I was invited to City Hall Friday morning to participate in the Dowagiac business and community leaders forum for Dr. W. Craig Misner of Michigan Leadership Institute to gather information for the Union School District superintendent search for the retiring Peg Stowers’ successor.

It was heartening that this process ended with a bang after going to the “community” forum Thursday evening and being the only person in the Union High School media center besides Craig and his wife.

The Misners assured distraught me there were plenty of people with plenty to say who availed themselves of earlier focus groups which went on at intervals all day.

I felt fortunate to listen to a group that included our mayor, city manager, college president, the councilman who chairs the Borgess Lee-Memorial Hospital board, a couple of pastors, the library director, a former school board member and informed, articulate business people, such as real estate broker Dave Springsteen and downtown merchant Kris Lamphere of Who Knew? I was in listening mode and didn’t really hear anything with which I could quibble.

I’ve been of a mind for a while now that Dowagiac needs a school chief with exceptional communication skills and fresh ideas to tell our story, good and bad, so we define ourselves before someone else does.

Self-promotion has worked pretty well for Edwardsburg, since none of its scores was higher than fifth. Many fell below the top 10 and even in the middle of the pack.

Leadership searches are as complicated as you make them, even if I am also reminded of Jesse Jackson’s lament that if he walked on water the media would report he can’t swim.
Most interesting to me was that although the school board has yet to address Dowagiac’s 2010 Michigan Educational Assessment Program (MEAP) test results, these community leaders aren’t waiting and are well down the road to being dissatisfied with the data.

Where Niles Community Schools scored above state average in each of 16 administered tests for the first time ever, Dowagiac finished below state average in 14 categories.

We come across as a mediocre also-ran and the business community knows how hard it is to recruit for economic development or to sell homes with a school system that across the board ranks consistently in the bottom half of area districts and last in Cass County.
Fair or not, that’s reality.

On the other hand, we start out competitive in third and fourth grades when parents are more involved.

Third grade, 90.5 percent of Dowagiac students met or exceeded state standards in math, but four reached 100 percent, St. Joseph, 99.4 percent; Decatur, 98.7; Marcellus and Edwardsburg, 98.2; Niles, 97.8; and Cassopolis, 96.4.

Dowagiac didn’t rank in the top 30. State average was 94.8.

Third grade English, Dowagiac, at 89.8, tied state average.

Lake Michigan Catholic, Lakeshore, Mattawan, Bloomingdale, Decatur and Niles all exceeded 94.

Fourth grade math saw Dowagiac’s final foray over state average, 93 percent to 92.3 percent Michiganwide. But Marcellus had 100 percent, Edwardsburg 96.3 and Niles 94.7.

Fourth grade English, with state average at 84.1, Dowagiac was at 83 percent while Marcellus hit 91.4 and Edwardsburg reached 91.2.

Dowagiac, at 79.2 percent, just missed state average of 79.5 in fifth grade math, but Edwardsburg was 90 percent, Niles was 86.2 percent and Marcellus was 85.7 percent.
Dowagiac also fell below state average in English (83.5 vs. 85.2) and science (78.7 vs. 81).

In sixth grade, Dowagiac’s 82.9 in English was beneath 87.7 state average and Edwardsburg’s 94.1, Niles’ 91.4 and Cassopolis’ 91.

Social studies scores in sixth grade show a 73.4-percent state average, with the Chieftains at 66.2 percent, behind Brandywine, Cassopolis, Gobles, Marcellus, Coloma and Bangor.
In seventh grade math, Dowagiac slid to 76.9 percent, well below state average of 82.2 percent, Niles at 92.3 and Edwardsburg at 91.1.

Seventh grade English, Dowagiac found itself at 75.6 percent, behind state average of 82 percent and Cassopolis (86.9), Edwardsburg (86.2) and Niles (84.6).

Average scores of 70.3 percent were reported in eighth grade math, where Dowagiac’s 58.5 was closer to the bottom, ahead of only Bloomingdale, Fennville, Hartford, Cassopolis, River Valley and Benton Harbor.

Eighth grade English saw Dowagiac at 80.7 percent, below state average of 83.4, but ahead of Edwardsburg’s 79.9 percent.

Edwardsburg eclipsed state average of 75.9 percent in eighth grade science, while Dowagiac was down at 66.7.

Finally, ninth grade social studies scores saw state average at 71.1 percent, which Dowagiac trailed at 64.7 percent.

Niles, Marcellus, Cassopolis, Watervlet, Eau Claire, Brandywine and Coloma were all ahead with nothing higher than 76 percent.

City Manager Kevin Anderson used a sports analogy to demonstrate the single-mindedness that could turn these scores around.

A football team starts the season with a lofty goal of qualifying for the playoffs to perhaps play for a state title, not to finish at .500 or less.

I couldn’t help but think of the Super Bowl, which we didn’t need to play this year because the Indianapolis Colts with Peyton Manning were anointed.

Bless the New Orleans Saints and Drew Brees, who didn’t get the memo.

I agree with Chuck Burling there are success stories aplenty that never seem to get out there, but the schools have a weekly column and their own newsletter with which to help accomplish that mission.

My Dowagiac doesn’t have to take a back seat to anyone.

One of the few 1-1 ties I have ever won in my marriage sent our children to public schools – a decision I’ve never regretted.

If you thought it odd there wasn’t a Dowagiac school story in Horizons, I tried to do one on a veteran educator energized by teaching at the middle school, but lacking a response, I turned instead to Decatur, where I was greeted with open arms.

But I’m not here to bash our educators.

I love the great story of “Mr. Holland’s Opus.”

I’ve met countless heroes covering the school district from which I graduated since 1981.
We began the focus group by enumerating all the assets Dowagiac has for being such a tiny town, including a college, an airport and a hospital.

I always throw in a daily newspaper and Dogwood Fine Arts Festival because on paper neither of us should exist.

I was never fond of the warm, fuzzy notion that life is a game of tee ball and everyone should get an award for showing up.

The durable storyline that we are scrappy and squeeze every dollar for resources has served us well for a long time, but it doesn’t shoot high enough.

Dogwood is a great example of the power of the possible, ignoring naysayers and creating your own climate for success by expectations you define .

If its visionaries wallowed in defeatism or flinched in self-doubt at the prospect of inviting a Kurt Vonnegut, John Updike or Norman Mailer here, there wouldn’t be a new generation writing its own books, pursuing fine arts careers in college or believing that reading a book involves picking the author’s brain afterward. As Superintendent Ron Jones, whose Citizen of the Month is still going strong 20 years later, used to say, you get what you expect.

John Eby is Daily News managing editor. E-mail him at john.eby @leaderpub.com.