Off-color post is unbecoming of Seattle’s school board president

When observing public figures, there’s hazard in scrutinizing off-the-cuff remarks, policing dialog like a schoolmarm. However generally, an informal remark might be unintentionally revealing.

That’s why it’s value contemplating the hashtag posted on-line by Seattle Board of Training President Brandon Hersey on election evening. “#F—aroundandfindout,” he typed throughout an image of him along with his arms round victorious incumbent Liza Rankin, who crushed her challenger, and Evan Briggs, a candidate hand-picked by Hersey, who additionally gained.

The implication was that those that misplaced received the drubbing they deserved. It reads as a cavalier shrug to considerations expressed by these challengers that some constituents view the college board as out of contact and unresponsive.

Questioned concerning the knowledge of this put up, which is not seen, Hersey instantly owned his mistake. “I received carried away on election evening,” he mentioned. “It’s by no means my intent to ostracize or diminish.”

The remark was merely “a millennial hashtag,” he continued. Anybody offended by it had misunderstood, laboring below “generational and cultural variations.”

True, conventions change. Communication is ever evolving. And the candidates who gained weren’t these endorsed by this editorial board. However those that ran unsuccessfully might be forgiven for seeing Hersey’s quip as a private assault. It conveys a cliquey, clubby feeling that doesn’t recommend openness to those that voice different views.

Quite, the message is: Should you don’t prefer it, lump it. Or extra colourful phrases to that impact.

Fortunately for Hersey, he doesn’t work for Seattle Public Colleges. A staffer or lecturers union official making such a comment can be excoriated. The college district’s personal policies recommend workers might be disciplined for utilizing that sort of language in a public discussion board.

Setting apart the judgment of a college board president brazenly selecting favorites amongst candidates, Hersey’s hashtag was on the very least juvenile, modeling conduct the other of what most classroom lecturers try to instill of their college students.

“Might I’ve communicated higher? A hundred percent,” Hersey mentioned, conceding that his remark was cocky, however at coronary heart, simply an expression of pleasure {that a} majority of voters have validated the board’s work.

Nobody is suggesting a hashtag containing an expletive is a few kind of excessive crime. However it does betray a troubling lack of seriousness for an individual overseeing a billion-dollar funds whereas dealing with $100 million deficits amid sagging pupil efficiency and a brand new plan to chop workers whereas rising class sizes.

In Seattle Public Colleges, that is no time for jokes.