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Retired substitute resigns at board meeting, criticizes laptop learning and cell-phone policy
Summary
Retired teacher and substitute John Schwendler announced his resignation during public comment and urged the district to reduce reliance on student laptops, enforce a uniform cell-phone policy and address perceived administrative bloat; he cited district proficiency and chronic absence figures from the district website.
John Schwendler, a retired teacher and long-time substitute, used the public-comment period to announce his resignation and sharply criticize several district practices.
Schwendler told the board he was resigning as a substitute and said he could no longer support what he called an overreliance on laptops in instruction. He said the district "went all in" on laptop learning and argued the approach was not producing the expected academic results. He cited district figures he said were taken from the district website: third-grade reading proficiency 51%, fifth grade 65%, eighth grade 66% and seniors college-ready at 68%. He also said the district has a 17% chronic-absence rate.
Schwendler raised staffing and policy concerns, asserting there are "91 vice principal slots" at roughly $60,000 each in the district and questioning whether young students require separate discipline principals. He criticized uneven enforcement of cell-phone rules across high schools and urged board members to visit campuses and talk with students. He closed by calling for a shift away from near-exclusive use of laptops: "It's vastly time to lower the emphasis and reliance upon laptops almost completely and return to actual teaching." The board acknowledged his remarks; no formal response or corrective action was recorded during the meeting.
Schwendler’s comments combined data points, personal observations from classroom experience, and policy prescriptions; the transcript does not include verification of the staffing figure he cited nor an administrative response addressing the specific data points during the meeting.
