Broward’s School Board: Mean Girls
BY BUDDY NEVINS
OMG, they can be sooooo annoying.
Who?
The Mean Girls of the Broward School Board.
School Board members are acting like the movie “Mean Girls.”
Take nine women. Put them together for much of every work day. And Broward voters get cliques, sniping and nastiness.
Just like high school.
That would be okay if they were only concerned with shoes, hair products and boys. Like high school.
These Mean Girls vote on a billion dollar budget!
“I hate to say this, but there are nine women on the Board. When they feel offended by another member, it is taken to a more personal level,” one Board female tells me.
“Its like ‘Mean Girls,'” another member says.
Let’s take the now infamous Post-It note Incident.
Two of the most recently elected Mean Girls – you call them School Board members – were gleefully passing a Post-It note back and forth on the dais earlier this year.
One of them threw the note in the garbage. It was retrieved by a third School Board member, who saw it referred to her. As a bitch. And worse.
This third School Board member made copies of the note and left it on the desks of the two Mean Girls.
Ouch.
No wonder the Board needed a Relationship Building Workshop earlier this month.
But when the Board got together to talk about getting together, things broke down fast. The effort failed.
You have to feel sorry for Superintendent Robert Runcie.
Runcie thought he would be running a huge school system. Instead, he is the chaperon of a bunch of unruly sorority girls.
It would be funny if these women didn’t have a real job. Like seeing our kids get the best possible education. Like safeguarding our tax money.
These women have to learn that every Board member is different. Different backgrounds, different constituents and different opinions.
And every Board member has the same vote.
Every Board member deserves respect.
Its time for the members to grow up.
October 7th, 2013 at 9:51 am
They may act like the mean girls. They sure don’t look like them.
October 7th, 2013 at 11:12 am
kinda sexist – hilarious though
October 7th, 2013 at 11:32 am
No sympathy for Runcie. Yes he works for them and that is understood. The reality is this, he wants the residents of this County to accept him as a leader and agree to a bond issue than he needs to step up.
Runcie needs to step up and be the leader/figureheard of the BCSB. He needs to publically call out these members and shame them into acting right. What is the worse that happens? He gets fired? If the ladies fired him over telling them to shape up and focus on what is important, the credibility of the BCSB, the little that is left would be gone.
October 7th, 2013 at 2:15 pm
What kind of mysogynistic crap are you spewing, Buddy. When men in government don’t get along (like House Speaker Boehner and Sen. Reid), you don’t call them a bunch of dumb old fraternity boys.
The school board members just don’t get along. Period. (no pun intended) Did the third school board member whole world shatter because two other school board members do not like her? If so, she needs to develop a thicker skin. She’s a politician, what did she expect?
Buddy, you did not need to bring up their gender as a way to smite or ridicule the two school board members passing post-it notes. This was unbelievably sexist of you. All three of them need to start acting their age and not their shoe size.
FROM BUDDY:
It was a female School Board member who brought up their gender.
October 7th, 2013 at 6:59 pm
Next time maybe one of them will dispose of the note more carefully instead of throwing it away for someone to find.
Unless they really wanted someone to find it.
This is Broward County after all.
Buddy, I think you need to have a contest to guess the identity of the two MGs. The winner gets a stack of post-it notes and a shredder.
October 7th, 2013 at 7:17 pm
Oops, maybe you should call them BITCHES, Buddy, that probably will fit them entirely in what they’re doing… that’s girl’s for you and what they do!!!
October 7th, 2013 at 7:17 pm
Why am I not shocked? Decades of ridiculously immature, greedy, socially disordered, inept SBBC board members continue to be elected by US with often the same character traits then set in our administrative staff and Supers , and so the results become what we expect. More of the same. Let the Students run the board. Novel idea!!
October 7th, 2013 at 8:33 pm
Sorry, Buddy, I think that Jane Miguel had it correctly pegged. They are not “girls,” let alone “mean girls. They are School Board members, who happen to be women, doing a job. Your misogynistic attitude is telling, and those who are encouraging you to dig deeper into this “dispute,” appear to enjoy cat fighting. Stop it, please. If, in fact, one or 2 school board members acted inappropriately, (Oh dear, it has NEVER happened when “the boys” were in charge),then their ACTIONS need to be addressed in an adult manner, in the appropriate forum. Certainly not in the context that you placed them in.
October 7th, 2013 at 9:02 pm
Who thinks its Korn???
October 7th, 2013 at 9:59 pm
Karnak says
one worked at the pentagon
One had kids went to a school founded by dr.kennedy
One is a firm believer in “what brown can do for you”
October 8th, 2013 at 7:17 am
Sexist much?
October 8th, 2013 at 8:12 am
Sorry, there is nothing sexist in this if you KNOW the two new board members. They are your prototypical mean girls and they never ran to help ALL children.It’s all about THEIR OWN children. Get it right. Marginally intelligent, know little about education and what is going on in the bigger picture, and yet, here they are calling each other bitches. Great role models.And the older women on the board do not even remotely attempt to be civil to the public they serve. I have been to many of these meetings and their level of disdain and condescension is eye opening to say the least.
October 8th, 2013 at 9:32 am
Lesson to be learned: The more things change, the more they stay the same……..
October 8th, 2013 at 9:34 am
There is no hope in education, none whatsoever, as long as it’s mixed up and messed up with and by politics.
October 8th, 2013 at 10:05 am
Isn’t it a violation of the Sunshine Act for elected officials to be passing notes and destroying or disposing of that communication?
October 8th, 2013 at 7:29 pm
I worked for Broward County School System from 1995 through 1999 before I moved away and I was proud of them at that time. Since then they have gone to hell in a hand basket. Evidently they have too much time on their hands. They need to leave the good solid employees alone that have been there for almost 20 years with no marks against them. Start getting rid of the dead beats and let them go along with the ones that are seeking jail terms!! As I said I moved away but, I keep seeing wrong doings by the Board Members. Maybe they should be screened and if they are already they need to dig deeper to see what type of Women you are dealing with.
October 8th, 2013 at 9:40 pm
Wow.. I ditch the Bored, my donors and all my cute banker boys for my new LegisLater man and look what happens. It is a good thing they did not do that while I was on the Dais. When I got done emailing my married banker boys or my hot man from Becon, I would have shown those new girls just what a real
Bitch Slap is all about!
Miss me yet? Jen Jen
October 9th, 2013 at 12:00 pm
“Take nine women”
More like “Take nine idiots”
October 9th, 2013 at 7:18 pm
Real women don’t act like mean, spoiled brats. Or corrupt sleazes for that matter. Charging sexism every time someone describes ridiculous, immature behavior from females is a classic tactic.
There’s nothing sexist about what Buddy wrote. He wrote the facts and the facts fit perfectly with the title he gave them.
Karnack, you’re such a clever devil!
October 9th, 2013 at 9:08 pm
I still would like to know why one of the members was allowed to get away with her use of the N word…. Post it notes pales in comparison !
October 11th, 2013 at 5:17 pm
One of the many reasons the teachers have had enough and retiring in droves. I would like to know why there are school board members that send their children to private schools. How dare they run for school board when they don’t even put their children in public schools!! The teachers are treated like garbage and the district couldn’t care less. We need school board members without ice in their veins.
October 12th, 2013 at 2:30 pm
Wow this is incredible, and should be,considered bullying. But,I REALLY want to know names so I will be sure not to vote for them!
October 12th, 2013 at 5:03 pm
I’ve learned that my comment about “corrupt sleazes” has led someone to think I was talking about the present board members.
I was referring to past history of corruption and sleaze. I should’ve made that clear.
Everyone hopes, I’m sure, that Broward school board history does not repeat itself.