Drive through any neighborhood in the D and you’ll find a staggering number of abandoned buildings, houses, and other remains of public infrastructure long forgotten. Among those discarded and abandoned buildings are schools, lots and lots of schools. From middle schools to adult-ed and pre-school education centers, even historic “ Cass Tech” high school sits in utter disrepair. From east to southwest, this is a common neighborhood sight. Imagine the mental toll it would take on your psyche seeing schools that have been operating since you were little simply be left, forgotten, and then violated by the desperate and the homeless. Imagine your subconscious bombarded by daily reminders that you and your children have been long forgotten by the highly paid and easily corrupted school board members. Left to fend off scrap thieves and thugs without help from city government, Detroit’s educational infrastructure is near gone, and with it so are more and more students each year. So the big question is why? The other is what?  
     

  In the past 5 years D.P.S. has closed over 100 schools far and wide throughout Detroit. Spread out in all directions, they currently sit empty, suspended in various states of decay. The abundance of unwanted and unneeded elementary, middle, and high schools is a sad reminder of the overwhelming woes this area is facing. Places where children once played and learned have now become home to animals and bums. Scrappers roam freely on the relatively large campuses of the high schools, picking at scrap metals and stealing anything that can be sold. Wires from the ceilings of classrooms and hallways are pulled right out and stolen. Damage from vandals is evident in almost every single school. Unlike a systematic scrap operation, random vandalism is just as, if not more detrimental to a structure. Anything that can not be sold including; books, computers, desks, chairs, and other schools supplies are commonly set on fire, and destroyed.
     

Now the current plight of the D.P.S. did not occur over night, but was cultured from years of disregard for standard practices and procedures. Procedures that are vital in establishing order throughout a system of administrators, teachers and students. Even some current school board members are under investigation over suspected “miss-dealings.” These allegations and more recent evidence of wide spread fraud that have left the public school system in shambles. Past administrations have left the burden of a four hundred million dollar deficit spanning the last two fiscal years and the next. Including the revelation that the district will lose over $96 Million in State and Federal aid based on the current declining student enrollment numbers. Combined this with the staggering loss of twelve thousand students just this year, it simply doesn’t make sense. Currently another 800 plus teachers are on the chopping block. The board recently fired superintendent (Connie Callaway) had turned over boxes of records to federal investigators looking into multiple branches of the D.P.S. Between the rush by the school board to fire Callaway and the thousands of workers, teachers and administrators laid off over the years, the sad picture of a failing school system starts to become clear the more you learn.

 
     

 

Detroit Public Schools don’t work! Unfortunately, they probably never will. Now that might sound harsh and pessimistic but over the years one thing has become very, very clear; D.P.S. has failed on every level repeatedly, in planning, management, administration, security, student enrollment and college placement. The systemic atmosphere of tolerated neglect is one of many reasons the D.P.S. will have a hard time rebounding from its current crisis, and it will inevitably remain its biggest obstacle. Overseers and management have been willingly disregarding their responsibilities; others just simply are the wrong persons for the job at hand. Unqualified and less than motivated, these people are bleeding the system from the inside, like an internal wound. General nepotism and wide spread abuse coupled with blatant disregard, or fear of any retribution, has caused D.P.S. to fall into turmoil.

In the past month the school board voted to fire the tuff, no-nonsense superintendent of schools, Connie Callaway. This stunning turn of events happing just as she had begun to shed more light on the problem inside D.P.S. Through internal D.P.S. reviews and her own investigations, she has uncovered wide spread cases of corruption and fraud; perpetrated by those in, and out-side, of the Detroit Public Schools system. Allegations of contract abuse run rampant. In her words, “Almost every day seems to uncover new allegations.” These daily findings have caused the Federal Government to get involved. In a memo sent to board members, Calloway states she was cooperating with investigators and will turn over any and all records in question. In response, multiple board members quickly scolded her and demanded a vote on the handing over of documents to the F.B.I. Speculations of the investigators interest range from contract bribery and abuse practices, to strait up fraud. Ghost employees, and blatant miss use of school money for lavish trips top the list of unconceivable misconduct now being discovered.

     

 

 

   I suppose this is a good place to point out that not only is our former Mayor and multiple city council members under Federal investigations, but also the D.P.S. It’s a low blow anyway you look at it. Grown people stealing from innocent, impoverished children to feed their own selfish and materialistic needs. It’s times like this it’s real hard to explain to people why I put up with this city. That argument was made even harder this past month with Calloway’s firing. I believed that she did want to clean up the problems in this city. I also believe she knows how to. The problem is that D.P.S. has been in such disarray for so long it wasn’t going to get fixed in eighteen months. This situation will take years to resolve. This brash action by the school board just highlights the need for better leadership on the board. With so many members facing investigations stemming from Calloway’s willingness to help investigators, it can easily be argued that her firing was backlash. A class action lawsuit I fear is coming soon, and still no hope for children in Detroit is on the horizon.
     
 

 

 

 

The problem with the current school system is simple. It has long tolerated and even encouraged and almost nurtured corruption. Lacking the basic checks and balances like review boards, and independent analysis, the D.P.S. is left to police itself while controlling its own financial faucet. One such non-existent position is the person or persons responsible for following up with contracts handed out by the school board. These contracts include everything from lunch programs, management, movers in charge of relocating all useable equipment and assets to remaining schools, and security for vacant properties. These and many other contracted duties have gone completely and utterly unchecked for decades. There is evidence of this in almost every single school I have explored. Piles and piles of useable goods simply left behind for scrappers and looters, or worse vandals. In some cases I have even had a hard time moving through rooms in certain schools and warehouses because of the enormous amount of supplies left behind. Case in point; the former D.P.S. supply warehouse off 14th & Michigan. Sitting adjacent to the old Train Depot, this warehouse was abandoned some years ago, and to this day is still full of large amounts of school supplies. Although these materials are currently “un-usable”, they weren’t always that way, so the question remains, why?

 
     
  Why leave behind stacks of Math, English, and History books when kids at Detroit schools currently can’t even take books home because they are forced to share, and schools are in the position that they can’t risk the loss of a single book. Why leave behind test scoring “scantron” cards by the literal ton. Desks, chairs, and mounds of pencils by the case, pens, chalk, erasers and loose-leaf paper all left behind. Basketballs, tennis equipment, and blank student identification cards left behind. Thousands of boxes of student records, city contracts, and general office paperwork left in this D.P.S. storage building and other buildings all over the city. So…. WHY? Why leave vast amounts of usable goods behind, left to rot, and decay. Their purpose…wasted. Why put the local people in danger of having their identities stolen in order to save a few bucks in moving cost. What conceivable excuse do the people who run D.P.S. have? If you ask them, it seems his or her predecessor left every single problem on the plate, and the real victim isn’t the children…but them. There is no excuse that any D.P.S. executive could give to justify putting the futures of innocent children in jeopardy as well as the survival and security of their families.
     

While searching the piles of old educational artifacts, it was clear millions of dollars had been wasted when the district moved their storage headquarters. I poked around for a while and found an astonishing amount of evidence that the place was simply forgotten and written off long ago. Most of the papers I discovered on one floor in the old warehouse were of people’s personal records that had simply been discarded. The same goes for the Highland Park Adult Education center off the Davidson freeway. Gym equipment, hundreds of desk chairs, and a library full of books, some still in really good condition lay exposed. Sadly hanging in the same library was a portrait of Martin Luther King Jr., now defaced, it read…scrawled in marker, the word “nigger” and an arrow pointing to his face. This and hundreds of other graffiti pieces covered the walls and chalkboards. Metal pipes and wires had been gutted from ceilings and walls long ago. The building had been left wide open for years with virtually no scrap metal left. Thieves had taken down whole walls just to get to the elevator motor and its valuable parts.

 
     
  Even in such revered schools like Cass Tech High the plague of incompetence has cost the city. Left unchecked and unguarded, the old building is currently being pillaged of all value. In three short years the building went from a remarkable gothic icon to no more than a scrapped out, vandalized, relic with a large black soot spot on its front face. This spot is from the fire that was started when a group of scrappers would not leave the premises. They chose to start an intentional fire to divert the police while they made off with thousands of dollars in copper piping, and wire. Thankfully they were caught. Not far a vocational school off Grand River contains dozens of wood working machines, auto repair tools, and medical equipment. All the windows, copper and goods removed, it now sits as a danger to neighborhood children who play and cause mischief here. The old swimming pools in these buildings usually are filled with a toxic brew of organics and chemicals. In one building the pool was literally being used to drain PCB’s (http://epa.gov/pcb/pubs/about.htm ) from the electrical transformers stolen in the local area. One accidental fall into this mess could cause severe corrosive burns.
     
 

 

Every aspect of neglect comes back to the school administrations inability to follow up on completed contracts. This extremely important process of evaluation, and open competition for these contracts is key. Without data to use to evaluate the jobs completed, and how efficient and effective they were, you can’t even shop around for a comparison. This fundamental roll was simply forgotten about by a benevolent school board. In appearance the board was happy with the success of these contractors, and kept re-hiring them to complete similar work at other locations. All the wile upping the price each year for service justified by the repeated ignorance from the school board and its willingness to blindly hand out multi-million dollar contracts to criminals. Yes…criminals. Some of the operators of the business in question are or have had mob and criminal ties. Other ties have been made to the city’s embattled mayor and his circle of questionable associates. Allegations of embezzlement surfaced involving the mayor’s good friend Bobby Ferguson, amongst other key city players. Their personal ties to members of the school board have risen more than a few eyebrows.

 
     
 

Beyond the elected and appointed members of the governing body, you have the children who unfortunately have become part of the problem as well. In a society that puts more value on “fly sneakers, whips, and chains,” and “how you be roll’n?” does little to encourage a younger generation that education is worth the time. Kids in the Detroit school system have to deal with insurmountable odds just to get through early life. Middle age and beyond seems like a non-reality and thus creates a living in the now attitude. Those who manage to make it to high school tend to get caught up in social life and fade into the stat sheets that trouble so many in the D.P.S. system. With a graduate rate that is in the 30-40% range, it’s hard to comprehend the shortcomings for a society living in this reality. Destined for a harder life and a less stable future, it becomes more and more a struggle thus continuing the circle of the impoverished and under educated. Doomed to live, and repeat this cycle until held accountable, the entire city, as a whole will suffer not just financially but also in the resources that matter most to companies and free open markets…skilled, educated workers. That was the basis of the development during Detroit’s industrial age. Detroit was a society of motivated and ready to learn people, willing to do any job… for the right price. Since then, we have strayed far from the moral, social and ethical standards that got us here. Governments, past and present, have been thoroughly corrupted by the criminal elements in this town. In a city that has proven nothing is sacred anymore, including a child’s education, its time to own up to the mistakes of the past and do something drastic to change this mess.

     
 

 

With a dwindling student population and no hope in sight for the volume of students below national standards, the Detroit Public School system needs to be disbanded for its own good, for OUR OWN GOOD. This must be done if it cannot turn things around soon. It’s a radical position I know. But the alternative is far worse. With no clear plan for turnaround in place it could be 7-10 years before things look better for the public schools in Detroit. By disbanding the schools you would allow private schools to come in and correct the problems of the past in a matter of months to a couple years as compared with the gloomy alternative; such as an overburdened school system that will solve none of its problems anytime soon.

 
     

 

By replacing the irresponsible with privatized accountable workers and new policies in place to hire displaced teachers at a better pay, we could all be saved the death throws of another sad Detroit institution lost to incompetence and apathy. In this day and age, a child should not say his or her misfortune in life was the result of not having a chance to begin with. Too many students are being disadvantaged by the actions of far too many that should know better. It’s time to act like adults, putting the kids first, and egos second. Detroit has one last chance to get it right. The State’s overseers are ready to make a decision and takeover control. If this current situation does not resolve itself in the near future we will not be able to stop inevitable.