In This Issue:  | | • | Two by LA Times Columnist Steve Lopez: STATE ISNÂ’T THE ONLY ONE FAILING OUR KIDS + PUT THE SQUEEZE ON LEMON TEACHERS | | | • | LA Daily News: CHARTERS TAKE ON LAUSD – Seven schools fighting district plans to withhold $3 million in state money | | | • | LA Times Editorial: DUBIOUS ‘STINGSÂ’ AT SCHOOLS | | | • | EVENTS: Coming up next week... | | | • | 4LAKids Book Club for August & September—THE HUMAN SIDE OF SCHOOL CHANGE: Reform, Resistance and the Real-Life Problems of Innovation—by Robert Evans | | | • | What can YOU do? | |
Featured Links: | | | | The test scores are out and thatÂ’s about all IÂ’m going to
say about that. Of late LAUSD has been living and dying
by test score results; loudly trumpeting success and
quietly downplaying and lack thereof. Cue the downplayers.
As if the STAR — CAT6, SAT9, CAHSEE, CAPA, CST and SABE/2 are the real way we know how well we are doing — or not doing — at preparing our young people for their own futures. As if.
HereÂ’s some YES or NO questions for a real world test:
Q: Can our fourth graders/middle schoolers/high school
seniors read?
Q: Do they read?
Q: Can our high school graduates balance a checkbook?
Q: Get into college or a job training program?
Q: Fill out a job application?
Q: Register to vote?
Q: Write a report?
Q: Do they even make it to graduation?
A: Half of LAUSD eighth graders donÂ’t!
In his two columns below LA Times columnist Steve Lopez makes excellent if unpopular points. About test scores, bad teachers, the so-called Williams “settlement” and how we should be measuring success. Along with accountability comes responsibility. Lopez isn’t just hammering LAUSD and teachers and administrators — the state, the feds and parents bear responsibility also.
And in the Daily News article on Charter Schools you can
see just how LAUSD rewards success!
Q: At WednesdayÂ’s Bond Oversight Committee meeting,
I asked the Assistant Superintendent in charge of
LAUSD’s Full Day Kindergarten Program: “How much
money is in this yearÂ’s District Operating Budget to
support this FDK roll-out?”
A: In case you missed it, his answer was nothing. Zero
dollars. One Hundred-seventy-one schools are going from
half-day to full-day K this year....and LAUSD is paying nothing additional! That means the first-through-fifth graders are paying for the program!
There was a bit of good news in the Times editorial
{“Dubious ‘Stings’”) about LAUSD working to end the
LAPD on-campus drug buy program.
And (...never start a sentence with ‘and’!) I was going to
add a piece to this weekÂ’s 4LAKids about summer
reading programs for children lucky enough to be on
vacation ....but instead I have an assignment:
Call your local school. Ask the principal (they're back from vacation!) this:
Q: Has the $50 per child the budget office removed from
each schoolÂ’s budget at the beginning of the budget
process earlier this year – money the Board of Ed voted
in June to be given back – has it been returned to the
school yet?
YouÂ’re not accusing anybody of anything ...youÂ’re just
curious!
Two by LA Times Columnist Steve Lopez: STATE ISNÂ’T THE ONLY ONE FAILING OUR KIDS + PUT THE SQUEEZE ON LEMON TEACHERS
• STATE ISN’T THE ONLY ONE FAILING OUR KIDS by Steve Lopez
August 18, 2004 - So who gets detention now?
Teachers, principals, governors, legislators, parents,
students?
The report card for California schools is out, and lots of
people should be going to bed without dessert or TV. The
progress of the last few years has leveled off in math and
English, according to an analysis by my colleagues Duke
Helfand and Doug Smith.
Only 30% of third-graders were proficient in English, a
three-point drop from last year. In math, a one-point
increase means that a mere 35% of sixth-graders are up to
snuff.
"These scores should be viewed as a wake-up call for us
all," said state schools superintendent Jack O'Connell.
Wake up and do what?
It's not as if grand ideas are flying out of Gov.
Schwarzenegger's office. Last time Education Secretary
Dick Riordan opened his mouth, he not only made a fool
of himself in front of children, he reminded us he hasn't
done anything.
Schwarzenegger used the state report card to tout a
recent settlement with the American Civil Liberties
Union, which had claimed that poor students are denied
adequate schools, teachers and resources.
But the $1-billion deal is a mere shifting of existing funds,
it sets up a new layer of bureaucracy, and it's a relative
pittance. The $139 million earmarked for textbooks, for
example, won't go far.
Meanwhile, state tax breaks have been cut off for teachers
who reach into their own pockets for classroom supplies,
and teacher training is another budget-war casualty.
Throw in the damage done by an old-school teachers
union that resists reform and protects its tired old dogs,
and we do not have a recipe for educational success here
in the Golden State.
But having said that, you can't put all the blame for lousy
test scores on politicians, educators or the fact that
California's spending per pupil is nowhere near the top of
the national rankings. You might even argue that given
the challenges in California, the test scores aren't all that
lousy.
About one-fourth of the state's 6 million public school
students are still learning English, and nearly one-half
qualify for free or reduced-price meals. You're never
going to ace the standardized tests when 3 million
students are from low-income families and 1.5 million of
them are struggling with the language.
As for the latter group, somebody has to say this, so here
goes:
By all means, hold onto the culture you grew up with. We
all benefit from the diversity of people and ideas in
California, and I'm hoping my daughter, who hasn't yet
uttered her first words, will speak Spanish as well as she
speaks English.
But parents who don't learn to speak English and pass it
on to the kids, along with their native language, are
putting themselves, their children, and everyone else's, at
a disadvantage.
When I got to know the workings of a successful charter
school in South Los Angeles, I found that one of the keys
— along with nonunion teachers who put in longer days
and made routine home visits — was mandatory parent
involvement.
How are you supposed to check your child's homework if
you don't know how to read it? How are you supposed to
talk to the teacher? Less than one-third of the state's
11th-graders are proficient in English. What job prospects
are they looking at?
Yeah, we all know the schools have plenty of room for
improvement. But they only have the kids six hours a day,
and they can use some help.
• PUT THE SQUEEZE ON LEMON TEACHERS by Steve Lopez
August 22, 2004 - I wasn't even trying to get under their
skin. But not since Sister Roberta smacked me in the head
with a sixth-grade spelling workbook have I so enraged
the teaching profession.
This would be understandable if I had beaten up on
teachers. But I barely mentioned them last week in a
column about the stalled progress on math and English
test scores for California's public school children.
Sure, I said that teachers unions resist reforms and
protect tired old dogs, but for the most part I defended
teachers. I said we can't expect schools to excel with
limited resources, lazy parents and huge numbers of poor
students, many of whom don't speak English.
"So it's the old-school teachers union and union teachers
who are the problem? I beg to differ, Mr. Lopez," wrote
teacher Maureen Sloan.
I'm afraid I have to give Ms. Sloan a D-minus for reading
comprehension.
"I am one of those old dogs you mentioned," wrote
teacher Barbara Morgan, "but I am not tired."
As a graybeard myself, I can identify with that.
"I'm taking back my vote for you for governor," wrote
teacher Mary Langley, who said she works from 7 a.m. to
4 p.m. at her school and does two more hours of
homework. "Would you like a little blood too?"
Since there seems to be so much confusion and thin skin
out there, allow me to clarify.
Yes, I'm aware the vast majority of teachers are
hardworking souls dedicated to improving the lives of
children, and some of them are practically miracle
workers.
Yes, I know some principals and administrators are
dopes.
Yes, I'm aware there can be too much emphasis on
testing, sometimes at the cost of true learning.
No, I am not anti-union. As a union member for most of
my career, I know the many advantages, but that doesn't
mean I'm blind to the problems.
Everyone knows that at virtually every school, there's a
teacher or two, or three, or four, who aren't pulling their
weight. Why are they never given up by other teachers,
and why are they never run out of the building?
"It costs about $200,000 to take a person through the
process of kicking them out," says Roy Romer, chief of
the Los Angeles Unified School District. "A lot of
administrators are hesitant to start the process because
they know how laborious it can be."
Tim Buresh, chief operating officer for the district, said
two teachers were fired last year, and that roughly a
dozen more are collecting full pay while sitting at home as
their cases are reviewed.
"We've had a lot more teachers arrested than fired,"
Buresh told me, saying that drug and sex crimes are the
most common offenses. "It's not only easier but it's faster
to get criminal convictions than to get through the
termination process."
I don't mean to pick on L.A. teachers in particular, but
roughly 7% of the district's teachers call in sick every day.
That's a much higher rate than the national average, and
last year, the district spent $172 million on substitutes.
It also spent $2 million on bonuses and retirement
account incentives to lure teachers into the classroom
more often. Asked about those incentives earlier this year,
an executive with United Teachers Los Angeles called the
$2 million peanuts.
OK, wait a minute here.
The district is paying $2 million, on top of salaries, just to
get teachers to show up.
And that's peanuts?
Would a ruler across the knuckles be more effective?
L.A. school board member Mike Lansing had another
bone or two to pick with the union. He said he was made
to feel "like the antichrist" for suggesting that teachers at
some schools ought to be working 180 days a year
instead of 163.
"The standard for most countries is 200 to 220, with 180
minimum," Lansing said.
His other problem is teachers' resistance to performance
reviews. They simply do not want anyone peering into the
classroom telling them how to do their jobs, nor do they
want to have their abilities judged on the basis of student
test scores.
OK, before I close, and before hundreds more teachers
race to their computers to send me poison darts, allow me
to repeat:
We know that most of you are unsung and
underappreciated, if not underpaid. We know you do
great work under ever more difficult circumstances that
include unruly kids, uncooperative parents, and the
aforementioned dopey principals and administrators.
Thank you.
"I know for a fact that I have thousands of very good
teachers," said Buresh. "But their reputations are being
tarnished by the lemons we can't get out of the profession.
That's not fair to the good teachers, and it's certainly not
fair to the children."
LA Daily News: CHARTERS TAKE ON LAUSD – Seven schools fighting district plans to withhold $3 million in state money
• smf notes: The recent spate of news stories about
charter schools being shut down by the state illustrates
the wholly unnecessary conflict between charter schools
and LAUSD. The schools being shut down existed
through a loophole in state law that previously permitted
any school district to charter schools anywhere in the
state. There were some abuses by charter operators and
there was lack of oversight and accountability by small
remote districts — these abuses were not universal. Now
the State has ruled that charters can only be granted by
local districts – and has revoked the charters of schools
chartered by remote districts. The result has been that
many charter schools been forced to fold.
One of the reasons charter operators turned to remote
districts in the first place was a lack of “charter-
friendliness” on the part of LAUSD. It may or may not be
fair to characterize LAUSDÂ’s board, superintendent and
downtown staff as being opposed to charters ...but that
has certainly been the perception of many observers.
The following, essentially a food-fight over money – has
been developing over quite a while. IÂ’d like to pretend
that IÂ’m a neutral observer here, but I have seen Principal
Yvonne Chan and her Vaughn Charter in Pacoima at
work. Ms. Chan is without a doubt the most dynamic
school principal I have ever seen – she is a powerhouse!
The program she has led at Vaughn has turned an
underpeforming school in a challenged neighborhood into
something truly wonderful! And the DistrictÂ’s reaction
proves the old saw: “No good deed goes unpunished!”
—smf
• By Jennifer Radcliffe - Staff Writer
Saturday, August 21, 2004 - Seven charter schools have
joined together to battle the Los Angeles Unified School
District, which they say is overcharging them for services
and plans to withhold $3 million in state money they need
to educate poor students.
The newly formed Coalition of High-Achieving Los
Angeles Charter Schools, which includes five campuses in
the San Fernando Valley, claim they pay nearly $4 million
annually for special education programs, facility
maintenance and administrative oversight but aren't
receiving that level of services in return.
The group also wants to stop the district from carrying
out plans to withhold a total of $3 million in state funding
this year -- money each school received in 2003 -- to help
educate minority and disadvantaged students.
"We're going to go to the regular courts and the court of
public opinion on this. We're not going to let them take
money from our children," said Joe Lucente, executive
director of the 10-year-old Fenton Avenue Charter
School in Lake View Terrace.
"We will do anything and everything in our power to
make sure our kids get every cent they deserve."
District officials point out that state law allows them to
charge charter campuses for special education programs,
and say LAUSD actually loses money by providing
services to the independent campuses.
However, district officials could not immediately provide
a detailed accounting of how they spend the $4 million
the charters pay annually for special education,
administrative oversight and deferred maintenance
programs.
Coalition leaders said they have been waiting a year for an
itemized list of what the district spends on its members:
Fenton; Pacoima Elementary, Montague Academy and
Vaughn Next Century Learning Center in Pacoima;
Granada Hills High; Santa Monica Boulevard Elementary
in Los Angeles; and Palisades Charter High in the Pacific
Palisades.
The coalition also is demanding that LAUSD allow the
campuses to continue receiving state money to help
educate poor and minority students. The schools received
the so-called integration funds in 2003, but the financially
strapped district plans to keep the money this year.
Tim Buresh, LAUSD's chief operating officer, said the
charters operate independently from the district and so
shouldn't expect any of the integration money it receives
from the state on a per-pupil basis.
"Let's just say there's some holes in the logic here,"
Buresh said. "We've only got so much to share here, and
this is part of the compromise of being a charter."
Coalition members say they educate some of Los Angeles
Unified's poorest and most diverse student populations
and that they deserve a cut of the funds.
"It's not even a money issue, it's a civil rights issue. For
my school, it's a social justice issue," said Principal
Yvonne Chan, whose Vaughn Next Century Learning
Center stands to lose $480,000 in desegregation money.
There has been a long history of tension between LAUSD
and schools that have converted from traditional to
charter campuses. Charters are free from most district
rules and requirements, but pay fees for overhead,
administration and other costs.
Fenton Avenue, for example, pays the district $189,274
for oversight and $196,212 for special education
programs. If also stands to lose $367,775 this year in
integration funding -- money that Lucente had counted on
to expand state-of-the-art virtual classroom systems to
the kindergarten and first grades.
"Because of all the money LAUSD is withholding and
threatening to take from us, I can't justify doing that," he
said. "I think the underlying premise here is that we
always put the child first and the district is always getting
hung up on adult issues."
While charters must serve all students without tuition,
they are free to extend their calendars, lower their
student-teacher ratios and pay their teachers more -- as
long as they stay within budget.
Many charters have won grants, taken out loans and
found other ways to save so they can buy more land,
improve their buildings and expand their technology.
Charter leaders say their autonomy has allowed them to
adopt innovative teaching techniques that deliver higher
academic performance.
"Los Angeles Unified is punishing success and that hurts
low-income kids," said Gary Larson, spokesman for the
California Charter Schools Association. "They pocket the
money and they do nothing in return."
Test scores released last week for the 2003-04 school
year showed that fourth-graders at 20 elementary charter
schools outperformed their counterparts at traditional
LAUSD campuses.
For example, about 42 percent of charter school
fourth-graders and 27 percent of those in traditional
schools scored proficient or above on the reading portion
of the California Standards Test. The state average was
40 percent.
District leaders say they're trying to work out the kinks of
the relatively new educational reform movement.
Board member Julie Korenstein, who has been critical of
charter schools in the past, said charter leaders need to
bring their concerns to the board -- which is exactly what
the coalition plans to do.
But board member David Tokofsky said the charters also
need to understand they have a place in the system despite
their autonomy.
"The district bureaucracy needs to explain and teach the
conversion charters that they are not an island unto
themselves," Tokofsky said. "The district has to teach
them that they just can't take things that are cheaper and
leave the district with the things that are more expensive."
But charter founders say the problem -- and any solution
-- is more complicated.
"It's a power struggle," Chan said. "Either we march
together or ... play this card game where we try to trump
each other. I don't have the energy to do that, nor do I
want to spend energy that way."
LA Times Editorial: DUBIOUS ‘STINGS’ AT SCHOOLS
• After 30 years, undercover drug cops may have outlived
their usefulness on Los Angeles campuses.
August 20, 2004 - Student 0350405 seems precisely the
kind of student the Los Angeles Police Department was
trying to protect when it launched its undercover "School
Buy" program 30 years ago to rid Los Angeles Unified
School District campuses of drugs. She has good grades
and an unblemished disciplinary record and is a star on
her school's softball team and a role model in her
neighborhood. Or at least she was, until she was arrested
last spring for selling marijuana to an LAPD officer
posing as a student. Now she's been ordered to spend her
senior year in an off-campus program for gangbangers,
truants, kids on probation and other troublemakers.
The girl, assigned a number to protect her identity in
disciplinary hearings, was one of 252 students arrested
last school year by LAPD officers and expelled by district
officials. In 30 years, School Buy busts have snared more
than 8,000 teenagers and confiscated what police
calculate is more than $7 million worth of narcotics.
But school officials have begun to question whether the
disruption to student lives is too high a price, particularly
in the absence of proof that the program cuts the flow of
drugs.
The way School Buy is supposed to work is simple.
Young officers are given a month of training and a cover
story, then enrolled in schools to befriend kids and ferret
out drug dealers. At the end of every semester, police
sweep through campuses arresting students. The haul,
mostly baggies of marijuana, is displayed on television.
The way it works in real life is not so tidy. Students say
officers badger classmates who are not drug dealers but
who agree to find drugs for them as a favor. Concerns
about entrapment keep many cases from being
prosecuted. And because drug dealers tend to be wary of
new customers, those arrested are increasingly kids with
disabilities or emotional problems.
"Instead of the guy slinging dope on campus, you wind up
with a random collection of whichever kids might be
naive, stupid, persuadable or gullible enough to find a
joint for a stranger," said Kevin Reed, the school district's
legal counsel. He has launched a review of the program
— the district's first.
Student surveys suggest that the availability of drugs in
city schools is unchanged over the last decade — slightly
more than one-third of students say they are offered, sold
or given drugs on campus each year. School Buy
commander Capt. Sharyn Buck says the deterrent value
of annual busts kept those numbers from rising.
"Knowing there could be a narc on campus has stopped
the blatant drug dealing we used to see."
Los Angeles is the only big-city district in the nation that
allows this kind of undercover operations. School Buy
was the brainchild of then-LAPD Chief Daryl Gates and,
with the Drug Abuse Resistance Education program, the
linchpin of LAPD efforts to keep kids off drugs. But most
DARE officers have since been pulled from schools and
dispatched to the streets, their program having been
found to have little long-term effect.
Barring dramatic findings of positive results in the school
study, it may also be time for School Buy officers to pack
their backpacks.
When the program began in 1974, the district had no
police force of its own. Today, Los Angeles Unified has
350 police officers. Every middle and high school has at
least one; they're the ones who ought to work with
students and staff members to cut the flow of drugs.
Thirty years ago, school officials could consider
individual circumstances when punishing kids caught in
campus stings. The nation's take-no-prisoners war on
drugs ended that discretion. In 1996, state law required
that any student selling drugs on campus be expelled. A
1998 federal law makes those students ineligible for two
years for loans or grants to help them pay for college.
Limiting educational options for teens already flirting with
failure won't help keep them on the straight and narrow.
Keeping drugs off campus is not just a worthwhile goal,
it's an obligation. It is also impossible for the Los Angeles
Police Department to accomplish.
If the softball players and advanced placement students
and student council leaders are using drugs — or at least
know right off where they can be found — it will take
more than annual roundups to turn things around. School
police and administrators accustomed to letting the LAPD
bear all the weight should take back their responsibility.
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
Thursday Aug 26, 2004
• Manual Arts New Elementary School #1 (Science Center School)
Please join us to celebrate the ribbon-cutting of your new community school!
smf note: This project, an adaptive re-use of the old Armory in Exposition Park – adjacent to the Coliseum and Museums – is one of the most innovative, promising and interesting projects in LAUSD's building portfolio!
Ceremony will begin at 10 a.m.
Manual Arts New Elementary School #1
700 State Drive in Exposition Park
Los Angeles, CA 90037
• Central Region Elementary School #14
Phase II Presentation of Recommended Preferred Site
Local District 4
At this meeting we will present and discuss the site that will be recommended to the LAUSD Board of education for this new school project.
6:00 to 7:30 p.m.
Rosemont Avenue Elementary School
Auditorium
421 N. Rosemont Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90026
• Valley Region Maclay Elementary School Addition
Community Meeting Local District 2
Please join us at this meeting where we will present and discuss the proposed expansion and reconfiguration of the New Maclay Primary Center into a K-5 elementary school.
6:30 to 8:00 p.m.
Maclay Middle School Auditorium
12540 Pierce Street
Pacoima CA 91331
____________________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
Meets on the third Wednesday of the month @ 10AM in the LAUSD Boardroom, 222 Beaudry Ave, Los Angeles
Meetings are broadcast at 9AM on KLCS, Channel 58 on the Sunday following the meeting. http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 212.241.4700
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213.633.7616
4LAKids Book Club for August & September—THE HUMAN SIDE OF SCHOOL CHANGE: Reform, Resistance and the Real-Life Problems of Innovation—by Robert Evans
Publisher: Jossey-Bass Paperback: 336 pages ISBN: 0787956112
This book was pressed into my hands by a senior
educator, high in the DistrictÂ’s hierarchy.
We were wary of each other. She undoubtedly viewed me
as a wild eyed parent activist — intent on upsetting the
apple cart. I am a proponent of the bottom-up reforms
espoused by William Ouchi in “Making Schools Work”; a
would-be empowerer of parents and school site
administrators.
I viewed her as the protector of the status-quo of slow,
steady improvement as measured by test scores — and
the great top-down centrally-driven bureaucracy that is
LAUSD.
WeÂ’d both be right. I have no respect whatsoever for
apple carts; I come from the film industry and apple carts
are always the first to be smashed in the big chase scene!
I press Bill OuchiÂ’s book into as many hands as I can. She
and I discussed at length the LEARN reforms at LAUSD,
a too-brief wrinkle-in-time where principals and parents
were empowered ...until the interest waned and the
political will and money ran out. Until other agendas
took hold. Time passed LEARN by before it had a chance
to work or fail.
I expected EvansÂ’ book to be an apologia for things as
they are, instead I found a truly enlightening vision of
where we are in public education and just how difficult
the very necessary change will be. I returned the borowed
copy with many thanks and bought my own.
Evans is a psychologist - and his analysis is of the
teaching profession and the business of public education.
Imagine youÂ’re a teacher. Imagine you are faced with the
challenges of the classroom, the politics of the schoolsite
and the dynamics of the administration, children, parents
and school district. Now mix in the politicians – right, left
and center – and activists, bureaucrats and theorists. All
call for every flavor of reform imaginable ...and embrace a
new one with every lunar cycle! Even if youÂ’re a good
teacher every successful practice you have and every
decision you make is second-guessed and compared to a
rubric that measures success – or lack thereof – in a new
way every day. And all the while your friends from
college are making three times more money than you!
Evans analyzes management styles and models of reform
and suggests strategies for building a framework of
cooperation between leaders of change and the people
they depend upon to implement it. He is no fan of
top-down central-control — but he truly abhors
‘change-of-the-month-club’ reform! Evans does not tell
us to be slow in school reform, only to be thoughtful,
thorough and respectful of the true instruments of change:
Those in the classroom working with young minds.
Two thumbs-up, one for Ouchi and another for Evans!
—smf
• Dr. Robert Evans is a clinical and organizational
psychologist and director of the Human Relations Service
in Wellesley, Mass. A former high school and preschool
teacher, he has consulted to hundreds of schools and
districts throughout America and around the world and
has worked extensively with teachers, administrators,
school boards, and state education officials.
• Editorial Reviews:
"A unique, superb, and penetrating analysis of the human
side of educational change. Evans knows the human
realities of change and portrays them vividly in both
individual and organizational terms. His discussion of
hope and realism in the final chapter is a gem." —Michael
Fullan, dean, Faculty of Education, University of Toronto
"Evans certainly understands what gets in the way of real
school change and what the simple, key elements are that
can make it happen. No board member, superintendent, or
school principal should make one more decision or host
one more meeting without reading this book." —Judy
Cunningham, principal, South Lake Middle School,
Irvine, Calif.
"Evans has written a realistic yet hopeful book that sets a
new standard for providing the leadership needed to
implement school improvements. An engaging and
much-needed update of the critical, but often overlooked,
human side of change." —Thomas J. Sergiovanni, Lillian
Radford Professor of Education and senior fellow, Center
for Educational Leadership, Trinity University
"School leaders will find this book realistic about the
difficulties of change, rich in practical advice about school
improvement, and useful in showing how to transcend the
limits of their own experience to practice effective
leadership." —Thomas W. Payzant, superintendent,
Boston Public Schools
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.
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