Is School Out for CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett?
By Anthony Parker

Cool Cleveland contributor Anthony Parker talked with the CEO of the Cleveland Public School System, Barbara Byrd-Bennett. Rebecca Hague, the CEO’s Media Specialist, External Affairs, was present as they sat in front of the fireplace in the boardroom and started the interview. Cool Cleveland spoke with her about public image, decrease in educational resources, and the public's misconceptions.

Anthony Parker: Why do you think the media doesn’t acknowledge the good things you do, and instead go after you in investigative stories?

Barabra Byrd-Bennett: I think the average Clevelander, the average person who lives in my community next door to me would have, and probably still does, believe that I have either stolen or abused dollars! And that’s unfair...it’s just unfair and it’s inaccurate. At this critical time to have one’s integrity and credibility maligned was a little painful. Particularly when the auditors said there was no finding of misuse in any way.

What are some of the misconceptions you think that the public may have of you?
Oh, I think people think that I know it all. Which I don’t! I’m always meeting and asking people and trying to learn. I think that people think this work is easy. I’m in the office, meeting everyday at 7-7:30AM. I don’t leave here 'till 9 or 10 o’clock every night for the last six years. And I work weekends; I do it because I’m passionate about the work. And I’m also a home girl. I’m from Harlem! I’ve got to be where there’s music and spirituality. I believe very much. I consider myself very spiritual. I know that stuff doesn’t happen just because you do it. That there’s a higher calling and a higher power and I believe in that; and I generally like people.

Tell me about the state, and why aren’t they giving the schools their money?
It’s real simplistic. The Supreme Court of the State of Ohio has declared not once, not twice, not three times, but four times, that the way in which our state funds public schools is unconstitutional. And it has charged the elected officials to go back and fix it four times. And it hasn’t been fixed. I would say to the members of the community that if you or I did not obey the Supreme Court, we would not be walking the streets or we'd be locked up somewhere. It’s just illegal not to obey the Supreme Court of Ohio. Our school systems, which are at stake, are not sufficiently and adequately funded.

Does this affect other states across the country?
In fact, one that I can point to is New York, a state I’m very familiar with. Most recently, perhaps a year and a half ago, the New York Supreme Court decided the same thing. There had been a series of cases, court cases. The court finally said here’s what you can do to fix it. So the court provided the remedy and said this is what you’ve got to do. Now New York City Proper in the state of New York gets a significant proportion of dollars to fund children’s learning.

Do you think that will eventually have to take place here in Ohio?
I’m not as hopeful as I would like to be. I think that there are some people who don’t understand; I don’t know if it’s by choice or ignorance what it takes to educate our children. Urban inner city children. I don’t think the people understand the struggles and the barriers that my children have to overcome. I don’t think they understand the level of poverty. I don’t think they understand many of the health issues. We have the highest lead count in the county in the city of Cleveland. Lead paint. So I think a lot of that is misunderstood and misinterpreted. And in my perfect world I would just love to see my kids have an equal opportunity, just an equal opportunity, to show that they got the gray matter; that they can do it! And I think that we’ve shown that over the past five years.

If you have fewer teachers because of layoffs, how do they deal with the kids, and will it be harder for students who need one-on-one attention?
Yes, it’s going to make it harder for several reasons. One - if the class size gets larger then it’s going to make it harder. Two – the after school programs and the summer school programs that we had to help our children catch up and get on level ground is not going to happen. The only piece we’re exploring (I always try to find where is that light somewhere in that tunnel) is that when I arrived here, we had about 77,000 children. Last year we closed with a little under 72,000, and the population projections are saying we’ll probably be at 69,000. That means the population of public school children is diminishing. So the class size ratio would be different; the other good thing is it’s not that kids are running away from Cleveland because it’s so awful - this is a trend across the nation. People are having small families. You seldom see a family of eight, twelve. It’s like two or three. And so our little people coming in are a smaller group. Now my high school kids...we have more children enrolled in high school right now than the Cleveland school system has had in ten years because we’re keeping our kids in schools.

Are more people getting into teaching, has it leveled off, or is it going down? Why would someone want to be a teacher today?
You have to really be crazy. And I mean that in a good way. You have to have a touch of madness. You have to believe in those little people. You have to believe that when you look in their eyes you see yourself. To be in education and to stay. The pay is not at all commensurate for any teachers for what they do. Our teachers and our force are good people who deserve to have a salary commitment with where we say education should be.

Now will that ever happen?
I think that it only happens when teachers are not the only people talking about it. When you have the public saying and the community saying the most important thing in our community is education. And so...give the people who do that work what they deserve and hold them accountable on the end product. But I think when you look around our community and the nation, the rhetoric is good; but I think they may value something else.

Regarding the school construction issue, please explain it to people who know there is money for building schools, but yet it can't go into the layoffs.
Thank you so much for asking that question because you are right! We went to our community and asked them to support a bond. The community voted and passed a 335-million dollar bond which gets us matching dollars from the state. And when you get the matching dollars it could give us about 1.2 billion dollars to rebuild our buildings. Now the catch 22 with that is a bond issue...a capitol bond issue...those dollars can only be used for building. You can only build, renovate, make them warm, safe, and dry, fix the windows, the doors, the electrical wires and all that; but you can’t hire any people, you can’t buy any text books, you can’t do any summer programs, you can’t use any of those dollars to operate the school district. Our community needs to understand that it’s a bond issue. It can only be used for the buildings. It cannot be used to operate our district. That’s the major difference.

Are other cities doing the same thing with the bond issue?
Yes. I have been in conversations with lots of my colleagues because you do have to keep a broad perspective with what the rest of the world is doing. LA, Miami, Detroit, Columbus, Akron, Canton, and Youngstown, all have capital programs going on. All of them...all capitol programs...bond dollars for buildings are separate from operating. You just cannot mix them!

In the six years you’ve been doing this, have you ever thought, at a low point, “Maybe I should think about getting into something else?
Yes I have thought of it when...to be very honest no one’s ever asked me that quite that way. I thank you for that. Yes... when my health has been at its lowest. Recently, I thought, why would people lie? Why would people create trouble where it doesn’t exist? Yes, it was a low point when I did say, "Hey I’m going to be a grandma soon; I don’t need this!" And then I went into one of my schools. Some of the children at Martin Luther King...you may of read that 6 of the top 10 children graduated, young men, were males, African-American males. When I went over there to hug them and they told me where they were going to school, I knew I could hang here a little longer and do this work. That’s the reward.

Interview from Cool Cleveland reader Anthony Parker parkerman1@msn.com

Photo by Thomas Mulready

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