One of the things that is most difficult to understand in Camden is what levels of community support there are (and are not) for policies. I wanted to share this comment from Keith Benson about his experience canvassing the Camden: 

Keith Benson: After having canvassed that East Camden community going door to door, and speaking to people on the street, I walked away with two recurring themes. FIRST, overwhelmingly, the community wants McGraw and East Camden Middle to stay district public schools and are very concerned about the forced takeover. To be sure, I did hear some parents however say they had their child in city charter schools and “liked them better”, but they were not in the majority at all. Further parents were much more informed than I initially thought and knew full well what was going on concerning these two schools and the Board’s, Mayor’s, and Governor’s desire to see these schools given away to “their friends.” (In my canvassing I never mentioned that I am a teacher here, and I live in Parkside and teach across town so I was unknown to many people I spoke to that day)
Perhaps most important of all however to me was not their preference in school governance (public or charter) but unanimously, EVERY PERSON I spoke to was disgusted that they did not have an oppurtunity to participate in the decision making concerning the fate of the public school in their neighborhood. EVEN the parents who send their kids to charter school expressed that it is “messed up people around here aren’t even asked what they want.” The day’s canvassing made me aware that the community does have a desire to contribute and participate, but largely don’t know how, and feel “they ain’t gonna listen to us no-way.”

To be clear, the lack of authentic civic/community engagement did NOT begin with this administration; BUT they darn sure perfected it. One thing the current administration is adept at is silencing community voice through dictating, mandating, and overtly silencing. What CCSD seems to view as “opposition” or what the superintendent repeatedly calls “special interest groups” is really a community of lower income minorities that want to see children in Camden succeed academically, and be part of the process, and have their concerns taken seriously and addressed. But as we see here, and as we saw last year, they are too often literally pushed out the doors and on to the margins.

The solution for CCSD to not appear to be, and certainly seem so oppressive, aloof, elitist (and dare I say racist), is to allow for public elections for BOE, allow the community to vote what THEY want for THEIR child’s schooling, extend speaking time limit for speakers during the public portion (as was the case before the takeover, and as other districts give their constituents a 10 minute limit) and allow what they appear to be “the opposition” a seat at the proverbial table. But a prerequisite for the above courses of action is a respect for the community, which thus far, CCSD has shown to have little to none of.