Our View

Our View

State takeover of Earle best move for community long term

It is simply incomprehensible how the bureaucrats within the Arkansas Department of Education allowed the Earle School District to get to the point it did before being placed on the fiscal distress list and forced to be taken under state control.

You know it is bad enough that the district will have to somehow repay the federal government $300,299 that was spent on unallowable expenses in 2015-1016 for which there is no paperwork as well has having to return another $303,436 of Title I money if the state appointed superintendent can’t find a way to redirect it to use for allowable expenses.

These are our tax dollars, regardless of whether or not it came from Washington or from our state coffers. What we’re saying is that this is a large sum of money that we suspect will be difficult to come up with based on the negative financial situation this district is currently in.

But, with that said, let’s bring up a more disgusting revelation that was made known by state appointed Superintendent Dr. Richard Wilde. Based on district records less than 25 percent of Earle high school students have high enough SAT scores to avoid having to take remedial college courses.

It is certainly bad enough that the district was found in serious violation for unallowable spending of state and federal tax dollars but, to learn that less than 25 percent of high school students passed the SAT test reveals a situation that will be harder to resolve than fixing the financial mess.

This poor student achievement is the direct result of having so-called teachers unable to properly do the job they were hired to do. Furthermore, we’re told, the district has a few teachers who have college degrees in subject area, but are not state certified, which state law does allow school districts to have teachers in the classroom without being fully licensed. It would seem to us that If that is the case then this Act 1240 law is basically irrelevant. So why is there a law supposedly requiring certification when it doesn’t mean a thing to hire teachers that aren’t certified?

Alone this same issue, the biggest challenge Wilde faces in dealing with providing quality education is hiring top notch teachers, which at this point has been proven to be near impossible.

The problem these rural small school districts face is attracting good employees which is a critical element in making sure students receive the best education possible.

What Wilde needs to consider is dangling that proverbial carrot such as offering special incentives or bonuses to qualified teachers seeking a career position. It also might be considered to offer rent subsidy to teachers interested in taking a position with the Earle School District.

We find this whole situation both unfortunate and ridiculous in light of the fact this could have been avoided if those overseers on the state level had been more diligent in their audit responsibilities as well as student performance oversight.

Blame can certainly also be placed on the elected school board for absolutely failing to know what their superintendent was doing and just exactly how this district was being run.

The real victims in all this are the students who were being denied a proper education.