Dennis Maes, An Important Legislative Check On D60 Executive Power

Dennis Maes (on far left), 72, is such a local titan, I don't see how he can lose the School Board race. His credentials not only surpass his competitors, but they surpass the seat itself. The Judicial Center has Dennis Maes' name on it forever. Maes is a living legend. Maes was Chief Judge of the 10th Judicial District for 17 years. Maes never had to run against anybody during his tenure as Judge. He had to endure "retention" elections. Running for School Board is a harder & different campaign than running for, & being, Judge was. Maes was paid $139,000/year as Judge. Members of the School Board do not get paid any compensation whatsoever. A school board seats gives one only legislative power, & of course, there's the honor of it.

Superintendents get virtual absolute power, plus they're paid a 6 figure salary, meanwhile the volunteer School Board members have to whine from the outside. Being a Judge is being part of the Judicial Branch; the School Board is the legislative branch. It's a different animal altogether. Having a Judge run for a School Board seat gives the School Board instant credibility. Pueblo City Schools (D60) have a budget of $100 - $200 million, more than the budget for the City of Pueblo. To be honest, compared to Pueblo County Schools (D70), Pueblo City Schools (D60), & Pueblo County, Pueblo City is the poorest among them all.

Me: "Will you be able to stand up to Macaluso?"

Maes: "No. The question is: will Macaluso be able to stand up to me?"

The reason Maes is running for Pueblo City School Board is the same reason why John Quincy Adams was a U.S. Representative of the House after he was President. Even if they're not the head honcho, their duty to the public is calling them so strongly, they must be a public servant of some kind, any kind. In short, because Maes is an old man who gives a damn, & he needs something to do. In a weird way, I trust that. His daughter is a teacher, his son-in-law is in administration, & he's got 2 grandkids in the local public schools now. Maes wants his children to have all-star educations. Maes wants his daughter & son-in-law to be treated right. Maes gives a damn. About his kids & grandkids. And yours.

Maes is the John Quincy Adams of Pueblo City.

Personally, I can't see how Maes could lose. Maes is the clear front runner & he's running a very serious campaign. Maes can only fuck this up. I don't see how he can lose this election, but Maes doesn't celebrate so quickly. Maes doesn't take anything for granted.

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I called "Ol' Good Time Charlie" a week ago, asking him about the political hierarchy of the 10th Judicial District, & Ol' Good Time Charlie turned that into a sit-down meeting. I wasn't exactly sure what to talk to him about, so I talked to him something I know a lot about: Education Theory, & Popular Education.

Maes began to brag about the Truancy Court as a major accomplishment he did in his 17-year stint as Judge, when I asked him if there were "any Huck Finns back then, playing hookey?". Maes said there was a bunch of Huck Finns, "at least back then, there was".

Maes was proud of that truancy court. Since none of the violations were criminal violations, he didn't mind having to punish the kids to get them in line, including putting them in jail for a spat.

I also read that Maes also championed one curious girl all throughout her educational career, & now she's in law school.

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I handed Maes a print version of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs, & I mentioned that many times schools are separate realities from many children's daily lives. Taylor Voss is at least pointing out that we have homeless children here (1,000 of them). I mentioned to Maes about a homeless boy in Louisville, KY who was killed while living on the streets of Louisville, & how callous it was for teachers to ignore his dire real-life reality. We as a society needed to help that boy with his living situation, not force him into a compliant stupor. Dude's homeless, & you want him to learn Calculus? GTFO.

"If a person is a stuck in a ditch, then we don't move onto the next thing. We get them unstuck out of that ditch," I told Maes.

The ideal standard of what public education should be is Sudbury Valley model schools. There's absolute personal freedom & absolute democracy in the Sudbury Valley. The only requirement of a Sudbury education is that a student must clock in for 8 hours a day, & that's it. Then they're free to pursue their own curiosities & passions, to read, to run, to internet, to socialize, to play, to discover, to be as creative as they want to be, to do whatever suits their fancy. Students dictate their own curriculums, they organize student councils, and ultimately, the children learn through creativity & play. There's adults who mentor them, who are guides by their sides, but there's no authoritarian "sage on the stage" kind of folks. Sudbury Valley is like Montessori's "follow the child" philosophy, only better. Montessori gives the illusion of freedom, whereas Sudbury is actual freedom, total & absolute.

"But how will the children stumble upon Shakespeare & Engineering & other smart stuff without our guidance? They'll just discover it on their own accord?"

"Precisely. That's how past generations did it."

All alternative forms of education are a million times better than the oppressive & strictly hierarchical public schools. In a way, since Pueblo City Schools are failing, we have a wonderful opportunity to turn things around by radically changing the entire meaning of the word "education".

"I never let my schooling interfere with my education." ~Mark Twain

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I handed Maes a printout of "The Learning Pyramid" too. The Learning Pyramid shows how lecturing doesn't teach children anything, since they only retain 5% of lecture, and how we need to have more discussions (50% retention), more experience (75% retention), & have the children teaching, us & others, since they retain 90% of that which they teach. The best way to teach is to get your pupil teaching. And teachers, parents, & administrators can set the example of how we're supposed to behave in a democracy, by showing everybody by example how they have carried on with their own educations, on their own time, by teaching & learning from others, & from self-education (Khan's Academy, Hip-Hop History, Crash Courses, How-To videos) the most powerful form of education.

How easy would it be to have would-be teachers in "Teacher Training" schools, teaching & learning from each other? They'd be practicing their craft, showing respect for the lecture method, & for each other. Yet, they don't do that. Would-be teachers are still treated like kindergärtners at these schools by oppressors demanding 100% compliance. Even the teachers of teachers are terrified of freedom, of "organized chaos", of democracy. They would have burned Jean-Jacques Rousseau's "Emile" too, just like they did 300 years ago. Paulo Friere is contraband.

I see the world through the prism of Maslow's Hierarchy & The Learning Pyramid. They've soaked into my skin, & have become my adopted model of reality.

I pointed out to Maes that when the children turn 18 years of age, then they're supposed to be these full-grown adults, able to make important responsible decisions. At 18, our "children" can get married, sign contracts, go off to war, & get their heads shot off. Yet at 17 years of age, we were having them raise their hands just to go to the bathroom. We should be making them stronger - in mind, body, & spirit - so by the time they're 18, they're ready to take on the world. If they're still having to raise their hand to go to the bathroom at 17, then they're still children. We're sending our dumb obedient babies out into a cold uncaring dog-eat-dog capitalistic world.

Maes said he was inclined to agree that we should make our children stronger, but being a "devil's advocate", he mentioned that he sent one boy to jail, for contempt of court, because that boy needed to know about listening to society's rules.

I asked Maes who ordered him to run for School Board, & proving my point, Dennis Maes said that he told himself to.

I admitted that we need to learn society's mores, & he conceded that we should also know how to take initiative & govern ourselves.

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The 3rd & final piece of paper I handed to Dennis Maes was a list I compiled of a bunch of Educational Theorists & Popular School models I knew about. I told him the best thing about being the melting pot that is America, is that out of an entire world of ideas, we can take the best ideas for ourselves. So while I have my favorite educational program, virtually all of the alternative educational models are better than public schools. How great would it be if parents could pick a Montessori school, or a Sudbury school, or Reggio Emilia school for their child? He agreed with a kind of school choice, as long as it remained in the domain of public education, & I agreed. We both basically support elitest Magnet Schools over elitest Charter Schools, though I'd want all of the schools to be Magnet Schools. Why only teach the talented 10%, & not the talented 100%?

I mentioned to Maes about the "100 languages" of Reggio Emilia, about Sugata Mitra's conclusion of education being "self-organizing & self-emergent", and about W.E.B. DuBois's talented 10th. "The Top 10%" was the one major connection I had with Ol' Good Time Charlie (that, & being the eldest of bunch of siblings; he's got 10 siblings, I got 4; we both grew up Catholic, which explains the large families). I conceded that sometimes you'll need a hammer for the rowdy 10%, but I asked him about the talented 10%, about the gifted & talented. If anything, that was the beauty of Black schools. The teachers of Black schools in the deep & dirty antebellum South knew that the society around them was opposed to them, and that elevating a portion of the gifted & talented students wasn't just ideal, but necessary for the survival of their race. Black teachers worked overtime on their most intelligent students, the "talented 10th", going to their homes, making sure their parents knew what a bright child they had on their hands, making sure that student knew all of their future options. Elevating a leadership class from Black communities was imperative to their collective survival, so school wasn't just a hobby for Black educators & their communities, but a question of life & death.

Maes agrees that we shouldn't just "teach to the middle", that the top 10% needed just as much attention as the bottom 10%. Dennis Maes will leave no child behind. Maes agreed that Pueblo City needs to target a leadership class, a talented 10%, to be the future generation who will run things when we're all gone.

Ladies & Gentlemen, we have ourselves A New Hope. A 72-year old Luke Skywalker.

A friend of mine said that Maes was a strict judge, that he wasn't fair, and if Maes thinks he's going to bring that bullshit into our schools, then he can just forget it.

On Charlotte Macaluso, Maes said that he won't micromanage her, & that he will give her the space she needs to do her job. Neither of us knew if she signed a 3-year contract or not, which would make her term a 3-year term if she did. Maes did mention, as with Constance Jones, that contracts can be broken. While Maes won't micromanage Macaluso, Maes will dictate the parameters of policy, & make major decisions on the budget. Maes is endeavoring on a new journey. He's not in charge of Pueblo's entire Judicial Branch anymore. Dennis Maes is campaigning to become a member of the Legislative Branch of Pueblo City's schools, vying to be 1 member of a city school board of 5. So if Maes is authoritarian, hopefully, he'll use that to be a great children's advocate on the school board, but also keep that bullshit out of our classrooms. We need democracy in the classrooms, not more tyranny. There's plenty of tyranny in the classrooms. Public education must be where democracy is practiced, so that young Americans, young Coloradoans, young Puebloans, will be able to lead their generations. 

His authoritarianism can be useful in making the school board a bigger voice than what it has been in the past. Charlotte Macaluso is the head executive of Pueblo City Schools, & the only 2 branches of government I know that can check the executive branch, is the judicial & the legislative branch. We have 3 branches of government in order to prevent tyranny. Adding Maes to the School Board would give the School Board a credibility it didn't have before, & if Maes can stop the executive branch from steamrolling over him, & making him subservient - since the Legislative & Executive branches are co-equal branches of government - his addition to the D60 School Board would be a welcome legislative check on the tyranny of the executive branch, & perhaps in his spare time, Maes can fix - or establish if need be - the judicial process for the administrators, teachers, parents, & children of Pueblo's city schools while he's there.