1. The apparent move by
Gunnison City Council to tran-
sition into a new city manager
has ruffled quite a few feathers.
A former councilman publicly
aired his concerns over the han-
dling of the situation last week.
Yet, if you’ve paid attention to
city politics over the course of
the past year, it shouldn’t come
as a major surprise.
During a tension-filled per-
formance review before council
late last year, City Manager Ken
Coleman cited a rift that he
believed had developed between
himself and city leaders, stating
that he may be “the cog in the
wheel that needs to change.”
Even prior to this past spring’s
election, candidates recognized
that if elected they would likely
be among the council to usher in
a new city manager.
It’s understandable that coun-
cil members would want change
to be as smooth as possible. It’s
even understandable that some
councilors’ envisioned transi-
tion timeline may not match that
which Coleman had in mind.
Rather, we take issue with the
means by which this apparent
transition is being pursued.
An open records request by
the Times reveals that current
councilors have pushed the
boundaries of acceptable behav-
ior under open meetings law.
Such laws exist to ensure that
public business is not conducted
secretly. It’s required that meet-
ings be posted at which a major-
ity of an elected body, or a “quo-
rum,” is present. We’ll come back
to that concept.
Records show that Oct. 12
Mayor Richard Hagan broached
the topic of retirement in an
e-mail to Coleman, suggesting
that council discuss the matter
in executive session “so that all
can hear the same things.” Why
that executive session hasn’t
occurred, we’re not sure.
Instead, on Oct. 24 Hagan
indicated in an e-mail to
Councilman Bob Drexel that
the mayor had “completed my
one on one conversations with
council” and that he hoped “to
sit down with Ken to plan the
direction forward.”
Again in an e-mail to Coleman
Oct. 26, Hagan stated that he had
“been able to visit with all coun-
cilors (a couple twice). …”
Jeff Roberts, executive direc-
tor for the Colorado Freedom
of Information Coalition, calls
these sort of “one on one” meet-
ings between elected officials a
“walking quorum.”
“Two members of the coun-
cil, or the mayor and a council
member, meet privately in a
series of separate meetings to
discuss the same topic in an
attempt to build a consensus or
an understanding,” he explained.
“If one council member conveys
the thoughts of a second council
member to a third member, then
it may be a violation.”
Short of a Gunnison councilor
admitting that the thoughts of
another member were relayed to
him or her in one of these meet-
ings, we’ll never know if such a
violation occurred.
The potential missteps don’t
seem to end there. E-mail
records reflect Coleman and
councilors Drexel and Leia
Morrison attempting to arrange
a meeting earlier this month for
the purpose of “negotiation.”
Negotiations for what it’s not
clear, but someone apparently
put the brakes on the attempt.
Morrison indicated in an
e-mail minutes before the
scheduled meeting that she
“was just informed that our
City Attorney will be handling
negotiations.”
It appears that the cart has
been placed before the horse.
In our view, a better way to
handle the entire matter would
have been through Coleman’s
annual employment review,
scheduled for Dec. 8. Or, if
the matter is so pressing that
it needs immediate attention,
convene an executive session.
There are certain things —
such as personnel matters —
that open meetings law allows
to be kept confidential because
they shouldn’t be made pub-
lic. In fact, such matters dis-
cussed in executive session are
required to be kept confiden-
tial.
But apparently, in the acro-
batics of attempting to conduct
a series of one-on-one meet-
ings over an extended period of
time, those closest to the situ-
ation have been talking a little
too freely. Clearly, the rumor
mill is churning.
In addition to apprehension
cited by the former councilor,
this seems to have resulted in
undue angst among city staff,
some of whom fear that their
own jobs are in jeopardy.
We can’t fathom why coun-
cilors would not want to dis-
cuss such a pressing matter
freely among themselves in a
confidential forum.
Unless, that is, the attempt
is to sway the opinion of some
before council convenes on the
subject.
Unfortunately, that’s at odds
with the very spirit — and pos-
sibly the letter — of open meet-
ings law.
City manager situation mishandled
OPINION
970.641.1414
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2015 Member2015
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2015
VOTEMY
Just a few years ago, a student
who earned a high school diplo-
ma in Utah may have had very
different skills than a Colorado
high school graduate.
Even within the state of
Colorado, high school standards
varied. Students in rural areas
such as the Gunnison Valley
received a very different edu-
cation than students in urban
districts.
Thus, the idea of Common
Core was born to standardize
benchmarks for K-12 students
for reading and math and
replaced the varying levels of
quality across the country.
Overall, the Common Core
standards upped the ante for all
students no matter their loca-
tion, increasing rigor by asking
students to think and reason
using “why” and “how” instead
of just the “what.”
In 2013, Colorado began
implementing the Common
Core standards in English lan-
guage arts and math, joining 42
other states across the country.
New standards require new
methods to assess learning.
The PARCC (Partnership for
Assessment of Readiness for
College and Careers) test was
developed through cooperation
between state governors, busi-
ness leaders and non-profit edu-
cation reform organizations.
Last week, the first round of
PARCC scores was released for
the nation and for the state of
Colorado. With any standard-
ized test, it is important to take a
macro view of the data instead of
assuming that the numbers give
the whole story. In Colorado, 43
percent of fourth grade students
met or exceeded expectations in
the language arts section of the
PARCC. Only 37 percent of 10th
grade students met or exceeded
expectations. Students actually
did worse in math. While 37 per-
cent of third grade students met
or exceeded expectations, eighth
grade students fared much
worse with only 19 percent
meeting the minimum expecta-
tion.
It is easy to look at those num-
bers and proclaim the failure
of the Common Core and the
failure of our education system.
Before that happens, we need to
consider a number of factors.
The 2014-2015 school year
was the first year the PARCC test
was given to Colorado students
and is therefore a baseline year
for data collection. It is impos-
sible to compare scores from
last school year to other stan-
dardized, nationally-normed
tests which assessed students
on completely different stan-
dards. We must also consider the
timeline. Colorado only began
implementing Common Core in
2013 and not all schools and dis-
tricts implemented it right away.
Teachers and administrators
needed training and professional
development time to adapt their
curriculum (Common Core does
not dictate curriculum, rather it
focuses on skills students need
to be successful in college and
careers). Students may have had
little exposure to the standards
tested on the PARCC. Lastly,
Common Core increases rigor
for all students so it is to be
expected that the first round of
tests will produce mediocre or
poor results.
Overwhelmingly, teach-
ers across the nation support
PARCC and its correlation with
Common Core standards. A
group of teachers, composed of
current and former state teach-
ers of the year, recently conclud-
ed that PARCC tests are better
than any of the standardized
nationally-normed assessments
used previously. They found that
PARCC did a better job reflecting
desired skills and knowledge and
maintained the right amount of
complexity for each grade level.
If we were to ask those teachers
their opinions on the low PARCC
scores from last school year, I
imagine they would give the
same reasons as above: profes-
sional development, time and
exposure and the introduction of
an entirely new test.
Any time we look at data,
we should examine it from all
angles. In the past, scores from
all students in one grade level
would be compared with scores
from all students in the same
grade level the previous year.
Now that we have preliminary
PARCC data, we can use that
information to show student
progress over time. Instead of
comparing one group’s perfor-
mance with an entirely different
group’s performance, we need to
measure how a group improves
over time.
Common Core and PARCC
testing level the playing field
for all students. Instead of ask-
ing students in one state to
learn a different set of skills
than students in another
state, we can now compare
the performance of students
across schools, districts and
states. Students in all schools
— alternative, charter, tradi-
tional, online — are expected
to perform to the standards
and those standards are higher
than before. We need to give
schools and our students time
to demonstrate proficiency. We
need to examine the data with
objectivity and understand of
the history of Common Core.
Most importantly, we need
to continue to maintain high
expectations for all students in
all areas of the state — some-
thing we can do with the help
of the Common Core standards
and PARCC testing.
(Eryn Barker is the director
of GOAL Academy — an online
school in Gunnison — and is
a participant in the America
Achieves Fellowship for
Teachers and Principals.)
Eryn Barker
Patience needed on state assessments
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