YOUR SAY: Is there a solution for MCA or is action needed now?
"... Are the educational needs of MCA students being met? If the answer is no, Curtis Jones, the superintendent, has only two choices: help them fix it — something he's not suppose to do — or recommend to the Bibb board that it invalidate MCA's charter and close the school."
— Telegraph Editorial board
In the 1960s I was working in a nearby county as the lone public health sanitarian and part of my duties were to inspect all public food establishments once a month. There were seven schools in the county at that time and the protocol used was to discuss the inspection finding with the lunchroom supervisor and drop a copy off at the principal's office. The county school superintendent was a member of our local Board of Health and was briefed anytime a substantial problem was found, especially if expenditures were needed to correct the problem.
A routine inspection required verification the refrigeration and dishwasher water temperatures were sufficient, absence of rodents or roaches, general cleanness of the premises and collection of a water sample and milk sample that were forwarded to a state lab in Macon for analysis. Generally the inspection was routine with a few minor infractions, but one year when the milk provider was changed by the county, the samples from every school showed an extremely high E-coli contamination, a bacteria that is often associated with animal fecal matter. I immediately re-sampled every school and the results were the same. When I contacted the health department in the county where that vendor processed all it's milk, the weekly inspections of the plant were all acceptable.
It didn't take an Einstein to determine the contamination was happening between the plant and the schools. As I backtracked the delivery of the milk I quickly found the source of our problem. The milk was delivered from the plant to a central point in the county in five gallon metal containers and taken to the schools by another employee. The empty cans were picked up at the school by the delivery person and placed on an outside platform where they often sat for days before they were returned to the plant.
The containers were not new and the metal seems were worn so a perfect media had been inadvertently set up to grow bacteria in the left over milk and warm sun. Minimal sanitation of the tanks at the plant before refilling was not sufficient to destroy the germs.
Meanwhile the school superintendent was furious with the milk vendor and ready to cancel the contract on the grounds they failed to provide a safe, sanitary food product as required by the contract. He had no interest in why the milk was unsafe to drink nor did he offer any solution as to how it could be corrected. I was able to persuade him to give the vendor a chance to correct the problem, and he agreed on the condition we would provide an acceptable lab report on the milk in every school by the end of the week.
The vendor was extremely happy to have a second chance to save his contract worth thousands of dollars, and picked up all the metal containers and replaced them with disposable cartons as I requested. Two days later we had acceptable lab reports for the superintendent.
Macon Charter Academy has entered into a contract with Bibb County to provide quality educational services to some students in our community. They are vendors of that product and If they can't deliver those services at this time, it is incumbent on the Bibb board to terminate the contract at the end of this school year and use that money to hire additional staff and services in our public school system for the return of the MCA students. It would be highly improper for Dr. Jones to become involved in the day-to-day operation of any charter school. He has all he can do to manage the public schools in our county. MCA must abide by it's contract with the Bibb board else our students there will fall even further behind.
A mind is a terrible thing to waste, someone said. So is time, if I may add.
John G. Kelley Jr. is a Macon resident.
Macon Charter Academy is a Bibb County public school.
— Editors
This story was originally published February 6, 2016 at 7:47 PM with the headline "YOUR SAY: Is there a solution for MCA or is action needed now? ."