17 thoughts on “Price leaving MMSD”

  1. I guess the handwriting on the wall wasn’t in invisble ink after all.

  2. Does anyone know what the hiring process is for a position like Roger’s? Do they include citizen members on the interview panel like they do for principals and assistant superintendents? Or does the Superintendent just hire somebody? I liked Roger personally, but didn’t think he was always very forthcoming with information and seemed to complicate things unnecessarily. Presentation of budget data doesn’t seem to be his strong point. I really appreciate all the work that Lawrie has done the past two years to clarify and start uncovering what’s been going on with the budget. There’s a lot more out in the open than there was prior to Lawrie’s arrival on the Board. I hope Roger’s successor understands the need for a transparent budget and is able to restore some credibility to the budget process. The latest round of budget cuts have been quite painful and the administration needs to be upfront about all aspects of the budget so people can really see and understand the necessity for these types of cuts to be made. Lucy asked some very pointed questions about Teaching and Learning the other night that I would like to hear answers to as well. I guess we need to remember that for next year’s round of budget deliberations! This district doesn’t have a great budget process…..but at least it’s getting better thanks to Lawrie and can be improved a lot more if the right person is hired to fill Roger’s job.

  3. If they are going to keep the position that Roger occupied the district needs to hire a professionl with an accounting degree and successful budget background. They should not hire from within whether it be a long-term LTE staff person or someone in a board approved position. The Board needs to insist on accurate financial reporting and so does district administration. Frankly, I’m thrilled that Roger Price is leaving the district.

  4. The latest is that MATC may be putting Roger Price’s hire on hold due to questionable practises at MMSD. They probably do not want their operating reserve depleted like it is at MMSD. Damm this means he stays at MMSD.

  5. You people make me sick. Do you have any clue where MMSD would be today without the efforts of Roger. I can’t stand the your liberal Madison b/s. Oh, and Hopefull.. why don’t you get your friggin facts right.

  6. You’re kidding, right Big E? Where would MMSD be? Oh, I don’t know, maybe if there had been honest, transparent acccounting, the BOE would have made better informed decisions and perhaps we wouldn’t be facing closures/consolidations of neighborhood schools.
    Oh, and then there is that little matter of the federal lawsuit the district is going to have defend (at some cost) that is going to reveal some interesting details about alternative email servers (think RNC)and how bidding and accounting got done in MMSD.

  7. Once again… get your facts right… those lawsuits don’t hold any value. The audit has been done. The investigation is over. Hey guess what, they found no wrong doing.
    There is no reason for any personal attacks. If you need to place blame on someone so you can feel better about yourselves, then I would suggest looking at the pathetic excuse of a school board. Schools and children’s education is no place for a political agenda. Who finalizes the budget? oh ya, the school board.

  8. Drawing down the equity fund without substantive board discussion until this year was not good policy on the part of the administration nor the School Board.
    The School Board is indeed responsible for governance of the school district, but they do rely on the professional expertise of their staff to have the information necessary to make good decisions on behalf of the district. There are some who feel this was lacking with discussion of the equity fund balance and how/why it was changing.

  9. As I understand it, Big E, the BOE relies on the administration, Roger Price playing a lead role, for the generation of the statistics and demographics; moreover, that’s the source for the superintendent’s recommendations as well both of which heavily inform BOE action.
    As to the lawsuit, I don’t pretend to know anything more than what has been posted here and published in the paper. But, unless it’s tossed out on an early motion, before discovery, it will cost the district to defend it and there will also be an opportunity for the plaintiff to do a little deeper digging than the investigation to which you refer but offer no link to.

  10. Hey Bid E…you need to get facts straight.
    Operating reserve when Roger came 47 Million
    Operating reserve now 16 Million
    Difference 31 million. Up until this year BOE had no idea that MMSD was overspending the budget by such an extend. Technically it is illegal to overspent the expenditure budget without BOE approval. They finally are asking questions. Also ask the business consortium how things are going with disfuntional system Roger saddled them with. The only entities who are happy are all the educational business consultants in the area especially Davidson Services…they now are filthy rich with taxpayer money which will never see the classroom.

  11. I’m happy to see the dialogue. Is the consortium referred to connected to the district’s purchase of the Lawson computer program? (Lawson is the system that the State decided to drop, stop putting money into and cut their losses.) And is Davidson Services also related to the purchase and support of Lawson? Perhaps someone coming into Roger’s position will take a look at the costs and see whether MMSD should also dump Lawson. Any potential candidate should be required to explain how they will fix the reporting system and disseminate accurate information to the public, BOE and MMSD administration.

  12. Lawson is the package which the University of Wisconsin System purchased to replace the mainframe-based human resources and payroll systems. The product did not work and could not be implemented for the UW System for various reasons.
    However, the fitness of Lawson for UW System has absolutely no bearing to its fitness for MMSD; UW System is several orders of magnitude larger, and more complex than MMSD — there should be no expectation of reasonable comparability.
    That said, if the Lawson product is to evaluated, it must be evaluated based upon its fitness to organizations MMSD’s size only and the set of business rules the product must handle — not UW System.

  13. Yes, the consortium is comprised of several surounding school districts including Middleton and Oregon who now wish they hadn’t been so hasty in signing up to support the fiasco at MMSD. Davidson Services was the consulting firm that assisted the school district in implementing Lawson….and of course the longer it takes and the more problems you have the better they like it….more time, more problems more taxpayer money for them. It would be great to see an independent audit (a firm not hand picked by Roger who will dictate the final results before they even start) of the whole mess. There is no doubt in my mind that the whole implementation is being covered up the administration…their theory was keep pouring money into it to keep it afloat and to avoid the embarrassement of full disclosure. If the taxpayers only knew..

  14. I like how this thread started with “Roger Price has been hired by MATC.” Ummm.. let’s see that was posted on the 3rd, but the interview process was still going on and he hadn’t been offered the job YET. I am glad that he is leaving MMSD only because I am hopefull that he doesn’t have to deal with the mindless, let’s jump to conclusions Madison public… I wish him the best at his new position with MATC. I will be watching with a smirk as a majority of the MMSD administrators resign in search of a better community to serve…Trust me, there’s more to come.

  15. Hey…I believe we are a successful and appealing community. Even though we have differing opinions, and it’s great that they are expressed-because this shows our active interest-we all still have “our Community’s” best interests in mind and foremost are our children’s future potentials. Please remember it is not going to be easy to support a referendum/a possible holdover till there is school funding reform, and school funding reform is not going to be easy either, nor is it going to be easy to get fair and adequate Federal educational funds, but it will be much more difficult and unpleasant, we can all agree upon that, if we do not take care in the messages we send. Overall unity within the ideal of quality education should be a given primary goal and we should all be willing to temper our frustrations and play the “find solutions and implement them game” verses “the blame game”, which will spin negative instead of positive. These are not “great times” but I believe with understanding, respect, commitment and honorable intentions we will have a quality public school system again soon. Hang tough everyone!

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