Science and Stories

Science and Stories are Different

Nicholas Johnson
The Gazette, Dec. 8, 2021, p. A6
“The good thing about science,” the bumper sticker began, “is that even if you don’t believe it, it’s still true.”

Aristotle could have written that, if there were cars with bumpers in his day (384-322 BC).

Aristotle came upon a group of men engaged in heated argument. Upon his inquiry, they reported the disagreement involved the number of teeth in a horse’s mouth. To which he replied, “Let’s go find a horse and count them.”

As Mason Williams confessed in the last line of his lyrics for “The Exciting Accident,” “this is not a true tale, but who needs truth if it’s dull.”

Like professional journalists in search of truth, scholars repeat similar versions of the story – as a parable – while disagreeing about the who, what, where and when it was first told.

I like the Aristotle version because he relied on personal observation in much of his writing, including “The History of Animals” in which he reported the number of teeth in horses.

Upon hearing Kellyanne Conway’s concept of “alternative facts,” Aristotle would have sided with Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, who famously said, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but they're not entitled to their own facts.”

Sadly, what seemed obvious to Aristotle over 2300 years ago, and to the research scientists among us today, has not been internalized by large percentages of our Homo Sapiens species. (Photo credit: See SOURCES - Photo/Info, below.)


High school and college courses in physics, chemistry, biology, and other sciences necessarily require some awareness of the vocabulary and current knowledge base of these sciences.

Some students develop a passion for science. Some avoid these courses. Others take them but leave school singing Sam Cooke’s lyrics, “Don't know much biology/Don't know much about science book.”

But what the National Science Teaching Association headlines is, “Science classes enable students in grades 9-12 to develop the critical-thinking skills required to make informed decisions about public policy, evaluate claims made in the media, talk to their doctors, and navigate an increasingly technological world.”

Whether it’s called “the scientific method” or “critical thinking,” these are lifetime skills that can be taught in any course and utilized by all of us every day.

In 1946, James B. Conant, among many other roles a chemist and one-time president of Harvard University, spun his Yale Terry Lectures into a little book called, “On Understanding Science: An Historical Approach.” He was suggesting, in effect, to understand science first understand scientists, what they do, how and why they do it, and the language they use to talk about it.

Framing answerable questions that suggest how they might be answered. Recording observations. Revising hypotheses and theories as necessary.

Homo Sapiens have been telling each other stories for millennia – often as lessons for children – from Aesop’s Fables around 600 BC to Watty Piper’s “The Little Engine That Could” in 1930.

Nothing wrong with that – unless we’re unable to see the difference between a fact and a phony, a story and a science-derived statistic.

And what’s that difference? American COVID deaths approaching 800,000.
______________
Nicholas Johnson is former co-director of the Institute for Health, Behavior and Environmental Policy; contact: mailbox@nicholasjohnson.org

# # #
SOURCES
Bumper sticker. Google search: bumper sticker "the good thing about science"

Mason Williams (“not a true story”). Mason Williams, “The Exciting Accident” Lyrics, AZLyrics.biz, https://azlyrics.biz/m/mason-williams-lyrics/mason-williams-the-exciting-accident-lyrics/

Scholars & parable. “Q: Searching for source of “horse’s teeth” parable (No Answer, 1 Comment) Google Questions/Answers] Subject: Searching for source of "horse's teeth" parable, Category: Reference, Education and News > Teaching and Research Asked by: slblack-ga, List Price: $100.00, http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=713157

Aristotle & horse’s teeth. Google, People also ask … “How many teeth does a horse have Aristotle?” The Greek philosopher Aristotle was one of the first to document the anatomy of the equine mouth in 'The History of Animals' written in 333BC 1. Aristotle correctly numbered the teeth at 44 in the adult and even described periodontal disease in the horse, which is still a common problem today. Oct 6, 2015 https://www.google.com/search?q=aristotle+horse+teeth
…
“Q: Searching for source of “horse’s teeth” parable (No Answer, 1 Comment); Google Questions/Answers] Subject: Searching for source of "horse's teeth" parable, Category: Reference, Education and News > Teaching and Research Asked by: slblack-ga, List Price: $100.00, http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=713157

“There was once a part of Greek thinkers -- this was around the time of Aristotle -- who sat up all night having a furious argument about the number of teeth in a horse's mouth. Unable to agree, they went out and collared a passer-by -- an Arab. He listened attentively to all their arguments, and then without saying a word, he walked away. He returned in a few moments, however, and told them the correct answer. 'How did you decide?' they cried. 'Whose was the better argument, the sounder logic?' 'Logic be damned,' he says, 'I've just been round the back to the stable and counted 'em.'"
--"Chemical Plant" by Ian Williamson
CHRISTIAN ORIGINS
http://www.christianorigins.com/crossan.html

Aristotle, History of Animals.
These appear to be derived from the writing of Aristotle: History of Animals- Book 6, Part 3, By Aristotle
http://people.cornell.edu/pages/dtc24/piece/151/History-of-Animals--Book-6,-Part-3.htm

Google Search: Aristotle, "History of Animals"

Aristotle, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aristotle, 384–322 BC (62)
"His data in History of Animals (333) Generation of Animals, Movement of Animals, and Parts of Animals are assembled from his own observations,[67] statements given by people with specialized knowledge such as beekeepers and fishermen, and less accurate accounts provided by travelers from overseas.[68]"

Alternative facts.
“Alternative Facts,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alternative_facts, “’Alternative facts’ was a phrase used by U.S. Counselor to the President, Kellyanne Conway, during a Meet the Press interview on January 22, 2017, in which she defended White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer's false statement about the attendance numbers of Donald Trump's inauguration as President of the United States. When pressed during the interview with Chuck Todd to explain why Spicer would ‘utter a provable falsehood,’ Conway stated that Spicer was giving ‘alternative facts,’ Todd responded, ‘Look, alternative facts are not facts. They're falsehoods.’”

Not entitled to own facts.
Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, “Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but they're not entitled to their own facts.” Quoted in, Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 38, Thursday, March 6, 2008, House, pp. H1402-H1408. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2008-03-06/html/CREC-2008-03-06-pt1-PgH1402-2.htm

Don’t know much.
Cooke, “Don't Know Much About History Lyrics,” http://www.songlyrics.com/sam-cooke/don-t-know-much-about-history-lyrics/

Science courses.
Google search: teaching science in high school

“Science” as “critical thinking.”
National Science Teaching Association. https://www.nsta.org/levels/high-school (“Science classes enable students in grades 9-12 to develop the critical-thinking skills required to make informed decisions about public policy, evaluate claims made in the media, talk to their doctors, and navigate an increasingly technological world.”)

James B. Conant.
“James B. Conant,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_B._Conant

Aesop’s Fables.
“Aesop’s Fables,” (“Aesop's Fables, or the Aesopica, is a collection of fables credited to Aesop, a slave and storyteller believed to have lived in ancient Greece between 620 and 564 BCE. “ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aesop%27s_Fables

Little Engine That Could.
“The Little Engine That Could,” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Engine_That_Could (“The Little Engine That Could is an American folktale (existing in the form of several illustrated children's books and films) that became widely known in the United States after publication in 1930 by Platt & Munk. . . . The story's signature phrases such as 'I think I can' first occurred in print in a 1902 article in a Swedish journal. . . . The best known incarnation of the story The Little Engine That Could was written by 'Watty Piper,' a pen name of Arnold Munk, who was the owner of the publishing firm Platt & Munk.”)

COVID deaths.
Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center, US Deaths, https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/, Dec. 2, 2021 (782,201)

Photo Credit/Info.
"FMN Laboratory researcher in the process of assembling a neuromorphic processor based on a photonic integrated circuit that allows computations at the speed of light. To manufacture such optical devices, FMN Lab developed technological processes aimed at achieving extremely low losses. The whole cycle of creating a processor includes several stages: from preparation of the surface of a silicon wafer and deposition of multilayer thin film coatings to fabrication of nanoscale circuit topologies and automated assembly of fiber optic processor modules and components.
FMNLab; Creative Commons Attribution 4.0; FMN Lab team (2).jpg; [[File:FMN Lab team (2).jpg|FMN_Lab_team_(2)]]; 3 March 2021, 13:19:41; 6,607 × 4,405; image/jpeg

# # #

School Board Governance

School Board Members Must Speak Out
Nicholas Johnson
The Gazette, October 6, 2021, p. A6
Returning to my Iowa City home from Washington, confronting appeals of friends who were teachers, I agreed to run for school board, won, but promised only one term.

Later, I tried to recruit new school board members. It wasn’t easy.

Perhaps it was my candid sales pitch: “Well, you may not get any pay, but at least you’ll get a lot of grief.”

We spend less on K-12 than other countries, and our economy grows faster than education spending. But our federal, state and local governments budget $734 billion for it annually -- roughly the size of the defense budget.

Given the responsibilities of school board members it’s remarkable they have neither entrance requirements nor training.

But then neither do presidential appointees.

Maritime Administrator at 29, and lacking administrative experience, I asked Commerce Secretary Luther Hodges about training. There was none. I pleaded for at least some advice. He said all I needed to remember was to pee every chance I got.

Iowa City’s much beloved librarian, Lolly Eggers, served as my school board campaign treasurer, and provided, as befits a librarian, a book: John Carver, Boards That Make a Difference. She had found it useful with her board. So did we.

As Carver puts it, most advice for boards just teaches “how to do the wrong things better.”

Our superintendent was preparing the board’s agenda, complete with what motions should be made and when. As I said at the time, “We don’t have board meetings, we have superintendent meetings to which the board members are invited and have the best seats.” We changed that, redefining the roles of board members and superintendents. [Photo credit unknown, possibly Nicholas Johnson; from blog post, "The School Bored."]

The Cedar Rapids school board’s Board Governance Policies bear some similarity to what we did 23 years ago.

Where they differ in practice involves the role of elected officials and group decision making. We made clear individual board members did not speak for the board. But they did speak -- and listen.

As FCC commissioner I wrote some 400 dissenting opinions. As a school board member, I wrote a newspaper column every two weeks about K-12 education. Sometimes painful for my colleagues, my writing was nonetheless tolerated as part of the group decision-making process.

One reason democracies have multi-person legislative bodies, appellate courts, commissions – and school boards – is the assumption groups produce better decisions than authoritarian dictators. When group members are elected officials, they have an added obligation to express their views, communicate with and represent constituents, to be a voice for the voiceless, an ear for the unheard.

There is not a single challenge confronting Iowa’s school boards that has not been discovered, diagnosed, treated, and resolved by one of America’s 16,800 school boards, or the 19 countries that outscore the U.S. for quality of K-12 education.

School board members need to spend hours regularly studying the literature, reporting, speaking out and stimulating discussion. That, and many other tasks, are things that cannot properly be delegated to a superintendent and board chair.
_______________
Nicholas Johnson is a former Iowa City school board member. See https://nicholasjohnson.org/governance Contact: mailbox@nicholasjohnson.org

SOURCES
[School Board. My term ran from 1998 to 2001.]

[K-12 expenditures. Melanie Hanson, “U.S. Public Education Spending Statistics,” EducationData.org, Aug. 2, 2021, https://educationdata.org/public-education-spending-statistics]

[Defense Budget. “Budget Basics: National Defense,” Peter G. Peterson Foundation, Aug. 2, 2021, https://www.pgpf.org/budget-basics/budget-explainer-national-defense (“The United States spent $725 billion on national defense during fiscal year (FY) 2020 according to the Office of Management and Budget . . ..”)]

[Use of word “pee” in The Gazette; precedent. Adam Sullivan. 2021 headline: “Banning fake pee? In this economy?” The Gazette, Feb. 19, 2021, https://www.thegazette.com/staff-columnists/banning-fake-pee-in-this-economy/ ]

[Lolly Eggers. Iowa City Public Library Librarian, served from 1975-95. “Iowa City Public Library celebrates legacy of Lolly Eggers, Former Library Director,” Press Release, Iowa City Public Library,” July 2, 2021, https://www.icpl.org/press-releases/iowa-city-public-library-celebrates-legacy-lolly-eggers-former-library-director]

[Carver. Doing the wrong things better. John Carver, “Remaking Governance,” American School Board Journal, March 2000, p. 26, http://nicholasjohnson.org/writing-2/asbjcarv.html]

[Cedar Rapids School Board governance. “Article 2 Board Governance and Operations,” Cedar Rapids Community School District Policies and Procedures,” https://crschools.us/series/200/]

[Group decision making. Tim Barnett, “Group Decision Making,” Encyclopedia of Management, Reference for Business, https://www.referenceforbusiness.com/management/Gr-Int/Group-Decision-Making.html ]

[Number of school boards. Imed Bouchrika, “101 American School Statistics: 2020/2021 Data, Trends & Predictions,” Education, Research.com, June 10, 2020, https://research.com/education/american-school-statistics (“The U.S. is currently home to 16,800 school districts.”)]

[19 counties better than US education. “20 Best Education System in the World,” edsys, May 22, 2019, https://www.edsys.in/best-education-system-in-the-world/; Patricia Fioriello, “Top K-12 Education System in the World,” Critical Issues in Education, https://drpfconsults.com/top-k-12-education-system-in-the-world/ (“The top five K-12 education systems worldwide are as follows:” – the U.S. did not make the list)]

# # #

The Media Under Siege

The Media, Under Siege:
And What KHOI Can Do About It

Nicholas Johnson 

KHOI-FM 89.1 Fundraiser: An Evening with Nicholas Johnson 

Ames, Iowa 

November 16, 2018

Thank you for the invitation I join you this evening. The only thing nicer than being asked to speak is to be invited back to speak.

The topic, and speech title, you have requested is “Media Under Siege.” Always the conscientious student, I feel obliged to say something about the assignment you’ve given me, and we’ll begin with that.

But it might be useful to put that siege in context, especially during our discussion period. So I’ll also have something to say about our democracy under siege; what it takes to create and maintain a democracy, the role of media in that process, the role of KHOI, and what you and I can do in our daily lives to help revive that democracy.

Media under siege. Five months ago, June 28th, five journalists were assassinated in the newsroom of the Capital Gazette, near Annapolis. Last month, October 2nd, Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi journalist working for the Washington Post, was brutally assassinated in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul.

Sadly, these six journalists are a small percentage of the 1000 journalists who have been assassinated over the past ten or fifteen years. Assassination is the ultimate silencing of the media, the ultimate example of media under siege. And those assassinated are just the ones killed because of the content of their reporting. Many more have died while reporting from a battlefield or during other dangerous assignments.

Assassinations are not the only threat. Newspaper subscription and advertising revenue is about half of what it once was. Television network affiliates, formerly guaranteed at least one-third of the potential viewing audience, now find themselves competing with 500 cable and satellite channels.

The influence of both broadcasters and publishers is further diminished by the competition for eyeballs. Every hour we spend staring at a laptop or smartphone screen, searching the Internet, checking our Facebook page, answering email or texting friends, watching YouTube videos, playing video games, reading or watching the thousands of online social media, news sources, podcasts and videos, are hours not spent looking at a TV screen or newspaper.

I’m informed there are some people who spend time tending their gardens, taking a walk in the woods, or reading books, without any electronic devices. Frankly, I find that unlikely; and at best a minuscule percentage.

Finally, media are among the first institutions to come under attack in the 49 nations headed by dictators, authoritarian strongmen or wannabes. Such leaders conduct massive propaganda campaigns. They revise the schools’ textbooks. The ruler’s control of the media can take the form of personal or government ownership of stations and newspapers, intimidation and punishment of publishers and journalists, criticism designed to erode the public’s trust of independent media, or blocking citizen access to external broadcast signals, Internet sites and publications.

We will return to the media in a few minutes and during our discussion period.

The Context: democracy under siege. But first, let’s provide a little context for KHOI and its need for our financial support. KHOI is a much more essential institution, in this place and at this time, than even its fans may be aware.

For the media is not the only essential institution that is under siege.

Our democracy may well not survive the current attacks upon it from home and abroad. Let me repeat that. Our democracy may well not survive the current attacks upon it from home and abroad.

Like climate change, there comes a time when the red line has been crossed, when the life of a democracy, or even life on Earth, can no longer be resuscitated.

Like a good marriage, a good democracy is something we must work at. An apocryphal story reported a poll in which local citizens were asked which they thought the greater problem in their community, ignorance or apathy. Most answered, simply, “I don’t know, and I don’t care.”

A democracy requires people who do know and do care; people who have an almost religious faith in both the idea and the reality of democracy. It needs those who know the questions to ask, have access to accurate and relevant facts, the education to understand them, and the interest, energy and motivation to act accordingly, to fulfill the responsibility democracy places upon us.

When one of the kids would come running into the house after school, they would say to my wife, Mary Vasey, “Hey, Mom, make me a sandwich.” Did you have kids like that? Mary’s response was to place her hand on their head, and solemnly incant, “You are a sandwich.”

Unfortunately, the creation and preservation of a democracy is even more difficult than turning a child into a sandwich. And yet the destruction of a democracy can occur almost as quickly as you can turn a sandwich into a child.

Most often democracies yield to dictators, not from external military aggression, but from internal defection, using the very freedoms and processes democracy provides. We like to say that it can’t happen here. But it has already happened here. On February 20, 1939. 20,000 Americans, dressed as Nazis, filled Madison Square Garden, with arms raised in the Nazi salute. They cheered as the speaker called for a “white, Gentile-ruled United States.”

[https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/542499/marshall-curry-nazi-rally-madison-square-garden-1939/]

Only three weeks ago tomorrow an anti-Semite with an AR-15 turned the Tree of Life Synagogue into a tree of death for 11 Jews in Pittsburgh’s Squirrel Hill neighborhood. Reports of hate crimes took a big jump last year, up to 7100.

[https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/13/us/hate-crimes-fbi-2017.html]

You can’t buy a democracy in a store. You can’t create one by passing a law. In that sense there is no such thing as “democracy.” There are only the nations, and their people, whose institutions make a democracy possible. These institutions are to a democracy what the columns, or pilings, are to a beach house, raised above the relentless storm surge.

Democracy's institutions.

• Education. Well-funded free public K-12 and higher education
.
• Libraries. Free public libraries for those with the education to use them
.
• Courts. A respected, independent judiciary to check the leader’s abuses
.
• Voting. Legislators representing constituents’ interests, not special interests, elected from districts that have not been gerrymandered, with voting systems designed to encourage, rather than discourage, citizens’ participation
.

These are among what I have called the Columns of Democracy in my most recent book by that title. If those institutions are supported, adequately funded, respected, and encouraged a democracy is possible. When they are damaged or destroyed democracy collapses, just like that beach house when it loses its columns.

Communications. All of these institutions are essential to democracy. But communication and the media were thought to be central by our founders and remain so today.

Look at all our predecessors did.

Thomas Jefferson said, “Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter.” To which he immediately added, “But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them.”

["The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers and be capable of reading them." – Thomas Jefferson to Edward Carrington," January 16, 1787, Julian P. Boyd, ed., The Papers of Thomas Jefferson, 11:48-49 (emphasis supplied).]

In two sentences he made the case for the First Amendment, free public education, and universal postal delivery of newspapers, magazines and books at subsidized rates. Jefferson made no mention of his presidency on his tombstone, but did include, “Father of the University of Virginia.”

We’ve had public schools since Boston Latin School in 1635, a central purpose of which was always civics, turning Americans into participating citizens.

Jefferson also saw the necessity of libraries. Following the 1814 Library of Congress fire he doubled the former collection, making available his personal library of about 6500 volumes.

In addition to the postal system with its Pony Express, the subsidization of canals, railroads, universal telephone service (plus today’s broadband), airlines and the Interstate Highway system also served in part to facilitate communication.

Let us first be a little more precise about what we mean by “the media” and its contribution to democracy. Much of what’s on radio and television, and in books and magazines, has little to nothing to do with the Columns of Democracy or citizenship. It may even be counterproductive.

Entire sections of newspapers are devoted to sports. Even the New York Times has its popular, if incredibly difficult, crossword puzzle.

The 19-minute “ABC World News Tonight” contains little world news and even less of the information citizens need. It deliberately attracts an audience that apparently likes to be frightened, even terrorized, by an exited anchor person’s dramatic portrayals of the day’s worst disasters and dangers – some of which aren’t even legitimate local news where they occurred. Storms are “deadly”, a driver was “trapped” in her vehicle, school buses were involved in “tragedies,” there was a “scare” at sea onboard a listing cruise ship. There are “deadly” airline and highway accidents, shootings and stabbings, fires and floods, explosions and hurricanes.

ABC comes a lot closer to what Paddy Chayefsky predicted as the future of news, in the movie “Network,” than any CBS Evening News with Walter Cronkite. It certainly makes a fellow want to stay safely indoors watching television.

No, what we want to focus upon is the information a democracy’s citizens need to address the challenges and opportunities confronting their democracy; all sides of the problems and solutions, the public policy questions, and the answers offered from other communities and nations.

And speaking of other nations, let’s separate and identify some categories of the information we need and the media that provide it.

International news. What’s happening on the world’s continents, and nations’ capitals? There’s no shortage of sources. My iPhone has apps bringing me news from the world’s best newspapers: the Guardian in London, Le Monde from Paris, others in Berlin, Moscow, Karachi, Doha, Erbil, Beijing, Mumbai, Tokyo.

National news. For us, that’s mostly what happened in New York and Washington today, plus some regional centers like Chicago and Los Angeles – along with an occasional midterm election or huge California fire. Again, we can have multiple sources and apps on our smartphones: New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, AP, Bloomberg, plus PBS and NPR.

State news. For state news, the Des Moines Register used to self-identify as “the newspaper all Iowa depends upon.” And it was; delivered by truck around the state, available on the counter of every small-town café. There is no equivalent today, although The Gazette does a nice job of state news for eastern Iowa, and the Register still serves central Iowa.

Local news: communication and community. All of which brings us to KHOI, perhaps the Ames Tribune, and the subject of local news.

Americans may have multiple sources for international, national, and even state news.

But if you want to know the arguments for and against the new water plant, who’s died and who’s opened a new business, what roads are closed for construction, what’s happening with property taxes, or the results of your local school board election, for most Iowans neither the New York Times nor the Register are going to be much help.

Unlike international and national news, there simply are no alternative sources for the local news that is the most important supporting column for a community's democracy. This is an essential need that KHOI is uniquely positioned to provide for Ames.

Like every other industry, some newspapers are doing better than others. But the national average is that subscriptions and advertising revenue are now about half what they once were. Hundreds of papers have gone out of business. Virtually all have had to cut back on reporters, and therefore the number of government agencies, subjects and local news stories.

Television and radio stations have an ADI, their “area of dominant influence,” the geographical area within which residents not only can but do receive their signal. Newspapers have “circulation areas.” For many purposes, those ADIs and circulation areas are the most meaningful geographical definition of our “communities” – regardless of where the “city limits” may be.

Think about the number of words beginning with “c-o-m-m”: commune, the commons, communal, communitarian, yes; but also, community and communication. For community is the essential chemical element from which democracies are made. And communication networks are what create and define our communities – whether the family as a community; the teachers, parents and kids in a K-12 school; a church congregation; the workplace; suburban development; city, county, state, nation, and for some, their sense of being a part of a global community.

Without communication communities disintegrate, and without communities democracies fail.

What can we do? What can KHOI do? What can you, you and I, do?

Political. We can increase our political participation. Only 55% of Americans eligible to register actually vote. That makes us 26th in the world; eight countries are above 75%; Belgium is 87% and we’re 55%.

Iowa City is in Johnson County; what some call the “Peoples Republic of Johnson County.” We’re only two percentage points above the U.S. average. Of Iowa City residents eligible to register, often less than 10% vote in school board, City, or County Supervisor elections. Hopefully, Ames is better.

But merely voting is not enough. As Frederick Douglas observed, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.” We must keep in touch with our elected officials: with personal visits, phone calls, emails, letters, and demonstrations.

You can volunteer to work for candidates or political parties. You can run for office, or agree to serve on one of our multiple governments’ boards and commissions.

Media. When conventional media suffer so does our democracy. If you have a business, support your newspaper by advertising. Think of it as a charitable contribution; one you can take as a tax-deductible business expense. Become a subscriber. Be a contributor of columns and letters to the editor. And support independent, nonprofit media financially: KHOI, Iowa Public Radio and Television.

If local media are not able to assign fulltime beat reporters to the school board or city council, consider doing it yourself. Become familiar with Ames’ Website, www.CityOfAmes.org. Learn about your 26 local government departments – the Planning & Zoning Commission, or Parks & Recreation Department – pick the one that most interests you. Then follow its work, write about it in a blog, social media, and submissions to newspapers. Produce or participate in a KHOI program reporting on local institutions.

K-12, Higher Education, and Public Libraries. One of the earliest purposes of American schools was “civics;” giving students the knowledge and skills they need to be citizens in a democracy. How well are your local schools performing that historic and essential function? If you don’t know, find out. Are they adequately funded?

Over 100 years ago Iowans decided that eight years of free public education was not enough. We began requiring12 years and high schools. Isn’t it about time Iowa go from K-12 to K-14, with free public community colleges, as Tennessee, California and other places are doing? You can play a role in increasing public funding of Iowa’s K-12 schools, community colleges, and higher education institutions like Ames’ own Iowa State University.

Free public libraries are an essential companion to education in creating and maintaining a democracy. Are yours – and Iowa State’s – adequately funded? Is there more you could do locally to increase citizens’ use of their resources?

Judiciary. We want a rule of law, not the law of rulers. How much do you know about legal services for the poor, our local and appellate judges, their qualifications, their independence, their budgets, the efforts to turn the judiciary into just another partisan branch of government?

Community. Each of us can do more to help build a sense of community with the little things we do each day, including the smile and greeting we give a stranger we pass on the street. We can do more to promote civility in our relationships; to go beyond tolerating diversity to celebrating diversity and the richness it adds to our lives. We can try to learn more about the needs of individuals in various segments of our community; needs for housing, nutrition, healthcare, transportation – and what’s being done to meet those needs.

And there is a role for KHOI with each of these Columns of Democracy: politics and governing, media, education, libraries, the judiciary, community building. You’re already doing much of this heavy lifting. But is there more you could do with your programming, identifying issues for discussion, and giving electronic voice to Ames’ voiceless?

When Benjamin Franklin was leaving the Constitutional Convention a stranger asked him, “What kind of a government did you give us? A Republic or a Monarchy?” To which Franklin responded, “A Republic, if you can keep it.”

For 230 years we’ve kept it. Our democracy has had its challenges – the Civil War, the Great Depression – but it has never before been threatened with extinction. Now that’s a possibility. We can no longer take it for granted, no longer assure our grandchildren that America’s democracy will forever survive.

Whether our democracy continues is up to us, how much you and I are willing to do, and what you do with KHOI. That’s what I’d like for us to now discuss.

# # #

First Thoughts on 911 -- 15 Years Later

From 1998 through 2001 I added to my law school teaching and research obligations the tasks of a local school board member -- plus an every-two-week column on K-12 issues in the local paper. As it happened, the final column was written following September 11, 2001, and published September 25. Rereading it recently, I was struck with how little the truths have changed during the course of our multi-trillion-dollar 15 year "war on terror."

For this September 11th, the fifteenth anniversary of that awful day, it seems worthwhile to share the thoughts that came to mind so soon after those events. Here they are. -- N.J.

Teach Our Children Tolerant Ways

Nicholas Johnson

Iowa City Press-Citizen, "Opinion," September 25, 2001, p. 9A
Oct. 4 [2001] will mark the 44th anniversary of a shock to our nation. Not a deafening explosion. A faint beep from a 183-pound, basketball-sized orbiting satellite. Sputnik meant the Soviet Union was ahead of us in the space race.

Our response? Something called “The National Defense Education Act” – emphasis on “defense.” More money for math, science and foreign language instruction. This time let’s include social studies.

This is the 79th and last column in a series begun Oct. 12, 1998. It was originally planned to be thanks for those who elected me to the School Board, my fellow board members, administrators and staff. A review of the board’s accomplishments. Its remaining agenda. My continuing Web page. And an announcement of the John Haefner Social Studies Award I’ve created through our district’s foundation.

Two weeks of shock, grief and anger from terrorists’ barbaric attacks on our nation changed that.

President Bush urged us to get back to what we were doing before Sept. 11. What was he doing that morning? Campaigning for his education bill.

It’s time for the president and Congress to get back to it.

Some call for a U.S. revenge of violence. Others plead for greater understanding. Either way, education is a major part of the answer.

We have the world’s finest intelligence gathering technology. What we don’t have are enough folks who can translate those millions of conversations and e-mails into English.

How can you spy, let alone infiltrate if you don’t know the language? If you can’t find the country on an outline map? If you know nothing of its people – their history, culture, economic conditions and religion?

We have more military power than many nations combined. And yet we’re still vulnerable. Not to the wars of the last century. Those we could still fight and win. Vulnerable to the wars of this century. Wars without nations, front lines and tanks. Wars fought with cardboard box openers and commercial airliners.

A terrorist used to be “someone who has a bomb but doesn’t have a plane.” Now terrorists use planes as bombs.

It’s good to tighten airline security. But terrorists have many alternatives to bombing buildings with hijacked planes.

Terrorism is not about “winning wars.” It’s not even about death and desgtruction, as such. Terrorism is about fomenting terror.

Terror comes from the innovative and unexpected attack. A bridge, nuclear power plant or natural gas pipeline here. An electric power grid or Internet there. Atom bombs in backpacks. Poisoned air in a subway one day. A water supply another.

Such attacks are easy for perpetrators willing to die. Especially in countries where individual liberties are highly desired and valued.

We don’t want to turn America into an armed camp. But even if we imposed martial law we could not eliminate our vulnerability.

Retaliation may make us feel better. But it will likely increase terrorism.

So what can we do?

Something our school district’s already doing. Encourage children to celebrate – rather than hate – the community’s and world’s diversity.

Prejudice against all Muslims is abhorrent. Attacking Sikhs, thinking them Muslims, reflects basic ignorance as well. We must provide more understanding than do our corporate media about others’ living conditions. Whom do they blame for their misery? Their oppressive regimes? What attracts them to a bin Laden?

America is a generous nation. But it’s also capable of overt and covert government and corporate practices that oppress and exploit others for convenience and profit.

Practices often seen as arrogant. Policies reflecting ignorance of others’ cultures.

Such ignorance contributed to our misjudgments in Vietnam, the hostage taking in Iran and this terrorist attack. Not to mention failecd global marketing efforts.

Our students will be better able than we to deal with the globalism and terrorism we leave them. Is education the only answer? Of course not. But it’s an imperative beginning. And it’s something we can do.

Goodbye, and thanks for the opportunity to serve.
_______________
Nicholas Johnson is an Iowa City School Board member. More information is available on his Web site: www.nicholasjohnson.org.

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ICCSD: School Boundaries Simple Three-Step

April 25, 2014, 8:15 a.m.

Note and Summary: This blog essay was first posted two years ago. As Iowa City School District school boundary lines are once again in the news (e.g., Holly Hines, "Parents Want Kids Walking to School; Concerned Proposed Longfellow Boundaries Would Limit That Option," Iowa City Press-Citizen, April 25, 2014, p. A1), it seemed worthwhile to post it again. In brief, it's a suggestion that (1) to ease stakeholders' buy-in to any proposal the changes' effective date might better be six to seven years in the future, and (2) rather than regularly returning to these divisive and disruptive boundary issues when changes are needed, the School Board might be well advised to adopt a flexible boundary policy (with two, rather than one, boundary lines for each school), giving the Board, and its superintendent, the ability to respond to modest changes in population over time that only affect parents and children who are new to the District.

School Board Alternatives to Procrastination and Frustration
Who goes to which K-12 schools and why?

There are 15,000 school districts and school boards across the country confronting those questions.

[Photo of prior, not current, ICCSD Board. Photo credit: Nicholas Johnson.]

Apparently the Iowa City Community School District (ICCSD) school board is now doing so again.

Here's a three-step process for easing everyone's pain.

Step One. Decide to do it. You. The Board members. Not a community committee or a consultant or the Superintendent. Not a series of open forums prayerfully in search of what one board member called "a solution that satisfies the whole community." Alesha L. Crews, School board members talk about next steps; Say portable buildings a short-term solution, should not be permanent," Iowa City Press-Citizen, May 17, 2012, p. A3.

You are the buffer among the District's stakeholders -- students, parents, administrators, teachers, staff, property tax payers, and citizens. Face it, you'll never satisfy them all.

Only you can create "fairness" for the poor and working poor and lower middle class District parents, when the contests arise in which their interests are pitted against those of our most economically and political powerful families.

Remember, this is a public school system. No one but you has a right to dictate policy. Dissatisfied students and parents who want more absolute control over the details have options, from private schools, to other school districts, to home schooling.

Consider their wishes? Of course. But to think, as one board member put it, that it is "absolutely critical that we don’t ignore anyone’s needs," is a classic example of the triumph of hope over experience. It will inevitably produce the K-12 equivalent of the line that "a camel is a horse built by committee."

Nothing against camels mind you, but only the Board can create a rational, efficient, school system in which all the pieces fit, work together, and optimize the desired output -- increased numbers of students graduating closer to their academic potential.

As Nike says, "Just do it."

Step Two. Think specifically about District goals, not generally about drawing lines.

This is where "if you don't know where you want to go, the odds are very high that you'll never get there" comes into play.

Here are some of the destinations you might want to think about:

(a) Are you willing to take your time, or do you have to do it right now? You could announce a new approach to redistricting that will take effect six or seven years from now. That would eliminate most of the emotional opposition from students and parents affected by a shorter time in which to accommodate change. Most of those who will be affected by a future plan don't yet have kids in school -- or haven't even yet moved to Iowa City.

(b) How much flexibility, or rigidity, do you want? Flexibility is a variable that can be turned up or down, like a rheostat controlling the lighting in a dining room. Do you want fixed, immovable lines -- until the next time you have a redistricting crisis? Or would you like to give the Superintendent, and yourselves, some flexibility?

For example, you could provide (and, if (a) is adopted, not until, say, seven years from now) that (1) once assigned to an elementary school a student could finish at that school, but that (2) there would be two, not just one, geographical areas feeding that school. [i] One would be immediately contiguous to the school, a small enough area that virtually no projection of increased population would result in more students living there than the school could properly hold. The children of families living in, or moving into, that area would be assigned to that school. [ii] The other, larger area, would give the Board and Superintendent the flexibility to assign students living there to any one of three or four closest schools. (Of course, once assigned, under principle (a) the student could finish there.) Thus, as new families moved into that larger area they might know the probabilities of where their children would be assigned, but they would not have a firm commitment of a school from the District. (For more discussion and detail, see, e.g., "Disparity in Class Sizes: Simple Solution Rejected," October 13, 2010.)

(c) Settle upon your position with regard to the demographic balance represented in the assignment of "free and reduced lunch" students to the schools. You may want greater disparity than we now have, less, about the same, or have no position, leaving the outcome to chance -- the latter in all probability a policy that will produce an increase in the disparity. Just make up your minds; hopefully with specific numbers.

(d) There are many other variables you can think about, resolve, and announce. Do I have personal preferences on some of these District goals? Of course. But that's irrelevant. These are the Board's decisions to make. My focus at the moment is not on what you decide but what it is you decide about.

By laying out your own very specific metrics for where you say the District is headed, and providing that they will have little to no impact on today's students and parents, because they won't take effect immediately, you provide stability for the future, and virtually eliminate the emotional opposition.

Step Three. Evolve toward your goals. With a little advance individual reading and thinking, Steps One and Two should be capable of resolution with one or two weekends of Board-member-only workshops. Remember, it's your decisions we're talking about, not those of some consultant. Once you announce the outcome, where the District is headed, it will be possible -- without forcing decisions, but as needs for tweaking arise (like now!) -- to make those decisions consistent with your longer range plan (without imposing it wholesale ahead of schedule).

When I confront computer frustration, which seems to happen with some regularity, my computer consultant son, Gregory (http://ResourcesForLife.com) usually advises, "Well, Dad, there are three steps," following which he puts in simple, three-step language what it is that his cyberlaw professor father should do to get on with his personal life in our digital world.

I thought this "Three Simple Steps to School Redistricting" might be helpful for our local School Board as well. We'll see.
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Do Iowa's School Districts Need Consultants?

August 9, 2012, 10:00 a.m. Are They Worth It?

[Credit: Ted Elliott Resources.] The Iowa City Community School District is looking for a consultant -- or consultants -- again. Adam B. Sullivan, "District considers hiring consultant; Firm would determine building capacity, enrollment trends, growth projections," Iowa City Press-Citizen, August 8, 2012, p A1.

[And see, e.g., "School Boundaries: There Are Better Ways," April 16, 2010 ("The ICCSD is not the only school district from among the 15,000 in the U.S. that is confronting the need to redraw its schools' boundary lines. . . . However, most districts also manage to resolve it without months of undirected chaos, changes in direction, and the 'assistance' of expensive consultants."); "School Board Can't Do Job? There They Go Again," January 7, 2010 ("What is it about elected and appointed board members and administrators? Why this compulsive, knee-jerk sprint to search firms and consultants whenever they come face to face with the real job they're there to do? Honestly, what is it? Fundamental, gut-wrenching insecurity and low self-esteem? A political cowardice that seeks to ward off any possible criticism from any quarter with the ability to say, 'But that wasn't our decision; . . ..' Or is it a candid, honest assessment that they are really incapable of doing their job?"); "School Boundaries Consultant Folly", August 28, 2009 (and associated, embedded links); "UI VPs and ICCSD Consultants," August 14, 2009 ("it seems to me the tasks he has identified [for consultants] are tasks well within the job descriptions and expertise of administrators and staff the District already has in place").]

And what do they want these consultants to do? Why does the board think it needs them? The Press-Citizen quotes the superintendent as saying, "As we go through the process of doing facilities planning . . . there is some data we need. We need to know how many kids we have . . .."

This is not calculus, folks. It's not even trigonometry. It's elementary school math.

We had an Australian family visiting us last week. Their young son is almost three years old. He can count. Maybe the Iowa City District could hire him to gather that "data" regarding "how many kids we have." I'm sure he'd be willing to do it for substantially less than the $8000-to-$120,000 bids the board is considering.

Yes, I agree. I am being a little unfair. The board also wants to know "how many kids we're going to have." They think consultants can help them design buildings, draw school boundary lines, and determine transportation and staffing costs. But enrollment projections are already being provided by the University of Iowa. And as I'll soon explain, the decisions in question can and should only be made by board members, not consultants.

Administrative and Executive Pay Scales -- and for What?

What are we paying our school superintendents and college presidents for anyway? With their salaries running ten times those of many of their institutions' employees, and many corporate CEOs paid as much as 400 times their employees' salaries, it's hard to say what level of pay would be appropriate, reasonable and fair. But aren't we already paying them for their expertise to do the very things they want to pay consultants to do?

I'm reminded of the time our Board of Regents was unwilling to exert sufficient effort to retain UI President David Skorton, one of the nation's most highly regarded -- and now highly paid -- university presidents. As Slate has said, "Skorton, a man of great humor, warmth, and charm, is a distinguished research cardiologist and an accomplished jazz musician." Robert H. Frank, "Why Has Inequality Been Growing? How technology and winner-take-all markets have made the rich so much richer," Slate, December 6, 2011. That certainly squares with my own experiences with him -- although I would go on at much greater length regarding the full range of the extraordinary talents of this man. (If I am not mistaken he was qualified to, and did, hold positions in three of Iowa's graduate colleges.)

When the Regents refused him a pay raise, and many expected him to be miffed, his response was characteristic of the man: "When the median family income in Iowa is around $45,000 and I make over $300,000, it’s hard to argue that is not a lot of money. It’s very generous." Nicholas Johnson, "Pricey Presidents' Added Cost," Daily Iowan, March 7, 2006. (Cornell University is now paying him probably about three times that.)

Call me naive, but I think even $100,000 a year, plus benefits -- twice the average Iowan's income -- ought to be a liveable wage in most towns in Iowa today. At $250,000 -- five times the average Iowan -- the recipient is in the top 2 percent of American wage earners, most of whom live in east or west coast locations much more expensive than any in Iowa. Andrew Ross Sorkin, "Rich and Sort of Rich," New York Times, May 15, 2012, p. WK1.

It would be unrealistic to think that a school district or college should be able to obtain the equivalent of a David Skorton at those, or any other, salary levels. Individuals who combine the talents of Thomas Jefferson, Galileo, Michelangelo, Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett, Jesus, Wynton Marsalis, and Jerry Seinfeld are extremely rare.

So we're not getting those qualities. But what are we getting for our money? What can we reasonably expect? Sometimes it seems like the equivalent of the fellow who applied for a job as chef, and when asked what he most liked to make for dinner replied, "reservations." An institutional administrator whose primary skill is picking consultants is little better than that aspiring chef -- especially if the consultants he finds aren't that much better, either.

The Responsibilities of School Board Members

School board members cannot reasonably be expected to bring high level administrative skills, and K-12 expertise, to their jobs. It is a largely thankless position with little-to-negative payoff professionally, politically, socially, and none financially. As I used to say when serving on the Iowa City school board, "You may not get any pay, but at least you get a lot of grief."

That said, for whatever reason board members have chosen to serve. From my perspective that means they have assumed some self-imposed responsibilities.

They need to combine the desire and ability to listen to all stakeholders, along with the political courage to stand up to the inevitable opposition to the changes necessitated by the best interests of the district.

They must be able to think rationally and precisely about their governance system and come to agreement about their self-imposed procedures.

They need to get themselves informed about the range of issues confronting school districts all across the country, and given our global economy, progressive systems in other countries as well.

They need to recognize that, with 15,000 school districts in this country it is highly unlikely they will confront any challenge that has not already been present, identified, confronted, resolved, and written up about another district somewhere.

There are thousands of useful articles, books, government and foundation reports, education periodicals, and academic research regarding K-12. School board members need to spend at least as many hours informing themselves by searching the Internet, and local libraries, as the hours away from home they would spend attending a national school board convention in a holiday resort at taxpayers' expense.

Many to most of the issues school boards confront are issues that school board members, and only school board members, can address and resolve.

As I used to tell my colleagues, "Normally before you ask an architect for advice you know whether you want to build a courthouse or an outhouse." Only the board can decide what they want to do inside those school buildings -- not an architect, a committee, or a consultant. If they think team teaching and block scheduling are a good idea the walls will be in different places. If the board is persuaded by the available research that the optimum size of a high school is about 800 students, that will affect the size and cost of any new high schools. If the board decides, as advised by the National Commission for the High School Senior Year, that the best place for high school seniors is out of the high schools, that may reduce the "overcrowding" that dictates the need for new buildings.

The same thing can be said regarding school boundaries, class sizes, allocation of students from low income or homeless families. These all involve decisions that should be assumed, personally, by board members -- legally, politically, morally, and administratively -- not "contracted out" to the superintendent, committees, or consultants.

Ulterior Reasons for Using Consultants

Of course, the problem is actually worse than this. Consultants are often used, not because board members haven't done their homework, not because they don't know the answer or how to find it, but because they want to distance themselves politically from the decision. They want to be able to say, "we got the best consultants in the business (or best people in the community to serve on our committee), and this is what they advised." This may be made worse still by paying a consultant who is willing to come up with the recommendation the board has already decided upon.

A Little Closing Consultant Comedy

Well, enough of all this heavy discussion. Let's close with some of the stories consultants even tell about themselves.

Consultants, like lawyers, suffer from an abundance of jokes.

A young consultant in a Mercedes pickup truck, dressed in suit and tie, missed his turn and found himself on a dirt backroad in Iowa alongside a field. Spotting the farmer, he decided he'd have some fun while getting directions.

"If I tell you exactly how many sheep you have in that field will you give me one?"

"Sure," the farmer replied.

The young man went to work with his laptop, access to a NASA satellite, and offered the answer: "You have exactly 1322 sheep."

"Right, said the farmrer, who opened the gate, and let the young man into the field to select his animal.

Now it was the farmer's turn. "If I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my animal?"

"OK, take a guess."

"You're a consultant."

"How'd you know?"

"Simple," replied the farmer. "You turned up here although nobody called you. You want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked, and you know nothing about my business. Now give me back my dog!"

How do you know you're dealing with a consultant?

When he took you to lunch he asked the waiter to explain the restaurant's "core competencies."

He can spell "paradigm."

He insists on referring to every serious problem in your organization as nothing more than an "improvement opportunity."

When you asked what he did before becoming a consultant he described it as "my sunk cost."

He is able to say "value-added" without laughing.

He refers to his wife as his "co-CEO." She confides to you that he used to refer to their dating as test marketing, he always put executive summaries on his love letters to her, he wanted to do more market research before they had their first child, and now he wants to re-org their family into a "team-based organization."

(Who provided some of the raw material to stimulate the above? Why, consultants of course. DCS Media "Consulting Jokes" and Tom Antion & Associates, "Consulting Humor.")

Want to be able to talk to your consultant? Forbes has contributed its own list of proposed vocabulary for MBA's seeking promotions. It will also be useful for school board members who wish to appear knowledgeable when talking with consultants. It contains such words and phrases as this sampling from Forbes 89: "thrown under the bus," "low-hanging fruit," "next big thing," "best practices," "peel back the onion," "phoned it in," "elephant in the room," "basic blocking and tackling," "our go-to-market," "move the needle," "the deliverable," "gone viral," "square the circle," "cash cow," "synergy," "incentivize," "perfect storm," "at the end of the day," "let's put lipstick on this pig," "results-oriented," "a one-off," "facing some headwinds," "put that in the parking lot," "let's blue sky this," "where the rubber meets the road," "net it out," "creative destruction," "boots on the ground," "paradigm shift," "data-driven," "win-win," and "wrap our heads around." Eric Jackson, "89 Business Cliches That Will Get Any MBA Promoted And Make Them Totally Useless," Forbes, June 19, 2012.

Concluding Remarks

I don't deny that there may have once been some institution, many years ago in a land far away, that actually benefited from consultants. That's certainly possible. But I'm not convinced we're better off with them than we would be if superintendents and board members would bring their own expertise, study, judgment, and political courage to bear to what are, after all, their personal responsibilities.

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Sebring's affaire de e-mail: Spotting the Issues

June 14, 2012, 3:30 p.m.

[If you're interested in this blog entry, you might also want to see "Sebring's Emails, Part II; How Private Emails Become Public Records," June 24, 2012.]

Was This Really an "Email Policy" Resignation?
Internal Links to Contents

Language and Issue Spotting
The Superintendent's "Affair"
Morals Clauses
University of Iowa Tech Use Regulations

Nancy Sebring was one of Iowa's most outstanding, solid, well-regarded school superintendents. In Des Moines, she was leading one of the state's largest and most challenging school districts.

I recall meeting her when a great grandchild of mine was in her school system, and talking school board issues with her (as a former member of the school board for the Iowa City Community School District). She was as impressive in person as was her record on paper.

In May of this year she announced she would be resigning as superintendent, and later that she was accepting a comparable position in an even larger school district: Omaha.

Then, over a weekend, it all came crashing down.

It turned out she had sent some personal emails to a friend, using school computers and Internet connections. Because both the school district and the media considered these emails "public records" under Iowa law, once requested they were handed over and soon spread upon the front pages of major newspapers.

Why this media and public interest? These were not simple, brief emailed requests like, "Honey, please pick up some milk on you way home tonight," or, "Could we make lunch next Wednesday instead of Monday?" These were romantic exchanges with someone other than her husband, characterized as "an affair." E.g., "revelations of the affair were made public on Friday." Lee Rood, "Sebring tries to stop release of more emails," Des Moines Register, June 7, 2012.

It was the stuff of the gossipy, privacy-violating, sometimes fictional, supermarket tabloid National Enquirer. (Here are some illustrative headlines from its current online issue: "Mitt Romney Backstreet Abortion Shocker," "Travolta's Six-Year Affair with Male Pilot," "World's Fattest Bride," "Cops Probe Psycho Cannibal Porn Killer in Hollywood," "Zombie Apocalypse Now," and "The Dingo Did Eat Her Baby.")

Can you imagine how the Enquirer would handle and headline the Sebring story? Perhaps: "Iowa School Officials Cool to Administrator's Hot Sex."

Now don't get me wrong, judging, let alone condoning, the propriety of the superintendent's actions -- whether the relationship or her use of school computers to maintain it -- is not the subject of this blog entry.

Language and Issue Spotting

My purpose is simply an exploration of our use of language in how we analyze and think about the many issues surrounding email (and other Internet) use by employees.

Precision in the use of language is crucial in making wise decisions.

A corporation has to address, and express precisely, "What business are we really in?" A research scientist knows it's often more difficult to frame the question than to find the answer. In personal life, asking impossibly vague questions such as whether one is "successful" or "popular" or "rich" is more likely to lead to demoralization than answers. Coming up with the most appropriate measures in establishing John Carver's "ends policies" for board governance, or a management information reporting system, is hard work. How a doctor phrases a diagnostic question to a patient may end up being literally a matter of life or death.

In law school we speak of "spotting the issue."

No matter how good a lawyer's legal theory may be, no matter how much her winning appears to be a slam dunk, if she fails to "spot the issue" regarding a statute of limitations that has already run, or an exclusionary rule of evidence that will keep her convincing facts from the jury, she may lose not only her case but the client, her professional reputation, and in some instances her license to practice law.

So what are "the issues" in a school superintendent's use of school computers and Internet access for personal messages?

Initially, I see five categories of issues.

(1) Inappropriate behavior in general (without regard to where, with what, or when).

(2) Use of an institution's offices, facilities and equipment (whether government, schools, or private firms) for personal purposes.

(3) Devoting time to other than assigned tasks during "working hours."

(4) Unauthorized, or otherwise inappropriate, behavior with regard to the use of an institution's facilities.

(5) Public records requirements. (Are "personal" emails "public" records?)

The Superintendent's "Affair"

As a cyberlaw professor I'm drawn to the e-mail-related policy issues. But my initial reactions are that they were really peripheral to what happened in this case. And since a blog entry can't handle much more that this discussion of "issue 1," the rest will have to wait for later.

Sebring alleges, and no one contests, before the relationship was known it did not diminish the quantity or quality of her performance for the district. (Indeed, it may have increased both.) The added cost to the district of her computer use for personal purposes was so small as to be incapable of calculation. She was not engaging in hacking, cyber-bullying of employees, running a private business from her office, or other computer misuse of that nature.

Indeed, had her "personal use" been limited to innocuous messages involving rescheduling luncheons, or sharing items with family members, it is highly unlikely she would have been fired or found it necessary to resign.

[I haven't researched the details of her school district's computer and phone personal use policy, but here is one example of a common approach: "Electronic media and service are primarily for City business use. Limited, occasional or incidental use of electronic media (sending or receiving) for personal, non-City purposes is acceptable, as is the case with the occasional receipt or placement of personal phone calls." Excerpt from "Pleasant Hill City Manager Contract,"
p. 15, Section 7.2, "Electronic Media, Internet and Cell Phone Use". Even without such an administrative rule, or contractual provision, this would be a reasonable, common sense way to treat de minimis use of an employer's property.]

Similarly, had she used a handheld device and an e-mail account unrelated to the school district, if the relationship and comparable private messages became public she might have had to resign anyway.

No, I think the media coverage, and resignation, resulted from the content of the messages, and the relationship they revealed, not the computer she used to compose and send them.

Had she not been married, a relationship with a male friend would have been less problematical (although the explicit language in the emails might still have been an issue for the school board). Therefore, the nature of her "marriage" is relevant -- because the word "affair" suggests she may have been unfaithful to a husband in a strong, ongoing marriage.

Here is an excerpt from how her husband describes it: "Nancy and I have lived separate and independent lives for the past seven years. Our careers have led us in different directions both geographically and personally. We remain friends and enjoy spending time with our children and grandchildren." Lee Rood, "Sebring tries to stop release of more emails," Des Moines Register, June 7, 2012.

How does one go about fairly evaluating what she did (as distinguished from her choice of language in messages she believed to be private)? Was her rejection by two school boards -- or their acceptance of her resignation -- reasonable under the circumstances, and if so why or why not?

Because the answer turns, in large measure, on those boards' reflection of the values and standards of American society -- and in this case Iowans -- it's useful to try to figure out what they are. It's not an easy search. Partly this is because of the language we use to talk about them. Words like "affair," "adultery," "faithful," or "sexual harassment" can cover such a wide variety of behaviors, with an accompanying wide variety of reactions, as to impede their utility as a result of being both under- and over-inclusive.

President Clinton's involvement with Monica Lewinsky gave rise to a national conversation exposing the realization we can't even agree on what the phrase "sexual relations" includes (i.e., oral sex as well as sexual intercourse?). By his definition (and that of many high school and college students) he was telling the truth when he insisted, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky." "Lewinsky Scandal", Wikipedia.org.

Moreover, opinions and reactions vary with one's socio-economic group, educational level, geographic residence, religion, social friends' values -- not to mention personal experience and many other variables. They also vary over time; meaning both the century in question and one's age.

So let's take a stab at it.

Americans' attitudes about sex, from the time of the Pilgrims until today, have been highly charged -- emotionally, politically, socially, legally, judgmentally, and religiously. So it is not surprising that when "sex" is involved in stories about high profile individuals there will be great public interest in the gossip and details.

However, attitudes regarding sexual relations vary across a broad spectrum. Some think any sex with anything or anybody at any age or any time is inappropriate. Some think sex within marriage ("between one man and one woman") is OK, so long as it is for the purpose of creating children. Others think it's OK whatever the purpose.

What about sexual activity by and among those who are unmarried (single, divorced, long-time separated)? What if one of the couple is single and the other is married (to someone else)?

Given the number of births to young, unmarried mothers, one would have to conclude that, whatever they may believe, a lot of singles are engaged in sex outside of marriage. Jason DeParle and Sabrina Tavernise, "For Women Under 30, Most Births Occur Outside Marriage," New York Times, February 18, 2012, p. A1 ("It used to be called illegitimacy. Now it is the new normal. . . . [M]ore than half of births to American women under 30 occur outside marriage.").

On the other hand, some, but relatively few, will openly say it's OK for a married person to have a sexual relationship with someone other than their spouse. The so-called "open marriage" movement of the '70s was not spectacularly successful.

On the other hand, once again practice varies somewhat from professed belief -- and possibly varies even more than the statistics drawn from those willing to confess they've strayed would indicate. Tara Parker-Pope, "Love, Sex and the Changing Landscape of Infidelity," New York Times, October 28, 2008, p. D1 ("[T]he General Social Survey . . . data show that in any given year, about 10 percent of married people — 12 percent of men and 7 percent of women — say they have had sex outside their marriage. . . . [T]he lifetime rate of infidelity for men over 60 increased to 28 percent in 2006, up from 20 percent in 1991. For women over 60, the increase is more striking: to 15 percent, up from 5 percent in 1991.").

Even within these statistics, and the range of individuals' opinions about them, circumstances seem to make a difference.

At one extreme is former presidential candidate John Edwards, who represented while campaigning that he had a good marriage with his wife (who ultimately died of cancer), while he was having an ongoing sexual relationship that he denied, as well as denying his paternity of a child born of that relationship, for which he had an aide take responsibility, while using money from a wealthy campaign supporter to support and silence the mother. Neil A. Lewis, "For Edwards, Drama Builds Toward a Denouement," New York Times, September 20, 2009, p. A1.

On the other hand, there is the single "one-night-stand," or very brief and casual relationship, during an otherwise solid and lengthy marriage (as distinguished from an undisclosed, serious, ongoing relationship that undermines the marriage and lasts for years).

Some women (and men) accept such behavior from their spouse -- or at least don't pursue a divorce. Anne Sinclair, the billionairess wife of the womanizer and former IMF Director Dominique Straus-Kahn, (who certainly doesn't need to stay with him for his money) has said of him (even before the New York incident with the chambermaid), "It’s important to seduce, for a politician. As long as he is still attracted to me, and I to him, it is sufficient." Vanessa Grigoriadis, "The Womanizer’s Wife; Billionairess Anne Sinclair stood by her man when just about everyone else in the world believed the maid. Is it that she knows Dominique Strauss-Kahn? Or that she doesn’t?" New York Magazine, July 31, 2011.

Similarly, speaking of President Bill Clinton's relationship with Monica Lewinsky, then-presidential candidate Hillary Clinton said, "she had been embarrassed by Bill Clinton's cheating, but said she knew all along that he loved her. 'I never doubted Bill's love for me, ever . . .." "'I never doubted Bill's love': Hillary Clinton speaks for first time about Monica Lewinsky affair," Daily Mail [London], January 18, 2008.

Of course, now-Secretary Clinton also added on that occasion, "every case is unique. . . . 'No one story is the same as any other . . .. I can't possibly substitute my judgment for yours, but what I can tell you is you must be true to yourself.'"

And at the other extreme from Sinclair and Clinton are millions of women, and men, who decide that being "true to yourself" compels a divorce as a consequence of sometimes far less serious perceived transgressions by a partner (including what may have been in fact wholly innocent behavior), and behavior accompanied by none of the public humiliation suffered by celebrities from the media.

The Sebrings situation involved separation.

"Separations" can vary between temporary (whether because of a job relocation, or while the couple tries to "work things out"), and relatively long term and permanent (as seems to have been the case for the Sebrings). As quoted near the beginning, her husband described their relationship this way: ""Nancy and I have lived separate and independent lives for the past seven years. Our careers have led us in different directions both geographically and personally. We remain friends and enjoy spending time with our children and grandchildren." Lee Rood, "Sebring tries to stop release of more emails," Des Moines Register, June 7, 2012. This sounds like their status was, in fact if not in law, the full equivalent of divorce -- insofar as the social standards regarding fidelity are concerned.

From her husband's statement, he would seem to have been not at all surprised or upset that she would have other male friends with whom she might, or might not, have had sexual relationships.

Ms. Sebring said of her e-mail-based relationship that it "lasted a little over a month and has now ended" -- something that some would find ameliorating (because it was short-lived) and others would find more serious (because suggestive of additional relationships). Indeed, Sebring's reference to her "personal relationship in this case, or any other case," might suggest that possibility. Mary Stegmeir, "Nancy Sebring's sexually explicit emails disclosed; Her early exit as Des Moines schools superintendent was triggered by their discovery,", Des Moines Register, June 3, 2012.

These nuances might not make a significant difference to a school board's evaluation of their superintendent, and I'm not passing judgment one way or the other on either the superintendent or the board.

However, as I began this blog entry, language matters. In the realm of moral judgments, a word like "affair" (like the expression "sexual harassment") is used to describe a widely disparate range of situations and behaviors.

Therefore, I do believe the media does have an obligation in such a high profile case as Sebring's to be fair and precise.

I hear the echo of Joseph N. Welch's comment, following a similar loose use of language by Senator Joseph McCarthy during the Army-McCarthy hearings: "Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?" "Joseph N. Welch", Wikipedia.org.

It is not my purpose to judge what Superintendent Sebring did, either in her relationship or in her use of the school's email -- though I suspect, in retrospect she wishes she'd done things a little differently. Nor do I mean to suggest that the media has been the moral equivalent of Senator Joseph McCarthy or the National Enquirer. Judgment is neither my purpose nor my proper role.

My only contention is that it seems to me simple fairness would have dictated that the full texts of the explicit language in what were, after all, believed by the senders and recipients to be private in the extreme (even if they were mistaken in so thinking) did not need to be distributed to all the readers of mass-distributed newspapers. It is for that reason those texts have not been included in this blog entry.

At a minimum, fairness and decency required as much precision as possible in making clear that Nancy Sebring's "affair" was not John Edwards' "affair."

Morals Clauses

There is another enormous issue here which I'm not going to take time and space to explore, and that is the use of "morals clauses" in institutions' contracts of employment. Schools used to forbid, not only pregnant married women from teaching in their classrooms, but married women whether pregnant or not.

"[T]he scandal has prompted Iowa city and school officials to consider whether morality clauses should be part of the employment agreements signed by top public sector executives. A review of the contracts of more than two dozen Iowa school superintendents, city managers and county administrators showed that the inclusion of the clause — which allows employees to be fired for moral or ethical breaches — is not common. But, in education in particular, the current trend favors tighter controls on employee conduct, contract law experts said." Mary Stegmeir and Josh Hafner, "Few public contracts have morals clauses; But many school, municipal leaders' conduct in office is covered by other language," Des Moines Register, June 10, 2012.

In what jobs, contexts, and under what conditions are which personal qualities or behaviors grounds for dismissal?

Who will decide what constitutes "immoral" behavior? What procedures will be used to evaluate alleged transgressions?

To what extent should disciplinary actions be limited to immoral behavior that interferes with workplace performance? Ms. Sebring asserts that “my personal relationship in this case, or any other case, did not interfere with my job performance.” It apparently did not involve any district employee. Mary Stegmeir, "Nancy Sebring's sexually explicit emails disclosed; Her early exit as Des Moines schools superintendent was triggered by their discovery,", Des Moines Register, June 3, 2012. Notwithstanding the self-serving nature of her assertion, it's certainly plausible. It's possible the relationship even increased her energy and on-job performance.

When, and for which behavior, is it appropriate for an employer to try to regulate off-premises behavior? For example, if an employee can be fired, or not hired in the first place, for smoking in the workplace, can they be similarly rejected for smoking at home? If a college baseball team's first baseman can be dropped for using steroids, does the same standard have to apply to the marching band's first trumpet player? If an employer can fire a worker for having an "affair" with a co-worker, does it follow that they can also lose their job for an affair with someone who is not?

Could a pharmacy (without religious affiliation) that refuses to supply customers with birth control pills, fire an employee caught telling a potential customer which local pharmacies do carry the pills? If so, could it also fire that employee for an off-premises letter to the editor, or comment on a call-in radio program, on the subject? For a private, off-premises conversation with a friend? Compare, Laurie Goodstein, "Obama Shift on Providing Contraception Splits Critics," New York Times, February 15, 2012, p. A12.

So many issues, so little time and space. Perhaps there will be more to come at some point regarding the cyberspace issues.

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Appendix
Excerpts from University of Iowa Tech Use Regulations
University of Iowa Operations Manual, CHAPTER 19: ACCEPTABLE USE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY RESOURCES (2002):

19.1 PREAMBLE
Although modest personal use of University-supplied technology resources may improve the skills of individual users and otherwise contribute indirectly to the University's mission, these resources should be used primarily for University-related educational and administrative purposes.

19.3 SECURITY AND PRIVACY.

Although it is the University's position that personal electronic files of faculty, staff, and students are not ordinarily to be considered "public records," users should be aware that a court of law, and not University officials, may ultimately decide such issues.

19.4 INDIVIDUAL RESPONSIBILITIES.

f. Avoid excessive personal use. Consistent with University telephone procedures (see VI-3.6), personal use of computer resources should be kept to a minimum. Personal use may be excessive if it takes place during regularly scheduled work time, if it overburdens a network, if it results in substantial use of system capacity, or if it otherwise subjects the institution to increased operating costs. Some uses will be plainly excessive in all environments, but the extent to which other uses become excessive may vary among units. In those instances, supervisors will provide more specific guidance to individual users by formulating unit policies or providing advice on a case-by-case basis.

g. Refrain from prohibited personal uses. Information technology resources, including the University's electronic address (e-mail, web), shall not be used for personal commercial gain, for charitable solicitations unless these are authorized by the appropriate University officer, for personal political activities such as campaigning for candidates for public office, or for lobbying of public officials. For purposes of this policy, "lobbying" does not include individual faculty or staff sharing information or opinions with public officials on matters of policy within their areas of expertise. Faculty and staff consulting that is in conformity with University guidelines is permissible.

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Three Simple Steps to School Redistricting

May 17, 2012, 9:00 a.m.

School Board Alternatives to Procrastination and Frustration
Who goes to which K-12 schools and why?

There are 15,000 school districts and school boards across the country confronting those questions.

[Photo of prior ICCSD Board.]

Apparently the Iowa City Community School District (ICCSD) school board is now doing so again.

Here's a three-step process for easing everyone's pain.

Step One. Decide to do it. You. The Board members. Not a community committee or a consultant or the Superintendent. Not a series of open forums prayerfully in search of what one board member called "a solution that satisfies the whole community." Alesha L. Crews, School board members talk about next steps; Say portable buildings a short-term solution, should not be permanent," Iowa City Press-Citizen, May 17, 2012, p. A3.

You are the buffer among the District's stakeholders -- students, parents, administrators, teachers, staff, property tax payers, and citizens. Face it, you'll never satisfy them all.

Only you can create "fairness" for the poor and working poor and lower middle class District parents, when the contests arise in which their interests are pitted against those of our most economically and political powerful families.

Remember, this is a public school system. No one but you has a right to dictate policy. Dissatisfied students and parents who want more absolute control over the details have options, from private schools, to other school districts, to home schooling.

Consider their wishes? Of course. But to think, as one board member put it, that it is "absolutely critical that we don’t ignore anyone’s needs," is a classic example of the triumph of hope over experience. It will inevitably produce the K-12 equivalent of the line that "a camel is a horse built by committee."

Nothing against camels mind you, but only the Board can create a rational, efficient, school system in which all the pieces fit, work together, and optimize the desired output -- increased numbers of students graduating closer to their academic potential.

As Nike says, "Just do it."

Step Two. Think specifically about District goals, not generally about drawing lines.

This is where "if you don't know where you want to go, the odds are very high that you'll never get there" comes into play.

Here are some of the destinations you might want to think about:

(a) Are you willing to take your time, or do you have to do it right now? You could announce a new approach to redistricting that will take effect six or seven years from now. That would eliminate most of the emotional opposition from students and parents affected by a shorter time in which to accommodate change. Most of those who will be affected by a future plan don't yet have kids in school -- or haven't even yet moved to Iowa City.

(b) How much flexibility, or rigidity, do you want? Flexibility is a variable that can be turned up or down, like a rheostat controlling the lighting in a dining room. Do you want fixed, immovable lines -- until the next time you have a redistricting crisis? Or would you like to give the Superintendent, and yourselves, some flexibility?

For example, you could provide (and, if (a) is adopted, not until, say, seven years from now) that (1) once assigned to an elementary school a student could finish at that school, but that (2) there would be two, not just one, geographical areas feeding that school. [i] One would be immediately contiguous to the school, a small enough area that virtually no projection of increased population would result in more students living there than the school could properly hold. The children of families living in, or moving into, that area would be assigned to that school. [ii] The other, larger area, would give the Board and Superintendent the flexibility to assign students living there to any one of three or four closest schools. (Of course, once assigned, under principle (a) the student could finish there.) Thus, as new families moved into that larger area they might know the probabilities of where their children would be assigned, but they would not have a firm commitment of a school from the District. (For more discussion and detail, see, e.g., "Disparity in Class Sizes: Simple Solution Rejected," October 13, 2010.)

(c) Settle upon your position with regard to the demographic balance represented in the assignment of "free and reduced lunch" students to the schools. You may want greater disparity than we now have, less, about the same, or have no position, leaving the outcome to chance -- the latter in all probability a policy that will produce an increase in the disparity. Just make up your minds; hopefully with specific numbers.

(d) There are many other variables you can think about, resolve, and announce. Do I have personal preferences on some of these District goals? Of course. But that's irrelevant. These are the Board's decisions to make. My focus at the moment is not on what you decide but what it is you decide about.

By laying out your own very specific metrics for where you say the District is headed, and providing that they will have little to no impact on today's students and parents, because they won't take effect immediately, you provide stability for the future, and virtually eliminate the emotional opposition.

Step Three. Evolve toward your goals. With a little advance individual reading and thinking, Steps One and Two should be capable of resolution with one or two weekends of Board-member-only workshops. Remember, it's your decisions we're talking about, not those of some consultant. Once you announce the outcome, where the District is headed, it will be possible -- without forcing decisions, but as needs for tweaking arise (like now!) -- to make those decisions consistent with your longer range plan (without imposing it wholesale ahead of schedule).

When I confront computer frustration, which seems to happen with some regularity, my computer consultant son, Gregory (http://ResourcesForLife.com) usually advises, "Well, Dad, there are three steps," following which he puts in simple, three-step language what it is that his cyberlaw professor father should do to get on with his personal life in our digital world.

I thought this "Three Simple Steps to School Redistricting" might be helpful for our local School Board as well. We'll see.
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