Yesterday, Mayor Kamal Johnson announced on Instagram that he was the recipient of a CASDA Friends of Education Award. CASDA is the acronym for Capital Area School Development Association.
Commenting on Instagram, Johnson had this to say about being given the award:
I am deeply honored to receive the Friend of Education Award from CASDA and the Hudson City School District. As someone who proudly embodies the spirit of blue and gold, I believe in supporting--not just critiquing--our schools in meaningful ways.
Whether it was organizing sock competitions against the principals during COVID, serving on the Attendance Task Force to address truancy, partnering on trainings to protect our most vulnerable students from ICE, volunteering as a coach, or participating in the Hudson Reads program, I've always aimed to contribute wherever I can.
We each have a role in helping children of our community thrive, and I'm grateful for the opportunity to be part of that effort.
The CASDA website provides this information about the Friends of Education Award.
Strong school communities also benefit immeasurably from the contributions of staff members, community members and parents who support your schools and offer opportunities for enrichment beyond the classroom. To acknowledge the important work of these individuals, CASDA established the Friends of Education Award to recognize individuals whose selfless dedication supports and sustains the school community.
In the past, awards have been given to individuals in recognition of the wide array [of] contributions they have made to their school, students and community. Recipients have included an individual who organized food backpack programs to address student hunger, dedicated volunteers involved with after school reading programs and a facilities director who worked with students to implement gender neutral bathrooms, to describe a few. While these efforts may not be reported on a state school report card, they enrich the lives of students and reflect education's highest ideals.
A famous Economist and army veteran from the Bronx once said:
ReplyDelete"When you want to help people, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they want to hear."
Or, as Kamal puts it: "I believe in supporting—not just critiquing—our schools in meaningful ways."
There are three ways to read this award/recognition:
1️⃣ Take One:
Bravo, Kamal!
Sincere recognition for good intentions and a well-received program. Hudson Reads is notable in that it brings in community participation, and the Ice Cream Social drew a solid crowd. Well done sir!
Also, Covid was so hard on everyone, but especially schools… and it sounds like you really leaned into helping the HCSD community when that once in a century crises hit. **
2️⃣ Take Two:
The CASDA Friends of Education Award is not a merit-based honor—it is a relationship award based on nominations by political allies who benefit from public funding. Like a rotary club plaque, it rewards affiliation, not achievement. It validates presence, not performance.
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💰 Consider the incentive structure: HCSD pays CASDA. CASDA offers awards for entities that pays them for training. CASDA and HCSD have jointly received STLE grant money. This is the educational equivalent of a trade magazine naming its biggest spending advertisers “Innovators of the Year.”
It signals success, but what it really reveals is an ongoing vendor relationship. When recognition is purchased, credibility disappears.
By contrast, honors such as the Milken Educator Award or the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching are rare, competitive, and judged by independent panels. (Obviously Kamal is not eligible since he is no longer an HCSD teacher… but you get the point).
Like National Merit Scholarships or the Regeneron (older readers might remember it as the Intel or Westinghouse) Science Prizes, they reflect true distinction—earned through performance, not patronage.
CASDA validates relationships. Merit-based awards validate outcomes. This is vibe vs. value.
🏀 To put this more plainly—and since I’ve enjoyed looking into American merit-based recognition on my return flight—the McDonald’s All-American Game remains the apex of high school basketball honors. It dates back to the 1970s and is defined by rigor: national selection, objective criteria, elite-level competition.
Being chosen puts a student in an elite group based on ability and future potential.
In contrast, a hyper-local certificate awarded by the school's hot dog vendor and nominated by parents for someone “playing energetically this season” is mostly symbolic—often driven by popularity, seniority, or simple endurance, and independent from the team's performance.
One track produces Jordan, LeBron, and Durant. The other yields yearbook pictures
Of course, effort at all levels should be acknowledged.
But shouldn't we ask: why can’t Hudson aim higher?
This is America, we are equidistant between the greatest intellectual and financial capitals of the world. There is no war or famine. We have uninterrupted electricity (and students don't have to plan their studies around an electricity brown out schedule) and every summer we don't get briefings on "Day Zero" when the water runs out.
I’d rather read about HCSD students becoming National Merit Scholars or Semi-Finalists, winning competitive bursaries, and going on to six-figure careers that alter the trajectories of their families.
🛞 I just returned from a reunion of sorts in Detroit, a gathering of friends who were Ron Brown Scholars, National Merit Finalists, and other high-achieving alumni. These are people now running major U.S. cities, worked in the previous White House, or are leading large-scale housing development across the country. They all joked that I was the DEI guy in the room since I can't play bball and my cupid shuffle needs some work…
The contrast between Detroit’s rising stars and Hudson’s missing cohort was jarring. And then I read this Gossips story.
[🥇 For context: around 16,000 students nationwide are named National Merit Semifinalists each year (top 1% of scorers by state). About 15,000 become Finalists, and just under 7,000 receive scholarships.
ReplyDeleteThis is a meritocratic national honor with real consequences. Individuals can win alone. Obviously a great school and many smart peers challenging you over a decade helps…. but one kid can do it.
For context: Hudson Valley produced 150 Semi-finalists and more than a dozen finalists in a recent year.]
How many has HCSD/Hudson+Greenport produced?
And what of these other elite (financial) awards—how many HCSD graduates in the past two decades have won:
1. Ron Brown Scholar Program – for high-achieving Black students demonstrating leadership and public service.
2. Coca-Cola Scholars Program – for academic excellence and sustained community impact.
3. Gates Scholarship – full university funding for high-achieving, low-income minority students.
4. Jack Kent Cooke College Scholarship – substantial support for academically gifted students with financial need.
Dozens, perhaps? I could not find a single public record. Perhaps Kamal or Principal Derek Reardon can clarify? I would LOVE nothing more than either of them chiming in right now and sharing a list of students (obviously anonymously, just meta data) bound for selective schools on these and other scholarships.
Some may say these awards are “best kept secrets” or that applications take time. But HCSD employs an entire counseling department and many of these programs are not open to students from privileged backgrounds.
Others may point to socio-economic constraints—over 40% of students from HCSD fall under a certain national poverty line…
But surely that is all the more reason to help HCSD students access these life-changing opportunities. These programs exist precisely to serve such populations.
If we all believe, like I do, that talent is evenly distributed but opportunity is not—then what explains Hudson's systemic underperformance?
Surely we have the talent... we seem to be paying top dollar to create local opportunities... and we are right next to a part of the world that is the highest opportunity metropolis in the world.
Hudson has a ~ $50 million plus budget, multiple 501(c)(3) organisations, and access to a national infrastructure geared toward helping at-risk students succeed.
And yet, Hudson students, as far as I can tell are absent from these outcomes.
Of course, Kamal—and everyone else trying—deserves real credit for their effort. And Kamal… it is tough to be a Mayor and hold a public office…. and you will note I mostly address issues that you put in the public record yourself.
But something is clearly not working. And we should not lie to ourselves, because the stakes are real.
My $15k in school taxes could uplift 5 young women in Sub-Saharan Africa per year and change their lives from a less than $6.85/day a day existence (Worldbank poverty line) to a solid middle class and above trajectory by global standards.
What does my (and other homeowner's) $15k in school taxes produce in Hudson? It pays for half of one student's spot per year… and statistically speaking… that student will not do any better for it.
3️⃣ So here is Take Three:
It is great that a financial beneficiary (client) of HCSD is giving an accolade to a politically connected figure with good intentions, who is very sincere in his attempts to uplift one particular segment of a small town.
🇺🇸 AND can we also take the necessary and hard steps to have our students win real merit-based awards that could change the trajectory of their lives and this community, regardless of their race, creed, political connections, or whether they are 10th generation or 1st generation Hudsonian or American.
** Still unexplained: Your dismissal/resignation from the previous HCSD after-school program and why the whole event is sealed.
**** At Hudson Junior/Senior High School, only 27% of students take at least one AP exam, and a mere 20% pass at least one.
Thank you for the thoughtful analysis ...
ReplyDeleteThomas Sowell grew up in Harlem, not the Bronx.
ReplyDeleteThe McDonald's All-American game didn't "produce" LeBron James (or any other high school basketball player).
Waiting for the day that any one of these ideas makes the leap from 'rambling blog comment' to 'actionable plan that helps my community'.
Thanks Leonardo!
ReplyDeleteAnd Chris... I did not say that the McDonald's All American game made those players... simply that making it _into_ the game on merit... was the prize.
The Nobel Committee does not make great scientists, they simply select them, often decades after their greatest work.
America didn't produce, initially, some of its best citizens, it attracted them from all over the world and inspired them realize their potential by being the "City on a Hill".
Great high-school teachers, great parents, and great College science programs start Nobel laureates on the path of discovery...
And of course all the major College and NBA scouts are at the McDonald's game...
Still waiting to find out if Hudson High has produced a single National Merit or Semi-Finalist student...
On your second point: it is not my job (or any tax payers's job to propose a plan... we pay tens of thousands of dollars a year in taxes for the elected and appointed leaders (our public employees) to make and execute a plan. (~$50m for HSCD and ~$20m for the City).
💡But, if you follow closely, I have proposed, or endorsed many plans.. and btw for "our" community, not "my community" or "yours", as your sentence reads, intentionally or unintentionally:
- City Charter Reform for a professional City Manager
- Limiting budget increases for the City and HCSD until key metrics improve
- Turning the celebrated Hudson Book Fair into a marque national and international event (instead of orphaning it to Greenport) that attracts educators and business
- Filling City of Hudson public roles with public job requisitions in a transparent way, not behind the scenes hiring
- Not passing socialist-style Rent Control laws but attracting private investors for housing
- Moving faster and more transparently to recoup tax delinquent properties and also do a city-wide tax reassessment to make taxes more fair.
- Not giving Galvan more tax breaks and Kamal and Randall T. Martin (the unelected but winter break / recess appointed 1st Ward Supervisor who mislead constituents about taxes) recusing themselves from voting on Galvan tax breaks.
⁇ Can you please name one of your ideas to make Hudson better?
p.s. Just to show the commentariat that when you nitpick at irrelevant facts... to distract, you better choose them wisely.
🔍 Thomas Sowell was actually born in North Carolina... and while his family moved to and lived in Harlem, as you pointed out, he spent formative time in the Bronx at a homeless shelter for boys working various low-level jobs after running into family trouble and dropping out of Stuyvesant (a school with many National Merit Scholars). He cites those Bronx years very frequently. See below why.***
But whether he spent more days in the Bronx or in Harlem or in Charleston or in Palo Alto... it is not the point.
My point is Hudson celebrates mediocre "vibe awards" not meritocratic value awards.
And until we aspire to and achieve value awards... Hudson's most vulnerable graduates and residents will continue to experience down stream problems like economic instability, employment woes etc.
Do you disagree or agree with my core point about vibe vs. value awards?
Have a nice day Chris and I am genuinely interested in your best idea to make Hudson better or which of the ones I list above you find most appealing.
"... after a magistrate labeled him a “wayward minor,” and moved into a shelter in the Bronx for homeless boys, where he kept a knife under his pillow at night for protection. He took whatever jobs were available at the time—messenger, laborer—for a black high school dropout with few marketable skills. He didn’t get around to earning a college degree until he was already in his late 20s and had served in the Marines."
https://manhattan.institute/article/thomas-sowells-harlem-years
Statements of goals aren't plans. This:
ReplyDelete"Why can't Hudson's [sic] host the largest and most successful week-long Children's Book Festival in America and use it to generate local economic impact for the entire city during quiet months… all event proceeds go directly to local pre-K / youth education and merit scholarships (or just pay for the tests) for local high-schoolers to go to universities and college preparatory programs?"
is not a plan. It's an aspirational question. Plans include things like, "here's how you do it". The only thing in your list that actually has a plan in place is the Charter Reform, and even that plan (mostly*) followed the blueprint laid out by NYS.
*except for the public engagement component
re: your Q about 'vibes and values' - this sentence doesn't mean anything to me: "My point is Hudson celebrates mediocre "vibe awards" not meritocratic value awards.".
Who or what is Hudson in this sentence? There are many organizations that celebrate a number of people, places and things. Hudson is not a monolith. We are many communities with competing interests and varying resources.
Hi Chris -
ReplyDeletere: "Aspirational question" vs. detailed "here's how you do it".
Organizing a small or large regional conference is not rocket science… you do not need me to tell you in intricate detail how to organize a conference. Besides, Hudson has a boatload of dusty "plans" that folks either pay very close attention to if its suits them, or ignore all together.
Kamal paid $200k for a "community survey" that has statistical errors in methods.
We need leadership. And we pay certain leaders in town, who are simply not leading.
The Book Fair (the one example you chose to highlight), went from being an embedded event in the City of Hudson / HCSD, to being ostracized from the City for unknown reasons. Let's start there.
"re: your Q about 'vibes and values' - this sentence doesn't mean anything to me: "My point is Hudson celebrates mediocre "vibe awards" not meritocratic value awards."
Kamal celebrates a client of HCSD giving him a non-competitive "award" for amongst other things, something to do with colorful socks. I appreciate the effort and intention… every bit helps, and drops become a river etc.
But for $50m ($30k plus per student) I'd rather read a story that HCSD has had X National Merit Scholars / Semi-Finalists, and that #Y students got into good colleges, and that those students are receiving $Z in merit or need based financial aid, thereby limiting student loan burden for future generations. And that some young kid who may have had a rough start… was nurtured by HCSD and ended up as a Ron Brown or Gates Scholar and going to his dream college/career. And of course there are different paths and every one is unique. Equally amazing would be reading about students earning spots at selective vocational schools and then going to thrive in productive careers.
Right now most of the news out of HCSD is about extreme bullying and assault, someone who died falling on a school sidewalk, and teachers calling for the removal of the Superintendent via a petition.
HCSD, like some other area 501c3s, seem to be producing high-paying and/or high-status jobs and FB posts for administrators, but not student outcomes in line with expenditures.
"Who or what is Hudson in this sentence? There are many organizations that celebrate a number of people, places and things. Hudson is not a monolith. We are many communities with competing interests and varying resources."
Ah, there’s the word often used to welcome and invite, but just as often wielded as a cudgel: ‘community’.
There is an old joke: “To a progressive, ‘community’ means whoever agrees with them on Twitter/FB that day—plus a random acronym to prove it’s inclusive.”
😉
But more seriously… re: "We are many communities with competing interests and varying resources."
You are right about trade-offs and limited resources, at least in government.
See… I believe our town should aspire to be one cohesive community, perhaps with different neighborhoods and interest groups that naturally come and go, but embracing true pluralism where groups collaborate for shared goals, not divide by victim status for diversity's sake.
America’s motto is e pluribus unum—out of many, one, it is not "out of one, many."
~
Now that I have taken the time to answer your question, I return to my original question;
What is your "aspirational question" as you call it, or idea for how to improve Hudson? I require no plan or feasibility study… and I won't pick on typos... just a point of view, and perhaps some creativity.
So no plans or even plans for plans, got it. I'll stop waiting for anything to actually happen. Thanks for letting me off the hook!
ReplyDeleteSince this is now an old thread and only those who already commented may see this I will go into a bit of detail:
ReplyDelete~
Still no ideas from you... normally I would let that slide but this is your day job, not mine.
If you are indeed the talented Chris Brown from the CEDC...
You are supported by tax payers, along with Matt Tucker, to advance the economy in Columbia County. This would have been a great moment to make the case for the questionable idea of Community Land Banks... or whatever you think could help advance the economy, or improve critical inputs (labor, education, capital, housing).
The CEDC broadband initiative was awesome. Did you help with that?
From your website: “To strengthen the area’s tax base through the growth and expansion of business and industry, and to promote job creation in Columbia County, New York.”
Your comment here perfectly illustrates a fundamental misunderstanding that some progressives (mostly friends of Kamal and Tom) in Columbia County espouse.
Residents fund government—and at times, public-private entities like the CEDC, which benefit from 501c3 tax-exempt status—to deliver services in the public interest.
Residents are compulsory stakeholders and tax payers; government is a monopoly service provider.
We are not here to serve you. You are here to serve tax-payers. You can invite us to voluntarily cooperate with you…
The CEDC has a monopoly-esque role as a quasi government entity, a type of royal charter, to perform certain functions. We give your entity tax discounts and fund your work with national, state, and local tax revenue.
Now... instead of being snarky... why don't you and Matt Tucker and your peers at the CEDC add a bullet point to your weekly staff meeting:
"Should Columbia County put its weight behind a national/international conference that can be the Sundance Film Festival, or Aspen Ideas Festival scale event, for Hudson/Columbia, to stimulate the economy. Should it be. youth book fair?"
The Berkshires and Dutchess County did it... why can't Columbia.
In other words... instead of helping advance tax breaks for some... grow the tax base.
And maybe there is already something? Or maybe a new initiative can leverage all the local businesses and art centres in the area that cater to weddings, but during the off season.
And then you call the top 25 tax payers / businesses in the City of Hudson / County, and you invite them to a nice breakfast at Klocke / Kitties / Lagonia Bistro etc. to decide on an idea and then you organize it.
Didn't you have your AGM a few weeks ago… would have been a great moment for this. I wasn't there but from the photos it seemed it was mostly public servants and tax payers.
https://www.dailygazette.com/hv360/news/business/columbia-county-economic-development/article_c42ad25b-ad76-465d-a22a-abc9005f93b3.html#9
Ok. I checked… and literally every single photo is of a politician, not a single business owner or investor. Maybe the photographer just knows the politicians and somehow did not take a single photo of a single business builder or investor?
I thought CEDC stood for ECONOMIC Development, not political development 😜
Why wasn't Albert Wenger, Ben Fain, Colarusso or other large employers and successful investor keynoting the event? Or do you also ask them to first submit a long and detailed PLAN? Charming.
~
I will email this thread to you and Matt so it is at the top of your inbox. I just texted 3 of the largest local hotel managers and events spaces and they'd love to help. None of them have heard from you guys. Weird.
And if we meet in person one day I will share with you how I helped increase a large city's tourist revenue by 35% in 3 years.
Pro-Tip: it wasn't writing long plans and handing out tax breaks.
And I wasn't paid like you are to do it and I had zero personal financial gain. It was a side quest to help a friend and create jobs.
p.s. If you are Chris Brown the rapper... and not the Housing Coordinator... disregard this thread... Welcome to Hudson, but I am pretty sure most of us are team Rihanna!
*** MIKE Tucker -> https://columbiaedc.com/about-cedc/staff/f-michael-tucker/
ReplyDeleteApologies for writing Matt... both are top 50 common male names, according to the SSA.