In This Issue:  | | • | SUPREME COURT DENIES BID TO DEPUBLISH RULING ON LAUSD TAKEOVER + ROMERO COMMITTEE HEARING | | | • | Youth Voices: STUDENTS TEACH EDUCATORS ABOUT SCHOOLS + STUDENTS EXAMINE DROPOUT RATES | | | • | LAUSD LOOKING FOR AN A IN ETHICS | | | • | DIABETIC KIDS WIN SCHOOL SETTLEMENT | | | • | HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources | | | • | EVENTS: Coming up next week... | | | • | What can YOU do? | |
Featured Links: | | | | This weekend marks the forty-second anniversary of the outbreak of the Watts Riots.
Two very positive community outcomes emerged like a phoenix from the civil disturbances of 1965 – paradigm shifts/infrastructure investments in a part of the city too long neglected.
These were the building of ALAIN LEROY LOCKE HIGH SCHOOL and MARTIN LUTHER KING JR./DREW MEDICAL CENTER in a part of the city so demographically and politically incorrect we keep changing what we call it: Watts, Willowbrook, South Central, Central LA. Locke High School and King Hospital still stand as Ozymandian monuments to the greater communities' earlier commitment and later cosmic lack thereof. But because the adults in charge failed in their duties to maintain, nurture and run these facilities - to just plain keep the promise - the legacy is of chaos and neglect and failure.
Shakespeare has Cassius say it; Morrow and David Strathairn and ten million thespians on a million stages only repeat the absolute truth about power and accountability: "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, but in ourselves."
Elsewhere the California Supreme Court locks the mayor out of LAUSD, New Yorkers question their mayor's role, some LAUSD students have their say (though the school district is absent and the mayor is tardy); Senator Romero reopens the argument, the budget remains undone, the school district wrestles with ethics on a Talmudic scale, legislators of all stripes vacation – and No Child Left Behind seems to be fodder for the holiday conversation.
Onward! - smf
SUPREME COURT DENIES BID TO DEPUBLISH RULING ON LAUSD TAKEOVER + ROMERO COMMITTEE HEARING
Metropolitan News Enterprise - a Los Angeles daily newspaper featuring articles on law and the courts, government, politics, business and health
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Thursday, August 9, 2007 - A Court of Appeal ruling striking down legislation shifting substantial control of the Los Angeles Unified School district to the city’s mayor as unconstitutional will remain binding precedent, the state Supreme Court decided yesterday.
In a unanimous vote at its weekly conference in San Francisco, the justices denied a request to depublish the April 17 ruling in Mendoza v. State of California, 07 S.O.S. 1900. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and state officials had decided not to seek the high court’s review, but Steve Barr, a former state Democratic Party finance chair and founder of a group of charter schools, petitioned the high court to depublish the opinion.
AB 1381, also known as the Romero Act, cannot be implemented because it would deprive LAUSD voters of their control over the district’s political structure, Justice Walter Croskey wrote for Div. Three in the opinion. The panel upheld a December 2006 ruling by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Dzintra Janavs.
“The citizens of Los Angeles have the constitutional right to decide whether their school board is to be appointed or elected,” Justice H. Walter Croskey wrote.
“If the citizens of Los Angeles choose to amend their charter to allow the Mayor to appoint the members of the Board, such amendment would indisputably be proper,” he explained. “What is not permissible is for the Legislature to ignore that constitutional right and to bypass the will of the citizens of Los Angeles and effectively transfer many of the powers of the Board to the Mayor, based on its belief, hope, or assumption that he could do a better job.”
Attorneys for the state, the city, and a parents group supporting the legislation—which was heavily lobbied by Villaraigosa and his backers and signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger—argued that the bill was valid because it left the elected board intact, albeit with reduced clout.
The legislation would have shifted much of the board’s current authority over the district of more than 700,000 students to the superintendent, would have given the mayor a veto over the board’s appointment of the superintendent, and would have transferred control of certain low-performing schools from the board to an entity headed by the mayor. The bill was proposed after the Legislative Counsel opined that lawmakers could neither grant the mayor power to appoint the board nor transfer the board’s powers to the mayor.
But Croskey said the Legislature was attempting “nothing more than an end-run around the Constitution,” and wrote:
“We conclude that the Romero Act is an unconstitutional attempt to do indirectly what the Legislature is prohibited from doing directly. The Legislature cannot overrule the LAUSD’s voters’ determination that their Board is to be elected rather than appointed, nor may it transfer authority over part of the school system to entities outside of the public school system.”
The public’s control over the district “would be annulled.” Croskey elaborated, “if the Legislature could simply bypass it by taking the powers of the Board away from that entity and giving them to the Mayor, or the Mayor’s appointee.”
In a footnote, the justice suggested that the legislation may also violate a constitutional provision requiring that legislation related to “the incorporation and organization of school districts,” be in the form of a general law, rather than a special law applicable to a single district.
In siding with the district, Croskey distinguished a Court of Appeal decision allowing the state to assume temporary control of the Oakland Unified School District as a condition of loaning the district funds to close a budget deficit.
While “the state may, and in some circumstances must, interfere with a local school board’s management of its schools when an emergency situation threatens the students’ constitutional right to basic equality of educational opportunity,” the jurist wrote, that is not the case here.
Croskey, who noted that Santa Ana and San Bernardino schools, among others, show lower test scores than LAUSD, explained:
“The Romero Act makes no findings of crisis in the LAUSD schools. Indeed, it could not, as LAUSD schools are not the worst in the state by any measure. Instead, the Romero Act purports to justify its interference with the Board’s authority on the basis that the LAUSD ‘has unique challenges and resources that require and deserve special attention to ensure that all pupils are given the opportunity to reach their full potential’....In the absence of any looming constitutional crisis, the ‘unique’ circumstances of the LAUSD do not, alone, constitute a basis for depriving the citizens of Los Angeles of their right to an elected Board running their school district.”
The mayor and the school board have subsequently agreed to form “partnerships” that would permit Villaraigosa a say in the management of some schools, but the parties have not fully agreed on details.
▲ Depublication is the California Supreme Court's discretionary power to order that a Court of Appeal opinion not be published in the Official Reports, thus depriving the opinion of precedential Value. The supreme court derives its authority to depublish from art. 6, § 14 of the California Constitution. (providing for publication of "such opinions of the [s]upreme [c]ourt and courts of appeal as the [s]upreme[c]ourt deems appropriate") and Rule 976(c)(2) of the California Rules of Court (providing that "[a]n opinion certified for publication shall not be published, and an opinion not so certified shall be published, on an order of the [s]upreme [c]ourt to that effect"). - Depublish or Perish: Why depublication is good for the California judicial system by Kent L. Richland
____________________
Save the date:
SENATE SELECT COMMITTEE ON URBAN SCHOOL GOVERNANCE
Gloria Romero, Chair
INFORMATIONAL HEARING
SUBJECT: Lessons From Locke:
What are the Implications for Urban School Governance?
FRIDAY, AUGUST 24, 2007
9:30 a.m. to 12 m.
Watts Labor Action Center
10950 South Central Ave.
Los Angeles
Youth Voices: STUDENTS TEACH EDUCATORS ABOUT SCHOOLS + STUDENTS EXAMINE DROPOUT RATES
► STUDENTS TEACH EDUCATORS ABOUT SCHOOLS: Teens research some of L.A.'s most troubled schools and report to the mayor's team.
By Duke Helfand
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
August 11, 2007 - Educators and politicians who fret about Los Angeles' high school dropout crisis might want to heed the advice of 15-year-old Carla Hernandez: Hire more teachers who care. Slash overcrowded classrooms. Stop sending failing students to the next grade.
Hernandez and nearly two dozen other teenagers spent part of the summer studying several of the city's most troubled high schools with the guidance of a UCLA research program. On Friday, they delivered their findings to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's education advisors at City Hall.
Much of what the students found mirrors data reported by professional researchers -- namely, that half or more students at some schools drop out before graduation.
But Hernandez and her friends were able to articulate the crisis in the most personal terms, explaining, for example, how students lose interest in school because they don't get a chance to learn about their own heritage. Or how even the best students struggle to learn in unruly and overcrowded classrooms. Or how others give up and disappear when they fall behind in credits.
The young researchers painted a grim picture of the downward spiral that often haunts dropouts: They said 80% of California's prison population did not graduate from high school, a statistic that has appeared elsewhere in published reports. "You're all sitting here listening to the research, but if you don't do anything about it, then you're part of the problem," Hernandez, who researched Crenshaw High in South Los Angeles, told Deputy Mayor Ramon Cortines and other members of Villaraigosa's education team, which pledged to incorporate the students' ideas into plans for partnering with schools.
Hernandez and the other students from Los Angeles-area high schools conducted their research through UCLA's Institute for Democracy, Education and Access.
During the five-week program that included classes at UCLA, the teenage investigators conducted surveys and interviewed students, teachers and administrators at several Los Angeles schools, including Locke High near Watts and Wilson High in El Sereno. They also spoke to Los Angeles Unified School District Supt. David L. Brewer and school board President Monica Garcia.
Two of the groups explored Crenshaw High and Roosevelt High in Boyle Heights, two campuses now under consideration by Villaraigosa as he prepares to announce a partnership with the district later this month that will allow him to play a role in running some schools.
They presented their findings Friday in PowerPoint computer presentations and video documentaries.
"It's hard to concentrate at school when you're thinking about the rival gangs surrounding Jordan [High] and Locke," said Earl Moutra, 17.
"It's taking a risk just to walk to school."
Moutra was part of a group that studied Locke High.
The four students on his team spoke about the influence of violence and broken families, called for greater collaboration between teachers and schools and urged instructors to listen more to students.
Notably absent from the City Hall meeting were L.A. Unified leaders, who had been invited.
A spokeswoman for Brewer said the superintendent was attending a meeting in San Diego. A spokesman for Garcia said she had a family commitment that could not be avoided.
Still, at least one school administrator said she welcomed the students' feedback. Roosevelt Principal Sofia Freire cited many of the same concerns raised by the students when ticking off the factors that lead to dropouts.
She said her campus of 5,200 students has been carved into 12 academies of 350 to 400 students so that teachers can get to know their students better.
"I believe that creating small learning communities is a way to personalize education for our students and make sure they don't fall through the cracks," Freire said.
Villaraigosa missed the five presentations, held on the top floor of City Hall. He showed up at the end for about 15 minutes and gave the students a pep talk, reminding them that he had dropped out of Roosevelt but returned, graduated on time and eventually made it to UCLA and law school.
"Who is better to ask about why kids drop out than young people," he said.
Seventeen-year-old Raquel Castellanos, who researched Roosevelt High, said she appreciated Villaraigosa's words but suggested that he spend more time in the schools to fully understand the depth of the crisis.
"He needs to go see for himself . . . from the students' perspective and the teachers' perspective," Castellanos said.
"He needs to get involved."
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►STUDENTS EXAMINE DROPOUT RATES: Teams release findings on why so many of their LAUSD peers quit school
By Rick Orlov, Staff Writer | Daily News/Daily Breeze
August 11, 2007 – Tracking one of the biggest educational issues facing Los Angeles, five teams of high school students Friday released results of their own study into why students drop out.
The findings from surveys of dozens of students, showed common themes ranging from a lack of engaged teachers and student boredom to frustration and outside community pressures.
A high dropout rate - anywhere from 25percent to 50percent, according to various studies - has plagued Los Angeles Unified School District.
At Roosevelt High School, for example, 80 percent of nearly 2,000 ninth-graders surveyed four years ago said they had hopes of going on to college. Four years, later, only 39 of every 100 students graduated. Even fewer were able to qualify for college.
"This is the problem we have been dealing with," Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told the students. "We are trying to get information from the school district on how many students drop out. We don't know if they move out of the city or out of the state, if they are going to another school or if they have just dropped out.
"It's the key to finding out what we need to do to improve our schools."
Villaraigosa has been at odds with the district for nearly two years, prompting him to back a slate of candidates who now make up a majority on the district's school board.
The mayor said he believes the new board is more open to reform measures and looking at different ways to improve the schools.
The students, all 10th- and 11th-graders, presented their findings as part of a summer program through UCLA's Institute for Democracy, Education and Access examining problems at under-performing schools.
Director Jeannie Oakes said the institute wanted to look at what causes youths to drop out because information indicates 50percent of ninth-graders are gone by the time they should be in the 12th grade.
She said only one-fourth of those who graduate from inner-city schools are qualified for college.
Villaraigosa said more needs to be done to not only track dropouts, but persuade them to return to school.
"I know what I'm talking about," Villaraigosa said. "I was a high school dropout … who came back to complete my education. And let me tell you, it opens up a whole new world to you."
The students - who went to inner-city schools in East Los Angeles, Boyle Heights, South Los Angeles and the midcity area - said they found common themes.
All the areas had high poverty rates, high crime rates with extensive gang activity, a disengaged teaching force and a lack of youth community activities.
Some students complained to the teams that teachers did not seem interested in whether they succeeded. One student at Locke High School was quoted as saying all she had to do was show up in class to get a passing grade.
Other complaints were a lack of relevancy to the community with no emphasis on the Latino or African-American experience in the United States.
One bright spot the students found was at the new Miguel Contreras Learning Center, where students were more involved in their classes and teachers developed projects and challenged their students.
Deputy Mayor Ray Cortines, a former teacher and superintendent advising Villaraigosa, said he plans to use the information to help plan changes.
"Part of the problem is there has been no sense of urgency by the public to change the schools," Cortines said. "That's what we are working so hard to achieve."
LAUSD LOOKING FOR AN A IN ETHICS
by Naush Boghossian, Staff Writer, LA Daily News
As L.A. officials and celebrities create a splash of summer scandals, the Los Angeles Unified School District is setting out to teach all of its employees how to distinguish between right and wrong.
And leaders of the behemoth public institution, which is occasionally pelted for lapses in ethical standards, hope a new $25,000 ethics-training video will be one of the keys.
The 30-minute video, created as a mock television show, raises ethical questions that fall into what it dubs "The Gray Zone."
Is it wrong, for example, for a teacher to accept an after-school tutoring gig from a student's parent?
Is it OK for a Los Angeles Unified maintenance worker to use a district truck on weekends?
If a retiring supervisor is asked to join a district vendor's firm, is that a great opportunity or a conflict of interest?
The video is the centerpiece of a one-hour ethics-training class that each of the district's nearly 100,000 employees will be required to complete by the end of June.
"Children learn about ethics from their role models, and those lessons last a lifetime," the district superintendent, David Brewer, said. "We as school officials have a special opportunity to serve as positive character role models."
The training comes at a crucial time: A survey found that LAUSD employees are under greater pressure to violate standards of conduct than is typical nationwide, district ethics officer Yea-Lan Chiang said.
Across the country, 10 percent of employees said they feel such pressure, compared with 27 percent in the LAUSD, she said.
"This is an everyday reality, so how do you support that?" Chiang said.
"This is not just about LAUSD having all these problems. This is about every organization, public and private, all across the country. It's just the reality that ethics challenges happen."
Training officially will launch later this month, inspired by state legislation passed last year requiring public officials to undergo biannual ethics training. While school districts were not affected, LAUSD officials said they felt it was the right thing to do.
"Teachers and staff at LAUSD have as powerful an impact in shaping character as sharpening student minds," Chiang said. "The larger issue is that we have a global ethics issue in the country. ... If we don't shape students positively, it has real direct impacts."
Janis Fries-Martinez, principal of Francis Polytechnic High School in Sun Valley, said the training is important to give administrators, teachers and students the tools to distinguish between right and wrong - or, in most cases, between right and right.
She posed the ethical question of whether it is right for a student to help a suicidal friend if that means missing class? Or right for that student to go to class?
"In every dilemma, there's a right vs. right ... and within the training we need to learn how to deal with them," she said.
"Have we given students and teachers those tools, those protocols, on how to really logically take a look at the pros and cons and make that decision?" she said.
The training ultimately is designed to trickle down and provide students with stronger ethical advice.
Bob Stern, director of the Center for Governmental Studies in Los Angeles, said today's society is more aware of ethical dilemmas.
Decades ago, for instance, reporters often protected politicians, athletes and celebrities. Today - particularly with the growth of the Internet - details of a public persona come under intense scrutiny.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and his girlfriend, Telemundo anchor Mirthala Salinas, have come under fire for ethical conflicts: the mayor for cheating on his wife of 20 years and Salinas for reporting on a public official with whom she has a relationship.
The recent accomplishment of baseball player Barry Bonds, who surpassed Hank Aaron this week to become the all-time leader in home runs, has been overshadowed by controversy surrounding investigations into steroid use.
And City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo recently came under fire after it was discovered that his wife, Michelle, was at the wheel of his city-owned sport utility vehicle when it was damaged three years ago.
"People are certainly more interested in it, media ... paying more attention to it, and the public seems to have an interest now in ethics and doing right," Stern said.
"We're seeing a lot of the stars like Paris Hilton having ethical problems, and certainly top L.A. city officials are having questions raised.
"There seems to be more focus on ethics as opposed to more unethical conduct."
So what do some city leaders say about the importance of ethics?
"Ethics is the foundation for success in a society, in an organization or in an individual's life," Brewer said.
"Ethics are important because we want to teach our kids a standard by which righteous people should live and operate," said teachers union President A.J. Duffy.
Spokespeople for the mayor declined to comment.
But is there a disconnect between what people say about the importance of ethics and the realities of life and daily decisions that are made?
"We all think we're ethical, and sometimes we're surprised when we do things and find out it really isn't ethical," Stern said.
"That's why this (training) creates an awareness and puts ethics on the radar, which is very good.
"We can all use a refresher course."
DIABETIC KIDS WIN SCHOOL SETTLEMENT
New American Media news report by Viji Sundaram
▼ Editor’s Note: There are more than 15,000 school-age children in California with diabetes, but only about 30 percent of California’s schools have a school nurse on campus on any given day. All that’s about to change, reports NAM healthcare editor Viji Sundaram.
smf adds: There is a world of difference between a school nurse and a "trained school staffer"; the decsion as to which must be removed from budgeteers and risk management folks and put into the hands of medical professionals. I recall the first thing our principal at Reed Middle School said each year as the school site council went to work on the budget: "I will not work here unless the nurse is here too!"
Aug 10, 2007 - OAKLAND, Calif. – Life changed dramatically for Los Angeles resident Greta Parker when her six-year-old daughter was diagnosed with diabetes one year ago.
From being a successful insurance agent, Parker became a healthcare-giver for Lilliana, running over to the child’s charter school thrice, sometimes even four times a day, to administer the insulin shots needed to keep Lilliana’s blood sugar level under check.
“I had to quit my job because I was in constant fear of what might happen if her blood sugar went too low,” Parker said. “If that happened, she could go into a coma or have seizures.”
Like most other public schools, her daughter’s school disclaimed any responsibility for testing and treating diabetic students. That responsibility lay solely with the parents.
But that’s about to change. Under a settlement reached this week by the California Department of Education over a lawsuit filed against it by the non-profit, the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF) on behalf of four parents and the American Diabetes Association (ADA), the state’s school children will from now on be entitled to care from a nurse or a trained school staffer.
“This (settlement) makes clear that school districts have an obligation to provide insulin administration and related services to eligible students who are not able to self-administer,” said state Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell, while announcing the landmark settlement at a press conference here Aug. 8.
The CDE, O’Connell said, was “committed” to ensuring that all children with diabetes have access to legally required care during the school day. Parents should not have to leave their workplace and “risk employment in order to care for their child.”
A Fremont mother reportedly lost her job because she had to frequently go to her child’s school to administer insulin shots, said Erika Cronin of San Ramon, one of four parents who sued. A trained nurse, Cronin had to put her career on hold when her daughter, Kendall, was diagnosed with diabetes nearly five years ago.
“There was always this fear that I would get a call from the school,” Cronin noted.
Statistics from the Centers for Disease Control show that 30 percent of children born in 2000 will develop diabetes. The odds of developing it are greater for minorities, according to the ADA.
Although the most common form of diabetes among young children is Type 1, for which a cure has not been found so far, the number of children with Type 2 diabetes has risen in recent years, according to the ADA. Poor nutrition and poor lifestyles are factors contributing to Type 2 diabetes.
People with diabetes have pancreas that can’t make insulin, so they need regular blood sugar testing and daily insulin shots to help their bodies process food.
More than 15,000 school-age children in California have Type 1 diabetes, but there are only 2,800 full-time nurses working in the more than 1,000 school districts in the state, with a total of 6.3 million students. Only about 30 percent of California’s schools have a school nurse on campus on any given day, acknowledged Superintendent O’Connell.
“For many children, this is a 24/7 situation, one where management cannot stop when they leave their homes,” observed Ann Albright, ADA’s health care and education president.
Not having trained personnel to administer insulin to students is a violation of the children’s civil rights laws, said Arlene Myerson DREDF’s directing attorney. In arguing their case, plaintiffs presented diabetes as a disability and invoked three federal laws, including the 1990 Americans with Disabilities Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act.
Advocates for children with diabetes maintain that in some districts, students either were not being provided with treatment at school, were missing out on such educational opportunities as field trips, or that their parents were being required to miss work to administer insulin to their child.
“This agreement will allow children with diabetes to reach their full potential in school,” said Modesto resident Jim Stone, an advocate for children with diabetes, who was at the press conference with his young son, Andrew. Six years ago, Andrew was diagnosed with diabetes when he was entering first grade. Stone was not among the plaintiffs.
Arlene Mayerson, DREDF’s directing attorney, said she hoped the settlement would set the stage for schools to provide students with health conditions such as asthma and epilepsy with similar care.
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
► DEATH OF A NEIGHBORHOOD: HYPERBOLE WITH HYPERLINKS from LA Times Opinion Online - In Echo Park issues over the building of a new elementary school, the NIMBY contingent – of whom Mr. Welsh is an unrepentant advocate here - contested the issue every step of the way and lost. smf notes: I've been accused of overstatement at times – but Times editorial writer Welsh outdoes me here! "LAUSD's $19-billion construction spree" – is as over-the-top a snippet of florid prose as I've seen …but it gets better!
► IG REPORT QUESTIONS NCLB'S UNSAFE SCHOOLS OPTION by Lesli A. Maxwell – Education Week - The inspector general's office in the Department of Education is the latest in a steady line of critics to conclude that a provision of the No Child Left Behind Act meant to identify dangerous schools and allow students to transfer out of them is ineffective and needs an overhaul.
► CIVIL RIGHTS, DISABILITY ORGS. CALL FOR "MULTIPLE MEASURES" IN "NO CHILD" OVERHAUL LEGISLATION - nearly two dozen major civil rights and disability advocacy groups today called on Congress to include "multiple forms of assessment" and "multiple measures or indicators of student progress" in legislation currently being drafted to overhaul the controversial "No Child Left Behind" (NCLB) federal education law.
► GRADING MAYORAL CONTROL Lauded in the press, New York Mayor Bloomberg’s education reforms are proving more spin than substance. Parents are losing patience.
► 43 Days w/o a budget: STALEMATE APPEARS TO HARDEN by Dan Walters - It's been six weeks since the 2007-08 fiscal year began and three weeks since the Assembly passed a state budget. If anything, however, the stalemate in the Senate appears to be hardening and could set a record.
► HIGH SCHOOL READING LISTS GET A MODERN MAKEOVER from The Christian Science Monitor. Precious summer minutes spent poring over Shakespeare or Nathaniel Hawthorne may seem less than appealing to teens, but some experts say there is a slowly growing trend to infuse more modern literature into summer reading.
► DAILY SHUTTLES TO CARRY WESTLAKE KIDS TO CITY POOLS Los Angeles Garment & Citizen - The city will provide a free daily shuttle service between the Miguel Contreras Learning Complex at 3rd and Bixel streets in the Westlake district west of Downtown and municipal swimming pools in the Glassell Park district and Griffith Park to the north. This article contains a number of factual inaccuracies …but the spin from the mayor's office and the activists makes one feel that good things may be happening.
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
***THE LAUSD WEBSITE WAS DOWN AT THIS WRITING ***
....Every day is ditch day - go to the beach!
________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 213-241-5183
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213-893-6800
What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Yolie.Flores.Aguilar@lausd.net • 213-241-6383
Marlene.Canter@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Julie.Korenstein@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385
...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor Schwarzenegger: 213-897-0322 e-mail: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/
• 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.
• Register.
• Vote.
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