Hundreds of Durham residents filled the auditorium at C. C. Spaulding Elementary School Tuesday night as Ann Denlinger, the recently elected superintendent of Durham Public Schools, participated in her first biweekly work session, which addressed the lack of adequate resources for special education and the lack of cultural sensitivity-as it pertains to black heritage-in the school system's textbooks and curriculum.
The meeting kicked off with a public dialogue in which Durham residents voiced their concerns to the Board of Education. Although the board usually hears from only a few audience members during this allotted time, Kathryn Meyers, chair of the board, attributed the increased number of participants from the audience to Denlinger's appearance.
"I was frankly pleased with the degree to which people think in focusing their concerns around students," Denlinger said, "because that's what we're trying to do-to get ourselves on to student issues."
Three students who currently attend Riverside High School-seniors Sherman Duffie and Kurt Campbell, and junior Logan Coles-delineated their concerns, many of which stemmed from an incident that occurred at their school Feb. 28. Duffie said about 120 white students left school during a presentation on black history and culture performed by a group of black students. After it ended, he said, those students returned.
Coles said that this action was indicative of a much larger problem concerning cultural sensitivity and recommended that the board adopt a more ethnically inclusive curriculum. He also asked the board to issue a response to Riverside's principal no later than March 21 regarding the matters they had just expressed.
Some members of the audience used their allotted time to criticize the board for what they perceived as an inadequate performance. "The community is very aware of what is going on in the political sense and took advantage of this opportunity, as they should, to put issues at the front of the list," Meyers said.
Many said that although the board normally fields the community's complaints attentively, its members rarely take appropriate action. Harry Monds, a Durham resident with three children attending Durham's public schools, berated the board for leading Durham schools "down the road of despair," and asked its members to resign.
"Many parents... got very mobilized and were determined to put exceptional educational issues at the top of the agenda for Dr. Denlinger," Meyers said. "And also there is a whole myriad of issues having to do with racial sensitivity, and I think that that's wonderful.... Clearly, these are issues that Dr. Denlinger has acknowledged need to be addressed right away."
Another key topic discussed during the session was a recommendation for a new salary plan for principals. Proposed by McArthur Jackson, assistant superintendent for human resources, the new system is based on three criteria: staff allotment, years of experience and merit/bonus, which can be up to 4 percent of a principal's yearly salary.
Board member Beverly Washington Jones raised a concern about the implementation of a bonus system that would reward principals for an improvement in their school's overall test scores or other achievement indicators. Jones said she was afraid that some principals might be discriminated against under this system because they may lack the necessary resources to accomplish their academic goals-a shortcoming which is not a reflection of their skills as a principal and should not be used to award a salary bonus.
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