MMSD Consultant is Biased

I’m not at all surprised.

The executive search group chosen to help find the next Madison schools superintendent reflects the biases of our current school board. The very first statement you see in the About section of the website of Alma Advisory Group out of Chicago is that it is, “is a woman-of-color-led consulting services organization.”

Imagine if you opened a website and read, “we are a straight-white-man-led consulting organization.” (In fact, there isn’t a single white guy on Alma’s team. So much for diversity.) And that identity focus is everywhere on their site. The profile of their CEO, Monica Santana Rosen, starts by stating that she is a “black Latina,” again as if her racial and gender identity is the most important thing about her.

When you start with identity you’re likely to end there as well. Alma ran the search process for a new superintendent in Denver and it proudly reports that, “The finalist candidates in this search included two men of color and one woman.” That’s it. There’s nothing in Alma’s write-up about it’s own work that has anything to say about the qualifications of the candidates they found or their accomplishments or their performance since being hired. What is important to Alma is the race and gender of the candidates.

And, in fact, Alex Marrero, the superintendent chosen from Alma’s pool is having a bumpy ride. This spring he failed to show up at a meeting organized by the city council over growing concerns about safety in the schools. “To not show up is absolutely insulting to this body,” said Council Member Amanda Sandoval, who is a parent of a DPS student. “I cannot express how upsetting this is.”

Alma is leading a community input process, which looks like fine, standard stuff to me. I took their online survey and it was okay, though it asked a few questions related to diversity and not a single one about school safety and good order. You will not be asked if SRO’s should return to our high schools. You will not be asked why you think our schools are losing students in the fastest growing city in the state.

What are the chances that Alma will produce a pool of candidates that reflects my values of good order, academic achievement and an emphasis on individual student and family responsibility? Just about zero.

Nonetheless, I urge you to fill out their survey anyway here. I’m not optimistic about what this process will produce, but there’s no point in giving up. What we really need to do is change direction on this school board because the board hired a search firm that reflects their point of view.