Priority Number One

Priority Number One

by

Burt Sage

Two brothers grew up together in a tight, strong family with deeply ingrained work ethics. James and Richard were separated in age by two years, with James as the older. Their gender was about the only thing that they had in common. They disagreed about almost everything. And they were extremely jealous of each other. Their poor mother couldn’t even cut pieces of cake without one complaining that the other’s piece was bigger.

Both boys excelled in school, but in different areas. James was the more intellectual of the two. He had slightly higher grades and was in the honor society and captain of the debating team. Richard was the more athletic of the two. He was captain of the basketball team and carried a high school record baseball batting average.

James graduated from high school as valedictorian and was awarded a full ride scholarship to MIT. Richard graduated in the top 10% of his high school graduating class and obtained a full ride athletic scholarship at the local State University. He majored in education, wanting to become a teacher.

Although both brothers had careers in the local area, the only time they met after graduating from college was at home for Thanksgiving and Christmas every year. At first the meetings were relatively cordial—they did have new experiences to share. James had gotten his Bachelor’s degree in engineering and an MBA. He was employed at the Corporate Research Center of Plumb Electronics, a major information technology company. Richard got his degree in education and was employed as coach at a local high school.

In their careers, the two were exposed to two entirely different world views. In the private sector, James saw the world as a place where innovation and excellence were valued and rewarded. In the public sector, Richard saw the world as a secure place where service and loyalty were valued and rewarded.

To James, an employees union was anathema. Fighting competitors for market share was difficult enough. Having nternal adversaries would only make that job harder. The employees at Plumb Electronics always rejected efforts to create a union. They were paid well, had excellent benefits, and knew that if they performed well, they would be rewarded in the company profit sharing plan. All Plumb employees were driven by the same goal, the growth and profitability of the company.

To Richard, the teacher’s union was mandatory. It was the only thing that deterred the high school administration from keeping teacher salaries and benefits at a minimum. Whereas the financial strength of James’s company was determined by the success of their products in the marketplace, the financial strength of Richard’s school depended on managing their budget. To balance the budget, the school administration and the teacher’s union were in constant negotiation. Negotiations were seldom cordial.

Over the years, James proved to be quite the innovator. He invented an algorithm which gave the Plumb products a distinct and long term advantage over the competition. He also proved to be an excellent manager and businessman, and soon became CEO of the company. He hadn’t married.

Richard proved to be an excellent coach, his teams were regarded as powerhouses in their league. And he also proved to have excellent interpersonal and negotiating skills. He soon was elected head of the teacher’s union in his district. Richard married Patricia, and they had two daughters, Susan first and Emily four years later.

Over time, Thanksgiving and Christmas became less and less cordial. James felt that schools in general, and particularly the school in their district, were failing their communities, and he felt that teachers unions were the biggest reason. While James and Richard usually argued in a civil manner, Patricia felt that James was out to get Richard and vigorously defended him, sometimes with violent outbursts.

These verbal altercations always ended the same way. “Then what do you want me to do?” an exasperated Richard would ask. “Just tell me. We can’t get investors, or sell stock like you can. Our budgets are fixed. And if we disband the union like you want, the administration will just take the money we give up for themselves. There wouldn’t be more money for the students.”

James had no answer.

Once again the family had gathered for Thanksgiving at the family home. James, now 47, was there by himself. Richard, now 45, was there with Patricia and their two daughters, Susan, 17 and Emily, 13. Including the men’s parents, there were 7 persons at the Thanksgiving table. As you might expect, the seating arrangement was weird. The men’s parents sat at each end of the table, with Richard, Patricia, Susan, and Emily on one side of the table. James sat alone on the other side.

“I have an announcement to make,” James said as they were finishing dessert. “This is important. I want to make sure I have everyone’s attention.”

The table became quiet. This had never happened before. At this point the men usually retired to the family room to watch football and the women took on the task of putting away the left-overs and washing the dishes.

“I would like to announce that Plumb Electronics has applied for and received a license to sponsor a charter school in this district,” James began. “We will begin construction in January, and the school is scheduled to open for the fall semester in two years.”

The announcement was greeted by a momentary silence as the significance of the announcement sank in.

Then Patricia jumped up. “I knew it!” she shouted. “The rumors were true. You’re going to close Richard’s school. This is what you wanted all along.” She picked up a fork and was about to throw it at James when Grandma reached out and grabbed her arm. “Sit down and be quiet, Pat,” she said sternly. “As usual, you’re jumping to conclusions. Give James a chance to explain.” And she took the fork from Patricia’s hand.

Dejected, Patricia dropped into her chair, folded her arms across her chest, and just stared at James.

“This was not an easy decision,” James began again. “But we think it’s the best decision for the company, for our shareholders, and for the community. The other choice was to move the entire company. If we did that, we would have to train an entire new workforce. And during the transition we would have to have two complete manufacturing facilities operating at the same time in order to keep our customers happy. It would also mean that about two thousand jobs in this community would disappear.

If we moved, we would have a more qualified pool of job applicants. That’s the reason we even considered a move in the first place. Our workforce is our most valuable asset. The applicants here who meet our quality requirements are few and far between. So our choice was to move or fix the problem here. We decided to try to fix the problem here. We’re not the only company facing the problem of unqualified job applicants. But few are actually doing anything about it. As far as I know, we are the first to try this approach at the entire school level. We believe the private sector should be more financially active in a child’s education. We’re going to try this.”

“So building an entire new school is your answer to fixing the problem, as you put it?” Richard said, agitated. “Why don’t you just improve the existing facilities? It’ll take a lot less money. We’ve been trying for several years now to pass a new bond issue to do just that. Why don’t you support that effort? You have enough employees to swing the vote positive.”

“That’s a good question,” James responded. “But you’re not going to like the answer. It doesn’t work. For decades money has been poured into schools to do just what you suggested. The problem only gets worse.

We’ve been studying this problem for over five years now. Whenever we interview a new applicant, we require them to take a competency test. It’s a test that is used throughout the country to establish a competency baseline for job applicants. It studies the basics—reading comprehension, self expression, and vocabulary. We’re able to compare our applicants to applicants at other companies and in other geographical areas. And we’re able to track this competency in a given area over time. The data speaks for itself. The competency of job applicants everywhere is low and falling. The public school concept is failing.”

“And you think that’s Richard’s fault?” Patricia jumped in. “No way. The teachers love him and re-elect him every year. The school just needs more money. Why don’t you just do what Richard wants—make our public school better?”

Ignoring Patricia, Richard slowly admitted, “James is right. The public school concept as it is now practiced is failing. I’ve been in budget negotiating sessions when my school gets new money. I am ashamed to say that there has been little discussion of using the money for educating the students better. It was only about the share that administration would get versus the share that the teachers would get. The way we teach hasn’t changed in years.

But I hope you understand my dilemma. Whenever it’s budget time, I am bombarded with urgent requests for salary and benefit increases. And with inflation the way it is now, it’s hard to make the case that such salary increases aren’t warranted. It’s my job to improve the compensation for the teachers.”

“If you feel conflicted in that job, why don’t you let someone else do it?” James asked.

“It’s a paid position,” Richard replied. “I get additional salary for doing that job.”

“Oh,” James said, sighing. “I see.” And he looked at Patricia, who continued to glare at him.

“I think I understand why you made the decision you made,” Richard added. “So to Patricia’s point about closing our school, what are the details?”

“We’ve also studied previous charter schools to see if we can learn from them, that is, what worked and what didn’t. To Patricia’s earlier point, there have been public schools that closed when a charter school opened in their district. But those schools were corrupt or incompetent beyond hope of recovery. Your school is nowhere near as bad as those schools were. Still, your ability to avoid closure will depend on how you and your school respond to the challenge of a charter school in your district.

Your school district will not bear any additional expense because of this charter school. Plumb Electronics will bear the construction cost and the operating costs of the school. Your only budgetary shortfall will be state funds which are on a per-student basis. But that will be partially offset because you will have reductions in staff due to some of your staff wanting to work for the new school.”

“Well, that’s somewhat of a relief,” Richard said. “What about a teacher’s union? Will there be one?”

“I doubt it,” James said. “The teachers will be employees of Plumb Electronics, not employees of the charter school. As such they will have access to our profit sharing, incentive and retirement plans. And because the teachers will be our employees, any union organizing effort will be voted on by the entire workforce of Plumb Electronics. There’s a strong anti-union sentiment there. Nobody has even tried for at least a decade.”

“Just what kind of a facility will it be?” Richard asked.

James just beamed. “It will be state-of-the-art all the way,” he said. “It may be an experiment, but we’re not going to be tentative. It will be big enough to handle all district students with room to spare. It will have the latest in electronic teaching aids, with computers for each individual student. As new AI algorithms are developed, they will be integrated into the teaching methods. Plumb is one of the leaders in AI; it’s our goal to create an internationally recognized school, to the point where people move to this community just to send their students to this school. The only student selection that will be done will be to prioritize local students. No local student will be turned away. And by local, I mean living in the current school district.”

“If it’s that good,” Patricia said defiantly, “no student will choose the public school. Our school will definitely close. Richard will lose his position.” Turning to Richard, she pleaded, “You can’t let this happen. We’ll be destitute. We’ve got to fight it.”

“You’ll never be destitute,” James said. “You’re family. What I’m hoping is that Richard will elect to support the construction of this school and apply for a position at the new school. Richard’s a good coach. But he’ll have to sacrifice some of his pension benefits. He’s been teaching for 18 years, right? That means he’s only vested in about 70% of his pension benefits. At the new school he will be automatically enrolled in our 401k plan. And he can work until he wants to retire. There’s no cutoff on the retirement benefit.”

“It’s too risky,” Patricia shot back. “What if Plumb Electronics goes bankrupt. Our school will never go bankrupt!”

“Either could go bankrupt,” James replied. “But I agree that Plumb going bankrupt is more likely. In that case, the school becomes an asset for disposal. Built into the operating plan for the school is a trust account which is untouchable by a Plumb creditor. This account provides for three years of operating expenses while any transition to a new owner occurs. If the school district opts to acquire the school, which is the default situation, there would be a seamless process of acquisition. It would become a public school, just like the one you have now, only much newer and with better facilities. And most likely, the teachers would form a union.”

“Humph,” was all Patricia said.

In the ensuing silence 17 year old Susan spoke up. “Several of my Facebook friends go to charter schools,” she said. “One of them, Fran, says her school even has a guitar teacher. Would this new school have a guitar teacher?”

“It would have a music department,” James said. “The exact skills available in that department remain to be determined. In any event, though, if a student needs guitar lessons, that skill will be made available. Priority number one at this charter school will be to bring out the best in every student, independent of who he is and what his individual “best” is. The US Army got it right. “Be the best that you can be!” There will be an individualized education plan for every student based on their aptitudes and desires.”

“That’s kind of how Fran describes her school,” Susan said. “They have individual educational plans for every student. Sure, the basics are covered. But each individual plan is tailored to that person. My friend Diane wants to be a hairdresser. She has a class plan to insure he/she is qualified for that specialty school.”

Continuing, Susan asked, “So if I had gone to this new school with my desire to sing country music, there would have been a plan for me?”

“Yes,” James replied. “You would have been prepared for a college level music school, maybe not specific to country music, but you would have been schooled in reading music, key changes and similar basics for sure.”

“I wish you had done this four years ago,” Susan said sadly. “It sounds exactly like what I wanted and needed. I graduate this spring. I’ll have to get a job and take music lessons at night. I’m two years behind where I could have been.”

“Sounds perfect for me,” 13 year old Emily said, smiling, as if she were champing at the bit to give her view. “For sure I’m going to go to this new school.”

Again silence returned to the table. Finally Richard said, “This isn’t common knowledge yet. Why did you tell us first?”

“You’re family, first and foremost. The impact on you is potentially significant, and I wanted to give you a head’s up. I’m also hoping to get your support.”

James paused, giving Patricia an opportunity to object. But she remained silent.

“You’re perhaps the most trusted individual at your school,” James continued. “Your support would go a long way to muting any resistance to making this happen.”

Again silence. Finally Patricia spoke. “I never thought I would say this to you, James, but thank you. It would have been much easier for you to just go to the newspapers and make this announcement. You wouldn’t have had to face me. But you chose the hard way. I have been listening very carefully to every word you said, trying to find a hole in your position that I could exploit. I found none. And when Susan and Emily both volunteered their support, I finally knew that my position was wrong.”

Turning to Richard, Patricia asked, “You want to be a coach with a training facility? And a stadium with lights so you can have evening games?”

“I’d give anything to be able to train my student athletes the right way,” he said smiling. “Proper training means fewer injuries. Count me in.”