COD board is hardly "transparent"

As a teacher at College of DuPage and a Wheaton taxpayer, I am concerned the COD board appears to take its marching orders from one particularly vocal local blogger ("COD employees' salaries made public," Aug. 9). At the instigation of Adam Andrzejewski, the author of the For The Good of Illinois Web site, the COD board voted to publish all employee salaries on the school's home page. The board members themselves failed to express any compelling rationale for this move, leaving it to Andrzejewski to read prepared public remarks that claimed this move would somehow improve "transparency" (I'd like to point out, however, that linking material that is already published in the annual budget to the school's home page is, technically, redundant, rather than transparent. As an English teacher, I tend to notice little details like that).

But this is a board that is hardly transparent when it comes to decisions that really affect the school. This board still refuses to explain why it fired President Emeritus Sunil Chand this past May. It is utterly silent when it comes to questions about the resignations of former Trustees Jane Herron and Mary Mack, both of whom expressed serious concerns about other board members' behaviors and decisions. This is the same board that spends long hours in closed meetings having private discussions that never see the light of day, only to emerge to quickly approve hundreds of thousands of dollars in change orders and construction contracts with little to no public discussion.

It seems that the COD board is willing to heed the comments of an outside lobbyist like Andrzejewski to the exclusion of the voices of the people who are affected by such decisions: COD students, COD employees, and their families.

Jackie McGrath

Wheaton