xxxNews Of The Weirdxxx

Bizarre but true stories about real people collected by syndicated columnist Chuck Shepherd.

Outside auditors concluded in May that 16 Houston schools with much-publicized “zero” dropout totals actually had at least 3,000. A whistleblower-principal told The New York Times that principals had been pressured to record their dropouts in some other, benign way. According to him, no one within the school district’s culture (created by former superintendent Rod Paige, who is now U.S. secretary of education) realized that people would be suspicious if these schools reported “zero” when every other urban school district in America is plagued by dropouts.

Apparently, there are few problems in the schools of Longmeadow, Mass., because Mary Ryan-Kusiak, chair of the School Committee, abruptly adjourned the Aug. 25 meeting solely because committee member Laura J. Bertelli refused to sit in her assigned seat. Bertelli said she was tired of Ryan-Kusiak moving her nameplate around, but Ryan-Kusiak said she’d cancel the next meeting, too, if Bertelli didn’t sit where she was told.

On the ballot in Denver in November will be a referendum calling on the city council to research various proposals on how to reduce residents’ stress and to prove scientifically which methods might work. “The buildup of society-wide stress is like a new pollution in the environment,” said activist Jeff Peckman, who collected the signatures to qualify the issue for the ballot. Said council member Charlie Brown, “What are we supposed to do, hand out incense sticks at Denver International Airport? Is that the image we want for our city?”
Send your Weird News to Chuck Shepherd, P.O. Box 18737, Tampa, Fla. 33679 or [email protected]
Copyright © 2001 by Chuck Shepherd

NEWS OF THE WEIRD