Step Up Group Asks El to Step Down as APS Chair; Several Southwest Atlanta Parents on List

Dear Cascade Patch:

We (Step Up or Step Down) have been so appreciative of your attention to the issues facing Atlanta Public Schools and want to share with you that today our group has asked Khaatim Sherrer El to immediately step down as Chairman of the School Board.

Please find below the e-mail our group sent to him this morning, and a full press release attached that explains our goals and intentions.

Again, thank you for your attention to this critical issue facing our city.  Please contact any of us with your questions.

March 18, 2011

Chairman El,

Our group has attended every public session held by the Board since January 24 and has logged countless hours of notes and observations.  We have grown increasingly concerned over the past few weeks that the progress made by the Board is not the substantive change SACS is requiring as you move through the process necessary to remove our high schools from accredited probation.

The substance of the e-mail communication from Ms. Butler-Burks, released by the AJC yesterday, confirmed our worst suspicions -- that the public face of the Board's work is merely superficial window dressing.  At this time, we implore you to relinquish your role as Chair -- to step down immediately and call for new elections of officers with a two-thirds vote.  We ask that both you and Ms. Butler-Burks recuse yourselves from candidacy in this election, as you suggested you would do in your November interview with 11-Alive News.

We  began this process with optimism and with good faith that your leadership could move the system in the right direction in the best interests of its students.  As it is apparent that the factionalism and distrust continues amid your important governance processes, we believe it is imperative that the Board move forward with new leadership and that both you and Ms. Butler-Burks agree to put the children first and step aside as leaders on the Board.

Sincerely,

The Organizing Members of Step Up or Step Down

Yvette Boulware
Dawn Brockington-Shaw
Alka Citrin
Julie Davis Salisbury
Nicole Foerschler Horn
Anne McGlamry
Leslie Myers-Joseph
Kandy Outlaw
Mary Palmer
Lisa Weldon

ATLANTA – The organizing membership of Atlanta School Board: Step Up or Step Down called today for Board Chair Khaatim Sherrer El to immediately relinquish his leadership post and for the Board to hold new elections for officers.  The group is suggesting a two-thirds vote to select the new leadership and that both El and former Board Chair LaChandra Butler Burks recuse themselves from election. 

Step Up or Step Down cites the continued in-fighting and power struggles between members of the Atlanta Board of Education as evidenced in an e-mail chain between LaChandra Butler Burks and Chairman El that was released by the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC) yesterday. 

“We are appalled at the open display of animosity and total lack of professional leadership, given the seriousness of the accreditation issue facing Atlanta Public Schools,” says Julie Davis Salisbury, an organizing member of Step Up or Step Down.  “While our system is under such intense scrutiny with our children’s futures on the line, we cannot sit by and witness this unprofessional and unproductive behavior continue among our governing Board,” she notes. 

“SACS is looking for clear evidence that the Board is putting the children first as it works through the governance process, and this recent disclosure is actually clear evidence that they are not, ” states Salisbury.

The Step Up or Step Down group, which represents close to 1500 individual public education stakeholders in neighborhoods across the City, believes that Chairman El has ignored specific guidance cited in the SACS report issued January 24.   The report calls Mr. El’s leadership style into question in at least two sections, noting its impact on “the effective operation of the system” and that he has “personally staged media events, without Board approval or knowledge.”   These two issues were again brought to light, along with others, in the e-mail obtained by the AJC.   

“Our request for action at this time is something Mr. El actually suggested himself during an interview with 11-Alive News last November,” Salisbury said.  In the interview, El said, “That was actually my suggestion very early on, is that both myself and my predecessor, Mrs. Burks – we bring some baggage in governing this Board, and providing leadership.  And it would be great if we both just step aside and allow mediation to work its course and from that emerge with new leadership.”  The link to that interview may be found at http://www.11alive.com/rss/rss_story.aspx?storyid=161949

The Step Up or Step Down group, formed January 21 in response to the SACS accreditation report, has attended and monitored every public session the School Board has held since that time and has logged hours of notes and observations.   In public commentary the group made during Monday night’s meeting, two of its organizing members cited specific concerns that progress to date was more superficial than genuine and that side agendas and internal discord continued to rule the day.

Dawn Brockington-Shaw, a parent with children in West Manor Elementary and Young Middle schools, told the Board, “The clock is ticking toward your April 29 progress report and we are concerned that real progress against your core issues is not being made.  SACS has asked for more than superficial change.  Please be clear about your efforts, and assure the public that this is happening.” 

Step Up or Step Down is a movement of parents, students, teachers and business owners from neighborhoods across Atlanta, working with the common cause of preserving the accreditation of Atlanta’s public high schools.  With more than 215,000 views to its Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/StepUpOrStepDown) since inception in late January, the group has gained momentum as a collective voice serving as a watchdog to the Board. 

The page has 827 followers and the group has received hundreds of e-mails from other parents wanting information.  For more information, please visit the group’s new website to sign up for regular updates at www.StepUpOrStepDown.org or send an e-mail to StepUpBoardofEd@gmail.com.

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