Commentary: Money spent on annuities should instead go to teacher wish lists

At the beginning of the year some schools have what is called “Wish Night.” The teacher’s wishes for items for his/her class are posted somewhere in the classroom at Back to School Night so that parents might buy those things for the classroom.

The items that are listed are not the latest Kardashian perfumes, Fitbits or iPhones. These items are for the students.

The teachers who have classes with wealthier parents receive many of the items, and obviously the teachers that do not have those classes do not get the items in question.

This practice is humiliating and embarrassing because many teachers feel that they are begging and begging for things that should be provided by the district. Isn’t this what we taxpayers pay for? Why should teachers have to beg for materials? After all, they work for a district that claims “every child succeeds?”

Apparently not. The taxpayers in Newport-Mesa are currently paying for an annual $20,000 annuity for the superintendent and $40,000 a year for the deputy superintendent and chief business official, which is added to their already overly generous salaries.

But the NMUSD board of education, in its infinite, inside-the-bubble wisdom has decided to double down on this annuity thing.

In the Daily Pilot reporting of the $20,000 annuity for Superintendent Fred Navarro, the board of Education President Dana Black gave the reasons for this gift based on his exceptional work in which he “creates an environment in which staff members work together to make sure that every child in the district succeeds.”

Parenthetically, how do they ascertain that? What exactly is succeeding in the trustees’ point of view?

The staff works together, Dana Black states, yet two high-level former staff members are suing, claiming a hostile work environment, and the former human resources executive director has filed a criminal complaint with the Costa Mesa District Attorney regarding the superintendent. How do the trustees know that there is not a hostile work environment now? The current employees are unlikely to complain out of fear.

Isn’t this a serious, obscene gesture to Newport Beach and Costa Mesa community, and the teachers, who I am guessing would love for the $20,000 and $40,000 yearly to go to the 22,000 students in the district who could use some of those materials that the teachers now beg for and often pay for with money out of their own pockets?

So as a friend of mine always says, “Never a problem, only a solution!”

The trustees need to come out of their bubble for a couple of minutes and take a long and careful look at the district as it really is, and then make it what it should be.

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SANDY ASPER lives in Newport Beach.