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Monday, October 08, 2007

NOT AGAIN! School uniforms come up at tonight's Board of Education meeting (and I try to get tasered!)

After everything that happened at the July meeting, you would think that Standard Mode Of Dress ("SMOD") aka school uniforms would not come up again anytime soon at the Rockingham County Board of Education. Or ever again for that matter.

Well, tonight it did.

Take a wild guess who brought it up.

Now to be fair, Ron Price did not outright suggest putting the SMOD issue back up for discussion as something to be immediately implemented (all hell would have broken loose on the far opposite side of the table if he had tried to). But the mere fact that Price spoke at length about wanting to have policies and guidelines already in place and ready for SMOD "in case" it is ever implemented, is troubling enough. I also happened to notice that Price spoke about SMOD as if it was something that the administrators and faculties of schools should decide upon, without any reference at all to soliciting input from the parents as to whether or not they and their children want uniforms.

Someone else told me during the meeting that it sure sounded like Price is trying to impose SMOD somewhere, that he's laying the groundwork down for it at least.

Talk about beating a dead horse!

In other Board of Education items, Gene Saunders - the drama teacher at Rockingham County Senior High and a longtime leader in area theatre - addressed the board about a new drama guild for high school students throughout the county that is now forming up. Saunders said that the plan right now is to have everything ready so that this summer the guild's first production will be Disney's High School Musical, which would no doubt be a big hit with the kids. The issue of where the wrestling team at Rockingham County Senior High also came up, 'cuz there's not any real room for them to practice on their own and it's a hassle - and a lot of wear and tear - to keep unrolling out the mats every afternoon. The biggest concern is not just room but having it stay warm over the winter without incurring too big a heating cost.

Oh yeah, and I tried my darndest to get tasered tonight! Superintendent Dr. Rodney Shotwell brought up the issue of tasers in high school and Rockingham County Sheriff's Deputy Clarence Cheshire gave a great impromptu discussion of tasers, how they work etc. I think it was board member Steve Smith who jovially asked for a demonstration and while everyone was laughing I spoke out "Hey Steve, I'll do it!" Steve told everyone "Hey we've got a volunteer!" and I think it must have horrified some folks especially board chair Elaine McCollum 'cuz she knows that I'd have done it, too! Unfortunately because of legal liabilities etc. Deputy Cheshire wasn't allowed to use the taser on me as a demonstration. But hey, I was willing to do it! I was hoping that Cheshire - who's a really good fella - would zap me so that I could start screaming "DON'T TASER ME BRO!" Woulda made for a great write-up in tomorrow's Reidsville Review :-P

All things considered, it was one of the quieter Bored meetings that I've been too.

But let the word go out to my brothers and sisters in the cause: beware and be aware, that we may have to fight this all over again...

"There is one SMOD, and Ron Price is its prophet!

P.O.T.S.M.O.D. ACKBAR!!!"

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey Chris!
I am so glad that someone else was there at the meeting or else no one could have believed that this guy is serious! Actually, he's been walking the halls of RHS the last few weeks. I sent him an e-mail that was less than friendly last night, so I hope he has some good reasons for even talking about SMOD again! I mean seriously, everyone just sits and pretends that he didn't get caught stealing signs just to be respectful and nice but if he's going to bring up SMOD I might have to talk about how I feel it's bad to have a criminal on the school board during the next public comments section of the next board meeting. All in all, I'm glad that most of the board members didn't give hime the time of day and just let him talk to be nice! It was so nice seeing you last night!
- Brittany Gibson

Chris Knight said...

You can talk about much of a criminal he is at the meeting, and you can definitely get away with it! School board members don't legally count as paid personnel of the school system. That much was established by board attorney Jill Wilson at the December 2006 meeting.

Anonymous said...

I just might have to go for it! He hasn't e-mailed me back yet, but he came to the high school the day after the meeting.