The guest op-ed is by Jennifer Cargal of West Seattle.

Excuse me, Seattle Public Schools, but your house in on fire. Dramatic change is needed.

For the last 15 years we have watched you struggle under the weight of a bloated, mismanaged central bureaucracy—however well intentioned some of the responsible parties might be. Despite this, parents, principals, and teachers have worked to improve schools around the city. They've done this without help, support, or funding from the District. And now we learn that while my son doesn’t have textbooks in some classes, the powers that be let at least $2 million dollars walk out the door for non-education related expenses.

Now we begin another round of incremental change that will only marginally change the district at best. Excuse me, but this is a crisis for every child in this district and the adults need to start acting like it is. Insanity is repeating the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

We need dramatic change and we need it now.

Turn the district over the city for two years. Bring in a former CEO or local Mayor who can clean house. There are many talented financial managers who can put in the correct fiscal controls. Require everyone in central administration to submit his/her resignation. For each position, determine if it is fundamental to the core mission of the school district. If not, eliminate that position. If it is, then interview the current holder of the job to determine whether he or she is qualified. In short, do what no one has been able to do for the last 15 years—clean house and put the district in order.

While all this is going on, the school board should also engage in a hiring process to bring someone here to run the school district once it has been rebuilt.

Finally, the City Council should make a recommendation on whether the school board should be paid. Given the complexity of the job at hand, maybe we shouldn’t expect people to do it on nights and weekends after they finish work at their day jobs. It could be that you get what you pay for.

We need to put kids first and that means acting now. Every year of inaction has huge consequences for our kids. The disastrous last fifteen years helped undermine the education of a generation of Seattle kids. There’s lots of outrage, but where’s the urgency to fix it? Act now and let’s do right by the kids in our community.