Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Superintendent Caples finds fault in Siskiyou County Grand Jury report

By David Smith, Siskiyou Daily -

Superintendent Bryan Caples submitted his responses to the 2012-2013 Siskiyou County Grand Jury report Friday, revealing an overall sense of frustration with the findings and recommendations provided in the report.

According to the report, the grand jury elected to perform a watchdog investigation of the SVUSD in an effort to review the results of the 2007 consolidation of Scott Valley’s various school districts.

The report provides a general overview of the SVUSD’s history and current operations, as well as a number of findings and recommendations.

“During the Civil Grand Jury Watchdog Investigation of the Scott Valley Unified School District, it became clear that there were a number of problems and issues that need to be addressed,” the report reads.

The findings and recommendations cover district policies and procedures, school board members, truancy rates and student tracking, issues with parents, student drug and alcohol use and crisis management practices.

“I first read the report and I was confused,” Caples said in an interview Friday, “because there were things in there we were already doing, or things we have no control over.”

The report suggests that the school board would benefit from the addition of an individual with teaching or administrative experience, saying that the board “lacks someone who understands the more complex issues regarding school administration and educational programs who can review the budget and other accountability documents and understands what is going on behind the scenes.”

Noting that the SVUSD has no legal authority to require teaching experience on the board, Caples said, “I felt that this finding was offensive to the people on the board because they do a dynamite job.

“They love the kids and our community and they are qualified to be on the board.”

The report also states that the jurors heard complaints that some parents enable inappropriate behaviors and that drug and alcohol abuse is rampant in the valley schools.

“According to some community experts, 90 percent of the high school students are drinking and smoking marijuana. Often students attend classes under the influence,” the report states.

Caples disputes the veracity of the report in its finding, stating that annual anonymous self-reporting surveys do not come close to 90 percent of the student population using drugs and alcohol.

“That was really frustrating to our community members, and I feel it was offensive that it was printed as factual,” Caples said.

In other findings, the report recommends that the school district continue conducting business as it has, but Caples said he feels that the inclusion of those findings in the report suggests there are problems that the district is not fixing.

“I’m just more frustrated than anything,” Caples said. “I think that the report hurt a lot of feelings in the community.

“Maybe more investigation would have helped clarify some of these issues,” he concluded.

Caples submitted his responses to the report on Friday.

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