In This Issue:  | | • | LAUSD TACKLES TEEN DATING VIOLENCE IN THE WAKE OF CINDI SANTANA'S DEATH | | | • | EDUCATION DEPARTMENT TARGETS L.A. SCHOOLS FOR LOW BLACK, HISPANIC ENGLISH ACHIEVEMENT + smf's 2¢ | | | • | 'The uncountable inaccountability of being | | | • | DOWN TO WIRE ON RACE TO TOP + STATE BOARD TO DISCUSS NCLB WAIVER | | | • | 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: | | | | 1. When faced with two news stories about a related subject in single news cycle, the media will choose only one of them.
2. They will always choose the wrong one.
It's a part of Murphy's Law.
On Tuesday there were two press conferences in the Blue Room at LAUSD – the traditional site of press conferences, photo opportunities and media events at Beaudry.
THE FIRST PRESS CONFERNCE, before the Board meeting, announced the new Anti-Bullying/Dating Violence Prevention Policy. The media was there in force. It featured school board members, the superintendent, community partners and a number of students. Boardmember Zimmer recalled the tragic demise of Cindi Santana – whose memorial service would follow later that afternoon – in a heartfelt and impassioned call-to-action. Students told heart-wrenching and tear-stained stories of bullying and abuse – and everyone made the pledge to move forward. Never again.
THE SECOND PRESS CONFEREENCE (given in the middle of the board meeting) was a rote affair. Staged - with a whiff of the greasepaint - with board members and the superintendent and Secretary of Education repeating speeches for the press they had made a few minutes previously in the board room; talking about the leaked beforehand agreement about English Language Learners while Mayor Tony looked on sourly. If it was history it was History-Take Two – everyone's toes on the tape marks, their sound bytes well rehearsed, their smiles forced.
The second story led the news: "Officials offer platitudes; film at five, six and eleven."
Teaching English Language Learners is important. Keeping kids safe at school is important. Both are things that the District can and must do better at. And promising to do better at both – especially when there's no money do either -- may be a sincere exercise in well-intended meaninglessness.
But let's hope we have made good plans. And that we are well begun at both.
And that we follow through.
Onward/Adelente! - smf
LAUSD TACKLES TEEN DATING VIOLENCE IN THE WAKE OF CINDI SANTANA'S DEATH
Huffington Post LA | http://huff.to/oqpNYx
10/12/11 02:02 PM ET - The Los Angeles Unified School District is reevaluating teen dating violence prevention in the wake of the tragic death of South East High student Cindi Santana on September 30 of this year.
Santana was allegedly stabbed and beaten by ex-boyfriend Abraham Lopez during lunchtime in the courtyard of South East High, and she died of her wounds at a nearby hospital. Before the incident, Santana's mother had warned the school about Lopez; specifically, that the young man had previously been arrested and then released after threatening Santana.
As we noted, at least a few students expressed some troubling opinions blaming the victim for her own death:
Although grief counselors and increased security measures were brought to South East High School in the wake of this tragedy, it appears that broader efforts are needed to educate students about abusive relationships. Students are speaking out on a Facebook page dedicated to Cindi. Posts range from sadness and confusion to misplaced blame -- one student even wrote, "She got STABBED FOR BEING A CHEATER!!!!!"
The LAUSD has taken note of the warning signs, reports CBS Los Angeles. At a board meeting Tuesday, the school district's board passed an anti-violence initiative to address teen dating violence and abuse.
Superintendent John Deasy will appoint a Prevention Coordinator and a Prevention Liaison to every school who will work with students, teachers, and parents on abuse education and intervention techniques, reports NBC 4.
The program will cost an estimated $2 million dollars and board members are currently working on fundraising, reports ABC 7 Los Angeles.
In a press conference announcing the initiative, board member Steve Zimmer expressed the hope that these new programs would prevent another tragedy from happening again. Intersection South LA quotes Zimmer: "policy is not consolation, and policy can’t reverse the tragedy, but what we’re trying to do today is make sure that anywhere in this district, when someone comes forward, or a family comes over, that school will have the resources to make sure this never happens again.”
ABC 7 Los Angeles also notes that Zimmer directly addressed the county's young people: "to students out there who today feel afraid, uncomfortable, insecure, know that something is just not right, please say something. Don't be silent."
Shortly after the hearing, hundreds attended a memorial service was held Tuesday to honor Santana. Her aunt described her as a "sweet girl who had a smile that would light up anyplace," reports KTLA.
●For more information on Cindi Santana and memorial donations, please reference Facebook | http://on.fb.me/qJ9iqI
●TEEN DATING VIOLENCE: Need help? In the U.S., call 1-866-331-9474 or text "loveis" to 77054 for the National Dating Abuse Helpline.
EDUCATION DEPARTMENT TARGETS L.A. SCHOOLS FOR LOW BLACK, HISPANIC ENGLISH ACHIEVEMENT + smf's 2¢
by James Marshall Crotty, contributor, Forbes.com | http://onforb.es/n8L1mN
10/13/2011 1:26PM | The headline news in yesterday’s L.A. Times was that the Department of Education settled its civil rights enforcement action against the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). The Education Department claimed that LAUSD institutionally discriminated against black and Latino high school students in the teaching of English. According to the L.A. Times, the main warrant that the Department used to explain why black and Latino students do not learn English at remotely near the proficiency of other ethnic groups is “disparities in technology or library resources.”
However, nowhere in the Education Department’s Office for Civil Rights complaint against the LAUSD [http://1.usa.gov/pG8zvS] is there any empirical evidence of a direct link between the LAUSD’s alleged sins of omission and the abysmal English-learning rates of blacks and Hispanic students. And nowhere is there any explanation of why Asian kids at these very same schools — many of whom come from impoverished and oppressive backgrounds and who are sharing these same, supposedly inadequate, facilities — perform far better at English.
This is especially significant, since it is generally difficult for an Asian learner to pick up English (there are almost no easy similarities between Mandarin, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Thai, Korean, Japanese and English). However, the similarities between Spanish and English (they share a Latin alphabet), should theoretically make it easier for Latino learners to learn English. Black learners don’t even have the second language excuse.
Yet, Asian students do not require, as a rule, any special English-learning programs, but many black and Hispanic students do. Why is that? The Education Department is silent. In other words, the evidence of even inadvertent discrimination is “anecdotal” at best, though the evidence of low black and Hispanic English language learning is indisputable, and, according to the Department of Education, almost uniformly bad across the L.A. Unified School District, regardless of school.
All that said, only the most hard-hearted among us dispute the need for uniform access to quality teachers, books, technology, libraries, and enrichment programs across schools and school districts. In addition, in my experience teaching and coaching at an inner city South Bronx high school, I can attest that many black and Hispanic parents want the very best education for their children and will go the extra mile to insure that happens. What’s more, there are, in my direct experience, and at every public school in America, shining examples of academically advanced black and Hispanic students who not only have command of written and spoken English, but who speak several foreign languages (and not just Spanish). I taught a few of these students. They not only excelled at languages. Many ran laps around my math and science abilities, starting in the 10th grade. Their “positive deviance” makes a lie of not only monolithic portrayals of “minority” students, but also of politically motivated attempts to aggregate minority students into a one-dimensional and uniform cohort of the oppressed.
Which is why the Department of Education’s focus on race and ethnicity is so backwards-leaning, wrong-headed, ugly, nasty, and counter-productive. Surely there must be examples of clear-cut discrepancies in resources between schools within the LAUSD, as in all any school district across the country, as in any large and complex bureaucracy. But are these discrepancies intentional? And more to the point of the Department of Education’s investigation, are they due to racism? Moreover, are these discrepancies in the delivery of academic resources truly the major culprit in low English-learning by large swaths of black and Hispanic students?
As Angelinos well know, the LAUSD has been on a spending binge to dramatically improve and modernize its schools, including $600 million plus spent on the state-of-the-art Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools on the former site of the Ambassador Hotel (where the late Attorney General was assassinated in 1968) and hundreds of millions more on the aesthetically cutting edge High School for the Visual and Performing Arts in downtown L.A. Both schools primarily serve black and Hispanic communities. As the L.A. Times article admits, “Schools that serve low-income minority students typically start with more government funding than schools serving middle-class populations.” Given the LAUSD’s obvious financial commitment, could it be possible that other stakeholders need to share in the sub-par English-learning going on at L.A. public schools?
Rather than probe that crucial question, Education Secretary Arne Duncan flew to L.A. on Tuesday to deliver the department’s civil rights verdict and, as a consequence, expects America’s second largest school system to miraculously and single-handedly improve the reading and writing scores of its core black and Hispanic constituency. No surprise that there weren’t any meaningful words from the Education Secretary or L.A.’s Mayor about what black and Hispanic parents can do to improve the English-learning skills of their recalcitrant charges (such as reading in the home, spending a few hours a day going over homework, educating themselves, teaching their kids that vandalism, gang membership, and violence are not acceptable), or what academically lagging students can do to take better advantage of the immense resources they have at their disposal, even in this era of educational budget-cutting. Once again, Mr. Duncan blamed the educator, and removed all responsibility and accountability from the parent and student.
As the L.A. Times article goes on to admit, “schools in more prosperous neighborhoods … have lower costs related to security and vandalism.” Is it the teachers’ fault that these high-cost, low-performing schools are beset by violence and vandalism? Is it any surprise that the best teachers eschew working at these institutions, where education takes a back seat to security? And is it any surprise that such schools require harsher “discipline practices”? Is Mr. Duncan going to fly in on the taxpayer dime and point the finger at LAUSD because of these parent, student, and community sins?
Reading about this Department of Education nonsense, I am reminded of how my Depression Era father went to grade school with one other pupil (his younger brother Paul) in a one-room schoolhouse in drought-ravaged South Dakota. I wonder if my father ever complained of “disparities in technology and library resources.”
It probably never crossed his mind. He had no time for excuses or blame. He was too busy making the most of his hardscrabble situation to worry about whether he got the short end of the stick.
But don’t depend on my perspective. What, say you? Am I completely off base in emphasizing how individual desire and culture (including expectations of academic excellence, and the will to enforce those expectations in the home) are the primary determinants in student learning? If so, I am open to all reasonable evidence to the contrary.
●●smf's 2¢: I agree with much of what Crotty says: Who, What, Where — and disagree vehemently with the Why and How of it. I really don't go for his "rather than blame educators let's blame (Hispanic+ Black) parents and students".
The challenge in our community and this day-and-age is to stop looking for folks to blame and start educating students and parents and educators. Somehow I don't think there is a solution in returning with Crotty's father to the one room schoolhouse of draught-ravaged depression-era South Dakota – nothing from that experience informs to education of inner city Los Angeles (or South Bronx) Hispanic and Black children in the year 2011.Wih apologies o the Swedish distiller: Absolutely nothing.
Of course the DOE Office of Civil Rights investigation of LAUSD is politically inspired! One only needs to trace the origins of the OCR under-secretary from The Broad Foundation to Ed Trust to the OCR. But so is the racism-as-immigration/educational agenda they are pursuing for non-English speakers in Alabama [http://t.co/Iug2b4Ms] : Put them and their parents on a bus and send them back to where they from. Nothing improves the test scores and saves K-12 dollars - a 'Win/Win' - like deporting a significant subgroup!
Unable to practice what I preach I assign significant blame to Secretary Duncan – who, as Crotty said, flew "in on the taxpayer dime and pointed the finger at LAUSD". That same day finger-pointer Duncan continued on to a taxpayer funded/US Dept of Ed sponsored "Town Hall Meeting With Parents" in Pico Rivera and gave them 20 minutes of his valuable time [http://t.co/Qr8hFNd2] – before going back on that same dime to Brentwood – where he rubbed elbows with those who paid $2,500 to $10,000 each for the privilege.
'The uncountable inaccountability of being
Themes in the News for the Week of Oct. 10-14, 2011 By UCLA IDEA | http://bit.ly/qA3rPn
Gov. Jerry Brown made headlines this weekend by signing almost three dozen education-related bills. By far, most of the discussion among education reformers centered on his veto of Senate Bill 547 (Washington Post, Huffington Post, Education Week, Los Angeles Times, San Diego Union-Tribune).
SB 547 would have reduced the emphasis given to standardized tests in rankings of public school performance. It promised to replace the Academic Performance Index, or API, which reports on results of standardized tests in math and English, with an “Educational Quality Index.” In addition to standardized tests, the EQI would have incorporated important outcome indicators such as graduation rates, dropout rates, college-preparedness and career-readiness. Authored by Senate President Darrell Steinberg, the bill had broad support, including Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson, charter advocates, business groups, career technical education, school boards and administrators (Thoughts on Public Education).
In his veto message, Brown said the proposed EQI didn’t address concepts he associates with quality education—excitement, curiosity and love of learning. Brown also expressed his belief that school improvement requires people coming together in dialogue and creating communities of change as much as creating more quantitative measurements.
“SB547 certainly would add more things to measure, but it is doubtful that it would actually improve our schools,” Brown wrote (Washington Post). “Adding more speedometers to a broken car won’t turn it into a high-performance machine.”
It’s too bad that California education has lost the chance to bring important indicators (i.e. graduation rates) into its evaluation system. Nonetheless, Brown’s criticism is valid in saying the new indicators would leave the state with too narrow a view of what constitutes valuable learning outcomes.
Both politicians make a valid case, but both miss key points. A quality education is defined by what students learn and how they learn. Certainly, we care about the knowledge and skills students acquire, but we also want young people to experience supportive, engaging and thought-provoking classrooms. Any index of educational quality needs to incorporate information about conditions for learning alongside data on outcomes.
In addition, both Steinberg’s bill and Brown’s reasons for vetoing it are silent on California’s pathetically insufficient capacity to mount a quality public education system. Neither speaks to school conditions across the state and how schools are struggling under the weight of budget cuts. Neither challenges schools and public officials to engage parents and communities in efforts to improve educational quality.
Schools need information and they need to discuss and use the information to improve the school culture and students’ access to the highest levels of curriculum and instruction. The original Public Schools Accountability Act of 1999, which set up the API, cautioned that an effective accountability system would require community involvement, be easily accessible to parents, and include both rewards and interventions to support school improvement. Steinberg and Brown are both half-right. If they could pull together the tools, leadership, and money schools need, then students would have a chance.
► ●●BROWN'S VETO MESSAGE:
Oct 8, 2011 -- OFFICE OF THE GOVERNOR | http://bit.ly/oBeuvK
To the Members of the California State Senate;
I am returning Senate Bill 547 without my signature.
This bill is yet another siren song of school reform. It renames the Academic Performance Index (API) and reduces its significance by adding three other quantitative measures.
While I applaud the author’s desire to improve the API, I don’t believe that this bill would make our state’s accountability regime either more probing or more fair.
This bill requires a new collection of indices called the “Education Quality index” (EQI), consisting of “multiple indicators,” many of which are ill-defined and some impossible to design. These “multiple indicators” are expected to change over time, causing measurement instability and muddling the picture of how schools perform.
SB 547 would also add significant costs and confusion to the implementation of the newly-adopted Common Core standards, which must be in place by 2014. This bill would require us to introduce a whole new system of accountability at the same time we are required to carry out extensive revisions to school curriculum, teaching materials and tests. That doesn’t make sense.
Finally, while SB 547 attempts to improve the API, it relies on the same quantitative and standardized paradigm at the heart of the current system. The criticism of the API is that it has led schools to focus too narrowly on tested subjects and ignore other subjects and matters that are vital to a well-rounded education. SB 547 certainly would add more things to measure but it is doubtful that it would actually improve our schools. Adding more speedometers to a broken car won’t turn it into a high-performance machine.
Over the last 50 years, academic “experts” have subjected California to unceasing pedagogical change and experimentation. The current fashion is to collect endless quantitative data t populate ever-changing indicators of performance to distinguish the educational “good” from the educational “bad.” Instead of recognizing that perhaps we have reached testing nirvana, editorialists and academics alike call for ever more measurement “visions and revisions.”
A sign hung in Albert Einstein’s office read “not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted counts.
SB 547 nowhere mentions good character or love of learning. It does allude to student excitement and creativity but does not take these qualities seriously because they can’t be placed in a data stream. Lost in the bill’s turgid mandates is any recognition that quality is fundamentally different from quantity.
There are other ways to improve our schools — to indeed focus on quality. What about a system that relies on locally convened panels to visit schools, observe teachers, interview students and examine student work? Such a system wouldn’t produce an API number but it could improve the quality of our schools.
I look forward to working with the author to craft more inspiring ways to encourage our students to do their best.
Sincerely,
Edmund G. Brown, Jr.
► ●●SENATOR STEINBERG'S RESPONSE | http://bit.ly/oBeuvK:
“The Governor’s veto of SB 547 leaves in place a narrow accountability system that is failing our students, teachers and schools because it is based 100 percent on standardized test scores.
“Calls to quickly yet thoughtfully address the inadequacies of the Academic Performance Index have come from not just editorialists and academics but from those on the ground delivering education every day.
“I am encouraged by the fact the governor believes the system is robbing our children of the opportunity to develop the ‘love of learning’ we all want to restore.
“I look forward to hearing his proposal on how to reform the status quo. We must act deliberately to repair a flawed system that has negative consequences for children and schools. I am confident we can produce an accountability framework that will achieve our shared objective of quality education and provide an early victory for 2012.”
► ●●SUPT. DEASY'S TWEET: DrDeasyLAUSD John Deasy
AGT is 1 of many data pts individuals, schools, local districts, & central should use 2 develop performance targets http://bit.ly/obsJU0
13 Oct
► ●● smf's 2¢: Brown has vetoed Steinberg's attempt to replace API with EQI. NCLB (and by extension AYP) is in its death throes - and RttT probably doesn't survive next November's election no matter who wins. PSC will go the way of NCLB. Yet this week Superintendent Deasy quietly rolled out "AGT" with a tweet (above) and a backpack full of anticipatable consequences. And the situation at Cochran Middle School pits AGT directly against PSC! [http://t.co/BpSdUL5R]
The soup is getting crowded with the alphanumeric noodles – but where's the chicken and the veggies? http://t.co/IPkpRMAc + http://t.co/zOltvJ6i
DOWN TO WIRE ON RACE TO TOP + STATE BOARD TO DISCUSS NCLB WAIVER
►DOWN TO WIRE ON RACE TO TOP: Torlakson pushing for it; Brown must agree
By John Fensterwald - Educated Guess | http://bit.ly/nG5GCy
Posted on 10/11/11 • With applications due in Washington a week from tomorrow, Gov. Jerry Brown still hasn’t decided whether to let California apply for the Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge. But, with Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson four-square behind it, the state Department of Education is preparing an application on the assumption – or at least the hope – that Brown will sign on.
Race to the Tots, as I call it, is a $700 million competition in which California could snare as much as $100 million to expand the quantity and improve the quality of its preschool and early learning programs. Early education advocates have called on the state to use the potential money for two priorities:
To test a Quality Rating and Improvement System, a rubric to create consistency and uniformity in evaluating the effectiveness of – and potentially to differentiate funding for – preschool programs.
To develop the curriculum and teacher training for transitional kindergarten, an innovative two-year program for late-birthday 4-year-olds that California will phase in starting next fall.
As with all variations of Race to the Top, the state needs the signatures of Brown, Torlakson, and State Board of Education President Michael Kirst. Only Torlakson has made his views known so far.
Sue Burr, executive director of the State Board, said that the final rules allowed more flexibility for the states to design their proposals, but the application is still prescriptive. Brown remains concerned that the Obama administration will require commitments from the state extending beyond when the funding runs out. If the state does move forward, California will give counties and regions with innovative early learning programs – Los Angeles, Fresno, and Santa Clara County, to name a few – latitude to serve their own residents, without interference from the state. The federal government should recognize California’s diversity, she said.
An application that satisfies Brown’s concerns, however, may not be strong in the eyes of the RTTT judges, who may want assurances that federal dollars will have a lasting effect and create statewide changes.
Burr said that in creating the RTTT application, the Department of Ed has been helped by members of the former Early Learning Advisory Council, which Brown eliminated in the current budget. As part of the competition application, California would have to agree to reestablish the advisory council in some form, Burr acknowledged.
California is also eligible, along with eight other states, to apply for the third round of the original Race to the Top competition. The seven districts that led the nearly successful second round have expressed interest in pursuing that opportunity, for about $50 million, through a nonprofit they formed, the California Office to Reform Education (CORE).
The application for that isn’t due until December, and final rules have yet to be set. Burr said that the Brown administration has similar concerns about making state commitments for money it doesn’t have. It hasn’t signaled to the CORE districts whether they should start work on the application, Burr said.
►STATE BOARD TO DISCUSS NCLB WAIVER: Costs and benefits of waiver will be studied first
By John Fensterwald - Educated Guess | http://bit.ly/mSPZgE
Posted on 10/13/11 • To no surprise, California took no action Wednesday, the early deadline for states to indicate an intent to seek a waiver from the No Child Left Behind Act. But that doesn’t mean that the state has decided it’s not interested, Sue Burr, Executive Director of the State Board of Education, said this week.
Burr said she has discussed with the state Department of Education the need for a cost-benefit analysis to compare the impact of the actions needed to qualify for the waiver with the benefits of promised spending flexibility from the law’s requirements. The State Board will discuss issues surrounding a waiver and listen to what the public has to say about the idea at its next meeting, on Nov. 9-10, she said.
The Board is likely to hear from a divided community, no matter what the numbers say. A spokesman from the California Teachers Assn. told the Contra Costa Times that the union continues to oppose a waiver. “We’re concerned that the waiver process would replace one set of federal top-down mandates for another,” Mike Myslinski said.
But Education Trust-West, a nonprofit advocating for minority students, called the waiver “an unprecedented opportunity to improve our education system to better serve all students.” And in an e-mail Wednesday, Rick Miller, Executive Director of the California Office to Reform Education (CORE), the nonprofit representing seven reform-minded school districts, again urged the state to seek the waiver and not wait for Congress to reauthorize NCLB, formally known as the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. “While we can all agree that ESEA reauthorization would be preferable, districts cannot afford to wait for Congress to act. The waiver process offers a much needed flexibility from overly rigid NCLB requirements in exchange for doing work in which we’re already engaged,” Miller wrote. “We strongly hope the state will apply in order to give schools and districts throughout California the freedom to invest scarce education dollars where they are needed most – in the classroom.”
The main issue dividing CTA and Ed Trust-West is teacher evaluations. As a condition for receiving a waiver, the Obama administration is requiring that states adopt a teacher evaluation system that gives significant weight to student test scores, among other factors. Such a requirement isn’t in the current NCLB, although the Obama administration wants a revised law to include it. The latest draft out of the Senate, with some bipartisan support, incorporates it as well. California’s current law on teacher evaluations wouldn’t qualify for a waiver, and a proposed revision, AB 5, will likely face a contentious debate next year. Assuming a new mandate for stronger teacher evaluations passes, school districts and unions would have to then negotiate the specifics.
States that receive a waiver would be able to stop the clock on meeting the NCLB requirement that all students be proficient in math and reading by 2014. No additional schools would be deemed failures and face sanctions. Obama is offering to let states flexibly spend NCLB money now used for tutoring and transporting students to non-failing schools in exchange for focusing attention on 15 percent of schools: the lowest-performing 5 percent, called priority schools, plus those where there are big achievement gaps – focus schools. For California, that might mean upwards of $100 million of existing federal Title I dollars to spend on these schools.
For an honest cost analysis, officials of the Department of Ed would have to take a hard look at the estimates made by their boss, Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson. His ballpark estimate of at least $1.8 billion more in annual expenses through the waiver process assumes that California would have to spend $2 million annually to turn around 915 schools – a novel interpretation if not a worst-case misreading of the Obama administration’s waiver offer. If true, though, then clearly California and every state would be better off waiting for reauthorization of NCLB, whenever that happens.
Initial state applications for the waiver are due Nov. 14, with a second round due in mid-February.
*** Update: Education Week reported today that 37 states, Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico filed an intent to pursue a waiver.
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
Re: Tweets from the No-Fault Zone: COCHRAN MS …A RHETORICAL QUESTION ANSWERED? PSC v. AGT: A collision course? ... http://t.co/BpSdUL5R
ALABAMA’S SCHOOLS CAUGHT IN IMMIGRATION LAW CROSSFIRE: A federal appeals court stepped and temporarily blocked t... http://bit.ly/ottQkN
AGT: L.A. UNIFIED PRINCIPALS TO SEE TEACHERS’ EFFECTIVENESS RATINGS + smf's 2¢: The previously confidential rati... http://bit.ly/oEhl24
HOW DO YOU TEACH GAY ISSUES IN THE FIRST GRADE?: California schools scrambling to add lessons on LGBT Americans:... http://bit.ly/nXpYwY
Tweets from the No-Fault Line: PSC @ COCHRAN MIDDLE SCHOOL: 14 Oct UTLAnow UTLA Warren Fletcher & AFT’s... http://bit.ly/qVS72e
SECRETARY OF EDUCATION DUNCAN WALKS OUT ON 1,000+ PARENTS WHO TRAVELED TO HIS L.A. COUNTY TOWN HALL …in favor of... http://bit.ly/o58tfH
ACLU FILES SUIT OVER ALLGED PROFILING OF LATINO STUDENTS IN GLENDALE: The civil rights group alleges that about ... http://bit.ly/pyU2jU
It’s broccoli, dear: THE PALATABILTY OF DATA: Maria Casillas, chief of school, family and parent/community servi... http://bit.ly/q5AdTl
"It’s broccoli, dear.": THE PALATABILTY OF DATA http://bit.ly/p3zTRB
TOO MUCH TESTING?: Gov. Brown sends a message/The L.A. Times disagrees kinda/sorta: Students work on a mat... http://bit.ly/n8IQOq
The revolving door of principals and announced principals at Central High School #9: ANOTHER EDUCATOR WITHDRAW... http://bit.ly/ndDkbA
From the same wonderful folks who brought us API+AYP: AGT! - LAUSD UNVEILING ITS SCHOOL-BY-SCHOOL REPORTS: …or: ... http://bit.ly/qUATE2
CALIFORNIA KIDS FACE DAYS WITHOUT CLASS AS REVENUE TRAILS: By James Nash and Michael B. Marois, Bloomberg Busine... http://bit.ly/qB6Pdu
LAUSD PASSES $2 MILLION PROGRAM TO TACKLE DOMESTIC VIOLENCE IN WAKE OF FATAL STABBING: smf notes: while the Dist... http://bit.ly/qasoxS
LAUSD AGREES TO REVISE HOW ENGLISH LEARNERS, BLACKS ARE TAUGHT + additional coverage: Officials say the accord, ... http://bit.ly/qvwEEs
12 Oct
Cindi Santana (1995-2011): WHAT IS LAUSD’S RESPONSIBILITY WHEN IT COMES TO TEEN VIOLENCE? + HUNDREDS MOURN CINDI... http://bit.ly/nnS1h9
LAUSD RESPONSE-TO AGREEMENT-WITH US DEPT OF ED /OFFICE OF CIVIL RIGHTS INVESTICATION OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNER... http://bit.ly/p48uAA
LOS ANGELES PUBLIC SCHOOLS FINALLY DEAL WITH ONE NONPROFIT’S INADEQUATE SCHOOL MANAGEMENT: by rick cohen in The... http://bit.ly/oQYLWV
2010 MEXICALI QUAKE STILL SHAKES CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS: The damage underscores a loophole in the state's earthquake... http://bit.ly/nQhowg
Civil Rights of ELL & Black Students: FEDS TO ANNOUNCE FINDINGS ON INVESTIGATION OF LAUSD: By Susan Abram Staff ... http://bit.ly/qyKhAS
11 Oct
EdSource: MORE ELEVENTH GRADERS TAKE MATH COURSES NEEDED FOR UC & USC ADMISSION: from EdSource e-mail blast ... http://bit.ly/rsYljz
MILITANT LIBRARIAN PHOTO: http://bit.ly/oWheGx
GOV. BROWN SIGNS CEDILLO’S DREAM ACT: A local perspective: The historic measure, long championed by Assemblyman ... http://bit.ly/ri4EAM
A School Policy to Increase School Safety: CAMPUS KILLING RENEWS CALL FOR LAUSD PROGRAM + Resolution & smf’s 2¢:... http://bit.ly/pHgNTw
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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