Mr. Starr's Poor Performance for MCPS Students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Starr is an ineffective leader. His negative ratings come from his arrogance and poorly conceived ideas BUT the real harm being done is from his lack of leadership and planning for the budget, facilities planning, performance management, and curriculum support. This will end up costing MCPS and the taxpayers a significant amount in years to come.

The BOE needs to hire someone who has the skills to run an organization the size of MCPS. This is not Starr and its not surprising that he is failing. It takes someone who is willing to roll up their sleeves, clean house, set priorities, manage their budget, and not try to just cover up problems with flimsy PR.

I think he made a big mistake assuming that he could trust the institutional knowledge of the division of long range planning. He assumed he could let them do their job and the facilities/budget issues would fall into place, and he really overestimated their abilities. MoCo is just continuing in a downward spiral until we get either real leadership in a superintendent or real talent in the division of long range planning, which has been lacking for a very long time.

[Anonymous]

Completely agree with 8:40!!

[Anonymous]

I agree with 8:40 too. However, Starr just didn't make a mistake in trusting the institution. Starr has no interest in running a large organization. Operations and planning clearly bore the man to tears. He doesn't have any skills or abilities in this area even if he was interested in running the ship. Bottom line is that Starr was a bad hire. The BOE could remove him or diminish his role by bringing in a stronger chief operating officer that has a direct line to the board.

To Starr's communication team - Tell your boss to look up from his iPad and pay attention to the taxpayers and parents who are speaking. The BOE members were all generally attentive and responsive to the parent, PTA, and citizens who were testifying. Starr was an embarrassment. He couldn't bother to look up from his tablet or phone at all. I found it offensive. He owes everyone who spoke a public apology.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I agree with 8:40 too. However, Starr just didn't make a mistake in trusting the institution. Starr has no interest in running a large organization. Operations and planning clearly bore the man to tears. He doesn't have any skills or abilities in this area even if he was interested in running the ship. Bottom line is that Starr was a bad hire. The BOE could remove him or diminish his role by bringing in a stronger chief operating officer that has a direct line to the board.

To Starr's communication team - Tell your boss to look up from his iPad and pay attention to the taxpayers and parents who are speaking. The BOE members were all generally attentive and responsive to the parent, PTA, and citizens who were testifying. Starr was an embarrassment. He couldn't bother to look up from his tablet or phone at all. I found it offensive. He owes everyone who spoke a public apology.

8:40 here - agreed. I know it sounds drastic, but my family and I have decided to leave MoCo after watching this last fiasco. I'm sure we could find great schools within the system and I know plenty of families who have, but seeing the way decisions are made and the lack of direction at the highest levels makes me think MoCo needs a pretty major institutional overhaul. Maybe it's just too big. Maybe it's just too stuck in its ways. Whatever it is, I've lost confidence that my concerns will ever be heard or that the interests of the students will ever be prioritized (or at least not before my kids graduate). There are other more successful school districts and plenty of independent schools in the area. And we're placing our confidence elsewhere....

[Anonymous]

1) give teachers a 7% raise across the board
2) roll out "curriculum 2.0" with teachers incapable of implementation, execution, assessment and evaluation
3) issue a decree that all MCPS students will no longer have the option for advancement in Math if able, capable and ready

1) Dumb
2) Dumber
3) Dumbest

Starr had better start getting out his PR marketing consultants and advisors to bail out of this mess

An assessment of this character almost 2 years ago!

[Anonymous]

I normally take the Parents Coalition with a HUGE grain of salt, but they just published wht looks like a FOIA for his resume here:

http://parentscoalitionmc.blogspot.com/2013/12/superintendent-joshua-starrs-resume.html

If this is accurate, it reveals that he was never a regular teacher (just a sub). Again if true -- how was he considered qualified to run a hugh and diverse system like MCPS?

[Anonymous]

He's not qualified, this is the problem. Its also not going to take a great teacher to address the problems in MCPS. They need a very strong manager and leader who will get rid of the underperforming and entrenched personal and attitude issues within MCPS. There is way too much insular bubble think going on. You can't blame them since their leadership doesn't hold them accountable but this needs to change.