School district senior leadership needs to stop covering up discipline issues | Opinion

Kyle Savage
·3 min read
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Retired Marine General Jim Mattis once stated: "You cannot allow any of your people to avoid the brutal facts. If they start living in a dream world, it’s going to be bad.”

While Gen. Mattis, one of our generation’s greatest leaders, was referring to the cost of complacency and group think on the battlefield, it applies to all aspects of leadership including education. No matter where you stood when our former Superintendent was removed by the School Board of Brevard County, we must do better for our children than we’ve done before.

Kyle Savage is the Treasurer for the Brevard Federation of Teachers as well as a parent of two students in Brevard public schools.
Kyle Savage is the Treasurer for the Brevard Federation of Teachers as well as a parent of two students in Brevard public schools.

I am a father to two students in the Brevard Public School system, an elected officer for the Brevard Federation of Teachers and a Veteran who had the honor to serve on General Mattis’ team while deployed for our country. It is for those reasons I feel we must change the culture of Brevard Public Schools from one whose first response from senior leadership is to deny and cover-up an incident rather than admit an error and fix the issue.

Insead, the culture must be one that treats all 9,000 employees as professionals and one where honest feedback is the norm, not the exception. Teachers and principals must be empowered to manage their classrooms and schools.

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Brevard Public School teachers are afraid to speak out because of retribution from their principals and senior leaders. Their fear is valid. The Brevard Federation of Teachers has seen teachers reach out to the former Superintendent only to have their principal retaliate against them verbally and threaten their jobs. This sort of culture is dangerous and must go.

We agree that all our decisions need to be data driven. I know first-hand the data being provided to the public about student discipline is inaccurate and outdated. Schools are encouraged to not write referrals and minimize out of school consequences. Hundreds of teachers have been instructed not to write referrals on certain students or situations. Unfortunately, BPS senior leadership continues to deny this fact. Principals are required to track sub-group data on student discipline based on student disability, race, gender, and economic status. While this data is vital, under the current culture at Brevard Public Schools, this data tracking leads to a suppression of the issues facing our students and teachers every day.

The Brevard School Board met with dozens of community leaders, school staff and union officials in December to tackle ongoing problems with student discipline.
The Brevard School Board met with dozens of community leaders, school staff and union officials in December to tackle ongoing problems with student discipline.

Last November Brevard Federation of Teachers gave a presentation on discipline issues and solutions to the former Superintendent, as well as the district's senior leadership, and the school board. Our teachers lament that when the only thing to come out of it was another day they were allowed to wear jeans. Meanwhile. students who were causing major disruptions in class were being sent to administration only to return to class immediately, often with candy in hand. Ther school district continually refused to confront these problems, even disbanding the discipline committee.

It is the duty and personal courage ingrained in me from my military service that fixing the culture in Brevard Public Schools is urgent and has major consequences if we fail. Not addressing the culture that has led to our current situation will only increase student discipline issues and lower student achievement.

In February, we will mark the tragic five-year anniversary of Marjorie Stoneman Douglas where 17 students and staff were murdered. In the aftermath of that tragedy, we learned that an ineffective discipline plan and culture where honest feedback isn’t accepted enabled a sociopath to commit Florida’s worst school shooting. Brevard must do better for our children.

Kyle Savage is the Treasurer for the Brevard Federation of Teachers as well as a parent of two students in Brevard public schools.

This article originally appeared on Florida Today: School district needs to stop covering up discipline issues