Take, for instance, recent comments via Twitter from State Superintendent Janet Barresi’s chief of staff Jennifer Carter (that’s the same Jennifer Carter who, earlier this year, was unable to get confirmed to the spot at a raucous State Board of Education meeting).
The tweet was in reference to Union and Jenks school officials who brought a lawsuit to challenge a recent state law allowing parents of special needs children to send their children to private schools on the state’s dime. Named in the lawsuit are the parents of some of the children who had attempted to transfer to a private school.
“Dirtbags @SchoolChoiceOK:
Union, Jenks sue parents of special-needs kids. Classic rearguard action,” Carter wrote, according to the Tulsa World.
So a high-ranking education official calls school administrators “dirtbags,” eh? Surely the controversy ended there, right? And what is a “rearguard action,” exactly?
Following questions about the tweet by the World, Barresi issued a non-apology apology on Carter’s behalf.
“While
Jennifer’s tweet was a poor choice of words, it is morally wrong for
superintendents of school districts to sue parents who want nothing more
than what’s best for their children,” Barresi wrote in a statement to
the Tulsa World.
Speaking of “private,” Carter’s Twitter account has been since switched to that status, the World reported. Oh, snap!
State
Rep. Jason Nelson, R-Oklahoma City, the author of the law the schools
are challenging, used his best politi-speak to call the school’s action a
“frivolous lawsuit.”
“Jenks
and Union officials are shocked that anyone would call them ‘dirtbags’
for persecuting the families of children with special needs,” Nelson was
quoted by the World as saying.
“I’ve
got news for them: Get used to it. Oklahoma citizens will no longer
stand by while wealthy school bureaucrats abuse their power.”
The
state Department of Education has not yet issued a statement regarding
whether there are any take backs in relation to the cooties that
everyone knows Union and Jenks has, and Nelson has yet to issue a
release asking Oklahoma’s wise-beyond-its-years and blindingly
good-looking citizens to take the school officials’ lunch money.
This article appears in Sep 28 – Oct 4, 2011.