To the editor:

“I have the strong suspicion that the adults serving for Wayland Board of Education and administration lack awareness and comprehension of the implications of outsourcing its responsibilities and earmarked public funding to parasitic education profiteers.

The adults running WUS act like outsourcing is normal and good. It’s not.

Let me let you in on some hard truths: Nobody at Capturing Kids’ Hearts™ gives a flying fudge about any kid at Wayland.

Nobody at Clayful™ gives a flying fudge about any kid at Wayland.

No kid from ProMow™ gives a flying fudge about any of the trees at Wayland because no ProMow™ knows a single administrator and not one administrator knows a single ProMow™ kid.

In two years of being an EDUStaff™ call girl, outside of Santino DiCesare, Carolyn Whyte and Angie Farmer, I’ve NEVER had a principal acknowledge me as a substitute teacher in their building. Nobody cares.

I’ve never talked to anyone from EDUStaff™ either. The guy who pimps EDUStaff™ subs has his own private airport in Leighton Township. That is public ed dollars funding one man’s luxury lifestyle.

Why do adults make these choices for our schools??

There is a defined hierarchy in our public school systems that I am not the first to recognize. Generally speaking, as you move up through the system, competency drops off at each level as the system self-selects and sorts itself.

If you want to find brilliance in our public schools, the ONLY place it will ever manifest itself is in a student. There are some kids out there who shine brighter than any adult positioned to oversee their education.

But moving up a level, most any gifted child is going to choose a much more respected and compensated profession than teaching. There is some intelligence to be found at this level, but it won’t really ever shine. Principals desire the meekest and mildest teachers, not the best and brightest.

Just like nuns take vows of celibacy, there is an unwritten (i.e., not legally justified) rule that teachers take lifetime vows against ever having a public thought. Principals want a subservient compliant staff harem whose primary purpose is to be pleasant on the eyes and ears to both the principal and the community. Academic merit never outweighs these desired characteristics. If there is any brilliance at the teacher level, it is strongly suppressed.

At the administrative level is where the dropoff in boldness in our public schools is most severe. Teaching can be incredibly emotionally draining, and many teachers find after just a few years that teaching is not at all for them. At that point a teacher can either quit the profession or flip to the dark side of administration.

Too many administrators are middling educators who struggled to run a healthy vibrant classroom. When they get to the administrative level, all decisions prioritize acute conflict avoidance above all else. Get through the day and go home above all else. Teachers are to be pleasant on the eyes and ears above all else, and toxic positivity from the harem is a defense shield to prop up the principal’s ego. Everything is Awesome (er, mediocre)!

Finally at the top of the public K-12 pyramid is where you find your lowest competency. At more affluent districts (like Rockford and Forest Hills), you will find boards comprising folks with professional education backgrounds, but this drops off rapidly as you get into the cornfields.

Our WUS board doesn’t have anyone with a background in education. As many of you know, I took last place in our recent board election. An Illinois Nazi (he had a White Lives Matter social media post and repeatedly harassed my candidate page about kitty litter through a racist burner profile) with absolutely no connection to Wayland Schools received 500 more votes than me.

Say what you want about that decision-making from our community, but you all also removed Cinnamon Mellema, who was the only board member who had a clue what she was doing. Now we only have an echo chamber of ignorance flying the plane. At least they’re confident!

But in all seriousness, stop outsourcing public ed funding to parasitic profiteers! It’s incredibly shallow thinking. You think you are absolving yourselves of responsibilities by giving funds away, but you’re not. You’re only failing our students.

— Jake Gless, Wayland