In This Issue:  | | • | Crescendo/Celerity Charters: LAUSD SHUTS DOWN CHARTERS IN CHEATING SCANDAL + LA BOARD VOTES TO CLOSE 2 SO.BAY CHARTERS + LAUSD TO CLOSE 6 CHARTERS | | | • | STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION GETS TOUGH WITH FEDERAL SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT GRANTS: Continued funds contingent on progress | | | • | Parent Trigger: INFORMATION LEFT OUT OF CHARTER SCHOOL DEBATES + NEW RULES FOR WEAK SCHOOLS + REGULATIONS APPROVED FOR SCHOOLS' 'PARENT TRIGGER' LAW | | | • | HISTORY TEXTBOOKS: NO SLANT REQUIRED-Whether in Texas or California, politicians & interest groups have no rightful place in the writing of textbooks | | | • | 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 is the weekend of the dubitable Carmageddon. And the Harry Potter end times. The Sigalert from Hell and/or a zillion dollars in box office receipts. Coincidence? I think not!
By the time this issue of 4LAKids reaches you the 405 shutdown debacle will be nearly history – and L.A. will have either descended into gridlocked+loaded chaos – or we will be copping the 'Is that all there is?' Y2K/H1N1/5-21 Rapture attitude. As of Sunday morning it looks a lot like the latter ...but being prepared is a good thing – ask any boy scout. Preparedness is hard thing to appreciate in a school district where planning – short-term, long-term or contingency – is nearly impossible.
Three weeks ago in San Diego the freeway warning signs 120 miles and 21 days south warned of the impending 405 Sepulveda Pass closure. Last week the second-most-visited-page on the New York Times website was about the 405 closure. The 2nd most visited site on the LA Times site was how to determine the size of the male reproductive member by comparing index and ring fingers [http://lat.ms/pfOLcF]. (She who directs the LAUSD sex ed effort insists students call the naughty bits by their proper names – but she only deals with middle schoolers – not the LAUSD e-mail firewall!)
But enough about the 405 and sex – let's cut straight to charter schools and the board of ed!
ON TUESDAY THE LAUSD BOARD OF ED WAS JUST AS CONFUSED AS THE REST OF US about what the state budget and AB 114 mean ...but not so confused that they couldn't routinely ignore public comment and concern over issues such as community input in Public School Choice, the gift of Clay Middle School to Green Dot and the dismissal of the Obama Prep principal.
One public commenter eloquently asked the board: "Are you even listening?" Three minutes and 'Thank you, your time is up' is NOT community engagement! Stakeholder Input and Public Comment are to Transparency and Accountability as Parent Involvement is to LAUSD.
Superintendent Deasy promised the Obama Prep folks that local district supe would discuss the removal with the school community when he could (making clear there are some things that cannot be discussed) ...and making Obama Prep even more like HS#9 last year!
However, a comment from Celerity Education CEO Vielka McFarlane got the superintendent's notice and he immediately-and-unexpectedly reversed his off-and-on recommendation for renewal of the Crescendo charters to off again. (Celerity was to be assuming operation of Crescendo Charter Schools after the revelation of Crescendo’s cheating on state tests). The board voted the charters for two Crescendo schools not be renewed and another four will be disapproved next month because Celerity hired one of Crescendo's principals implicated in the scandal. (see: LAUSD UNEXPECTEDLY MOVES TO SHUT DOWN CHARTERS IMPLICATED IN CHEATING. )
FIRST: I'm not sure how Crescendo gets to assign the operation of its schools to another operator. This sub-contract of operation reminds me of the excesses of deregulation in the arbitrage, mergers and acquisitions of banking/energy trading and junk bonds of of the 80's + 90's. Are public school charters another marketable commodity like bundled mortgages and commercial paper?
SECOND: Celerity. Webster says it means rapidity of motion or action. But not so fast: That name should ring a bell – it's the charter operator the Parent Revolutionary trigger-pullers chose in the attempted stealth takeover of McKinley Elementary School in Compton last year. Until the Compton Board of Ed, the State Board of Ed and the courts intervened. (Parent Revolution likes to claim it was just the Compton School Board being self-serving – but in reality it was the courts and the State Board that tossed the sorry effort out!) Celerity currently operates four charter schools in LAUSD – and it looks like they won't be running the six former Crescendo schools.
Our Standardized Test Cheating Scandal here in Los Angeles isn't as big as the ones in Atlanta and D.C. and elsewhere – but the woven web is no less tangled!
THE STATE BOARD OF ED MET WEDNESDAY AND SEEMED TO HAVE CONCLUDED THEIR INPUT ON THE PARENT TRIGGER REGULATIONS [see: Parent Trigger: NEW RULES FOR WEAK SCHOOLS ] – but beneath the consensus of unanimity simmers some very basic disagreements that will need to be straightened out in the public comment period – or settled by the legislature or in the courts. Be prepared to make your comments – and say tuned.
Underlying all of this is the constant reinterpretation/revision/leveraging of the restructuring and reconstitution provisions of the expired and unlamented federal No Child Left Behind Act, the California Charter Schools Act of 1992 (SB 1442 - Hart) [http://bit.ly/pEyjxz] and Section 6 of Prop 39 [http://bit.ly/p9VzZg]
seemingly amended now by the poorly-crafted Parent Trigger Law and the artful regulations proposed.
...as well as by homegrown modifications and hybrids
• Things like Pilot Schools (a collective bargaining agreement)
• The Mayor's Partnership - (a memorandum of understanding (MOU)
• and the LAUSD Public Schools Choice Resolution – which literally allocates billions of dollars of public property according to rules (That's what school boards do, they make rules!) made up as they go along.
• And sometimes: NOT according to the rules!
MOU’s are not contracts and Resolutions are not law – they are agreements in principle and do not have the force of the Ed Code [http://1.usa.gov/qh6Jcu]- or Title 5 (Education) of the California Code of Regulations [http://bit.ly/otter]. Neither are state constitutional amendments, which Prop 39 is.
• Can a charter be formed without teacher input? • If a charter school has a mandated attendance area is it a independent or dependent charter school? • Is it a charter school at all? • Is a charter school with declining enrollment subject to Prop 39 co-location? • The Mayor's Partnership, in a recent press release, claims it is: "The largest non-district school operator in Los Angeles" [http://bit.ly/n1odFM] – is it 'a non-district operator'? • Do the A-G LAUSD graduation requirements apply to charters? Pilots? Partnership Schools? I-Design schools? • What is an I-Design school? • Are we creating hybrid schools ...or are we morphing into a hybrid school district?
There are no right or wrong answers to these questions – but there need to be answers when the questions get asked.
NO SHOT? NO SCHOOL! IF YOU ARE THE PARENT OF A SEVENTH-THROUGH TWELFTH GRADER – or if YOU are a 7th-12th grader: Students MUST get the Tdap/Whooping Cough booster shot BEFORE they return to school at the end the summer – IT'S THE LAW! This is true if the student attends a public school, a charter school or a private school. You can wait and see if the governor signs the bill the legislature passed on Thursday granting a 30 day extension (why didn't they do that with the tax extension?) ...or you can just get the shot. Past illness with pertussis/whooping cough is NOT an exemption to the law. Go to your doctor. Ask at your pharmacy. CVS, Rite-Aid and Walgreens offer vaccinations. Be sure to get proof of vaccination. Contact the County Health Department: for free or low-cost immunizations dial 2-1-1 or call 1-800-427-8700, or see http://bit.ly/TdapClinics. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services offers a public clinic locator by zipcode at http://findahealthcenter.hrsa.gov/
IN SACRAMENTO various boards of regents again increased tuition at UCs and CSUs – the California Dream of Accessible-if-not-Free Public Education For All is growing far more distant; not a promise but a past-tense-memory. We will not raise taxes but we will raise tuition. The accomplishments of GLBT men and women will be taught in schools and right wing is horrified at the sign of another apocalypse. So it is with the Dream Act – which would provide scholarships to proven scholars; 'How can we educate those we cannot employ?' they ask. To which we reply that we must solve one problem at a time.
These are the times that try our patience; the summer soldiers and sunshine patriots go to the beach – avoiding the 405. Wear sunblock.
¡Onward/Adelante! - smf
Crescendo/Celerity Charters: LAUSD SHUTS DOWN CHARTERS IN CHEATING SCANDAL + LA BOARD VOTES TO CLOSE 2 SO.BAY CHARTERS + LAUSD TO CLOSE 6 CHARTERS
L.A. OFFICIALS UNEXPECTEDLY MOVE TO SHUT DOWN CHARTERS IMPLICATED IN CHEATING
by Howard Blume – LA Times | http://lat.ms/qzvHoQ
July 12, 2011 | 6:52 pm - In an unexpected action, Los Angeles school officials Tuesday voted against renewing the operating agreements of two charter schools involved in a cheating scandal last year. The decision could lead to a shutdown of all six schools run by the Crescendo organization.
The vote by the Los Angeles Board of Education was based on the revelation at Tuesday’s meeting that a principal implicated in the cheating scandal had been hired by the outside organization brought in to manage the Crescendo schools. L.A. Unified officials had explicitly directed that no former Crescendo principals could work either for Crescendo or for the Celerity charter organization, the outside group that was brought in.
“This was beyond not following the agreement we had,” said L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy. “I would use the word 'directly lied to.' "
Celerity Chief Executive Vielka McFarlane said that she hired the principal, Sheryl Lee, before agreeing to manage the Crescendo schools, which are located in South Los Angeles.
“We cannot retroactively go back and terminate an employee over an issue we were not aware of,” McFarlane said in the meeting. She said she hired Lee in March, well before she was invited to manage Crescendo schools.
Deasy was not satisfied.
“If Celerity was unaware they would be the only human beings in L.A. County unaware of the issue,” he responded.
On March 1, officials decided to begin the lengthy revocation process against Crescendo, after allegations circulated that Crescendo founder and executive director John Allen ordered principals and teachers to use actual test questions to prepare students for the 2010 state standardized tests.
Less than a month ago, Deasy indicated he would support keeping the schools open, based on reforms, safeguards and disciplinary actions Crescendo had taken -- including firing Allen. The board was scheduled Tuesday to take up only a long-delayed renewal agreement for two of the Crescendo schools, a vote expected to be almost pro forma.
Instead, the two charters were not renewed and the other four schools face revocation.
The issue over the principal emerged when Crescendo teachers came forward to complain about five-day suspensions for their alleged part in the cheating scandal. The teachers asserted their only role had been to blow the whistle on wrongdoing.
“We’re being penalized for something that we didn’t do,” said Crescendo teacher Sandra Kim.
While arguing against their suspensions, they also criticized Lee’s hiring, which prompted district officials to move against the schools. The district’s action could result in the teachers’ losing their jobs entirely. But they said they would continue to press to keep the schools open under different management.
An attorney and a Crescendo board member said, after the meeting, that Crescendo’s board would probably reimburse any loss suffered by Celerity if it would agree to break its contract with Lee -- if that was necessary to keep the Crescendo schools open.
L.A. BOARD VOTES NOT TO RENEW CHARTERS FOR 2 SOUTH BAY CHARTER SCHOOLS
By Melissa Pamer Staff Writer | Daily Breeze | http://bit.ly/oCLjkZ
7/12/2011 06:57 pm - The Los Angeles school board voted Tuesday not to renew the operating charters for two South Bay charter campuses that had been involved in a cheating scandal.
The two elementary schools, Crescendo Charter Academy in Gardena and Crescendo Charter Conservatory in Hawthorne, were among six campuses operated by Crescendo Schools, which was found to have encouraged cheating on standardized tests last year.
After a series of firings and reforms at the organization, Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy last month halted charter revocation proceedings against the schools. Crescendo had agreed to be run by another charter organization, Celerity Educational Group.
At Tuesday's meeting, a teacher at one of the Crescendo schools revealed that Sheryl Lee, a principal involved in the cheating scandal, had been hired by a Celerity school.
That prompted Deasy to say the hiring did not honor Crescendo's agreement with the district. He reversed his recommendation to renew the charters for the two local schools, and the board voted 6-1 in accordance.
Crescendo also operates Crescendo Prep West in Gardena and three other campuses. LAUSD spokeswoman Susan Cox said it was not clear how Tuesday's action would affect those schools but that it "it's not looking good."
The board directed the district's charter school division to begin today helping parents at the two local schools find new campuses for their children to attend in fall, Cox said.
LAUSD TO CLOSE 6 CHARTER SCHOOLS AMID CHEATING SCANDAL
KTLA News | http://bit.ly/rcrbjB
7:00 a.m. PDT, July 13, 2011 - LOS ANGELES (KTLA) -- Los Angeles Unified School District officials have decided not the renew contracts with six charter schools following a cheating scandal that has rocked the district leading to a shutdown of the schools.
LAUSD officials voted on the issue Tuesday.
The move means that students from the six schools will need to find new schools this fall.
L.A. Schools Supt. John Deasy says the organization hired to manage the Crescendo schools, which are located in South Los Angeles, did not follow the rules set forth by the district.
The scandal was revealed after allegations circulated that Crescendo founder and executive director John Allen ordered principals and teachers to use actual test questions to prepare students for the 2010 state standardized tests.
Deasy indicated last month that the schools would stay open but undergo stringent reforms, including firing Allen.
Tuesday's vote to close the schools instead of implement reforms was unexpected.
STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION GETS TOUGH WITH FEDERAL SCHOOL IMPROVEMENT GRANTS: Continued funds contingent on progress
By Kathryn Baron | Thoughts on Public Education | http://bit.ly/qyQYIl
7/14/11 • In a day fraught with finger-pointing and defensiveness, the State Board of Education (SBE) on Wednesday put 90* schools on notice that their second-year funding for the federal School Improvement Grant (SIG) program is not a sure thing.
Faced with what State Board President Michael Kirst termed a “searing” report from the U.S. Education Department, the SBE voted unanimously to withhold funds from the original SIG schools, known as Cohort I, until they’re in full compliance with federal requirements.
The 21-page report [http://1.usa.gov/nTvkdb], presents findings from monitoring teams sent to California by the U.S. Department of Education (ED). It paints a picture of schools that have not made good on promises in their applications, and have yet to replace their principals and half their faculty as required by some of the reform models.
SIG is a competitive federal program providing $3.5 billion in Title I grants over three years to improve the nation’s persistently low-achieving schools.
But even California’s selection process came under fire. ED cited the entire California Department of Education (CDE) for an inadequate job of carrying out the original application process.
“To me, this is very concerning,” Kirst told state ed officials overseeing the SIG program. “Since we’re part of the problem, and this is a very negative report, I want to hear how you plan to respond. This is not good news.”
CDE staff, in turn, placed some of the blame on the schools for misinterpreting the rules, some on the federal government for not being clear enough, and some on the state legislature for not allocating enough money for oversight. Staff mentioned several times that the legislature will not approve travel money to visit the schools. Their only first-hand look was with the federal teams last March.
“I can tell you that ED and CDE staff were speechless to see that large districts had implemented nothing that was required,” said Christine Swenson, director of CDE’s District and School Improvement Division.
Swenson reported that only about 10 percent of the schools had spent at least half of their grant money by March 31st, more than halfway through the school year. A few had hardly touched the funds.
Schools defend their honor
Some school district officials bristled at that and similar comments, arguing that if they didn’t comply it’s because the rules weren’t clear and no one told them they were out of compliance until just a few weeks ago.
“These applications for Cohort I were turned in over a year ago to CDE; they’ve had plenty of time to look at them,” said Nader Delnavaz, Administrative Coordinator of Secondary Programs in Los Angeles Unified School District. Now, at the cusp of the second year, they may have to lay off the new staff hired under the grant, such as intervention counselors, because the funding isn’t assured.
Board President Kirst said he understands their frustration, but says the state is under a lot of pressure. “I think that what appeared today was a major breakdown in the implementation of an important federal program,” said Kirst. “We got a significant rebuke from the federal government and we felt we had to act in order to show that we’re really trying to implement the federal law with integrity.”
How long may they waive?
Schools applying for funds in Cohort II also didn’t get their wish on Wednesday. The SBE voted to ask the feds for a one-year waiver in order to avoid a repeat of the same mistakes and miscommunication that occurred with the first group of grantees.
There’s a strong likelihood that ED will approve it since it was their idea in the first place. Swenson said the delay will give staff time to work with schools on the technical aspects of their proposals.
Some of the more than 50 schools that had already submitted applications for the 2011-12 academic year asked for priority consideration since they’ve already negotiated with their unions over staffing and work hours. Swenson answered that not only won’t the federal government approve that, but ED officials said there isn’t a single Cohort II proposal from California that’s acceptable as written.
* One of the original 91 SIG grantees, Glenbrook Middle School in the Mount Diablo school district, has closed.
Parent Trigger: INFORMATION LEFT OUT OF CHARTER SCHOOL DEBATES + NEW RULES FOR WEAK SCHOOLS + REGULATIONS APPROVED FOR SCHOOLS' 'PARENT TRIGGER' LAW
Themes in the News for the week of July 11-15, 2011 by UCLA IDEA | http://bit.ly/nMBqRG
15 July 2011 - Charter schools are growing in number, and a decision this week by the California Board of Education may increase the pace.
The board approved regulations for the “Parent Trigger law,” which would ease conversion of traditional schools to charters at certain low-performing campuses (Los Angeles Times, Sacramento Bee, Educated Guess). A dozen other states are considering similar laws that allow a majority of parents to restructure or close existing schools. Many of these initiatives are supported by local groups that receive significant funding directly or indirectly from The Heartland Institute, a conservative group working for “free market solutions” (Education Week).
A lot of hope for equitable reform is being placed in the charter movement, generally—without clear evidence that the charters will improve conditions for the poorest and most underserved students. Meanwhile, proven school reforms are disastrously neglected; the years pass by without meeting most schools’ needs for fully qualified teachers, reasonable class sizes, adequate instructional time and other basics.
A common observation of charters is that some select those special education, English learner or poor students whose education is less costly or difficult than similarly labeled students in non-charters. Conversely, the non-charter, traditional schools typically serve more challenging students although this distinction isn’t made clear in many school reports. For example, the public data might not distinguish between a special education student who is disruptive to classmates and one who adjusts easily to school routines (New York Times).
Clear and timely data on student characteristics and demographics are important for assessing the adequacy and fairness of charter school resources. For example, a child whose four-person family earns $40,000 qualifies for free and reduced-price lunch—but so does a child whose family earns less than the federal poverty level of $22,350. Data highlighting the proportion of students receiving free and reduced-price lunch might show that charter schools serve similar students to traditional public schools even as the schools enroll students who vary widely in the learning supports and services they require.
It’s urgent that we understand whether and how the increase in the number of charter schools (currently, charters enroll about 370,000 California students) affects education in all public schools. The success of a few charters offers little comfort if accompanied by broad school system decline and inequality.
Until data and accountability systems improve, the public will not be able to tell whether claims of charter superiority are achieved by better teaching, superior organizational design, better funding, free-market competition, selective enrollments, or if the claims are simply unfounded. Likewise, the public will gain little benefit from valuable lessons to be learned from charter school successes as well as failed charter experiments. A bill authored by Assemblywoman Julia Brownley (D-Santa Monica) aims to make charters more accessible by increasing demographic requirements that would more closely mirror the communities they serve (California Watch).
The Brownley bill is one step in the right direction.
CALIFORNIA: NEW RULES FOR WEAK SCHOOLS
NY Times National Briefing | WEST By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS | http://nyti.ms/nWDlha
July 13, 2011 The California State Board of Education on Wednesday gave tentative approval to a new set of rules giving parents more power to force changes at poorly performing schools. Parents who had taken buses from across the state erupted in cheers at a packed meeting room in Sacramento as the nine-member board voted unanimously. The proposed regulations will be available for public comment for 15 days, and they could be challenged. The rules would supplement a new state “parent trigger” law, under which parents at a school can force one of four actions, including takeover by a charter school, if at least 51 percent of them sign a petition. The rules have been controversial. A petition to convert a Compton Unified School District elementary school into a charter school has already wound up in court.
REGULATIONS APPROVED FOR SCHOOLS' 'PARENT TRIGGER' LAW: THE STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION SETS RULES TO CLARIFY THE LAW THAT GIVES PARENTS THE RIGHT TO PETITION FOR NEW STAFF, MANAGEMENT AND PROGRAMS.
By Teresa Watanabe, Los Angeles Times | http://lat.ms/pB0IWx
July 14, 2011 - After months of controversy, the state Board of Education set out a clear road map Wednesday to allow parents unparalleled rights to force major changes at low-performing schools.
The board approved regulations clarifying the "Parent Trigger" law — the first in the nation to give parents the right to petition for new staff, management and programs at their children's schools. Organizations representing parents, teachers, school districts and other parties overcame sharp differences to reach consensus on such contentious issues as how to draw up petitions, verify parent signatures and ensure public disclosure about the petition process.
Disagreement over those issues exploded last year in the law's first test case at McKinley Elementary School in Compton. There, parents sought to oust the school staff and convert the campus into an independently run, publicly financed charter operation. The petition campaign divided the campus, sparked lawsuits and fueled charges of harassment on both sides.
Controversies also inflamed efforts to draw up regulations at the state board, with various charges that board members were trying to ram through rules favoring charter schools, teachers or other interests.
So when the board unanimously voted to approve the regulations Wednesday, the room exploded in cheers and applause.
"It's like a dream come true to know that I have a voice in my community as well as my state, and my children will have a better future because parents like these took a stand for their children," said Daniel Jackson, a Los Angeles parent who took an overnight bus to Sacramento with other advocates to support the regulations.
Gabe Rose of Parent Revolution, the Los Angeles-based education reform group that helped lobby for the law, said the regulations will allow parents to move forward with confidence and organize petition campaigns across the state. He said six to eight parent empowerment groups have formally filed papers to affiliate with his organization.
Even the California Teachers Assn., which opposed the law last year, supported the regulations, and board member Patricia Rucker, a former CTA lobbyist, voted for them.
But CTA spokeswoman Sandra Jackson said the union believes that parent trigger petitions calling for a charter school conversion must obtain support from half of the school's teachers, as is currently required under existing charter school law.
Board President Michael Kirst, however, appeared to reject that view in comments Wednesday.
"It's called the parent empowerment act, not the teacher empowerment act, for a reason," he said.
If no issues are raised during a public comment period, the regulations will take effect with no further board action.
The regulations require the state to create a website with information about the petition process, including a sample petition so organizers will not inadvertently make errors in drawing it up, as occurred in Compton.
They also require the public disclosure of organizations providing financial or other support to petitioners. In addition, the regulations ban payment per signature and require disclosure of those who are paid to gather signatures.
And, school districts will be required to verify signatures through written documents already on hand, such as emergency contact cards. That issue sparked a lawsuit in Compton when officials required people who had signed the petition to come in person with photo identification.
Not all contentious issues were addressed. The regulations do not require public meetings at the schools, nor specify which parents can trigger change with a successful petition. The law allows parents of half the students at the targeted school or those campuses that feed into them to force school districts to convert to a charter campus, replace staff, transform the curriculum or close the school. But the California School Boards Assn. and other advocates argue that the majority of petitioners should be from the targeted school.
The public meeting and petitioner issues are being addressed in legislation by Assemblywoman Julia Brownley (D-Santa Monica), who heads the Assembly education committee.
Despite such continuing concerns, Sherry Griffith, the school board organization's legislative advocate, hailed the consensus.
"When you decide to roll up your sleeves and decide to work together, you can get pretty far," she said.
And Lydia Grant, a San Fernando Valley parent who also rode the bus to Sacramento, said the regulations would give children in failing schools a new start.
"Every parent like myself has had the door slammed in their face when they have tried to improve the education of their child," she said. "This legislation finally gives us that army behind us to stand up and demand that our children get a better life."
Los Angeles Times staff writer Michael Mishak contributed to this report.
HISTORY TEXTBOOKS: NO SLANT REQUIRED-Whether in Texas or California, politicians & interest groups have no rightful place in the writing of textbooks
LA Times Editorial | http://lat.ms/pR8C8C
July 17, 2011 - We don't need any of that Texas-style, right-wing political slant in California textbooks, so it's good to see a bill, SB 302, progressing through the Legislature that would require textbooks to be scrutinized for any of the odious changes that the Texas Board of Education ordered inserted into schoolbooks there. But it's too bad that while state Sen. Leland Yee (D-San Francisco) was guarding textbooks against that conservative spin, he neglected to guard against the liberal political spin that was recently signed into law.
The Texas changes, adopted in 2010, represented an offensive twisting of historical fact. This included downplaying Thomas Jefferson's role as a Founding Father because of his advocacy for separating church and state, elevating the inaugural speech of Confederate President Jefferson Davis to the same prominence as that of Abraham Lincoln, and making it appear as though the internment of 100,000 Japanese Americans during World War II had no racial aspect. That's just wrong.
Yet California has also been politicizing its textbooks for years, in ways that are perhaps less blatantly dishonest (and more in line with the politics of this page) but that still reflect an unwarranted intrusion into academic issues. Among other things, textbooks are now required to show members of ethnic groups in exact proportion to their populations, and to include only positive portrayals of specific groups, no matter what the reality is. One of the more egregious examples is that the elderly must be portrayed as uniformly fit and active, as if older people don't struggle with disproportionate levels of illness, disability and financial troubles.
Now the Legislature has added to the list with a bill written by Yee's fellow San Francisco Democrat, Sen. Mark Leno. SB 48 requires textbooks and other instructional materials to include the contributions of "lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender Americans." Banned are instructional materials that "contain any matter reflecting adversely upon persons on the basis [of] sexual identity." Gov. Jerry Brown signed the bill Thursday.
The gay rights movement is a legitimate subject in the study of U.S. civil rights. In fact, it's more than legitimate; it's a critically important movement of the 20th and 21st centuries that students ought to learn about. But that doesn't change the fact that politicians shouldn't be dictating what material appears in textbooks. Besides, do we really want textbooks to include the details of a historical figure's sexual orientation even when it might have nothing to do with his or her role in history? And does it make sense to require that portrayals of gay people focus on "contributions" and not anything that could be construed as negative? Real history is richer and more complicated than feel-good depictions.
Whether in Texas or California, politicians and interest groups have no rightful place in the writing of textbooks. It is the job of the state to give broad direction to the scholars who frame a well-rounded curriculum, and the job of other scholars to write clear, interesting and thoughtful textbooks to impart that curriculum to our students without meddlesome micromanagement. It would be a great thing for education to see a bill that offers such protections to academic integrity.
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
CALIFORNIA’S NONSENSE POLITICS: By PETE GOLIS, columnist for the Santa Rosa Press Democrat | http://bit.ly/ocpbQ... http://bit.ly/nymKlo
CONSERVATIVES BEGIN EFFORT TO REPEAL CALIFORNIA’S GAY HISTORY LAW: By On Top Magazine Staff | http://bit.ly/... http://bit.ly/pqvmwi
LA’s DEVELOPERS ARE ABOVE THE LAW + smf’s 2c: by Stephen Box in CityWatch LA | http://bit.ly/pyfWxH 07.14.2... http://bit.ly/oJLsge
LOCAL SCHOOL-BASED HEALTH CLINICS WIN FEDERAL GRANTS: - Howard Blume - LA Times/LA Now | http://lat.ms/mVWpb9 ... http://bit.ly/qOQVa5
OUTSIDE EXPERTS PUT CHICAGO SCHOOLS UNDER MICROSCOPE: Team looks for ways to improve teaching and learning: By N... http://bit.ly/p5GKHs
Parent Trigger: NEW RULES FOR WEAK SCHOOLS + REGULATIONS APPROVED FOR ‘PARENT TRIGGER LAW’ + CA SCHOOL BOARD APP... http://bit.ly/phMfhj
L.A. UNIFIED SEEKS MORE TIME FOR STUDENTS TO GET WHOOPING COUGH VACCINE + WHOOPING COUGH: How Not to Get Tough w... http://bit.ly/oU5w1j
Crescendo/Celerity Charters: LAUSD UNEXPECTEDLY MOVES TO SHUT DOWN CHARTERS IMPLICATED IN CHEATING + L.A. BOARD ... http://bit.ly/rdrz8I
SCHOOL DISTRICT OFFICIALS PROPOSE CHANGES TO PUBLIC SCHOOL CHOICE PROGRAM: By Connie Llanos Staff Writer | Daily... http://bit.ly/r4aRbv
MORE SCHOOLING: a letter to The Times + smf seconds the motion: letter to the editor | http://lat.ms/ozaUFz 12 ... http://bit.ly/oDYqZ7
FORMER FREMONT HIGH TEACHERS JOIN CHARTER (…OR PILOT) SCHOOL MOVEMENT: By Elizabeth Warden - Posted on May ... http://bit.ly/qbzK6k
MORE SCHOOLING: letter to the LA Times + smf seconds the motion: letter to the editor | http://lat.ms/ozaUFz Re ... http://bit.ly/p7ocic
Barack Obama Global Prep: LAUSD DECISION HAS SOUTH LOS ANGELES SMOKING HOT: by Janet Denise Kelly VIEW FROM HER... http://bit.ly/pisZAj
Controller John Chiang on State Budget: CASH RECEIPTS ALREADY $351 BEHIND: Posted by Kevin Yamamura | http://bit... http://bit.ly/o7vLKo
HIGHLY RATED ISNSTRUCTORS GO BEYOND TEACHING TO THE TEST: Highly rated instructors go beyond teaching to the sta... http://bit.ly/pC4PN0
SCHOOL FUNDING REFORM SKEWEWERED BY CTA: By WAYNE LUSVARDI – CalWatchDog | http://bit.ly/qny5NO JULY 11, 2... http://bit.ly/p8AeHM
SCHOOL-GROWN FOOD FOR LUNCH: Against the Law?: By Karla Hampton |-HealthyCal - http://www.healthycal.org -http:/... http://bit.ly/o8yOTx
BILL SEEKS STANDARDS FOR CHARTR SCHOOLS’ STUDENT DEMOGRAPHICS: Joshua Emerson Smith |California Watch | http://b... http://bit.ly/pPkRMa
"A culture of fear and a conspiracy of silence…”: EDUCATORS IMPLICATED IN ATLANTA CHEATING SCANDAL + THE STATE O... http://bit.ly/ntrcBc
AB 114 Backlash: TEACHER LAYOFF LAW STIRS CONFUSION, CRITICISM + CTA BARS THE WAY TO REFORM IN SCHOOL + smf 2¢ +... http://bit.ly/rcR4PW
K.Yamamura/SacBee:"The ED bill(AB114)didn't show up on the floor until after 10 pm and had cleared both houses by 10:45" bit.ly/nlilut
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
*Dates and times subject to change. ________________________________________
• 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: 213-241.8700
What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Bennett.Kayser@lausd.net • 213-241-5555
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Nury.Martinez@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385
Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • Find your state legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • 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 Brown: 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.
• If you are eligible to become a citizen, BECOME ONE.
• If you a a citizen, REGISTER TO VOTE.
• If you are registered, VOTE LIKE THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT. THEY DO!.
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