One significant source of tension involves the personnel changes Ritchie made last fall. Faculty and parents say she eliminated a part-time counseling position without sufficient advance notice.
“We did have the budget cuts in the fall—I think everyone knows about that—and we did lose a position due to that particular budget cut,” Ritchie says. She says she gave the former counselor the requisite two weeks’ notice, and that the position was later replaced with a drug- and alcohol-specific counselor through a grant from Santa Fe Public Schools.
But when a section of choir also was eliminated, parents and teachers worried that the school’s focus on the arts would be compromised. The final blow came when the school’s edible garden coordinator, whose projects included the memorial garden dedicated to the four Santa Fe teens who died in a car accident last summer (two of whom, Julian Martinez and Rose Simmons, attended Monte del Sol), had her hours cut from 30 hours per week to eight. The coordinator ended up leaving the school.
“A lot of the programs that made Monte so beautiful, like the garden and mentorship, are used more as a gimmick more than actually supported,” Dean says. “When people ask about Monte or come and scope it out for their kids, the new head learner will talk about how beautiful the garden is—but they cut the coordinator!” she says.
Ritchie is quick to explain that all the cuts had to do with the budget. Though Monte del Sol receives the bulk of its funding from the state, the garden coordinator’s position was funded through a separate foundation, which couldn’t raise the money to keep supporting a garden coordinator.
No one disputes the school’s budget problems.
“When the state tells you, you have to cut money, it makes for these really difficult decisions,” Lisa Otero, a history teacher and the school’s dean of students, tells SFR.
Van Sickle, too, appreciates the difficulty of the situation.
“[Ritchie] came in at a really ratty time, with all the budget cuts from the state,” Van Sickle says. “I don’t envy her walking into a charter school at the time she did.”
For Van Sickle and many others, though, the problem wasn’t so much the changes themselves but, rather, how they were accomplished.
“Instead of coming to the school community and saying, ‘Look, we’re hugely over a barrel; what can we do?’ they never even told anyone that it was happening—much less gave anyone in the community a chance to step up and say, ‘Choir’s really important for my kid. Let’s do a fundraiser and see if we can’t keep it,’” Van Sickle says. “Those decisions were just made. The whole atmosphere of openness and tolerance seems to be closing down.”
Gretchen Gordon, a congenial blonde who joined Monte del Sol in its first year as the school’s nurse, says that not only were the staff changes not transparent, but that they were also used as leverage.
“There were constant threats—‘The budget is tight; positions are going to be reduced,’” Gordon says.
Ruiz says that especially in the context of a school based on inclusiveness, Ritchie’s top-down approach to balancing the budget led to anger and frustration among faculty and community members.
Some parents and students were upset when the coordinator for Monte del Sol’s memorial garden (top) had her hours cut and then left.
Credits: Photo: Alexa Schirtzinger
By late fall, faculty morale was so low that Gordon felt compelled to contact the National Education Association to ask for information on joining the teachers’ union.
“Once I started that, it was this constant coming into [Ritchie’s] office to explain myself,” Gordon says. “I felt I was being harassed and intimidated.”
Ritchie denies she was ever opposed to the union.
“I was in the union myself until I came here,” she tells SFR. “I don’t have any feelings about it, really.”
Gordon says her relationship with Ritchie continued to deteriorate, and she resolved to leave Monte del Sol at the end of the school year because “I’d feel complicit if I stayed.”
For students like Dean, the division within the school hit home.
“Our teachers were stressed out and upset and angry,” Dean says. “It started to get really distracting because there was such a huge rift in the faculty.”
In spite of the desperately positive spin the writer attempts to impart to the MDS experience, the fact is, it is little more than a day care drop-in center for teens. I noticed that "Head Learner" Gerlicz had his own child attend SF Prep. As would any parent, he wanted to see she received a quality education - and he knew MDS was never going to provide that. That's pretty telling all by itself, isn't it? It's typical of the fuzzy-headed thought process that all too many Santa Feans proudly embrace to ignore testing in education, and instead rely on "this really beautiful way of learning". Unfortunately, not much is actually learned, but we all feel real good about the fact we didn't learn anything. Of course, MDS students are enthusiatic about their "school", and why not? It requires essentially nothing of them. Feel like learning? Go ahead. Not so motivated? Go strum your guitar instead. When every class is recess, student approval is unsurprisingly sky-high! I wonder if they will be so enthusiastic about their MDS "education" when it's time to compete against actual students in college, or the real world workplace? Maybe a little more reading, and a little less interpretive dance would have been a good idea, huh? Oh well, too late now. But at least we didn't conform! Anyway, we can always live at St. E's, right?
It's good that we have Santa Fe Prep to educate The Realist's young Biffs and Muffys and put them on the inside track to Princeton. It's even better that we have Monte del Sol, ATC, Desert Academy, St. Mike's, the Waldorf High School, Tierra Encantada, Santa Fe High, Capitol, and all the other schools in town for the rest of our kids. MdS and ATC have long had high graduation rates and high numbers of kids going on to college- even, Realist, to name-brand colleges where they have done quite well. I don't know where your negativity comes from, but it can't be from interacting with the majority of kids from Monte del Sol.
I just wanted to clear up that Tony Gerlicz did not send his daughter to MDS because she did not want to go to school where he was principal. As a teacher, I've often seen students not wanting to attend where their parent is a principal. Several teachers had their children at MDS, but everyone had to join the lottery (including Tony's daughter if she had wanted to go). At my time there I saw several teachers in tears after their son or daughter did not make it into the lottery.
Just the facts. i'm not jumping in this argument.
Sorry, I didn't have a Muffy or a Biff to educate at SF Prep - Tony Gerlicz did. Does that make him a bad guy, in and of itself? If it matters, my kids attended MDS for one year, but I yanked them out and sent them to public school, as I found MDS to be a complete waste of time. The "negativity" in my initial comment comes from the article itself, which although overtly sympathetic to MDS, also clearly points out that it is failing the kids. It's interesting that you seem to feel I must never have interacted with any MDS kids. Actually, I've interacted with quite a few, aside from my own. By and large, there's nothing wrong with them, but they're being let down by the school, which is failing to educate them. I never suggested the kids were the problem, as they are not in charge of their own education. Tell any kid he has a choice between doing algebra or playing hacky sack, and which will he choose? That doesn't make him a bad kid, but he WILL suffer for it down the road. That's why it's up to educators provide an atmosphere of education, rather than playtime. At MDS, it's hard to tell who the adults are, and this is now painfully obvious in light of these abominable test scores. And rather than be outraged at the pathetic job this school is doing for our local youth, you're more offending by "negativity". If these test scores aren't cause for "negativity", what is?
In response to The Realist:
As a graduate of MDS, class of 2008, and a Junior attending The University of New Mexico, I can honestly say that I was completely prepared for all of my higher education courses at UNM. And seemingly much more prepared than the majority of college students in those courses. I believe this can be attributed to the years I spent at MDS (7th-12th grade). I can attest to the fact that the teaching methods compared to that of other schools is unique, however I can also attest that the teachers never once failed to take an interest in the students' learning. With many teachers recieving awards and nominations (Lisa Otero, Teri Wyrick) and others with credentials beyond that of most high school teachers, it cannot be said that "not much is actually learned". As for test scores, all of Santa Fe has low scores. As for graduation requirements, compare MDS to other public high schools and find out that Monte requires more from their students.
Tony Gerlicz is a brilliant man, who created an even more brilliant school, and surrounded it with charismatic, caring and compelling faculty. It is a shame that the school has come to be on a different path than he intended. However, I understand that budgetting is very difficult, and see no evidence to lead me to believe that Ritchie is not trying to make the most out of the money that the school is entitled to. I am still "enthusiastic" about my high school education, and have the higher ground in the "competition with other students in college". Do not make the mistake of false accusations, when a true testimony of someone who has gone through the experience has not been heard.
I hope MDS is able to thrive in the future, and provide the same educational experience it gave to me and my brother.