BESE To Swear In New President

Penny Dastuge is set to be sworn in as president of the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education this week. Dastuge says she hopes to spearhead sweeping changes in public schools, to improve student achievement and do away with wasteful spending. Dastuge takes over as BESE's president Thursday. She says public school enrollment has dropped by over 30,000 children in recent years, but districts refuse to discuss the possibility of closing some schools. She says politics comes before students' success all too often. Dastuge says a lot more thought must go into the impact that policies have on students, rather than their effect on school systems. She says the current public schools system is frought with inherent problems. (A third of the state's public school students perform below their grade level, and about a third fail to graduate on time.)