Brenten Byrd, who will officially take over as superintendent of the Webb City R-7 School District July 1, has taken an unusual approach to winning over the staff- he continues to throw them under the bus.
Judging from the message Byrd sent to staff members, he believed Pope's claim that she had been hacked even before the investigation took place.
Our tech department was notified and immediately started working with Dr. Pope and I to try to find out when and how.
In an article that was posted on the Webb City Sentinel Wednesday night, Byrd indicated he first learned about the offensive tweets from a surprising source.
Byrd says the matter of the offensive tweets and retweets on X (formerly Twitter) came to light when “some of our staff” shared them with Randy Turner, of The Turner Report website.
Byrd also has no way of knowing whether it was someone on his staff or a member of the community who shared the tweets and retweets with the Turner Report.
In fact, Webb City residents who have been sharing information with me for years, but who are not connected to the school in any way, were among those who contacted me.
But Byrd immediately attacked his staff.
Byrd told the Sentinel he is "100 percent supportive" of Pope, as if there was still some question about that.
In his letter to staff, Byrd criticized those who shared information about Pope's alleged tweets."Please let this serve as a reminder that if you see something that doesn't seem right or is derogatory in nature on a social media account, please do not gossip about it, but instead let an administrator know so we can immediately take action."
None of those reasons, most of which were batted down by those who have knowledge of how hacking works, were included in the Sentinel article.
Byrd has asked the district’s technical department to investigate the source of the offensive posts. After reaching some dead ends, he says the district is asking X to further the investigation.
If that doesn't indicate the investigation has been completed, Byrd made it clear by emphasizing that Pope was not the kind of educator who would discriminate against anyone.
Byrd says that after all the supportive letters and emails he has received from Pope’s colleagues at Hurley that he is 100% sure that she is an “upstanding mentor and educator, loves kids and will help any kid.”
The Joplin Globe charges $428.87 for a one-year subscription. The Turner Report/Inside Joplin does not charge a cent.
25 comments:
Anyone else think that this totally homegrown guy seems like the perfect fit for Webb City R-7?
The perfect fit to help them go backwards just like when you put your car's transmission in R?
This is all so disheartening. As a webb city resident and an employee of the schools, I can say this has all been handled so poorly by central office. When you have a new leader coming in that has such horrible posts on her social media accounts the response should have been = uh oh let's hold up and check this out. But instead they email all staff with bogus claims of hacking and immediately defend her honor. She should not be coming in unless she can ease the fears we have of her exposed true self. As a school district we take care of our kids, no matter their race or ethnicity or sexual preference. We don't judge our kids and we don't judge our families. This new leader seems to do just the opposite, at least her social media would suggest such. I think the school board needs to take a deeper look at this new hire. They need to realize that there are so many staff who have lost trust and won't follow someone if they are truly racist and close minded.
I saw about 30 screenshots and they were beyond offensive. I don't know how she got the job. We are all entitled to our beliefs and have a first amendment right to express them, BUT there are consequences to voicing those opinions. The consequence for a public education administrator is to not get a job and to not keep it. You can't post racist and anti-islamic material when every type of child comes to your public school. I'm sure the district wants this to quietly go away, but now that it is exposed, it won't ever go away. The best they can do is try to mend the fences that were broken. Time for Webb City Schools to decide who they want to protect, the offender or the offended.
You can't say all of those posts were hacked when they go back years. Many posts had comments from her account back over several years. Not a hacked account, but a weak excuse of what was done by someone who believes terrible things about many different types of people.
What exactly was the deleted "X" (former twitter) account?
Even if it's deleted it's not 100% gone.
Brenten Byrd had an opportunity to correct his mistake, but he doubled down on a poor decision. Mistakes happen. True leaders admit their mistakes and correct them. Byrd’s persistence in this failure foreshadows a future of poor decisions and cover ups. His failure in leadership necessitates board action. It’s time for the Board of Education to fulfill their responsibility to protect the integrity of the district. If the BOE doesn’t act, teachers, students, and the public will organize. The clock is ticking. Pope must go.
The twitter account was @AllisonMPope , her replies showed up on the account as APope
Who doesn’t have a few skeletons in the closet? Nobody is perfect FYI
Thank you.
Who doesn’t have a few skeletons in the closet? Nobody is perfect FYI
Izzat you Dennis (molester and money launderer) Hastert?
Or maybe it's Rick Roeber?
Or are you some other right winger with a lot of nasty junk in your trunk?
I wonder if the teachers who left other districts to work at WC will regret that move now? I would be looking around if I had a choice. These two won’t be fun to work for—they already showed their claws.
Lot of whining over nothing.
@3:14 AM "Lot of whining over nothing."
So you're okay with racist, prejudices, conspiracy theory peddling bigots teaching your kids?
Feelings police are gonna get you.
No matter what happens, this does not fare well for the superintendents and the new incoming Board of Ed. Its like a festering wound that just won't heal and the bandaid keeps coming off, exposing the gangernous sore beneath the pretty butterfly bandaid. You can keep trying to move forward and hope everyone forgets, but the damn sore is there. It makes you stumble and lose your footing time and time again. You can either address the sore by exposing it to air and topicals or you can keep it covered, not knowing when it will expose itself again and derail your step and eventually your agenda. Lucky for her, she is so very close to her public teacher retirement and only has to hang on for three years to make Webb her top three years and then be swimming in the dough. #dollarbillsyall
Again, Social Media and Not Thinking - Will be the Downfall of this Generation - Let's Post everything, Hate Speech, Racist Remarks, Threats, Pictures, Political Everything, Religious Everything, Wild Opinions, so you can get your 15-Minutes of Fame or Followers - Showing Little or No Respect for Yourselves or Others - and the interesting thing is these Idiots - Never Learn - How it could Cost them a Job, Career, Standing in the Community, Future Income - by Following Political Idiots and Repeating their Stupid Diatribe Online - this includes for both Parties.
Companies, Businesses, Governmental Agencies, and your Customers - are reviewing your Posts and Offensive Language - what are you going to do when it starts to impact your Paychecks - Income, when they won't Hire Your or they Fire You for Offensive Language or Speech. Having an Opinion is Fine, but today people are going to Extreme Matters - to make their Rhetoric and Narcissist Speech Standout - Learn a Valuable Lesson - Don't Force Your Half-Thought Out Opinions On Others - It could Cost You in the Long Run.
Webb City and racism scandals...name a more iconic duo
Webb City administration is a shambles omg
The school has tried very hard to erase the stain from the previous scandal with the suicide death of an immigrant Muslim student on their baseball field. To now have a new scandal in such a short time it really seems like more than bad luck. Allison Pope brings some bad luck with her and if those twitter posts were hers, which I suspect they are, then she brings more than bad luck - She brings hatefulness, not love. She brings ancient thinking and not what the students and teachers need in school. She brings toxicity into a hurting community, which is not what it needs. She doesn't seem like someone who believes in supporting diversity and inclusion. Maybe someone thinks she has a pretty face to mask her blackened cold heart? She does kind of look like a Fox News Hostess in her picture.
Dr Pope probably doesn’t have a plan B. It’s WC or nothing. I can’t imagine any district in their right mind touching her with a 10 foot pole. (Unless they fail to do their due diligence of course.)
I would post my true feelings about Dr. Byrd’s handling of this situation, but I don’t want to be reprimanded for gossiping.
Hey Randy, can you make another blog post with just a collection of all her Twitter screenshots? People want to bury their heads in the sand and act like this didn’t happen. It’s impossible to deny that it did when you see the evidence.
Her skeletons are no longer in the closet
And the quarterback is toast
Glad someone finally addressed the 'gossiping' statement by Brenten Byrd in his letter to staff. That one really made me mad. Who is he to tell staff to not talk about SHOCKING social media posts made by our new asst superintendent's official twitter account. If he didn't want us talking about it then he should have actually vetted her accounts. Then he wouldn't be in this mess. But instead he didn't and her racist radical posts were out there to be seen by anyone who cared enough to look. Then once it was taken to the district's central office, they contacted Allison Pope and she shut it down. That's not a hack. That is getting caught. And it was shocking material that people SHOULD HAVE TALKED ABOUT.
Brushed under the rug instead of admitting what she did and doing something about it, disgusting.
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