Subject: Muskegon Public Schools: Quality, Leadership and Reputation in question.

Muskegon Public Schools Board

Questions asked:

What were your 5 top priorities for the district?
What frustrations have you experienced that you didn't expect?
What will be your 5 top priorities if you are serving in the upcoming year?

​Thank you letter sent to Elected Official Responders below:
Cindy Larson, President , Tasha Bibbs-Oakes, Treasurer

MceZ Core Principle for May is EXCELLENCE!

Open letter for publication in MceZ-IT!

May 22, 2018

Subject: Muskegon Public Schools: Quality, Leadership and Reputation in question.

Dear Ms. Larson,

Thank you for your response of May 21, 2018 to my letter of May 21, 2018 attached below. I look forward to contacting you in the future.

Best regards,
Eunice Beck
MceZ.org
MceZ Policy and Disclaimer Statement

​Fourth Sendings were sent to Elected Official Non-Responders below:​
Billie Bruce, Secretary Pro-Tem; Tasha Bibbs-Oakes, Treasurer; Louis Churchwell, Vice President; G. Lynnette Marks, Secretary; Zachary Allen Anderson, Trustee; Bill OBrien, Trustee

Original and Fourth Sending Letter sent:​

The MceZ Core Principle for June is FREEDOM!

Fourth Sending: June 14, 2018
Third Sending: June 4, 2018

The MceZ Core Principle for May is EXCELLENCE!

Open letter for publication in MceZ-IT!

Second May 29, 2018
May 21, 2018

Subject: (Fourth and Final Sending) Muskegon Public Schools: Quality, Leadership and Reputation in question.

Dear __________,

Thank you for your public service.

I have been a Muskegon resident for over 30 years. My children attended Muskegon Public Schools. I have seen MPS at its worst, i.e. no African American teachers with a 50% African-American student population. Obviously, there has been a significant improvement in this area during the past 30 years.

I have been catching up on the challenges for the district including the video of the meeting on April 17. The links to the articles are below.

Muskegon school board approves $1.61M in cuts to start 2018-19 budget
Updated May 15; Posted May 15
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2018/05/muskegon_school_board_approves_1.html

Muskegon schools superintendent tired of being 'personally attacked'
Updated Apr 26; Posted Apr 25
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2018/04/muskegon_schools_superintenden_4.html

Muskegon schools gives administrators big pay raises in face of deficit
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2017/10/muskegon_schools_admins_get_la.html

Muskegon schools trustees violate Open Meetings Act by texting
Updated Apr 10; Posted Apr 10
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2018/04/muskegon_schools_trustees_viol.html

'Minimally effective' Muskegon superintendent not on improvement plan
Updated Apr 24; Posted Apr 24
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2018/04/minimally_effective_muskegon_s.html

Muskegon schools gives administrators big pay raises in face of deficit
Updated Oct 25, 2017; Posted Oct 24, 2017
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2017/10/muskegon_schools_admins_get_la.html

Updated Apr 12; Posted Apr 12
http://www.mlive.com/news/muskegon/index.ssf/2018/04/muskegon_schools_to_close_buil.html

I believe it's important to be an informed citizen, taxpayer, and voter.

My questions to you as you reflect on your term(s) as a member of the Muskegon School Board are:

1. What were your 5 top priorities for the district?
2. What frustrations have you experienced that you didn't expect?
3. What will be your 5 top priorities if you are serving in the upcoming year?

I look forward to hearing from you. If I don't hear from you by May 28, 2018, I will contact you again.
Thank you.

Best regards,
Eunice Beck
MceZ.org
MceZ Policy and Disclaimer Statement

Cindy Larson, President ​

Cindy Larson
May 21, 2018

Questions 1 and 3 are the same. My priority has been and will continue to be whatever is in the best interests of our students giving them every opportunity to succeed. My frustration is what appears to be dissension among our board members. While there are questions to be addressed which we are doing, all of us have our students first and foremost while we make very difficult decisions.

Cindy Larson 

Tasha Bibbs-Oakes, Treasurer

                               The MceZ Core Principle for OCTOBER is JUSTICE!

Open Letter for publishing in MceZ-It!
October 19, 2018

Subject: (Thank you) Muskegon Public Schools: Quality, Leadership and Reputation in question.

Dear Ms Bibbs-Oakes,

Thank you for your response of October 18, 2018 sharing your vision for Muskegon Public Schools, to my letter of May 21, 2018 attached below. It is my hope that after the election, the elected members who will comprise the MPS School Board will dedicate and commit themselves to supporting Dr. Jennings, the superintendent, in his goals to raise standards and improve the quality of education for Muskegon Public School students. Thank you for your candidacy.

Best regards,
Eunice Beck
MceZ.org
MceZ Policy and Disclaimer Statement

Tasha Bibbs-Oakes
10.18.18

Hello Mrs. Eunice Beck, 

I hope that this email response will find you doing well and looking forward to a wonderful weekend. I would like to take this opportunity to first apologize to you for the delay with my response to your previous emails and thank you for taking the time to introduce yourself to me the other evening. It's always a great pleasure to meet concerned citizens such as yourself and discuss concerns and opportunities to make the community that we live in and serve a better place for our youth. I'm glad that you are interested in learning more about me and the goals that I personally have for our district and the Board of Education.
My 5 Top Priorities for our School District

1) Our Children deserve the opportunity to learn at a higher level of excellence. It's imperative that we provide our students with the tools that will allow them to be successful in our classrooms. In addition it's a must that we equipped our teachers with the tools and support in an effort to allow them to teach effectively and efficiently.
2) Transparency has been a huge area of opportunity for our district. It's important that we build and rebuild relationships with our teachers, parents, and our community.
3) Student enrollment deserves our undivided attention. We have an awesome district with awesome, students, parents, teachers, and leaders. We also have a very solid curriculum. We have students whom are valued community leaders, doctors, lawyers, teachers, professional ball players, etc.
4) It's critical that we are able to operate effectively and effectively with our finances. This will require stronger checks and balances with our budget and strategic planning that will produce the results that we need to operate successfully.
5) All School Board Members working together with our #1 focus being a quality education for each child in our district

My frustrations as a board member has been the divide that our school board has suffered from. I would love to see our board draw a line in the sand and move forward as a board so that we can focus on our students 100%. The children in our district deserve this along with their parents and the members of our community.

If it's God's will for me to retain my seat on the Muskegon Board of Education, I will continue to focus on the 5 priorities that I've previously mentioned.

Thank you for allowing me to share this information with you. I feel honored that you are interested in learning about the goals and the views that I personally have for our district and school board.

Please feel free to contact me with any additional questions and/or concerns that you may have.

Kind regards,

Tasha Bibbs-Oakes
The MceZ Core Principle for June is FREEDOM!