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EDITORIAL
Board Member: BOE is No Social Club
By Nathalie Yafet, Hillside School Board members
Supermarket tabloids compete for our attention every
week with gossipy stories about actors, politicians
and aliens and our local Worrall newspaper is learning a trick
or two from their techniques.
The Worrall publication stated that the board retreat was
cancelled "after it couldn't get members to show up."
The truth is that six board members were fully
committed to attending the retreat and three board
members had family issues which came up suddenly. Our
board president rightly felt that an effective board
retreat should have all members present and so made
the decision to cancel. The retreat will most likely
be held in October because of the limited number of
dates that New Jersey School Board facilitators have
available to work with us.
It was also alleged that I "accused" a board member of
violating a New Jersey School Board Association
policy. This is completely false. I never made such
a statement as New Jersey School Boards has no
policies governing any local school board actions.
What I actually said is that I am the Hillside
delegate for The Union County Educational Services
Commission and their business administrator polls the
board members on the morning of the scheduled meeting
in order to ensure a quorum so that additional
attorney fees are not incurred and other board members
and the public are not inconvenienced. I went on to
suggest that perhaps our business administrator's
office or the superintendent's office should do the
same.
The article goes on to say that Sergio Bichao sent
another board member "a nasty email." Mr. Bichao was
not called to give his side of the story.
Responsible journalists check their facts and give
people who are accused of something a chance to
respond to those accusations. This was not done.
Sergio Bichao, Sip Whitaker and I were not called to
answer the allegations made by other board members.
Since when are tactics like this employed by a
newspaper that expects to be taken seriously.
The members of this board of education were elected
for the same purpose: to serve the students, parents
and employees of the Hillside School District and the
Hillside community. Our accomplishments so far speak
for themselves. The number of law firms has been
reduced from five to two (a significant savings for
taxpayers) we have rehired a responsible auditor, and
we have survived a devastating budget cut of one
million dollars. A board of education is not elected
to be a social club or to plot political coups.
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