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Youth advocate moves from YMCA to schools
Wendall Fisher, former School Board member, twice Loudoun's Citizen of the Year, is moving on to a new job as the public schools' outreach supervisor.
Fisher has been working with the YMCA of Loudoun County since 1995. He has been executive director since 2000.
"I am going to miss my staff and the community I am dealing with and all the wonderful business relationships we have forged," Fisher said. "But this is a chance to keep on working with and for the youth of Loudoun County."
Fisher has been working with the young people of Loudoun since 1989 when he signed on as a substitute teacher at Broad Run High School. He moved on to be the in-school restriction teacher at Loudoun County High School, and moved in the early 1990s to the Loudoun County Youth Shelter as a therapeutic counselor.
At about the same time, he was elected to the YMCA board of directors, and in 1995 signed on as outreach director for the YMCA.
Loudoun voters chose their first elected School Board in 1995, and in January 1996, Fisher was sworn in as the at-large School Board member.
In 1997, the Times-Mirror chose Fisher as its Citizen of the Year. The following year, the Leesburg Daybreak Rotary named him its Citizen of the Year. The newspaper and the service club awards cited his contributions to the county's youth.
In his new job, Fisher will supervise parent liaisons in all the public schools, and he will supervise the reading program.
"Reading is for all children," Fisher said. "We want all parents, as well as businesses, to support these reading programs. "
It appears that the LCPS administration and the School Board have found someone they are comfortable with! Someone whose professional background in education appears to be in-school restriction teacher and as a member of the School Board. Was that in the job description?
The Outreach Coordinator for LCPS is quite different from a job at the Y.
The purpose of the Outreach position is to help increase the cultural competence of LCPS staff and broaden the level of educational engagement of students and their families. Don't the relevant skills required for this position require an experienced education professional who has the ability to train school staff in the effective methodologies of eliminating the so-called achievement gap of minority students?
Will these crucial skills come from someone who doesn't like the word "minority?" I worry when someone tells me that "they don't see color, they just see children", since people of color need people to notice who they are, including color! I hope Mr. Fisher is not someone who claims to be colorblind, for that is a disability that we cannot afford in the vital position of Outreach Coordinator.
Will Mr. Fisher have the skills and character to expose and correct the school system's weaknesses, rather than to defend all policies against all critics as is too often the case here in Loudoun County?
I hope Mr. Fisher will have the courage to carry forth the message of the minority community and all good citizens of Loudoun, that the changes that are necessary to eliminate the achievement gap won't come from maintaining the status quo.
What is needed in this position is someone who can foster change, not win awards.
Posted by LoudounPatriot
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