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March 12th, 2008 BETH SLOVIC | News
 

Schoolhouse Clock

Time is not on benson’s side.

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Timed Test: How many Portland school officials does it take to fix a clock?

If daylight saving time last weekend wreaked havoc on your schedule, pity the poor students and teachers at Benson High School.

Thirty-three of the 100-plus clocks at the inner Northeast Portland school simply aren’t working, according to Portland Public Schools. And many haven’t been working since September, causing students and teachers to guess constantly when the next bell will ring, teachers say.

The problem is mundane, for sure. But fixing the broken clocks has proved to be next to impossible, giving Benson kids an unwanted lesson in physics, economics and patience.

In science teacher Chris Hager’s classroom the clock hands are stuck at 3 pm, “as if in constant anticipation of the ringing of each day’s final bell” at 3:05 pm, he says. Nearly every day, at least one student in his class of 35 teenagers distracts the others with an excited question about the time, he says.

The clocks at Benson are controlled by the school’s central office and are all tied to an antiquated system that runs on the resistance created by the circuits of the entire unit.

That’s the physics part. If school district officials removed the broken clocks en masse, they would throw the whole system out of whack, they say.

Here’s the economics lesson: the district has resisted spending hundreds of dollars to buy battery-operated clocks for teachers, since that leads to new problems, according to Randall Johnston, the district’s maintenance manager. If one teacher’s clock has one time, and another teacher’s clock has another time, students will be equally confused, Johnston believes. “It’s failed at other places and we hate to waste the money,” he says.

The district also has resisted the idea of taking clocks from a closed school and installing them at Benson, in the event that the district ever leased that closed school.

Josh Hjertstedt, a field operations manager for the district, says he’s known about the problem for “a couple of months.” Recently, he sent Benson’s secretary an email saying the problem affecting about one-third of Benson’s clocks would not be addressed “anytime soon.” Only one company services those clocks, and it’s on the East Coast, Hjertstedt says.

The good news—requiring still more patience—is Johnston has ordered 33 new clocks for the old system, which should be arriving in a couple of weeks. Other schools are having similar problems, says Johnston, but “Benson is probably the most egregious.”

 
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03.13.2008 at 08:01 Reply
Why bring up a story about clocks without talking about the lack of money district wide. Isn

 

03.14.2008 at 10:03 Reply
Don't believe it for a minute. This is district spin for its "Reshaping Schools" process. The district has the mindset of wanting to avoid even the SMALLEST school maintenance to leverage parents' unhappiness in order to promote a fall capital bond measure.

I wish a contractor out there would donate their time to truly evaluate the Benson clocks, and see if PPS's whole claim is even true. This clocks issue is very likely a tactical smokescreen on the part of PPS. Many PPS parents have told me stories of their own parents or relatives who offered to provide services to PPS for free at schools (electrical, plumbing, roofing, fencing, drain work, etc.), but were not taken up on it -- even after formal, written free offers were made by licensed, bonded contractors!

In reality, you can purchase clocks at Target for $29.95 which receive a satellite signal and are synchronized to the correct time.

This is a perfect example of PPS's close-minded thinking, and lack of environmentally sound values. It is part of a PPS push to sell new school construction (after 20 or more closures since 2001) which is not necessary.

Issues like broken clocks in our PPS schools cause HOURS of disruption for students and teachers each year. It's not trivial. It sends a clear message to our students that they don't matter, that elements in their school life can remain broken for years and no one in administration cares enough to do simple maintenance. It shows the public that no one is minding the store in PPS facilities.

 

03.18.2008 at 06:40 Reply
EXACTLY what I was thinking, now let's hear PPS Communications declare "LIARS: LIARS I TELL YOU! Walmart/Target have always been against us."

"In reality, you can purchase clocks at Target for $29.95 which receive a satellite signal and are synchronized to the correct time."

 

03.30.2009 at 08:59 Reply
This is really the smallest of problems at Benson. Since entry requirements were dropped several years ago (due to a threatened lawsuit,) a series of events have ensued, which will probably end in the closure of the school, and very soon. There are gang problems, denied for reasons of public relations: and allegations of some rather unsavory behavior by a staff member perhaps too popular among the students. It is pitiful that such an esteemed high school should be allowed to fall this far.

 

 
 

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