for those who would be independent of Councilman Sharp. However, I think the board is going to be almost under his total control in the new term, and with directors Mims and Curls competing for his favors. That is really ironic, given how Curls opposed Sharp for office a few years ago, and Mims supported Curls.

Anonymous said...

This whole school district is going to h - - - in a hand- basket. Lord only knows what will happen now that Ms. Mims has April Cushing in her hip pocket. I am soooo glad my children had the good senses to buy their homes in Raymore and my grandchildren won't be attending Hickman Mills schools.

Anonymous said...

It is so sad that our school board doesn't care about our kids or our community. I have got to get us out of here. The facade of quality education is wearing thin and it's all because of the board president and the superintendent. So very sad.