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Bull$hit

Is anyone else watchung the school committee meeting on TV right now?? Pure bullshi+. Trying to make themselves look good, competent. HA. What a joke. What a disgrace.

Re: Bull$hit

Yes.....a lot of people watch those meetings on MMTV - however, before watching school committee meetings - I usually need to take medication to prevent me from vomiting- if you get my meaning!

Re: Bull$hit

MFD
Yes.....a lot of people watch those meetings on MMTV - however, before watching school committee meetings - I usually need to take medication to prevent me from vomiting- if you get my meaning!


Try working with these spurious, so-called leaders of our district. PRICELESS as any reasonable person with half a brain won't buy their crap.

Re: Bull$hit

MMTV
MFD
Yes.....a lot of people watch those meetings on MMTV - however, before watching school committee meetings - I usually need to take medication to prevent me from vomiting- if you get my meaning!


Try working with these spurious, so-called leaders of our district. PRICELESS as any reasonable person with half a brain won't buy their crap.


Are you talking about Brodeur, Lewis, and Clark? I agree - they are in lock-step with the Democratic leadership - no courage in that group of pols!

Now the Democrats are set to decide on a presidential candidate of their party with the choice of a socialist/communist or a soon to be indicted felon! What has happened to that party?

Re: Bull$hit

I'm more concerned with our own local felons. (MFD, stick to school stuff. Your red-scare rant doesn't help anyone. You make a lot of sense when you talk about the local corruption, but you are an instant turn-off when you start your trump-izing.)

Watched some of the budget barf show yesterday. Had a public meeting but couldn't manage to make sure the doors to City Hall were open. Can anyone spell OML? Blaming it on the "fobs" naturally (instead of our incompetent IT manager, who also hadn't been backing up city servers often enough, obviously, and subjected the police dept to several days with no access to any IT and then paid a ransom out of our taxdollars to hackers!).

Who's brilliant idea on the school committee was it to have an 8-4 Saturday circus, arraying the whole ship of fools for the further embarrassment of the community? Just for good measure they paraded out their most fanatical Ed foundation parent, as if that makes them look even vaguely credible (nope, not a chance of that). They (SC, mayor, MEF) have all become lockstep Dolanites with their misplaced rage and whining over their catastrophically failed override. Notice how they managed to avoid mentioning the $3.5 million surplus from this past year's budget, and instead are propagandizing a "million-dollar deficit" in Paymore's proposed "level service budget." How many ways can you spell S-C-A-M? No PR firm is going to be able to wash over the shameful ignorance and arrogance of those putting forth all this garbage.

Listen "education expert" Mr. 26% Dolan & your lobbying PAC, MEF: You lost. Get over yourselves. You have made a total mess of things with your "exemplary" figurehead. It is now beyond fixing without a total sea change of new and actually qualified leaders. All of you need to go get a life and figure out how to redeem yourselves. You are hurting children with your support of really bad people who are still collecting way more than they deserve from all of us, and damaging what might be left of the city's reputation. You want your hands to be back in our pockets for more, and want to grind in the misery with your relentless, poorly expressed rage and whining. The answer was and is NO.

Re: Bull$hit

School Comm Mar 5 PT1
https://vimeo.com/157856904

and if that doesn't turn your stomach, there's a Part 2.

Starting with Melrose's own uncute Grover. Oh so so gross.


Apparently she thinks the city needs a "full-time communications person"! Laughable really.
These people can't get out of their own way.
Just a rant where she admits "still being pretty angry" over the override.
It was all just a reaction to CKK's right-on remarks during super's recent evaluation, and to losing the override (by a huge margin, which these types just don't have the simple humility or common sense to think about).

Her "two cents". So pathetic. She was the only one to "participate."

Re: Bull$hit

Margaret Adams: "Next year the district might be cited by the Dept of Ed for not providing the required amount of ESL (Engl as Second Language) services."

And we citizens are supposed to believe that this is all due to money instead of that resources were negligently parsed by administrators knowing that they were in violation of the laws and regulations. But somehow they always have enough for their "pot of money" for administrative raises that they sneak through every summer when they think we're not looking.

Re: Bull$hit

budget b.s.
Listen Dolan & your lobbying PAC, MEF: You lost. Get over yourselves. You have made a total mess of things with your "exemplary" figurehead. It is now beyond fixing without a total sea change of new and actually qualified leaders. All of you need to go get a life and figure out how to redeem yourselves. You are hurting children with your support of really bad people who are still collecting way more than they deserve from all of us, and damaging what might be left of the city's reputation. You want your hands to be back in our pockets for more, and want to grind in the misery with your relentless, poorly expressed rage and whining. The answer was and is NO.


The Override was defeated by a significant margin. Voters sent a message. City and elected officials need to listen. $ has been wasted, cover ups are the norm, accountability is lacking and respect for "leadership" doesn't exist. The schools haven't been managed well at any level. Games continue to be played with budgets, deficits and surpluses. Trust has been squandered and the Saturday SC "special meeting" (theatre of the absurd production) will not turn things around. Try transparency, truth and admitting your mistakes. Then things might turn around. It will be painful but it is the only way forward.

Re: Bull$hit

Grossed Out
School Comm Mar 5 PT1
https://vimeo.com/157856904

and if that doesn't turn your stomach, there's a Part 2.

Starting with Melrose's own uncute Grover. Oh so so gross.


Apparently she thinks the city needs a "full-time communications person"! Laughable really.
These people can't get out of their own way.
Just a rant where she admits "still being pretty angry" over the override.
It was all just a reaction to CKK's right-on remarks during super's recent evaluation, and to losing the override (by a huge margin, which these types just don't have the simple humility or common sense to think about).

Her "two cents". So pathetic. She was the only one to "participate."


I just reviewed some of the Saturday school committee session - noticed that Ms. Grover, very disappointed about the failed override, recommended that the SC do more to advertise all the good things that are going on with the schools by using social media...such as Facebook, blogs, etc.to give the public more info on the schools! I think that she just woke up from her overnight stupor - has she ever heard of the Mayor's Blog that sends us messages about 5 times a day on all the happenings in the schools and city, the MEF & city hall Facebook pages and blogs, and the newspaper education stories. One obvious thing she did not recommend is for the getschool committee to encourage the public to come to meetings and to speak and provide the committee their opinions and recommendations - oh no - that would be too engaging for the SC. We don't want the public's input - just their votes and money!

Also, they were lamenting and discussing a level funded school budget with a 3 plus million budget surplus from last year! Someone please add some sanity to this process.

Re: Bull$hit

Adams: "doing science" Funny that. She wouldn't even know what science is if something scientific bit her.

After long, simpering rant where Driscoll listens to herself talk and drop as many buzz words as she can fit into her up-talk (those "angels" in her head), gets called out by CC who reminds committee to confine their remarks to the budget, to which Dolan jumps in with his equally obvious rant, continuously bemoaning the override loss. "Listen, the public made their choice. We have to live with that...."

Dugan, "at what point do we get cited for not teaching Science" ... or "at a sub-par level because we don't have the materials"....leading questions, again, all geared towards positioning that pi$$ moan, the public didn't vote for the override, now it's the voters fault for the fact that the district is going to cited for multiple violations (beyond the federal civil rights and state law violations Melrose has already been found guilty of), not meeting ESL laws, not teaching the new science curriculum, you name it.

Dugan, "as a liaison, I KNOW how much work is being done...." "No new instructional materials for grades 6 through 12"

Adams: "We don't have that rigorous line item for instructional materials"
Oh really.

This is all just a pre-fab disgusting crybaby session about all the things they plan to cheat the students out of in order to punish the community for failing the override. Huge bonds for textbooks, high school renovations, huge amount from city budget for next five years for technology, that the community has generously paid for, on and on. But the students are going to be denied what they need so that the administration can rub everyone's noses in the failed override. Classy. These people truly have no shame. Don't know if the rest of this shameful display can be watched.

Re: Bull$hit

How many times are they going to repeat "Best Practices" to which Taymore retorts "I will tell you...." or "I get very concerned" (oh, I'll just bet she's "concerned"! NOT) rant about ListServs "We've done so much"

These people need their own evangelical tent for their circus. Wow. Just so obvious and drab and horrifically "Sub-Par" (to quote Dugan).

Eddie "intends to spend the morning 'listening and learning'" Bad joke. Has zero to contribute, especially if it places him in any political disfavor with his next-seat buddy and patron, Rob.

At least DeSelm was no longer "Nascent"!

Re: Bull$hit

Transparency Time
The Override was defeated by a significant margin. Voters sent a message. City and elected officials need to listen. $ has been wasted, cover ups are the norm, accountability is lacking and respect for "leadership" doesn't exist. The schools haven't been managed well at any level. Games continue to be played with budgets, deficits and surpluses. Trust has been squandered and the Saturday SC "special meeting" (theatre of the absurd production) will not turn things around. Try transparency, truth and admitting your mistakes. Then things might turn around. It will be painful but it is the only way forward.



Wise words....if current personnel can't handle the changes required, they should be fired or look for new jobs elsewhere.

Re: Bull$hit

Wise Words
Transparency Time
The Override was defeated by a significant margin. Voters sent a message. City and elected officials need to listen. $ has been wasted, cover ups are the norm, accountability is lacking and respect for "leadership" doesn't exist. The schools haven't been managed well at any level. Games continue to be played with budgets, deficits and surpluses. Trust has been squandered and the Saturday SC "special meeting" (theatre of the absurd production) will not turn things around. Try transparency, truth and admitting your mistakes. Then things might turn around. It will be painful but it is the only way forward.



Wise words....if current personnel can't handle the changes required, they should be fired or look for new jobs elsewhere.


This

Re: Bull$hit

Grossed Out
School Comm Mar 5 PT1
https://vimeo.com/157856904

and if that doesn't turn your stomach, there's a Part 2.

Starting with Melrose's own uncute Grover. Oh so so gross.


Apparently she thinks the city needs a "full-time communications person"! Laughable really.
These people can't get out of their own way.
Just a rant where she admits "still being pretty angry" over the override.
It was all just a reaction to CKK's right-on remarks during super's recent evaluation, and to losing the override (by a huge margin, which these types just don't have the simple humility or common sense to think about).

Her "two cents". So pathetic. She was the only one to "participate."


I also saw her despicable display...yet again. Curious as to why she was "so surprised" to not see a room full of people to hear her nonsense. And who exactly gets up at 8AM on a SATURDAY after working all week long only to sit in an all-day budget meeting??...only to find the doors to City Hall have been conveniently locked to prevent access by the general public? It is no secret that the budget meetings were designed to be as inconvenient to attend as possible so the School Committee and administrators would not have to deal with "those people" (also known as the tax payers) as Robbie Dolan's employee Martha Grover calls them. It was also cleverly scheduled for March 5th by Margaret and Robbie to ensure that our best and brightest School Committee member Carrie Kourkoumelis could not possibly attend because of the MSO event that same day....very sneaky. And then to commend the Superintendent on hiring a PR firm (without the School committee's authorization) to spin the expensive and embarrassing mess she has created for Melrose taxpayers ( over 400k in legal expenses and OCR mandated civil rights training), honestly,is this woman high??

Re: Bull$hit

God, this woman is a poster child for nastiness. She's angry that the override failed. Who cares? She's the "Mayor's mouthpiece, all right - they have they same arrogant rotten attitude, that being that anyone who disagrees with them must therefore be an idiot. I was especially disgusted by her "ghostwriter" spew, and by her comment that she must not have worked hard enough to inform the ignorant electorate about why the override was needed, the implication being that the electorate is too stupid to understand the issue and needs someone to lead it around by the nose. Hence, the rant about a "communications director". What she really means by that is "propaganda minister".

What she apparently is too dense to understand is that the electorate understood the issue perfectly, and said with it's vote that "You people are full of crap, and we don't believe you anymore.".

Re: Bull$hit

"And we citizens are supposed to believe that this is all due to money instead of that resources were negligently parsed by administrators knowing that they were in violation of the laws and regulations. But somehow they always have enough for their "pot of money" for administrative raises that they sneak through every summer when they think we're not looking."

That "pot of money" for administrative raises was a real quote taken right from Thorp and Driscoll's cynical "Rolling Agenda" last spring. They really have no shame!

They drone and rant on and on about their "deficit" now, all as further bullying of the community that denied them their fraudulent override requests at last November's election. They are shameless in misportraying anything and everything to fit a narrow and really quite silly narrative--that voters said no to their ill-conceived tax override, and since the voters defeated the measure resoundingly, 62% to 38% roughly, the voters--and kids!--should now be punished by these vile, self-serving hacks, who are determined to construct a budget that will leave the district open to charges of violations and negligence by the Dept of Ed. They persist in portraying it all as a grim crisis (even while "Kidneys Dolan" contradicts himself routinely that "it isn't really dire") with only "tough choices." Meanwhile, the fluff PR pieces about the "Learning Commons" still being "on budget" continue so that the PR firm can claim it has fulfilled its mission and bill extra for any real news stories that it is commanded to deal with. Given the dark underbelly of all that's going on during the district's spin cycle, there is inevitable bad news that will surface and need mega-spin.

Re: Bull$hit

Nastiness
God, this woman is a poster child for nastiness. She's angry that the override failed. Who cares? She's the "Mayor's mouthpiece, all right - they have they same arrogant rotten attitude, that being that anyone who disagrees with them must therefore be an idiot. I was especially disgusted by her "ghostwriter" spew, and by her comment that she must not have worked hard enough to inform the ignorant electorate about why the override was needed, the implication being that the electorate is too stupid to understand the issue and needs someone to lead it around by the nose. Hence, the rant about a "communications director". What she really means by that is "propaganda minister".

What she apparently is too dense to understand is that the electorate understood the issue perfectly, and said with it's vote that "You people are full of crap, and we don't believe you anymore.".


Oh yes she is. And as a city employee and treasurer of the Ed Foundation, she and the foundation are in contempt of ethics clauses. They condescend to all of us and in so doing demonstrate their own flagrant ignorance, arrogance and contempt. No wonder she thinks the district needs a PR firm. Guilfoil has his hands full "managing" anything coming from this vile bunch and spinning it into the kinds of antifreeze solution that Margaret and Martha and Chris and that whole fun bunch can discharge ad nauseum.

Re: Bull$hit

Gee, wasn't just a few short years ago that Brodeur (then upwardly mobile prez of BOA) "gave" the schools (oh, who cares about separation of powers anyway!) some "leftover" tax money to buy those nifty Science kits that Conway and Herrera (remember her?) and Straznik (remember his fun times at HM?) claimed were indeed a science curriculum (they're not) and they were the great Answer to this district's pathetic history in the teaching of science? And then, oopsie, they discovered they needed another $100,000 just a year later, because, oopsie again, they didn't realize they had only purchased one subject for one grade of each science kit (because they hadn't bothered to do any scientific reasoning, or even read the catalog!)? And then, lo and behold, they discovered that the kits required annually replaceable materials ("manipulatives"), which they stopped buying when they then realized that no one was really using those "inquiry-based" science kits that they had all just a short time earlier sworn up and down were The Answer. And then, oopsie, have to allocate another $5,000 because somehow the kits from the Winthrop disappeared the same time its less-than-a-year principal vanished for greener pastures, maybe someplace that also needed a Science Answer.

Oh sure, Melrose Schools are now all about SCIENCE, and don't you forget it, especially with its own School Committee NASCENT SCIENTIST now who's going to make sure we never forget that!

[8)][:|]

Re: Bull$hit

yes absolutely
Nastiness
God, this woman is a poster child for nastiness. She's angry that the override failed. Who cares? She's the "Mayor's mouthpiece, all right - they have they same arrogant rotten attitude, that being that anyone who disagrees with them must therefore be an idiot. I was especially disgusted by her "ghostwriter" spew, and by her comment that she must not have worked hard enough to inform the ignorant electorate about why the override was needed, the implication being that the electorate is too stupid to understand the issue and needs someone to lead it around by the nose. Hence, the rant about a "communications director". What she really means by that is "propaganda minister".

What she apparently is too dense to understand is that the electorate understood the issue perfectly, and said with it's vote that "You people are full of crap, and we don't believe you anymore.".


Oh yes she is. And as a city employee and treasurer of the Ed Foundation, she and the foundation are in contempt of ethics clauses. They condescend to all of us and in so doing demonstrate their own flagrant ignorance, arrogance and contempt. No wonder she thinks the district needs a PR firm. Guilfoil has his hands full "managing" anything coming from this vile bunch and spinning it into the kinds of antifreeze solution that Margaret and Martha and Chris and that whole fun bunch can discharge ad nauseum.


These people live within a vacuum and believe that their little group of MEF mommies are respected and influential in the Melrose Community. The funny part of this is that it's just the opposite! Everybody sees them for the phonies that they are. Even with the widely failed override speaking volumes about how this vacuum of a group misread the community support for the override, the Supt. and Mayor continue to parade these people in front of the SC spouting out crap support for the Supt. hiring the PR Firm when all of Melrose knows this is a scam and a waste of money. Sorry City Hall, your mouth pieces aren't doing their job. Maybe if you managed your money better and complied with the OCR requests you wouldn't be in the situation you are in now and you wouldn't be $50K in the whole on legal bills. Just step up and take responsibility for your failures rather than wasting money on hiding them. The people of Melrose would have much more respect for the truth than the listening to the lies of your hired speakers at the SC budget meeting. And, lastly, next time it would be nice if you unlocked the doors to City Hall so that real residents could participate in public comment rather than only the City Hall Employee who apparently has special access to the building while others were "Unintentionally" locked out.

Re: Bull$hit

Watch at about 1:32 (part 1). Just crazy. Driscoll putting forward the idea of kindergarten parents paying for "consummables" again because she had to pay for high school workbooks etc. Shot down by Taymore because of regs.

"social emotional" & position of Social Worker discussed in such low bar, uneducated and yes, racist way. CT: "Many of our newcomers are refugees who have been traumatized...." Oh so here we go again, blaming the high cost of their budget on "that" population of "others" (ESL, etc.).

Re: Bull$hit

Not for anything but we are headed for our next crisis because CT is paying for the PR spin masters from unauthorized funding sources. E-rate grant funds can ONLY be spent on communication infrastructure and even then the eligible items is very narrow. This will undoubtedly result in, at a minimum, an audit finding but potentially an investigation by the FCC or US Dept of Education's Investigator General. CT's public comments that "the business manager called the E-Rate people and they said this is okay" is simply ridiculous. These administrators better smarten up as this kind of blatant disregard for the regs can and will jeopardize future E-Rate grant funding. More importantly, the school committee members better start doing their own research because as history has demonstrated, they simply cannot rely on CT to be above board.