My Plan for a $3,000 Gift to Public School Staff Outrages Some In My Community

Should I cancel the donation? What do you think? And why does anyone participate in politics?

Today I am going to complain and I feel gross about it because my life is amazing and no one wants to hear someone complain. But I want to share this story because I think it shows a side of humanity that people don’t talk about.

TLDR: Here’s the short version…

• I believe in active citizenship, so I joined the School Board.

• I had a silly idea to donate $3,000 to any staff or teacher at the school district.

• To make it a democratic process, I allowed anyone to nominate a staff member and vote for a winner online. Then I’d select the winner from the top ten.

• A few people got pissed! Calls to other board members, calls to the admin staff, outrage online… the whole nine yards.

• Now I need to decide if I should just cancel the whole thing, I want your input!

• And now I’m also considering resigning from the schoolboard. It just doesn’t seem worth it.

• And THIS is why people don’t serve.

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As many of you know, I strongly believe that the duty of a citizen means more than simply voting. It means actually serving and participating in our democracy.

As a part of that philosophy, I decided to join the Haslett school board in October 2023. I was appointed so I didn’t have to go through the whole election process.

It has been an incredibly rewarding and educational process, but it also has been an incredibly high time commitment.

I’ve missed putting Lane to bed and reading him a book, which is one of my favorite activities, several nights. I’m missing an event with my wife tonight and a whole trip next week. But I am still honored to be able to serve.

A few months back, I received an email from the school staff asking me for my clothing sizes because they needed to order me a gown for Haslett Graduation.

I don’t know why I never thought of it, but I didn’t know that I would be on the stage with the graduates celebrating them. At my own graduation I remember looking up at the podium in admiration of those people all dressed up on the stage. It is very surprising to think that I am going to be one of those people on the stage.

This got me thinking about graduation a lot. A couple of Sundays ago, I was on a 10-mile run around Haslett and had the idea to give away some money to graduates of Haslett Schools. I thought about maybe giving some kind of scholarship to reward students considering a path toward entrepreneurship.

But after a lot of consideration and talking with my wife, we decided that there are lots of scholarships for students, which is awesome! But there aren’t a lot of scholarships or direct monetary awards for the dedicated staff members of the school district.

So I got home from that run and, after talking with my wife, I wrote a post on May 5, 2024, that basically said I was going to give $3,000 away to any staff member of Haslett Public Schools.

I thought a way to make it more democratic and get more people involved would be to let anyone in the community or the staff member themselves nominate any staff member and share a story about how that staff member impacted their life in a positive way and why they should receive the award.

Then I had the idea of making it as fair as possible by allowing anyone in the Haslett community to vote for the award by commenting or liking the comment that nominated a particular person.

I felt like this was the way to get the community involved and make it as democratic as possible.

My wife would select the top 10 nominees that got the most votes, and then I would select a winner. Then I would give the individual staff member $3000 directly from myself. I felt this was the most fair because I wasn’t the only one just picking the person that would receive the gift.

I clearly stated in the post that this had nothing to do with my position on the school board and this wasn’t a part of the school district.

I have taken all of the board trainings, and I am a certified board member. From my reading of the rules and my understanding, this wasn’t a violation of any laws or any ethical rules by the state or district.

I never anticipated the amount of backlash that this would receive.

Sadly, my friends on the school board received complaints about this. The administration team at Haslett Public Schools received complaints as well. So many that they actually had to have their attorneys review my proposal, and they arrived at the same conclusion that I did: this was completely legal and not a violation of any ethical rules or guidelines.

The complaints seemed to be categorized into a few main points:

• It was a popularity contest

• It was illegal or unethical or a violation of board policy

• I should not be involved in selecting the winner

• I should have used the Haslett Foundation

• It "just felt wrong"

Some specific feedback included:

• "It's a morale killer."

• "It will do more harm than good."

• "As a board member why not work harder on getting all of the staff a much needed raise?"

• "A better idea may be to donate the money to a building in the name of the staff member you pick."

• "You should have done this through the foundation."

• "You should have done a scholarship."

• "What about paraprofessionals? (Even though it says for all staff)"

• "Why not all staff instead of just one?"

But I have addressed all of these concerns in my approach. I tried to reason with people with responses and even phone calls to upset individuals. No one changed their mind despite me giving more context and background.

Even though I disagreed with the criticisms, I decided to listen to their advice and made a private form where anyone could submit a nomination so that it wouldn’t be a popularity contest. I thought this would address one of the main criticisms. But it didn’t.

Why Didn’t I Give the Money to The Foundation For Haslett Schools?

The other general complaint revolved around the idea that instead of me giving the money directly to the staff member, I should instead donate the money to the Haslett Education Foundation, an organization that I already contribute to and value.

The reason I didn’t give the money directly to the foundation is because the foundation has recently hired an executive director, which is quite costly. The executive director's compensation put a lot of overhead onto the foundation.

I didn’t want the donation to go towards overhead expenses; I wanted all of the $3000 to go directly to the staff member of Haslett Public Schools. I continue to donate to the Haslett Public Schools Community Foundation, but for this particular donation, I wanted it to directly go to the staff member that needed it, and I didn’t want to burden the foundation with administering and managing this donation without being compensated for that work. It didn’t seem fair to me to make them administer it without being compensated.

After sharing the reasons why I did it this way and changing the nomination process to address all the negative criticism, it didn’t satisfy any of the upset people.

Now the criticism is that “it just doesn’t feel right” or “you shouldn’t be involved in picking the winner” or “it’s just wrong.”

I must say. I’m rather dismayed by this whole thing. Something that I thought would be a fun and happy event has been tarnished by a constant stream of criticism. Of course, the VAST majority of people have been positive. But some of the loudest complaints are from people I have known for 15+ years and have personally helped in the recent past. I know I shouldn’t let it upset me, but I have to be honest, it does.

So I’m not sure where this leaves me. To be honest, I want to cancel the donation if that is what the community wants.

I feel bad that this donation has caused my other school board members to have to spend time on this. I feel bad that this has been a headache for the dedicated administration team at Haslett Schools to have to deal with.

And if I’m being more honest… it makes me want to resign from the school board altogether.

I don’t know how anyone signs up to be a politician. This seems like a terrible job.

Let me know what you think I should do by replying to this email, commenting below, or sending me a text message.