SMALL STEPS: THURSDAY WAS A GOOD DAY IN LAUSD

As a parent representative and a parent leader in LA
Unified I go to lots of meetings. Good meetings, bad
meetings, indifferent meetings. The occaisional adult
equivalent of a food fight. On Thursday I went to
three, good positive meetings – three parts of
processes that promise to lead to good results.

• First we had the Air Conditioner Sound Issues
Subcommittee of the Bond Oversight Committee — a
pretty dry subject, but an important one as we build
and modernize schools in the District. Air conditioners
make noise and noise is counterproductive to learning.
The District has made mistakes in the past in
purchasing HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, Air
Conditioning) units - there are classrooms where it’s
difficult to concentrate, listen attentively and learn
because of air conditioner noise.

• Most LAUSD primary students are learning English
– which represent totally new and different sounds to
them.
• 20-25% of these same youngsters – English learners
or not – suffer identifiable hearing impairment at any
one time because of childhood ear infections.
• How many of these children just can’t hear the
teacher well enough to understand?

There are evolving new standards for A/C noise in
classrooms, and these represent challenges for HVAC
manufacturers. And LAUSD is about to undertake a
large procurement for installing and retrofitting HVAC
in existing buildings and portables.

Present at the meeting were Oversight Committee
members, senior Facilities staff, health and safety
experts, representatives of school board members, a
panel of sound engineers and an HVAC engineer by
phone hookup – as well as Gene Krisher of Friends of
the Children – citizen-advocate for LAUSD
schoolchildren on health and environmental issues. Most all of the right people were at the table and the conversation was informative, technical, practical - and most important: Shared!

It was a fine beginning to a process that will benefit
schoolchildren long into the future.


• Following this there was the Full Day Kindergarten
Working Group, a meeting of senior staff, union
leadership, administrators and many kindergarten
teachers to discuss and formulate curriculum and
planning - the ‘how’’ and ‘what ‘of Full Day K.
Exactly ‘when’ and ‘where’ are issues still to be
resolved by the Board, but the process is beginning
and the dialogue was encouraging. There is a way to
go and I’d certainly like to see some additional parents
in the process. But hey, as someone senior in the
District pointed out: “This is a big district capable of
progress only in tiny, baby steps.”

We are making those steps in the right direction.


• And finally the Bond Oversight Committee Outreach
Subcommittee held an evening meeting in Local
District J - the South Gate/Bell/Cudahy/Huntington
Park area where schools are most severely
overcrowded and new construction and modernization
most needed. The turnout by the community was
fantastic, the pizza and soft drinks much appreciated,
the coffee strong and the sharing of concerns genuine,
heartfelt and heard. As a member of the committee I’m
not about to issue our report here — but there is
unquestioned room for improvement in the District’s
outreach efforts, especially as regards modernization
of existing buildings. And it’s very unfortunate that a
representative of Local District J’s modernization
program was not present.




MUCH ADIEU ABOUT NAP TIME

This is a story that resonates! A Google News Search
turns up 600+ references — it’s approaching “urban
legend” status ...and its’s true! - smf

• NAP TIME: The Article That Started It All!
TIME MAY BE UP FOR NAPS IN PRE-K CLASS
By Nancy Trejos
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, March 15, 2004; Page A01

After lunch and snacks, alphabet and story times, the
lights go off. Sixteen tiny bodies sprawl on a sea of red
foam mats, the sounds of classical piano coaxing them
to sleep.

And there they stay, tucked under Spider-Man and
Powerpuff Girls blankets, until teacher Chantay Wynn
switches on the lights 45 minutes later. "Come on, get
up," Wynn chides 4-year-old Steven Dieu, lifting him
from his mat. "Open your eyes."
It's a daily ritual for the pre-kindergarten students at
Hoffman-Boston Elementary School in Arlington, as it
is at countless schools across the country. But in the
increasingly urgent world of public education, is it a
luxury that 4-year-olds no longer can afford?

By asking that question, a few leaders of Washington
area school systems have begun to challenge one of the
pillars of the early school experience: afternoon naps.
"Nap time needs to go away," Prince George's County
schools chief André J. Hornsby said during a recent
meeting with Maryland legislators. "We need to get rid
of all the baby school stuff they used to do."
Hornsby wants to convert his pre-kindergarten classes
into a full-day program. If he secures the funding to
begin that next fall, there will be no mats or cots
allowed, he said. In Anne Arundel County, where
full-day pre-kindergarten is in place, Superintendent
Eric J. Smith also has opted not to build nap time into
the schedule.

Educators including Hornsby and Smith find
themselves under growing pressure to make school
more rigorous -- even in the earliest grades -- in the
belief that children who are behind academically by age
6 or 7 have a difficult time catching up. "The time is
very precious," Smith said. "When they come into first
grade or kindergarten for the first time, they learn
within a few weeks of the school experience that
they're not as capable, and that's a burden that is
extremely damaging."

Critics of eliminating school naps say the reality is that
many 4-year-olds don't get enough sleep at home.
There are piano lessons, soccer practices and other
scheduled activities during the day, and many kids stay
up past their bedtime because their parents come home
late from work and want to talk or play.

"Kids are often kind of overscheduled even as
toddlers, even as preschoolers," said Kenneth A.
Haller, assistant professor of pediatrics at Saint Louis
University School of Medicine.

"We are a sleep-deprived society," agreed Stephen H.
Sheldon, director of the Sleep Medicine Center at
Children's Memorial Hospital in Chicago.

Typical 4- and 5-year-olds need 10 to 12 hours of
sleep, and if they don't get that at night they will likely
fall asleep during the day, according to the American
Academy of Pediatrics. The amount of sleep a
school-age child needs decreases each year, and the
need for naps diminishes after age 3, pediatricians say.
Most evenings, Adrian Moreno tries to get his son,
David, to fall asleep by 9 p.m. The goal is to wake
David at 7 a.m. to get him ready for pre-kindergarten
at Hoffman-Boston, where administrators continue to
support naps. But David, who recently turned 5, has a
3-year-old sister, and the two often keep each other
awake playing games until 10 p.m. or so, Moreno said.
It's no wonder that on a recent rainy day, David was
fast asleep soon after Wynn switched off the classroom
lights.

"I think they need to sleep a bit," Moreno said.
"They're small. They have to rest their minds."
Nia Baker, 4, wakes up around 6:30 every morning to
get ready for day care and later spends almost three
hours in pre-kindergarten at Seabrook Elementary
School in Prince George's, said her mother, Aisha
Baker. Then she goes back to day care until 6 p.m.,
when Baker, a single mother and a cashier at a D.C.
restaurant, picks her up.

The rest of Nia's evening usually goes like this: She
eats dinner, reviews what she learned in school for
about 20 minutes, plays a little, then watches TV for
10 minutes. Bedtime is 7:30 p.m.

"You get tired," Nia said, reflecting on her schedule.
Nia gets a 30-minute nap at day care, which her
mother appreciates. "They need a break to take a nap
and get rejuvenated," Baker said.

But support of naps is hardly unanimous.

"Do all 4-year-olds need nap time? The answer is
certainly no," said Ari Brown, a pediatrician in Texas
and author of the book "Baby 411."

Smith, who came to Anne Arundel County in July
2002 from Charlotte, is a firm believer that
pre-kindergarten students don't need naps. His
teachers and principals urge parents to make sure the
children get enough sleep at home. In place of nap
time is "quiet learning time," during which students
look at books or play with puzzles, said Barbara
Griffith, coordinator of the county's early childhood
programs.

If they do fall asleep, the teacher doesn't wake them.

But the message is clear: "This is not a child-care
program. It's an educational program," Griffith said.
In effect, kindergarten is becoming more like first
grade, teachers say, which makes preschool more like
the kindergarten of yesteryear. "When I was in
preschool, I remember learning socialization skills,"
Wynn said. "By the time they get to kindergarten, they
have to hit the ground running."

Wynn followed a recent "quiet time" -- what many
schools now call any break in the school day -- with a
rhyming drill. By the end of pre-kindergarten, Wynn's
students have to master seven skills, from writing their
names to memorizing words in a sentence to matching
words that rhyme. She tests them each fall and spring
to track their progress.

Zahava Johnson teaches two pre-kindergarten classes
at Seabrook Elementary, each almost three hours long,
one in the morning and one in the afternoon.

Johnson said her students stop paying attention to her
lessons after 15 minutes. So she offers an occasional
respite with fun activities, like singing a song about
trains.

If she teaches a full-day class next year, she said, she
wants the students to take a nap. Or at least take a
break from the learning. "This is an introduction to
school, and to have them work like a 6-year-old, I
don't think that's going to work," she said.

Seabrook Principal Marvel Smith is more supportive
of Hornsby's move to eliminate naps. "They can't be
babied," she said. "These are young minds. We have to
take advantage of this early stage when they grasp
everything."

• NAPTIME II: More from The Post:
NO NAP TIME? EDUCATORS ARE DREAMING
By Donna Britt
Friday, March 19, 2004; Page B01

Some ideas, you're unsure of. You listen to them,
weigh them and, even if you're unconvinced, you think,
"Maybe that makes some sense."

Other ideas seem so head-slappingly,
hold-my-Starbucks-while-I-recoil-in-disbelief dumb
that your only response is: "Huh?"

That was my reaction to the newfangled notion,
embraced by certain school systems, that naps should
be eliminated for pre-kindergarten children. As
described by an article in Monday's Post, that means
discouraging 4-year-olds in pre-kindergarten classes
from lying down for a brief after-lunch snooze.
As if today's kids somehow don't need the break
prescribed forever by parents, day-care centers and
preschools -- and that most grown-ups would take if
(A) coffee didn't exist and (B) our bosses wouldn't fire
us.

All together now: Huh?

"Nap time needs to go away," Prince George's County
schools chief André J. Hornsby said recently during a
meeting with Maryland legislators. "We need to get rid
of all the baby school stuff they used to do."
It was inevitable. In a 24-7 world, napping has become
"baby school stuff" that's beneath modern
post-toddlers. As a mom, I know that the American
Academy of Pediatrics is correct in asserting that every
4-year-old doesn't require a nap. Individual sleep needs
vary. By age 3, the organization counsels, fewer
children need naps.

Educators -- under increasing pressure to make
schools tougher and learning a priority for even the
youngest children -- are incorporating more
pre-kindergarten programs. It isn't surprising that some
believe that young students' time is better spent
preparing for reading than dozing.

So why don't more experts feel that pre-kindergarten
nap time should be jettisoned?

Nursery school teacher Kay Valge of The Children's
Centre in Bowie has taught reading and math readiness
to 4-year-olds for two decades. "If 4-year-olds go all
day long, they aren't able to concentrate on learning,"
Valge says. "They need to disengage -- some
downtime just to relax.

"Tired adults don't learn or concentrate well, either."
Silver Spring pediatrician Gabrielle Virgo fondly
recalls napping as a kindergartner, adding, "I don't
think it damaged me academically."
"When you look at brain growth, the critical years
extend to age 5," Virgo says. Far from time wasted,
nap time is actually when "kids incorporate lessons
they've learned, solidify their knowledge. . .
.
Mandating not sleeping for a large percentage of
4-year-olds will mean that they will not learn as well . .
. which almost flies in the face of what [educators] are
trying to do."

Surely the new no-nap proponents want only what's
best for students. So why does it feel so wrong?
It isn't enough that the run-amok pace kept by
America's sleep-deprived adults has made
multimillionaires of the Starbucks-Caribou
Coffee-Coffee Beanery crew. Or that our
elementary-schoolers are so weary that the National
Institutes of Health has launched a sleep awareness
program () for 7- to 11-year-olds to help them avoid
becoming teenagers who doze off behind the wheel.
Forget even, as we modern folk do, the body's natural
circadian rhythms. Are we so performance-obsessed
that even tiny children -- whose parents peel them out
of bed at 6 a.m. and don't see them again for 12 hours
-- can't catch a break?

Downplaying pre-kindergartners' sleep needs typifies
society's suggestion that "sleep is a nuisance, not a
necessity," says Carl E. Hunt, director of NIH's
National Center on Sleep Disorders Research in
Bethesda.

Hunt, a pediatrician, says most 4-year-olds -- unlike
their 5- and 6-year-old counterparts -- "wouldn't be
fully rested without an afternoon nap, no matter how
much sleep they get at night."

And, he adds, "most 4-year-olds and their families
don't get to sleep early enough."

So is it the schools' responsibility to play parent? Or
shouldn't they adjust, and readjust, to their students'
real lives?

Anne Arundel County schools chief Eric J. Smith is
proud of his system's nap-discouraging pre-K program,
first introduced in Charlotte, where he was
superintendent for six years. "I never got a single
complaint, here or there," Smith says.

Smith's mission is laudable: to make low-income
students competitive with their wealthier classmates.
Instructors of 4-year-olds "have a golden opportunity
to prepare them to enter kindergarten competitive with
their peers," he says. Most low-income children have
had far less exposure to books, educational trips and
even vacation, "all the outside experiences . . . that
help prepare more-affluent children for learning."
So teachers in his program "focus primarily on
language development and reading readiness," Smith
says. "The time we have with the children is critical.
We have to use it wisely."

So naps aren't encouraged. If children become tired,
teachers provide blankets on which they can curl up.
"But it's not mandatory," Smith explains. "We
encourage parents to make sure children have
adequate sleep at night."

But most kids don't get enough sleep. Even as Smith's
words moved me from "Huh" to "Hmmmm," I couldn't
help wondering why naps -- which most kids could use
-- were sacrificed.

Instinct just said, "That's wrong."

Clinical psychologist and former pediatric nurse Roxy
Wolfe knows why. Most Americans who care about
kids feel that "if we're going to take children out of the
home at a young age, we want a balance of nurturing
and enrichment," Wolfe says. "Whenever that gets out
of balance, we get worried."

Just thinking about it makes me want to lie down.

• NAPTIME III: from the LA Times:

A Plot to Zap the Nap
March 21, 2004

Good for school administrators near Washington, D.C.
With all other educational challenges now solved,
they're finally cracking down on naps by preschoolers.
You may not realize that, for generations, 4-year-old
laggards have been nodding off after the afternoon
snack when the teacher unfurls the mats, turns down
the lights and maybe plays soft music so little eyes
close and young minds drift away somewhere peaceful
and quiet for half an hour. Squandering time like this is
a scandal on a par with the tooth fairy myth. These
kids just lie there sound asleep like logs, only softer.
What an obvious waste of childhood time rest is!

How are these fresh-faced innocents going to learn to
be driven, to get their personal priorities out of whack,
to drink and eat too much, to get their stress and
cholesterol levels up, to misdirect their impatience and
to miss important family moments because of office
tasks they can't recall a week later? There'll be plenty
of time for naps later in life during unnecessary
meetings and long business flights among sneezing
strangers.

Who gave toddlers the right to loaf like this while
we're out slaving away after an extended lunch that
nobody seemed to notice? Who earns the money to
pay the property taxes to underwrite useless naps?
With all there is to do and learn in life, these wasted
30-minute nap times can add up.

And who isn't tired anyway? Twenty-first century life
is supposed to be exhausting, what with learning how
to program new time-saving things that do the same
old things, only with baffling instructions written by
Japanese engineers who fell asleep in English class. By
allowing snoozes, what are American preschools
teaching these 48-month-old toddlers about the other
888 months in the average American life? That when
grown up they can sleep in on Saturday? Nod off on
the couch during Larry King's weekly interview with
Carol Burnett? If these youngsters get away with naps
in preschool, what will they do someday in an
overheated college lecture hall when a tenured
monotone in a bow tie goes on about the Weimar
Republic?

"Nap time needs to go away," Andre Hornsby, a
Maryland county school chief, told wide-awake state
legislators recently, "We need to get rid of all the baby
stuff they used to do." You'll never guess what this
Prince George's County educator wants: More money
for full-day preschools with no nap time lollygagging.
Everyone who's ever been within whining distance of
tired 4-year-olds knows how cooperative and attentive
they would be by 2 p.m. of a full business day,
especially when told to sit still.

Here's another idea: Give Hornsby and his pals a
timeout in the corner to rethink this idiocy. Childhood
naps are neat. Without them, little people grow up to
become airhead administrators.




ACADEMIC ATROPHY: Study Released Concluding that Liberal Arts Suffering Under No Child Left Behind
MINORITY STUDENTS MOST AFFECTED BY
CURRICULUM CHANGES, STUDY REVEALS

The Council for Basic Education (CBE) has released a
new report that found that subjects such as foreign
languages, history, and the arts are getting less
attention in K-12 classrooms since the passage of the
Elementary and Secondary Education Act, also known
as the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). While eight
subjects should be covered in a liberal arts curriculum
(English, math, science, history, civics, geography,
foreign languages, and the arts), many schools
narrowed their curricula to focus on the subjects tested
under NCLB.

• WASHINGTON – The first significant study of how
the No Child Left Behind Act is influencing
instructional time and professional development in key
subject areas reveals that schools are spending more
time on reading, math, and science ...but squeezing out
social studies, civics, geography, languages, and the
arts.

The report, conducted by the Council for Basic
Education (CBE) and funded by the Carnegie
Corporation of New York, says that the shift away
from these liberal arts subjects is most pronounced in
elementary schools and schools with large minority
populations.

The study, Academic Atrophy: The Condition of the
Liberal Arts in America’s Public Schools, is based on
a survey of more than 1,000 principals in four
representative states (Indiana, Maryland, New Mexico,
and New York) that were chosen for their
socio-economic, political, and geographical diversity.

A SHRINKING CORE CURRICULUM

According to the report, three-quarters of all principals
surveyed say that instructional time for reading,
writing, and mathematics is increasing greatly or
somewhat, while a similar majority also reported
moderate or large increases in time for teachers to
hone their skills and knowledge in these areas. Close
to half of all principals surveyed reported increased
instructional time for science, and even larger numbers
project such increases over the next two years.

However, while these courses are receiving greater
emphasis, the overall curriculum is becoming
narrower, the report reveals. For example, elementary
school principals reported decreases in instructional
time for social studies, civics, and geography. Nearly
three in ten principals (29 percent) overall reported
decreases in time for social studies, compared to 21
percent who reported increases.

One of the areas subject to the largest cutbacks is the
arts. One quarter (25 percent) of all principals reported
decreased instructional time for the arts, with only 8
percent reporting an increase in this area. One third
(33 percent) of all principals anticipate further
decreases in arts instructional time, while just 7
percent anticipate increases.

In Maryland, which mandates elementary- and
middle-school assessment in only mathematics and
reading, evidence of waning commitment to certain
academic disciplines is especially pronounced. Over
half of Maryland elementary school principals reported
decreases in instructional time for social studies; nearly
four in ten (39 percent) of all Maryland principals
foresee reductions in instructional time for the arts,
while only two per cent expect increases.

"The narrowing of the curriculum is worrisome
because students need exposure to history, social
studies, geography, and foreign languages to be fully
prepared for citizenship, work, and learning in a
rapidly changing world," says Raymond "Buzz"
Bartlett, president of the Council for Basic Education.
"Truly high expectations cannot begin and end with
math, science, and reading."

CUTBACKS MOST AFFECT MINORITY STUDENTS

The most troubling evidence of curricular narrowing
occurred in schools with large minority populations,
the very populations whose access to a full liberal arts
curriculum has been historically most limited. Nearly
half (47 percent) of principals at high minority schools
reported decreases in elementary social studies; four in
ten (42 percent) anticipated decreases in instructional
time for the arts; and three in ten (29 percent) of
high-minority school principals foresaw decreases in
instructional time for foreign language.

"These findings raise the specter of a new opportunity
gap between white and minority students," says
Bartlett. "We’re seeing that low-income minority
students are being denied the liberal arts curriculum
that their more privileged counterparts receive as a
matter of course. In our effort to close achievement
gaps in literacy and math, we risk substituting one
form of educational inequity for another, denying our
most vulnerable students the kind of curriculum
available to the wealthy."

"No Child Left Behind may turn out to be a Pyrrhic
victory if we define its vision for achievement too
narrowly and thus institutionalize long-term academic
mediocrity and inequity," says the report’s author
Claus von Zastrow, director of institutional
development at CBE.

PROMISING TRENDS IN MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOLS

On the positive side, CBE’s study did identify
promising trends, particularly in higher grades.
Principals in middle and high schools are allotting
more instructional and teacher professional
development time to social studies, civics, and
geography. Principals interviewed for the study
suggested that events such as September 11th and the
Iraq war had strengthened schools’ commitment to
these subjects.

REPORT URGES TYING LIBERAL ARTS TO SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT STRATEGIES

In the report, CBE urges states to ensure adequate
access to a liberal arts curriculum by integrating all of
the core subjects into state systems of standards and
accountability, maintaining high goals for excellence in
the liberal arts, and working to better prepare teachers
to integrate the liberal arts into reading instruction.

METHODOLOGY

CBE’s study of the liberal arts combined a mail survey
of 956 elementary and secondary principals in four
states with focus groups of principals from across the
country.

The survey sample included a representative selection
of urban, suburban, and rural principals in each target
state. The databases from which the sample was drawn
were supplied by the National Association of
Elementary School Principals, the National
Association of Secondary School Principals, and the
American Federation of School Administrators. The
response rate for the survey was approximately 32
percent. 417 surveys were returned from Illinois, 155
from Maryland, 56 from New Mexico, and 310 from
New York. The remaining 18 surveys included no
information about state of origin and were not
included in the state-by-state analyses.

Founded in 1956, The Council for Basic Education is a
national non-profit organization advocating high
academic standards for all students and working to
strengthen teaching and learning of the liberal arts to
prepare students for lifelong learning and responsible
citizenship. CBE has worked with over 25 states, 28
districts, and 8 countries, as well as the U.S.
Departments of Education and State, the National
Science Foundation, National Endowment for the
Humanities, and the National Endowment for the Arts.


[LINK] Download the Report:



NEGOTIATING THE 'ED-SPEAK' MINEFIELD: SOME TERMS TO KNOW AND IMPORTANT POINTS TO REMEMBER ABOUT STANDARDS

TERMS:

• Content standards: Statements that define
expectations for students in terms of knowledge and
skills. They identify what students are expected to
learn in the various subjects as part of a good
education. Content standards provide details for more
general, abstract educational goals by specifying what
thinking and performing capabilities students should
master and what knowledge they should possess.

• Learning benchmarks: Points of reference used to
gauge the progress of students toward meeting content
standards, usually provided in terms of a grade level.
Learning benchmarks give an idea of what students are
expected to learn by a certain point in their schooling,
without being so specific that they ignore variations in
individual student progress or in the scope and
sequence of curricular offerings.

• Curriculum: The description of how and what
students will actually be taught in the relevant
course(s) to achieve the objectives described in the
content standards. The curriculum normally includes
lesson plans or outlines, primary source materials,
textbooks, videos, lectures, and other sources of
information.

• Performance standards: A description of the kind
of mastery students are supposed to achieve, normally
given in connection with a content standard. Content
standards identify something to be learned;
performance standards identify how well students are
supposed to learn it. Performance standards sometimes
identify more than one level of achievement for a
content standard, and label each level accordingly (for
example, basic, proficient, advanced).

• Opportunity-to-learn standards: Descriptions of
the nature and quality of the educational experiences
and resources that educators should make available to
students. In standards-based reform,
opportunity-to-learn standards measure what the
education system does to enable students to meet the
expectations set by the content and performance
standards.

POINTS TO REMEMBER:

• Shared expectations for learning, through standards,
can make students’ education more coherent by
coordinating teaching, learning, and testing.

• Content standards reflect the public’s view of
society’s purposes for schooling. Therefore, the
standards-setting process should allow for
participation by the public, including parents,
educators, and the business community.

• Content standards should be clear and usable. They
should guide—not constrict —teaching and learning.

• Content standards do not determine the curriculum,
nor do they represent a fixed unit of class time. How
and when a class operates are not as important as
whether students are reaching the standards. What is
important is that all children reach high levels of
learning.

• Not all students will reach benchmarks at the same
time. Some students may need more assistance. While
the old system essentially gave up on underachieving
students by expecting less of them, a standards-based
system establishes high expectations for all students.

• Standards provide many ways for students to show
their abilities. Beyond written exams, students will
build portfolios and undertake projects to show their
progress toward meeting standards.

• It is important to resist the temptation to focus only
on your child’s achievement. Support your child’s
progress, as well as achievement, for progress is the
key to achievement.




HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS + HIGH SCHOOL TECHNOLOGY TEACHERS: You’re young. You’re passionate. You know technology. You can make a difference today!

From now until April 30, 2004, theSpoke.net is
sponsoring You Can Make a Difference, a program for
high school students who have a desire to make an
impact with technology. We’re accepting proposals for
software projects that will benefit a charitable
organization.

All students that submit proposals will receive a copy
of Microsoft Visual Studio .NET Academic Edition
via a Premium Membership on theSpoke.

But that’s not all. We’ll award the top 10 proposals (5
to female entrants, 5 to male entrants) a $5,000 grant
to be divided up as follows:

• $2,500 – Student scholarship
• $1,500 – To be used to implement the
charitable project
• $1,000 – Technology grant to the school the student attends

• smf's SHAMELESS PROMOTION!: If you are looking for a non-profit to work with, the Los Angeles Tenth District PTA Dental and Vision Clinics - serving low income LAUSD students - need help with technology!

e-mail: PTA10thDistrict@aol.com


Interested? [Link} theSpoke.net You Can Make a Difference site



EVENTS: Coming up next week...
Tuesday Mar 30, 2004
____________________________________________________
• Central Region Middle School #7
Phase II Site Selection Update
Local District H
Your participation is important! Please join at this meeting where we will review:
* Criteria used to select potential sites
* Sites suggested by community and by LAUSD, and
* We will present and discuss the most suitable site(s) for this new school project
6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Ascot Avenue Elementary School Auditorium
1447 E. 45th Street
Los Angeles, CA 90011
Community Organizer: Fortunato Tapia

Wednesday Mar 31, 2004
____________________________________________________
• Central Region Elementary School #14
Phase II Site Selection Update
Local District F
Your participation is important! Please join at this meeting where we will review:
* Criteria used to select potential sites
* Sites suggested by community and by LAUSD, and
* We will present and discuss the most suitable site(s) for this new school project
6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Rosemont Avenue Elementary School Auditorium
421 N. Rosemont Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90026
Community Organizer: Lily Quiroa

• South Region High School #2
Phase II Site Selection Update
Local District I
Your participation is important! Please join at this meeting where we will review:
* Criteria used to select potential sites
* Sites suggested by community and by LAUSD, and
* We will present and discuss the most suitable site(s) for this new school project
6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
McKinley Avenue School
7812 McKinley Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90001
Community Organizer: Carlas McCauley

Thursday Apr 01, 2004
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• East Valley Area New High School #1B
Groundbreaking Ceremony
Please join us to celebrate the groundbreaking of a new community school!

Ceremony will begin at 10 a.m.

• East Valley Area New High School #1B
5525 Vineland Avenue
North Hollywood, CA 91601
Community Organizer: Sofia Torres

*Dates and times are subject to change.
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• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 212.241.4700
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213.633.7616

• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR



4LAKids Book Club for February & March – THE IRREDUCIBLE NEEDS OF CHILDREN by T. Berry Brazelton, MD & Stanley I. Greenspan, MD
WHAT EVERY CHILD MUST HAVE TO GROW,
LEARN, AND FLOURISH - Perseius Publishing -225
pages ($14.00) [Amazon has it on sale @ $10.50, but they also have used ones for a low as .99!]

• The last title in the 4LAKids book club “RAISING
AMERICA” was a pretty heavy criticism of the
phemeominon of American Baby Doctors in Print - so here we are with a work by the foremost contemporary ABDIP! I apologize to anyone who looks for an agenda; it’s just that my sick mind works that way! —smf

The Irreducible Needs are:

• The Need for Ongoing Nurturing Relationships.
• The Need for Physical Protection, Safety and
Regulation
• The Need for Experiences Tailored to Individual
Differences
• The Need for Developmentally Appropriate
Experiences
• The Need for Limit setting, Structure and
Expectations
• The Need for Stable, Supportive Communities and Cultural Continuity.


"What do you get when you cross an esteemed child psychiatrist (Greenspan) with a noted pediatrician (Brazelton), both at the apex
of their abilities? A darned important book, that's what." -Library Journal (starred review).

From Publishers Weekly:
Pediatrician Brazelton (Touchpoints) and child
psychiatrist Greenspan (Building Healthy Minds) join together to present a hard-hitting treatise on what children really need from their parents and from society. While the text is densely written, it is engaging. The two childcare experts share the mutually strong conviction that society is not currently meeting the basic needs of children. Each chapter is devoted to
the discussion of an "irreducible" need, such as the Need for Ongoing Nurturing...





What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member. Or your city councilperson, mayor, assemblyperson, state senator, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think.
• Open the dialogue. Write a letter to the editor. Circulate these thoughts. Talk to the principal and teachers at your local school.
• Speak with your friends, neighbors and coworkers. Stay on top of education issues. DON'T TAKE MY WORD FOR IT!
• Get involved at your neighborhood school. Join your PTA. Serve on a School Site Council. Be there for a child.
• Vote.

Contact your school board member