I just got this troubling chronology from a former active PTA Mom from Piedmont.
. . . My girls went to Piedmont for 7 years each, very political school. Dixon sent a principal in to get rid of three awesome teachers who parents complained about over things like homework and sexual orientation. Once the teachers were gone he moved the principal somewhere else.
But when I thought of Gene Rajanen, who threatened to send his girls to Hermantown. it made me think… I was very active in Piedmont, I pulled my 2 out of 709 because of Dixon and the Red Plan. My friend J**** was the president of the PTA, secretary and treasure and she drives her 2 to Esko because of The Red Plan and the mess they created out west, the co- president from last year ago pulled her 3(she and her husband are MDs!) out last fall and all are attending St. James, the pres from 4 years ago is homeschooling. Two years ago pres moved away from Duluth with her 2. Another past Piedmont PTA pres(who is an attorney) pulled her daughter & son out when I did; daughter at Hermantown for the duration and son at Harbor View. Humm, now that is an interesting pattern. I have thought about it before, but now Gene would make it 14 kids of all well educated parents involved big time in their children’s education and neighborhood school. It is this group of people who fought so hard to keep Piedmont open when it was on the chopping block. Wow that is kind of interesting. We did lose dozens and dozens of other kids as well to HT and Proctor, but these were our leaders.
Followed by this email:
Oops, my husband just reminded me of 2 other PTA pres in my girls earlier years, when Piedmont was being threatened to close. 2 to Hermantown and 1 to Edison and now Marshall. That would make 17 kids. 15 of them are the kids of past PTA presidents.
.
Followed by this email from someone else:
I need to confirm this with a friend of mine, but a good friend, who really hasn’t seemed to care much about the Red Plan, has a daughter at Piedmont, she has been happy with the school but now is upset. I don’t recall the particular issue but it has something to do with the Red Plan and where her daughter will go etc. They are pulling their daughter out and enrolling at st James. She said something about the District sending out a questionaire to Piedmont parents, asking them if they left, whether it would it be temporary and would they bring their students back – I was distracted when they were talking about this as we were at a cribbage party & there was lots going on at the same time, but I do remember everyone laughing and saying, “no way would they bring the student back” they were sick of this District not listening to the parents.
A couple weeks ago after I had needled the Trib for not covering the negative aspects of the Red Plan Sarah, the Trib’s education reporter asked for an example. I mentioned that Gary Glass had been asking the Administration for the numbers of kids who had open enrolled out of the District for months. The District wasn’t giving him that very public and routine information. Sarah told me she thought she could get that information the next day. If she did she didn’t write about it.
