[img]1220|left|Nancy Goldberg ||no_popup[/img]With the deliberately moving School Board not expected to make a remotely definitive statement on the dispute over the status of El Marino Language School until four weeks from today, Board member Nancy Goldberg said this morning that “the community needs to be patient with us.”
The patience can begin at tonight’s 7 o’clock Board meeting in School District headquarters.
A dry, perhaps dreary, discussion of arcane Board policy is the advertised highlight of the evening.
Nevertheless, protesting parents, upset at the potential, if not likely, intervention of the Assn. of Classified Employees in the El Marino adjunct program, are expected to turn out in sizable numbers for the third meeting in a row.
Ms. Goldberg, the wildly popular career teacher just retired from Culver City High School, has been taciturn through her first three School Board meetings. But now she would have her say.
A Ripe Time for Generic Opinions
She sees nothing close to fireworks this evening. Before the Board can plant its feet in this controversy, “we are precluded by policy, and policy indicates that we have to go through a process that pretty well has to run a course.”
As 41 years’ worth of students learned, Ms. Goldberg, who turned 75 years old last month, possesses a sly sense of humor. Acknowledging that many parties to the controversy are hungry for action, Ms. G says:
“At this stage, I don’t anticipate being shot or pilloried. The people of Culver City are not that erratic. But (the parents) have to have a forum for their views. Obviously the School Board is exposed to that, and it has to be.
“From what I understand at all three meetings since I became a Board member, I have to keep my mouth shut and let these things go through a certain process. When it reaches an apex of coming together, we can take some action. At this stage, it is rather like jumping the gun.
“People are allowing their emotions and their rhetoric to become so overheated that the thing is distorted. Hopefully, wiser minds will prevail. I don’t move quickly. I move methodically. While people are urging me to take sides, I don’t see it as that kind of an exchange.”
Does Ms. Goldberg think that the aroused parents will be mollified by the time they leave tonight’s Board meeting?
“I have no way of knowing,” she said. “I know people are afraid something will happen to their wonderful program – and I am as much in support of it as anybody – but I will not do anything to undermine it. I have seen what the parents do, and I have participated as a volunteer.
“But I also know there are rules we play by in the District. They are legal realities.
“I just think someone has fomented a great deal of dissent when it was not necessary. This is not something that hasn’t gone on for the last 26 years.”
How can El Marino’s program succeed for so long when “no one” outside seemed aware of it?
“It remains to be seen whether anybody knew about it,” she said. “It has a history of periodic review. And it has been an issue. There have been ways people have managed to ignore it, or circumstances of more import have prevailed over it.
“It is a recurring issue. These are the same issues that face other school districts. We have been trying to compare what they do and what we should do. Through this, we have to follow our own by-laws and policies.
“Someone may suggest we change them. There is a process for doing that.”
Ms. Goldberg says that as a freshman on the School Board, she practices caution.
“I am a novice to this,” she said. “I don’t want to walk into a minefield and blow my legs off.
“I would not have the temerity to propose change publicly until I knew how they worked and what the ramifications were. Therefore, I am much slower and more methodical.”
What would Ms. Goldberg tell parents who may be on edge for tonight’s meeting, eager for progress while realizing little that is meaningful figures to emerge?
“I think some points will be raised tonight,” she said. “But at this point I am not allowed to say anything. There will be an informational session that will put their fears at rest. People are frightened.
“When we become that uncertain, reach that stage, we don’t always think as lucidly as we should. I am hoping I can be on the side of taking it slow and easy, and not burning bridges. We don’t want to do something that will put us in some kind of legal mire.
When Ms. Goldberg says she supports the adjunct program, does that include the four-point protection of El Marino and other schools proposed two weeks ago by her fellowfreshman colleague Laura Chardiet?
“I can’t answer that,” she said. “To be honest, I don’t understand it. I need policy clarification.
“I think it’s wonderful she can walk into that position and feel so secure she could make those proposals. But I don’t have that knowledge.”
