Reply to Ditch the PTA, join the Parents' Coalition?

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Reply to "Ditch the PTA, join the Parents' Coalition?"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][
The lack of transparcency is related to how they run their site.  Posts that oppose their viewpoints are regularly censored.  For a group that (fairly) complains about the lack of transparency in MCPS they aren't very transparent as well.  If you claim to want transparency you should follow that rule yourself.

When people have asked about their leadership, organizational structure, etc. responses aren't forthcoming.  They have a registered PAC, but don't publicize what they do with it.  [/quote]

I don't have a problem with those accusations.

On censoring opposing viewpoints I would say:  I am going to leave aside any debate on whether and how much they do this.  Instead, I am going to argue that this is not important.  They have a blog and bloggers are free to post what they want.  Why do they have to post opposing views or let others obfuscate their issue?  They are not running a public debate society.  If someone disagrees, then they can post their own blogs.   The people that need to be transparent are the BOE and MCPS.  This is because they take our public money.  PC does not take our public money.   There is a huge, huge difference here.

As for leadership structure:  Again, why is this so important?  They are a private group as far as I can tall.  They post their names.  It seems to be run by Janis Sartucci.  Perhaps they have a decentralized structure.

To me, the value here is the documents and facts they post on their blog.   Can you find anything they write that is factually untrue and has not been corrected?   Are you glad that these facts are posted in an accessible manner?   Do you use those facts to inform your overall view of MCPS policy and budget matters?  I know where I stand on these questions.

Sure,  I am not as exercised about some of the issues they raise, but at a high level I agree with them that there is too little transparency for such a large budget.   It was on the PC blog, for example, that I found out that there is a movement at the state level to let unelected student board members vote on the school budgets (which is half of Montgomery's overall budget).  WTF?  Imagine if some kid is the deciding vote and all the union members are in charge of his grades.   That is the kind of under the radar stuff that happens all the time.   It is undemocratic and makes no sense.  This is just one example.   We need more debates, not less.  I really hope the PC stirs up trouble.  Keep on going PC.[/quote]

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