Sunday, November 25, 2012

Thankfully …and no thanks


Onward! 4LAKids
4LAKids: Sunday 25•Nov•2012 Thanksgiving Break
In This Issue:
 •  CALIFORNIA'S ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS GETTING STUCK IN SCHOOLS' REMEDIAL PROGRAMS WHILE DISTRICTS SIT ON UNSPENT FUNDS
 •  LESSONS FROM THE OTHER SIDE
 •  LAO REPORT: THE 2013-14 BUDGET: California’s Fiscal Outlook
 •  WHAT SHOULD CHILDREN READ? + smf’s 2¢
 •  HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources
 •  EVENTS: Coming up next week...
 •  What can YOU do?


Featured Links:
 •  OUR CHILDREN, OUR FUTURE: What will California schoolchildren, your school district and YOUR School get when the initiative passes?
 •  Follow 4 LAKids on Twitter - or get instant updates via text message by texting
 •  4LAKids Anthology: All the Past Issues, solved, resolved and unsolved!
 •  4LAKidsNews: a compendium of recent items of interest - news stories, scurrilous rumors, links, academic papers, rants and amusing anecdotes, etc.
“I can no other answer make but thanks,
And thanks, and ever thanks. And oft good turns
Are shuffled off with such uncurrent pay.
But were my worth as is my conscience, firm,
You should find better dealing. What’s to do?”

Shakespeare’s Sebastian in Twelfth Night gives his thanks and admits that words are cheap – but he has no better to give. I hope the Bard intended a bit of irony amongst the pentameter – he was paid for his words and they have proved golden.

If teaching is a thankless job as Warren Fletcher claims, let me thank each and every one of you who ply the craft and tread the boards and work the art – and the magic – of the trade. We cannot ever pay you enough – and I don’t see much sentiment in D.C. or Sacramento or Beaudry to correct that …just chin music. Eventually we will pay you more, “But were my worth as is my conscience, firm, you should find better dealing.” …but never enough.

But we should heap upon you honor and respect and we don’t.

If you administer or support the work – whether in the office or the classroom or the in cafeteria or in the library or on the playground or driving a bus or filling forms or in a cubicle …or voting yea or nay you too are doing God’s work. Thank you.

If you are a parent stop reading this and go hug your child, Read a book together. Convince your child to thank a teacher. And thank you!

If you are a volunteer: Thanks, and thanks, and ever thanks. And oft good turns are shuffled off with such uncurrent pay.

And if you are a student, please thank a teacher. It will confuse and embarrass them and they won’t know what to think or say. And you will have seized the teachable moment and wrestled that rascal to the ground!

Thank you everyone for reading thus far. I’m almost done.

Thanksgiving is about The Table, groaning with the harvest bounty. We gather together as family – the most important and complicated and continuous unit of civilized existence – all tangled in history and drama and DNA. If we are lucky enough we gather with friends – and if we are even luckier (and truer to the first Thanksgiving): with strangers – usually around the Dining Room Table. We celebrate the bounty and the gift of family and friendship with our family and friends and the strangers amongst us. And in so doing none are strangers; all are family.

Here is a poem about an even more apt and more workaday metaphor:

In "Perhaps the World Ends Here," Joy Harjo – a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation of Cherokee descent delves into what really happens around the kitchen table:
... It is here that children are given instructions on what it means to be human. We make men at it, we make women.

At this table we gossip, recall enemies and the ghosts of lovers.

Our dreams drink coffee with us as they put their arms around our children. They laugh at us at our poor falling-down selves and as we put ourselves back together once again at the table.

This table has been a house in the rain, an umbrella in the sun.

Wars have begun and ended at this table. It is a place to hide in the shadow of terror. A place to celebrate the terrible victory.

We have given birth on this table, and have prepared our parents for burial here.

At this table we sing with joy, with sorrow. We pray of suffering and remorse. We give thanks.

Perhaps the world will end at the kitchen table, while we are laughing and crying, eating of the last sweet bite.
From "The Hungry Ear: [an anthology of] Poems of Food and Drink” http://bit.ly/ThyGYW


…AND NO THANKS….

Today’s LA TIMES EDITORIAL: GIVE CHARTER SCHOOLS THEIR DUE [http://lat.ms/TaAt1h ] agrees with The Times long held belief that Charter Schools are the magic bullet that solves the ills of LAUSD and attacks Boardmember Steve Zimmer for his questioning of what Leonard Cohen called ‘the beauty of their weapon’.

The Times gushes about the success of charter schools – which it accepts on faith rather than on evidence – and concedes: “No one should deny that some of Zimmer's concerns about charter schools are justified. Many of L.A. Unified's charters are strong performers, but some aren't very good. In general, the schools have not enrolled a fair share of special-education students. Some parents have complained that their children who did poorly in charters were "counseled out" — or simply thrown out — by administrators who suggested they return to traditional public schools. That helped the charters' test scores look better, but it didn't help struggling students. The district has done too little to investigate such practices; it also should conduct a meaningful examination of charter high schools' four-year graduation rates, which aren't always impressive. And the school board has at times been too willing to renew the charters of schools with subpar test scores.”

Wait a minute. How many are the “Many” who are strong perfumers? How many are “Some” that are poor performers? We don’t know, because as the paragraph continues – the numbers and the scores and the rates are either suspect or unimpressive. Or, quoting The Times: “Subpar”.

“In General”, the Times continues, charters have violated the law.

The District “has done too little to investigate such practices…” The Times says – but when Mr. Zimmer suggests they do investigate The Times Editorial Board wraps itself in its historic anti-union bias and attacks him with all the vitriol they can load into their soy based ink.

One must remember that the Charter Law requires – REQUIRES – that charter schools DO BETTER regular public schools; that’s the price they pay for being charter schools.

Charters must maintain a “B” Average or better or they get kicked out of the program; it’s as simple as that! In exchange for waiver of certain rules , regulations and district adminsitrivia charter schools are supposed to be MORE (not less) accountable.

And that, Gentle Reader, isn’t happening.

¡Onward/Adelante! - smf


Postscript: Godspeed to Larry Hagman (1931-2012), whose Larry Hagman Foundation supports and promotes creative arts education for economically disadvantaged children in the Dallas-Ft. Worth area.

CALIFORNIA'S ENGLISH LANGUAGE LEARNERS GETTING STUCK IN SCHOOLS' REMEDIAL PROGRAMS WHILE DISTRICTS SIT ON UNSPENT FUNDS By Rob Kuznia, Staff Writer, LA Newspaper Group|Daily Breeze/Daily News | http://bit.ly/Te4SMu

11/24/2012 03:53:41 PM PST :: Melanie Perez wishes she could have played the saxophone. Octavio Reyes would have liked to take a computer science class.

Both students at San Pedro High School say they can't sign up for these electives because, at some point in their school careers, they were stuck having to take remedial classes for English learners - even though both speak English fluently and have performed reasonably well on English tests.

"I actually feel retarded when (the teacher) says, `What is this (word)?' and it's a carrot," Octavio said. "It's pointless. I already know it, and I don't think it helps me."

Their complaints highlight a wider problem that, although little known, could be among the state's most pressing educational challenges: Students stuck for years in the state's remedial programs for English learners are often denied the opportunity to take enriching electives or the more rigorous courses required for getting into college.

It's a problem that has been attracting more attention of late, leading to a raft of reforms that some say could make California a leader in the field - which would be fitting, considering a third of the nation's English learners attend California public schools.

But as is, the state is failing many of these students.

LOW ODDS FOR SUCCESS


Numbering 1.4 million, English learners make up nearly a quarter of all K-12 students in the state - and nearly 40 percent of all California's kindergartners. One in four quits school - the worst dropout rate of any demographic group in California. Only 60 percent graduate high school within four years.

Several pieces of legislation addressing this mammoth bloc of at-risk students were signed in late September by Gov. Jerry Brown. All take effect Jan. 1.

One, authored by Assemblyman Ricardo Lara, D-Bell, seeks to prevent English learners from languishing in the system for years by compelling the state Department of Education to reveal the number of "long-term English learners" at each school district.

Another, by state Sen. Alex Padilla, D-Pacoima, will force the state to come up with more consistent guidelines for deeming kids fluent. The implication here is that many students are unnecessarily stuck in remedial classes when their command of the English language is sufficient.

A third bill, also by Padilla, takes school districts to task for banking state money earmarked for getting these students on track.

School officials chafe at some of these characterizations, in particular that last one, especially at a time when schools are suffering from historic shortages of state funding.
Meanwhile, advocates of English learners say large numbers of them - for whatever reason - get stuck in the system, and that, at some point, their very status as English learners seems to inhibit their chances for success.

"If kids haven't been reclassified (as fluent) by fifth grade, they have pretty much been tracked, and are not going to be able to go to college," said Oscar Cruz, the head of Families in Schools, a nonprofit advocate for parents of low-income and minority families. "They're on a path where they're just taking remedial classes."

Lara's AB 2193 would create a consistent definition for long-term English learners and force school districts to not only keep track of such students, but also students at risk of earning the distinction.

Studies show that some 60 percent of English learners in grades 6-12 are considered long term, meaning they've carried the label for at least six years.

Padilla's SB 1108 - co-authored by Assemblyman Chris Norby, R-Fullerton - aims to create a more consistent set of requirements for deeming students academically fluent. As is, the state provides minimum guidelines, but allows school districts to tack on additional stipulations, arguably creating more barriers to reclassification.

"The criteria are just all over the map," Padilla said, adding that he would prefer to see districts err on the side of removing the label.

Padilla's other bill, SB 754, is a transparency measure that seeks to pressure individual school districts out of the practice of stashing the extra money they receive to provide services for English learners. Specifically, it would compel them to prominently post online their budgets and carryovers in these accounts, as well as explain why the money hasn't been spent.

School districts generally receive $300 to $500 a year in state dollars for every English learner they designate, but they don't spend it all. (This amount doesn't include the additional funds they receive from the federal government.)

In 2010-11, the state gave California's school districts a total of $915 million for helping English learners and low-income students. Known as the "Economic Impact Aid" fund, it lumps the two allocations together. By year's end, the school districts' combined ending balance from this fund amounted to $382 million - or 42 percent of the annual apportionment.

The 2011 carryover for LAUSD alone was $61.5 million, according to the California Legislative Analyst's Office.

That money, Padilla said, "should be spent; it should not be hoarded."

OCTAVIO AND MELANIE


Octavio is a good example of a student who could be fluent by state standards, but isn't due to an unique additional local requirement.

A senior at San Pedro High, Octavio still bears the "English learner" label even though he cleared the state-set hurdles for fluency. These include passage of an exam taken annually by English learners until they pass, and demonstrating a basic level of proficiency on standardized tests.

But the Los Angeles Unified School District also has another requirement for shedding the label: Students must maintain at least a C average in their English classes. That has been Octavio's hang-up.

"It was mostly because I didn't try," said Octavio, who has been an English learner since emigrating from Mexico at age 10. "I would get bored."

Other districts have their own tack-on requirements. The K-8 Hawthorne School District requires its English learners to pass a written exam. In Torrance, English learners must score higher on standardized English tests than what the state requires.

As for Melanie, who is a freshman at San Pedro High, she has been successfully reclassified as fluent but says the year and a half spent taking remedial English classes at Dana Middle School in San Pedro denied her the ability to take desired electives, such as band. While she was born in the United States, many other students were immigrants.

"There were times that I didn't care to do my work," she said. "I was like, `Why am I in this class if I know English?"'

NEW MASTER PLAN

Even as several pieces of English-learner legislation have become law statewide, LAUSD has its own new initiative.

The nation's second-largest school system has more English learners than any other district - nearly 31 percent of its 650,000 students. Officials estimate that nearly 40 percent of those are considered long term, unable to attain proficiency after five years in a program.

LAUSD's strategy for teaching English to these students is detailed in its 150-page master plan, which was overhauled last year after a federal civil rights investigation found that English learners weren't getting the same quality education as other students in the district.

Under the new plan, the district is more closely monitoring the progress of its English learners, with tutoring and other forms of intervention available to those struggling with either language or academic lessons.

"The goal is to increase proficiency in elementary grades, before students get to middle and high school and get mired in the long-term category," said Hilda Maldonado, director of LAUSD's Multilingual and Multicultural Education Department.

"We're using more of the district's data system to be able to monitor the progress and achievement of our students."

The district also wants to remove the roadblocks impeding students who can't test out of the English-learner programs despite their obvious fluency. Beginning next year, Maldonado said, teachers will be assessing middle and high school students with the goal of getting students reclassified even if they can't hit the academic benchmarks on district tests.

THE DISCONNECT


Statewide, there is an apparent disconnect between the number of English learners who demonstrate proficiency on standardized tests and the number of students who matriculate out of the English learner program.

In 2010-11, nearly 40 percent of California's English learners made the grade in English on standardized tests, but only 11 percent were reclassified as fluent, according to the California Department of Education.

A South Bay district with a lower-than-average reclassification rate is the K-8 Hawthorne School District. Here, just 8 percent of English learners were deemed fluent in 2010-11, even though nearly 50 percent scored proficient or better on standardized English tests.

Hawthorne schools Superintendent Helen Morgan - whose schools are generally strong performers given their high rates of low-income families - makes no apologies for setting the bar high for reclassification.

"In our instance, the writing component is more of a hurdle, but we want to make sure they are good writers before we drop all the support," she said.

TORRANCE SCHOOLS

Torrance Unified seems to do a better-than-average job of getting students out of the program in a timely fashion.

For instance, in 2010-11, the latest data available, while just 11 percent of English learners in California were reclassified as fluent, in Torrance the figure was 14.4 percent.

Kati Krumpe, the district's director of state and federal programs, says reclassified students in Torrance tend to outperform many of their peers who were never in the English learner program.

"I think that shows that the program is working," she said.

As for the 39-year-old Padilla, he himself was an English learner as an elementary school student in the Los Angeles Unified School District. That was before California voters passed Proposition 227 in 1998, thereby ending mandatory bilingual education.

"My textbooks in first grade were 100 percent in Spanish," he said.

He is the rare example of an English learner who thrived, eventually earning a mechanical engineering degree from MIT.

Taking a step back, Padilla says the crux of the problem is a lack of urgency on this topic.

"English learners are a segment of the population that continues to grow," he said. "If the trend is on the way up, and the educational attainment level of English learners continues to stagnate, I think we have a perfect storm for a crisis. And many would say the crisis is already here."

______________________________________
SB 754 + ECONOMIC IMPACT AID (EIA) FUNDS

State Sen. Alex Padilla faults some school districts for banking money they receive from the state meant for English learners and low-income students. This year he passed a bill (SB 754) that seeks to provide more transparency with these funds.

Beginning Jan. 1, local school districts will be required to prominently post online their budgets and carryovers in these accounts, as well as explain why the money hasn’t been spent.

To find out how much money your local school district received in 2010-11 for these groups -- and the size of its reserve -- simply type the name of the district in the field.

The funds in question are known as “Economic Impact Aid,” or – as this chart says – EIA funds. The “reserve balance” is the unspent amount. The 2010-11 EIA entitlement is the amount those districts received that year.



LOS ANGELES UNIFIED
EIA restricted reserve balance as of June 30, 2006 $20,975,555
EIA restricted reserve balance as of June 30, 2007 $95,858,247
EIA restricted reserve balance as of June 30, 2008 $57,040,977
EIA restricted reserve balance as of June 30, 2009 $70,760,344
EIA restricted reserve balance as of June 30, 2010 $70,624,847
EIA restricted reserve balance as of June 30, 2011 $61,561,321

2010 - 2011 EIA entitlement $136,039,688
June 2011 reserve balance as % of 2010-11 entitlement 45.3%
EIA eligible pupils 2010-11 441,231
EIA per pupil rate 308.32
______________________________________

Staff Writer Barbara Jones contributed to this report.

Other School Districts EIA/ESL info available here


LESSONS FROM THE OTHER SIDE
PARA LOS NIÑOS CHARTER SCHOOL IN AN INDUSTRIAL PART OF DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES TURNS OUT TO BE A MODEL FOR WHAT UPSCALE PARENTS SAY THEY WANT FOR THEIR CHILDREN.

By Sandy Banks, LA Times columnist | http://lat.ms/UYFE4q

November 23, 2012, 4:39 p.m. :: It's not exactly where you might expect to find an example of public school success:

The campus is in a former flower mart, across the street from the Greyhound station and a short walk from skid row in an industrial area of downtown Los Angeles.

But inside the Para Los Niños Charter School, children defined by disadvantage are proving skeptics wrong.

I paid a visit to the school last month, after I'd mentioned it in a column about an effort by parents in nearby South Park to create a new Metro Charter school for children living in the upscale neighborhoods near LA Live downtown.

Some of those parents seem to have written off nearby Para Los Niños; it's too poor, too Latino, too linguistically deprived to offer their children enough of a challenge. They are business owners, architects, technology creators, accountants — not elitists, just upscale high-achievers worried that their dreams and the school's aspirations wouldn't be a good fit.

Those are the kinds of concerns on many middle-class minds. Para Los Niños is a magnified version of a city school system that gets less diverse and more economically challenged with every passing year.

Of the 410 students on Para Los Ninos' elementary campus, 99% are Latino and 96% hail from low-income families. More than two-thirds of the students are not fluent in English.

But the school is proving that demographics are not destiny.

Its test scores are on par with many suburban public schools. And its curriculum relies on the sort of child-centered approach favored by progressive private schools with five-figure tuition.

Admission is by lottery, and the school has twice as many applications as open spots some years. Most students live in the garment district, but others come from as far away as Lennox and Long Beach.

"If you had our parents in a room and asked how many want their kids to go to college, 100% would raise their hands," Principal Titus Campos told me.

Still, Campos knows that the school's student-body profile turns some parents off. "We hear it all the time," he said.

When they try to recruit in other neighborhoods to diversify enrollment, "the question asked most is 'Where do the children come from? Are they all Latino?'"

Does that matter?, I asked sixth-grader Ron Bellamy. He's biracial but looks black and didn't speak Spanish when he came to Para Los Niños four years ago.

"It was perplexing at first," Ron admitted. "But there was always somebody around to translate." Most of his classmates spoke both Spanish and English. Instruction after second grade is in English only.

What mattered most to Ron was not skin color or language but the well-stocked library, lively music classes and elaborate art projects, he said. "My other school didn't have any of that."

What would he say to parents worried that their non-Latino children wouldn't fit? "They'd get along just like all of us. We don't put people in groups," he said. "We don't judge by race."

::

Social issues are part of the calculus that parents use to choose. But what happens in the classroom is what matters most. And the reality of Para Los Niños seems to me surprisingly close to the prospective Metro Charter's goals:

The focus is on learning by doing and fostering personal growth. Teachers aren't required to "teach to the test" but to reward curiosity and nurture creative thinking.

And the school is beautiful inside, with student collaborations — giant murals, sculptures and collages — lining the hallways. It looks more like a hipster art museum than an elementary campus with skid row roots.

The charter was launched in 2002 by Para Los Niños, a 30-year-old nonprofit that pioneered social service programs for neglected children whose homeless parents were trapped by economics on skid row.

The neighborhood is students' laboratory and their lives the canvas for their discoveries. They take city buses to Disney Concert Hall, hike historic Sixth Street Bridge, study the architecture of Union Station and the history of Little Tokyo.

The school has an artist-in-residence and a team of visiting architects. Students practice math by designing their own playground, study anatomy by constructing a "human" body, learn about the ocean by creating an image out of glass beads, chicken wire and fabric scraps.

It may not be glamorous or high-tech, but the students I met and projects I saw make me believe it works.

::

My column on the campaign for a new Metro Charter drew applause for parents' efforts to create a downtown school that newcomers can shape through high standards.

But it also drew complaints about "boutique charters" that promote isolation and shortchange "impoverished children of color."

Para Los Niños Charter shows the choice is not so stark.

By using art as a forum for the study of math, science and history, Para Los Niños keeps its students from falling behind while they are still learning English.

That embodies the promise of the tax-funded charter movement: allowing unconventional schools to experiment in ways that will ultimately offer public school systems road-tested measures for raising student achievement.

Para Los Niños Charter works because it brings parents into the process, trusts its team to innovate and isn't hamstrung by district rigidity or by union rules. Teachers create their own lesson plans and can go where students' interests lead; the cafeteria ladies who serve the lunches also clean the tables after students eat.

And the principal is not above mopping up a sick child's vomit, or afraid to receive a second-grader's hug.

"The focus here," Campos said, "is on everybody doing whatever it takes to meet the children's needs."

That may not make it right for every family, but it does make the campus a model of what a charter should be:

Not just a refuge for students fleeing unsafe, uncomfortable or underachieving schools, but a testing ground for new ways of teaching that broaden children's possibilities.



••smf’s 2¢: The PLN model of serving severely impacted inner-city children is exemplary; the kind of thing that charter schools can do in “out-neighborhood-ing” neighborhood schools – rather than out-competing the LAUSD big-box model with another corporate model. Thank you Sandy Banks for recognizing that PLN is a testing ground for everyone to do better - though I wish you wouldn’t fall into the trap of reporting things like the alternative being “unsafe, uncomfortable or underachieving schools”. Children are at their safest when they are in school, whether in the ‘hood or in Westwood or at PLN. They are probably safer in traditional District public schools because most charter schools are not built to the rigorous California Field Act seismic standards or Green Oaks fire safety standards.


LAO REPORT: THE 2013-14 BUDGET: California’s Fiscal Outlook
…your rose-colored-glasses are located in a compartment under the center armrest.

From the 11/20 CCSA email to their members:

The Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) released its annual Fiscal Outlook last week, updating its projections on the state’s fiscal situation. With the passage of Propositions 30 and 39, the LAO reports that “the budget situation has improved sharply” and that we can expect increases to Proposition 98 education funding in both the current year and in 2013-14, with steady increases of about $3 billion per year thereafter.

The LAO suggests that this new funding could be used to begin paying off maintenance factor obligations and deferrals, provide Cost of Living Adjustments and equalize funding. As a reminder, the Governor will issue his budget plan for 2013-14 in mid-January 2013.

The LAO Report: EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
[link to complete report follows]

BUDGET SITUATION HAS IMPROVED SHARPLY.

The state’s economic recovery, prior budget cuts, and the additional, temporary taxes provided by Proposition 30 have combined to bring California to a promising moment: the possible end of a decade of acute state budget challenges.

Our economic and budgetary forecast indicates that California’s leaders face a dramaticallysmaller budget problem in 2013-14 compared to recent years. Furthermore, assuming steadyeconomic growth and restraint in augmenting current program funding levels, there is a strong possibility of multibillion-dollar operating surpluses within a few years.

THE BUDGET FORECAST


Projected $1.9 Billion Budget Problem to Be Addressed by June 2013. The 2012-13 budget assumed a year-end reserve of $948 million. Our forecast now projects the General Fund ending 2012-13 with a $943 million deficit, due to the net impact of (1) $625 million of lower revenues in 2011-12 and 2012-13 combined, (2) $2.7 billion in higher expenditures (including $1.8 billion in lower-than-budgeted savings related to the dissolution of redevelopment agencies), and (3) an assumed $1.4 billion positive adjustment in the 2010-11 ending budgetary fund balance. We also expect that the state faces a $936 million operating deficit under current policies in 2013-14. These estimates mean that the new Legislature and the Governor will need to address a $1.9 billion budget problem in order to pass a balanced budget by June 2013 for the next fiscal year.

Surpluses Projected Over the Next Few Years. Based on current law and our economic forecast, expenditures are projected to grow less rapidly than revenues. Beyond 2013-14, we therefore project growing operating surpluses through 2017-18—the end of our forecast period.

Our projections show that there could be an over $1 billion operating surplus in 2014-15, growing thereafter to an over $9 billion surplus in 2017-18. This outlook differs dramatically from the severe operating deficits we have forecast in November Fiscal Outlook reports over the past decade.

LAO COMMENTS

Despite Positive Outlook, Caution Is Appropriate. Our multiyear budget forecast depends on a number of key economic, policy, and budgetary assumptions. For example, we assume steady growth in the economy and stock prices. We also assume—as the state’s recent economic forecasts have—that federal officials take actions to avoid the near-term economic problems associated with the so-called “fiscal cliff.” Consistent with state law, our forecast omits cost-of-living adjustments for most state departments, the courts, universities, and state employees. The forecast also assumes no annual transfers into a state reserve account provided by Proposition 58 (2004). Changes in these assumptions could dramatically lower—or even eliminate—our projected out-year operating surpluses.

Considering Future Budget Surpluses. If, however, a steady economic recovery continues and the Legislature and the Governor keep a tight rein on state spending in the next couple of years, there is a strong likelihood that the state will have budgetary surpluses in subsequent years. The state has many choices for what to do with these surpluses. We advise the state’s leaders to begin building the reserve envisioned by Proposition 58 (2004) as soon as possible.

Beyond building a reserve, the state must develop strategies to address outstanding retirement liabilities—particularly for the teachers’ retirement system—and other liabilities. The state will also be able to selectively restore recent program cuts—particularly in Proposition 98 programs (based on steady projected growth in the minimum guarantee).

LAO REPORT: The 2013-14 Budget:California’s Fiscal Outlook


WHAT SHOULD CHILDREN READ? + smf’s 2¢
By Sara Mosle in Opinionator – Exclusive Online Commentary from the New York Times | http://nyti.ms/UjFJ6b

November 22, 2012, 7:58 pm :: Malcolm Gladwell, author of “The Tipping Point” and a New Yorker staff writer, told me how he prepared, years ago, to write his first “Talk of the Town” story. “Talk” articles have a distinct style, and he wanted to make sure he got the voice straight in his head before he began writing. His approach was simple. He sat down and read 100 “Talk” pieces, one after the other.

The story nicely illustrates how careful reading can advance great writing. As a schoolteacher, I offer Mr. Gladwell’s story to students struggling with expository writing as evidence that they need not labor alone. There are models out there — if only they’ll read them!

Mr. Gladwell’s tale provides a good lesson for English teachers across the country as they begin to implement the Common Core State Standards, a set of national benchmarks, adopted by nearly every state, for the skills public school students should master in language arts and mathematics in grades K-12.

The standards won’t take effect until 2014, but many public school systems have begun adjusting their curriculums to satisfy the new mandates. Depending on your point of view, the now contentious guidelines prescribe a healthy — or lethal — dose of nonfiction.

For example, the Common Core dictates that by fourth grade, public school students devote half of their reading time in class to historical documents, scientific tracts, maps and other “informational texts” — like recipes and train schedules. Per the guidelines, 70 percent of the 12th grade curriculum will consist of nonfiction titles. Alarmed English teachers worry we’re about to toss Shakespeare so students can study, in the words of one former educator, “memos, technical manuals and menus.”

David Coleman, president of the College Board, who helped design and promote the Common Core, says English classes today focus too much on self-expression. “It is rare in a working environment,” he’s argued, “that someone says, ‘Johnson, I need a market analysis by Friday but before that I need a compelling account of your childhood.’ ”

This and similar comments have prompted the education researcher Diane Ravitch to ask, “Why does David Coleman dislike fiction?” and to question whether he’s trying to eliminate English literature from the classroom. “I can’t imagine a well-developed mind that has not read novels, poems and short stories,” she writes.

Sandra Stotsky, a primary author of Massachusetts’ state standards (which are credited with helping to maintain that state’s top test scores) challenges the assumption that nonfiction requires more rigor than a literary novel. One education columnist sums up the debate as a fiction versus nonfiction “smackdown.”

A striking assumption animates arguments on both sides, namely that nonfiction is seldom literary and certainly not literature. Even Mr. Coleman erects his case on largely dispiriting, utilitarian grounds: nonfiction may help you win the corner office but won’t necessarily nourish the soul.

As an English teacher and writer who traffics in factual prose, I’m with Mr. Coleman. In my experience, students need more exposure to nonfiction, less to help with reading skills, but as a model for their own essays and expository writing, what Mr. Gladwell sought by ingesting “Talk of the Town” stories.

I love fiction and poetry as much as the next former English major and often despair over the quality of what passes for “informational texts,” few of which amount to narrative much less literary narrative.

What schools really need isn’t more nonfiction but better nonfiction, especially that which provides good models for student writing. Most students could use greater familiarity with what newspaper, magazine and book editors call “narrative nonfiction”: writing that tells a factual story, sometimes even a personal one, but also makes an argument and conveys information in vivid, effective ways.

What Tom Wolfe once said about New Journalism could be applied to most student writing. It benefits from intense reporting, immersion in a subject, imaginative scene setting, dialogue and telling details. These are the very skills most English teachers want students to develop. What’s odd is how rarely such literary nonfiction appears on English — or other class — reading lists. In addition to a biology textbook, for example, why can’t more high school students read “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks”?

Narrative nonfiction also provides a bridge between the personal narratives students typically write in elementary school and the essays on external subjects that are more appropriate assignments in high school and beyond. David Coleman may dismiss self-expression. Yet he recommends authors, like the surgeon and medical writer Atul Gawande, who frequently rely on personal storytelling in their reporting.

Models of narrative nonfiction are everywhere, on programs like “This American Life” and “Radiolab,” in nonfiction books for young adults, like “Sugar Changed the World” (which is about slavery and science in the pursuit of the food additive), and even in graphic nonfiction works, like “Persepolis,” which tells the story of a young woman who grew up in Iran during the Islamic Revolution. Each has a personal angle that students can relate to but is also a genuinely enthralling narrative. Adult titles, like “The Omnivore’s Dilemma,” already have young readers editions, and many adult general-interest works, such as Timothy Ferris’s “The Whole Shebang,” about the workings of the universe, are appropriate for advanced high-school students.

Most readily, narrative nonfiction is available every day of the week in the dwindling outlets for long-form journalism. Students are a natural (and the future) audience for serious, in-depth reporting. Skilled practitioners can demonstrate the power of facts, and provide models — topic sentence by topic sentence — for compelling narrative.

There are anthologies of great literature and primary documents, but why not “30 for Under 20: Great Nonfiction Narratives?” Until such editions appear, teachers can find complex, literary works in collections like “The Best American Science and Nature Writing,” on many newspaper Web sites, which have begun providing online lesson plans using articles for younger readers, and on ProPublica.org. Last year, The Atlantic compiled examples of the year’s best journalism, and The Daily Beast has its feature “Longreads.” Longform.org not only has “best of” contemporary selections but also historical examples dating back decades.

If students read 100 such articles over the course of a year, they may not become best-selling authors, but like Mr. Gladwell, they’ll get the sound and feel of good writing in their heads. With luck, when they graduate, there will still be ranks of literary nonfiction authors left for them to join.

Sara Mosle has written about public education for The New York Times, The New Yorker and Slate, among many other publications. A member of the first Teach for America’s corps in 1990, she has taught in New York City public schools and currently teaches sixth-grade English at St. Philip’s Academy in Newark, which will become a public charter school as of September 2013. Ms. Mosle is also the author of a forthcoming book about a school explosion in 1937 in New London, Tex., which killed hundreds of children. She lives in Montclair, N.J., where her daughter attends public school.
_____


••smf’s 2¢: “Fiction is something that never happened, not something that isn’t true”. And children should be encouraged to read everything …and discouraged from reading nothing. . Comics. Classics. Cereal boxes. Novels. Textbooks. Poetry. People Magazine and The Atlantic. The idea that children’s reading should be metered or determined by an algorithm isn’t preposterous, it’s evil.

And to say that modern non-fiction writing doesn’t have its roots in fiction not only misses the importance and contribution of Shakespeare but also of Melville and Twain and Hemingway and Fitzgerald – and certainly of Capote and Kurt Vonnegut and Hunter S. Thompson and Tom Wolfe.

The Gladwell story is about The New Yorker – a journal of exceptional content that is mostly non-fiction – but with roots in short and long form fiction; poetry, criticism and social commentary. And some fine cartoons. ‘I say it’s non-fiction and I say the hell with it.’

David Coleman has been president of the College Board for exactly one month and 25 days. He writes neither fiction nor non-fiction; he markets tests for a living. Before he went to the College Board - a nonprofit where they pay him almost $750,000 a year to promote the SAT and AP Tests and the Common Core State Standards (NY Times: “…full adoption of the standards is uncertain — and the possibility that all states would agree to use the same tests and passing scores a distant fantasy…”) Coleman was a consultant with McKinsey & Co, a global management consulting firm {“We are the trusted advisor to the world's leading businesses, governments, and institutions”] . Coleman also started a company that became a leading provider of assessment reporting and customized content for states and large school districts across the country; that company was sold to textbook publisher McGraw-Hill. http://nyti.ms/10tMPra |http://bit.ly/UXNNpZ | http://bit.ly/Womia3

Follow the money/Connect the dots: Coleman is the tester-in-chief for the wonderful folks at School ®eform, LLP. He has Arne and Jeb Bush and Bill Gates and Eli Broad on his speed dial.

Coleman’s hypothetical boss’s hypothetical writing assignment is this: “Johnson: Tell me the story of the market analysis.” And Gentle
Reader - let’s be real: If Johnson can’t make the market analysis compelling+personal he’s gonna be looking for other employment after Friday.
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources LAUSD’s REVAMPED TEACHER EVALUATION SYSTEM GETTING MIXED GRADE: Teachers are finding value in the new evaluation... http://bit.ly/10BDxK1

ICEF: FINANCIALLY TROUBLED CHARTER SCHOOL COMPANY SAYS FINANCES NOW IN ORDER: By Adolfo Guzman-Lopez | Pass Fail... http://bit.ly/WNOOXz

LOW-INCOME STUDENTS GET CRASH COURSE IN COLLEGE PREPARATION: Low-income and immigration-status-challenged studen... http://bit.ly/UCR9jV

AFTER MORE THAN A DECADE, DISTRICTS, CHARTERS MAKING PEACE OVER FACILITIES: …or so says the Charter School Association... http://bit.ly/10wtTbi

Failing a test that really matters (continued): MORE THAN HALF OF LAUSD STUDENTS OVERWEIGHT: By Barbara Jones, S... http://bit.ly/10MB3r7

LAO Report: The 2013-14 Budget - CALIFORNIA’S FISCAL OUTLOOK: …your rose-colored-glasses are located in a compar... http://bit.ly/SNJM74

Poll: PROP 30 DREW SUPPORT FROM YOUTH, MINORITIES: By Isha Kawatra • Daily Trojan | http://bit.ly/RQXKqg Nov 19... http://bit.ly/SNs0Rt

The privatization of the University of California: THE FIGHT TO SAVE EDUCATION MUST CONTINUE: Op-Ed By Elana Ede... http://bit.ly/WtbU5s

DUNCAN SKETCHES OUT SECOND-TERM AGENDA, says NCLB waivers “make no sense”: By Michele McNeil, Education Week | h... http://bit.ly/Uea3NS

David Tokofsky: Congrats LAUSD for putting aside nearly 300 million in case prop 30 did not pass...now what to do with that money? Retweeted by smf

CAMPUS CUISINE: Serving up the exceptions and the challenges …but not the acorn squash + L.A. Unified student stores... http://bit.ly/U6E2qK

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

• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR


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!.

Who are your elected federal & state representatives? How do you contact them?



Scott Folsom is a parent leader in LAUSD and is Parent/Volunteer of the Year for 2010-11 for Los Angeles County. • He is Past President of Los Angeles Tenth District PTSA and represented PTA on the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee for ten years. He is a Health Commissioner, Legislation Team member and a member of the Board of Managers of the California State PTA. He serves on numerous school district advisory and policy committees and has served as a PTA officer and governance council member at three LAUSD schools. He is the recipient of the UTLA/AFT 2009 "WHO" Gold Award for his support of education and public schools - an honor he hopes to someday deserve. • In this forum his opinions are his own and your opinions and feedback are invited. Quoted and/or cited content copyright © the original author and/or publisher. All other material copyright © 4LAKids.
• FAIR USE NOTICE: This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. 4LAKids makes such material available in an effort to advance understanding of education issues vital to parents, teachers, students and community members in a democracy. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
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Sunday, November 18, 2012

Blink. Blinked. Blank.


Onward! 4LAKids
4LAKids: Sunday 18•Nov•2012 Mickey Mouse's B'day
In This Issue:
 •  LAUSD RESCINDS FURLOUGHS, EXTENDS YEAR; REJECTS CHARTER MORATORIUM + OVERSIGHT; APPOINTS NEW FACILITIES + FOOD SERVICES EXECS
 •  GATES FUNDED HARVARD STUDY EVALUATES TEACHER EFFECTIVENESS IN LAUSD AS MEASURED BY STUDENTS’ STANDARDIZED TEST SCORES IN MATH
 •  TO PREVENT SEX ABUSE SCANDALS, EMPOWER WHISTLE-BLOWERS + smf’s 2¢
 •  Failing a test that really matters: ONLY 31% OF CALIFORNIA STUDENTS ARE PHYSICALLY FIT + smf’s 2¢:
 •  HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources
 •  EVENTS: Coming up next week...
 •  What can YOU do?


Featured Links:
 •  OUR CHILDREN, OUR FUTURE: What will California schoolchildren, your school district and YOUR School get when the initiative passes?
 •  Follow 4 LAKids on Twitter - or get instant updates via text message by texting
 •  4LAKids Anthology: All the Past Issues, solved, resolved and unsolved!
 •  4LAKidsNews: a compendium of recent items of interest - news stories, scurrilous rumors, links, academic papers, rants and amusing anecdotes, etc.
ON TUESDAY the Board of Ed, flush with the voter’s mandate+ cash from the passage of Prop 30 Rescinded the Furloughs and Restored the School Year. For that which we are about to receive we are truly thankful.

ON WEDNESDAY an interesting thing happened at the meeting of the LAUSD Bond Oversight Committee.

The superintendent presented the program previously called Tablets for All (or iPads for All) and now is called the District’s Common Core State Curriculum Technology Initiative – his signature plan to deliver a digital device – a tablet, a laptop, a netbook, a smart phone or an iPad – into the hand of every student in the District. Along with the servers, wireless routers, digital backbone and requisite software, firmware, hardware and apps needed to support the network.

A computer for every student. One-to-One. That’s 600,000+ digital devices …and a lot of other stuff.

The conversation was deep and through. The superintendent’s argument was well made. BOC chair Steve English argued convincingly that portable wireless computing platforms are the educational infrastructure of the 21st century.

Wednesday’s proposal was to do a pilot and program evaluation and I’m convinced the pilot should be tried and evaluated. If not now, when? (On Aug 9th it seemed like the superintendent and Dr. Aquino were headed to the Apple Store with the Bond fund checkbook! - http://bit.ly/MGUKrO )

That the pilot program cost of $17.4 million was to be borrowed from funds previously-borrowed-and-recently-paid-back – promised for Early Childhood Ed facilities construction (NOT operation) is worrisome. All presenters – from IT, Facilities and the supe's office – assured the BOC that that loan would be repaid ASAP from future bond sales and/or state funds already due the District. There are no ECED programs in the construction pipeline and we know where the payback is coming from.

The reporting in the press that the devices to be purchased are to be tablets or I-Pads oversimplifies the program – there would need to be a public contract bidding process to select the platform(s) and vendor(s) – and almost certainly the devices would be a mixture of portable devices, including tablets and laptop computing platforms.

The LA Times: “The entire proposal is estimated to cost about $450 million for equipment and additional funding to set up wireless Internet access at schools” grossly underestimates the total cost. The main goal of the of the pilot program would be identify the full cost – but it is pretty well established that the total program cost would be closer to a billion dollars than half a billion – not counting debt service.

Other outstanding and as-yet-unanswered questions – questions that must be addressed in the pilot – before any more funding goes ahead – concern:

• Will students be able to take the devices home?
• Can vendors guarantee a ten year lifecycle of small computing devices in daily use by 600,000 young people?
• How the labor cost of technological maintenance over time at school sites – which must be paid from the general fund and not bonds – will be paid?
• …and what will be the effect on the school facilities brick-and-mortar/building-improvement-and-modernization program of reducing the Measure Q bond investment of $6 billion by $1 billion?

•• “A billion here, a billion there, pretty soon, you're talking real money.” – Attributed to Sen. .Everett Dirksen.

The Bond Oversight Committee meeting was not fully attended – four BOC members were absent. When the superintendent’s plan was voted on it got seven votes for, three against.

● from the BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE BYLAWS: Section 3. Voting: Recommendations to the District to approve or disapprove a project must be approved by a majority of the active members of the Citizens’ Oversight Committee.

There are 14 active members, it needed 8 votes. A yes vote by any of the absent four would have brought approval.

But that’s not the interesting thing – that’s only parliamentary procedure. Next month the motion could be brought back and approval almost certainly secured. (After all, Mayor Tony’s representative [and the alternate] to the BOC was one of the ones absent – surely one of the two could show up and vote Aye!)

THE INTERESTING THING IS THAT THE SUPERINTENDENT BLINKED. He immediately announced that he was withdrawing the entire proposal: Pilot+Plan – blaming the Oversight Committee | http://bit.ly/T8WAJ4.

Were the questions too probing? The answers potentially too uncomfortable and/or unworkable? Would the Board of Ed balk? – or ask more questions? Was the superintendent’s mind changed? Did the paradigm shift?

And without the technology, how will the kids take the interactive online Common Core State Standards tests?* What is CCSS about if not those tests?

¡Onward/Adelante! – smf


* They are State (rather than Federal) Standards because the Gates Foundation, not the US Dept of Ed came up with them – and ‘voluntarily imposed’ them on the states. The word for this is “Voluntold”.

In my opinion there is a race
For a place at the bottom of the pile
Is neither completely conceived nor is it ill advised
It just simply satisfies a basic need
We are few, we are few, we are few
We are few, we are few, we are few
     –“For Which We Are Truly Thankful”, Lambchop (Kurt Wagner)



LAUSD RESCINDS FURLOUGHS, EXTENDS YEAR; REJECTS CHARTER MORATORIUM + OVERSIGHT; APPOINTS NEW FACILITIES + FOOD SERVICES EXECS

►LAUSD RESCINDS FURLOUGHS; SCHOOL WILL END ON JUNE 7 THIS YEAR
By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer LA Daily News | http://bit.ly/UGqu3J

Posted: 11/13/2012 12:51:19 PM PST /Updated: 6:58:55 PM PST :: Thanks to voter-approved Proposition 30, Los Angeles Unified students will attend school for 180 days this year, the first time since the 2008 financial crisis that the district's academic calendar won't be shortened by a lack of money.

The school board voted unanimously Tuesday to rescind 10 employee furlough days, which included five instructional days for students.

School will end on June 7 rather than on May 31 as previously scheduled.

Teachers, administrators, school police, clerks and the employees who make up the district's 60,000-member workforce will be reimbursed for three furlough days taken so far this year, and additional days will be canceled.

Schools will still be closed Thanksgiving week, but those lost days will be added on to the end of the school year.

Proposition 30, which was approved Nov. 6 by 54 percent of California's voters, is expected to generate about $6 billion annually by raising the sales tax by a quarter-percent for four years and the tax rate for incomes of more than $250,000 for seven years.

The revenue will stabilize the budgets of districts statewide by reimbursing them for payments that have been deferred since California sank into recession in 2008. This year, for instance, LAUSD should have received $6,718 per student, but got only $5,221.


LAUSD REJECTS VOLUNTARY MORATORIUM ON NEW CHARTER SCHOOLS
By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer LA Daily News | http://bit.ly/T1aSuk

Posted: 11/13/2012 12:36:02 PM PST/Updated: 7:13:30 PM PST :: Following a flood of protests from parents and charter supporters, the Los Angeles Unified board on Tuesday soundly rejected a resolution seeking a voluntary moratorium on new charter applications while a strategic plan is developed to better govern their explosive growth.

Board member Steve Zimmer said he saw the need for an in-depth study of the district's charter system, which now educates some 110,000 students and has thousands more on waiting lists. He wanted to monitor how well charter schools are educating students and ways to share methods for closing the achievement gap and boosting parental involvement.

"The milestone of 100,000 is a moment in which we should step back and reflect on what is working in our role as (charter) operator and what isn't," he said. "We need to have a real strategy and a real plan."

But parents and charter supporters saw his resolution as a challenge to their right to choose the appropriate school for their child, with speakers sharing personal stories of how charters had changed their lives.

"You shouldn't just vote against the resolution," said parent Katrina George, whose handicapped son struggled at a traditional school but thrived once he was enrolled in a charter. "You should do the opposite and open more charters. At the end of the day, this should be about the kids."

Zimmer's colleagues said they'd tried to talk him out of pursuing the resolution, and Superintendent John Deasy said it was unnecessary.

"The work can be done without the resolution," Deasy said.

In the end, Zimmer and board member Bennett Kayser cast the only yes votes for the resolution. Board member Marguerite Poindexter LaMotte had left during the debate and was not present for the vote.

Zimmer's original resolution, introduced in September, called on the board to postpone or refer new charter applications to the Los Angeles County Office of Education. Critics noted that would be illegal, and he revised the proposal to ask charter operators to voluntarily hold off on submitting new applications until a timetable was in place for the suggested reforms.

Parents signed petitions and as many as 2,000 demonstrators flooded the street in front of LAUSD during a lunchtime protest. Most were gone by the time the board got through a lengthy agenda.

"We're not the enemy," said charter pioneer Joe Lucente, repeating comments he made during the demonstration. "Our very existence benefits all students, whether in traditional or charter schools... Don't fear us, embrace us."

The board also wrestled with arequest to renew the charter for Gabriella Charter, which shares space with Logan Span School in Echo Park. Parents from both schools - both of them thriving - said there just wasn't room on the campus to meet the needs of the students.

The board OK'd the extension with the charter, which boasts an arts education program and an API of 894, with the understanding that Deasy will try to find additional space for Gabriella.

Zimmer said it was just this sort of situation - "a collision of goodness" - he wanted to avoid when he introduced his resolution.

"The system has become about competition and not innovation," he said.

"I want to know what we can do best when we collaborate."

Board members Tamar Galatzan and Nury Martinez admonished Zimmer that he could not work around Proposition 39, the voter-approved measure that requires school districts to accommodate space requests from independent charters.

"Ten years ago, voters approved Prop. 39," Martinez said. "To continue to have these debates when you know what the law is polarizes hundreds of thousands of parents ... Be done with it, Mr. Zimmer."


LAUSD APPOINTS NEW HEADS OF FACILITIES AND FOOD SERVICES DIVISIONS
By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer LA Daily News | http://bit.ly/RTIcn8

Posted: 11/13/2012 04:35:03 PM PST :: The interim directors of LAUSD's Facilities and Food Services divisions were appointed by the school board Tuesday to the permanent posts.

Mark Hovatter, an engineer who has worked for Los Angeles Unified for more than 25 years, will oversee the multi-billion dollar Facilities Division, which is responsible for construction, maintenance and leasing of the district's schools, offices and other properties. He will earn $218,780 a year. He succeeds Kelly Schmader, who left in June to take the top facilities job at UCLA.

David Binkle will be responsible for the division that serves up 650,000 meals daily at schools across the sprawling district. He will earn $142,540 a year. He is a master chef who joined the district in 2007 as the No. 2 to Dennis Barrett, who retired earlier this year.


GATES FUNDED HARVARD STUDY EVALUATES TEACHER EFFECTIVENESS IN LAUSD AS MEASURED BY STUDENTS’ STANDARDIZED TEST SCORES IN MATH

NEW L.A. TEACHERS TOO OFTEN PLACED WITH NEEDIEST STUDENTS, STUDY FINDS
By Teresa Watanabe, LA Times/LA Now | http://lat.ms/TWfwc3

November 16, 2012 | 5:38 pm :: A new study has found that inexperienced teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District are disproportionately more likely to be assigned to lower-performing math students, perpetuating the achievement gap.

The study also found that L.A. Unified teachers “vary substantially” in their effectiveness, with top teachers able to give students the equivalent of eight additional months of learning in a year compared with weaker instructors.

Such findings raise “deep concerns,” said Drew Furedi, the district’s executive director of talent management who oversees teacher training. “For us, it’s a call to action.”

The study by the Strategic Data Project, which is affiliated with Harvard University’s Center for Education Policy Research, analyzed the performance of about 30% of L.A. Unified teachers based primarily on their students’ standardized math test scores from 2005 through 2011 in grades three through eight. The study stressed that test scores were only one measure of teacher effectiveness.

The study also found that teacher performance after two years is a fairly good predictor of future effectiveness. That finding could be used to challenge growing moves to overturn laws that give tenure to teachers after just a few years by those who argue administrators need more time to make that decision.

“Two years gives you a substantial amount of information,” said Jon Fullerton, the center’s executive director. [••smf: Before coming to Harvard, Jon served as the Board of Education’s director of budget and financial policy for the Los Angeles Unified School District.]

Fullerton said that L.A. Unified teachers varied more than those in three other school districts studied in North Carolina and Georgia. More so than in the other districts, Los Angeles schools also disproportionately placed newer teachers with less-proficient students –- who are an average six months behind peers assigned to more experienced instructors.

The study did not explore the reason for those findings but was aimed at providing “information and insight” to the district to craft responses, Fullerton said.

In other findings, the performance of math teachers improved quickly in the first five years, then leveled off. Those with advanced degrees are no more effective than those without, although L.A. Unified pays more to teachers pursuing them. And long-term substitute teachers, who have been employed more frequently to fill in amid widespread layoffs, have positive effects in teaching middle-school math but not in other subjects.

No single finding can produce a strategy to erase the district’s substantial achievement gap between white students and their black and Latino classmates, the study said, noting that the difference in performance on fifth-grade math tests is roughly equivalent to more than one and half years of learning. Multiple strategies will be needed, the study said.

Furedi said one key area of action would be the placement of effective teachers with lower-performing students. L.A. Supt. John Deasy has made it clear that principals should strive to “understand where teachers are and place those with success in front of kids who need them most," Furedi said.



ANALYSIS SHOWS DIFFERENCES IN TEACHER EFFECTIVENESS IN LAUSD
By John Fensterwald, EdSource Today | http://bit.ly/QOwKe2

November 15th, 2012 :: In Los Angeles Unified, novice teachers tend to be assigned students who are academically farther behind those assigned to experienced teachers. Before they depart, usually after only two years, Teach for America teachers have a bigger impact on students than that of other new teachers. And National Board Certified teachers significantly outperform other teachers in LAUSD.

These are among the findings of an extensive six-year study of about a third of teachers in LAUSD by the Strategic Data Project, which is affiliated with the Center for Education Policy Research at Harvard University. Researchers have conducted similar analyses of teacher recruitment, development and retention patterns in three dozen school districts and charter organizations nationwide, under work funded by the Gates Foundation. LAUSD’s report, which was released Wednesday, could become a key resource as the district and United Teachers Los Angeles negotiate changes to teacher evaluations and other parts of the teachers’ contract.

The finding with perhaps the biggest implication quantified significant disparities in effectiveness among the district’s elementary and middle school teachers, as measured by students’ standardized test scores. Researchers found that the difference between a math teacher in the 75th percentile – those whose students performed better than three quarters of other students – and a teacher in the 25th percentile was the roughly equivalent benefit to a student of having eight additional months of instruction in a calendar year (technically one quarter of a standard deviation). The differences were greater than the average of the other districts studied nationwide, although similar to the differences found in San Diego Unified. The study covered only 30 percent of teachers in the district – those whose students take the California Standards Tests, primarily elementary and middle school teachers. The differences between teachers whose students take the English language arts tests were less pronounced than with math.

Researchers used a method similar to the district’s controversial Academic Growth over Time, which factors in students’ past test scores and socioeconomic background to determine their teachers’ impact. LAUSD has used the method to rate individual teachers. Because ratings fluctuate significantly year to year, the method has been criticized as a tool for evaluating teachers. But Jon Fullerton, director of the Center for Education Policy Research, said that the method is useful for aggregate trends using group averages of teacher effectiveness – comparing novice and experienced teachers, or measuring the effectiveness of teachers with advanced academic degrees.

Drew Furedi, LAUSD’s executive director for talent management, acknowledged in an interview that test scores are just one of the multiple measures the district will use to measure effectiveness. But the data in the report, he said, most immediately “will help our understanding of placement strategies and distribution challenges in the system.”

Among other findings:
Only about one out of six Teach for America teachers return to teach in Los Angeles Unified after three years. Source: SDP Human Capital Diagnostic in the Los Angeles Unified. (Click to enlarge.)

Only about one out of six Teach for America teachers return to teach in Los Angeles Unified after three years. Source: SDP Human Capital Diagnostic in the Los Angeles Unified. (Click to enlarge.)

New teachers hired through Teach for America and the district’s own Career Ladder program, encouraging paraprofessionals to become teachers, have a positive effect ­– equal to two months and one month extra of instruction respectively in math – compared with other novice teachers. However, about two-thirds of Teach for America teachers, recruited from top colleges nationwide, leave the district after the program’s required two years, while more Career Ladder teachers continue on – a factor LAUSD will want to consider. Over the past several year, about one out of eight teachers were hired through the two programs. Furedi said that the district may do a similar analysis of other teacher preparation programs.

Novice and early career elementary teachers disproportionately are assigned struggling students – those entering the year an average of six months behind their peers. Novices not only are disproportionately assigned to schools with lower achieving students, but also are given more struggling students than experienced teachers within schools. Since experienced teachers on average are more effective, “this is a call to action, for better strategic placement of teachers for student outcomes,” Fullerton said Wednesday in a webinar announcing the results.

Math teachers in LAUSD improve substantially over time in the classroom – roughly equal to an additional three months of instruction by their fifth year. Improvement in English language arts is less dramatic.

Of the teachers who were laid off, 45 percent were in the top two quartiles of effective teachers in Los Angeles Unified. Source: SDP Human Capital Diagnostic in the Los Angeles Unified. (Click to enlarge.)

Of the teachers who were laid off, 45 percent were in the top two quartiles of effective teachers in Los Angeles Unified. Source: SDP Human Capital Diagnostic in the Los Angeles Unified. (Click to enlarge.)

Even though they are automatically paid more under the current salary system, LAUSD teachers with advanced academic degrees are no more effective than those who lack them. However, teachers with a National Board Certification outperform other teachers, by roughly two months of additional math instruction and one month of additional ELA instruction over a year. This could reflect the benefits of the program or the quality of the teachers who pursue certification, the study said. Only about 4 percent of LAUSD teachers have board certification, and most of those teach in high-performing schools, indicating the district may want to encourage placement in schools with greater needs.

In a finding with implications for a state law and district policy requiring layoffs by seniority, the study found that teachers who were laid off in LAUSD as a result of budget cuts were about as effective as teachers who kept their jobs. Since most of the laid-off teachers were less experienced, a slightly higher proportion – 55 percent – were in the bottom two quartiles of performance. However, that also meant that 45 percent of those let go were in the top two quartiles of performers, who, under a more rigorous evaluation system deemphasizing seniority, might retain their jobs.

From the Study: SUMMARY FINDINGS:

1. Teacher effects vary substantially in LAUSD, more than in many other districts. The difference between a 25th and 75th percentile elementary math teacher is over one-quarter of a standard deviation, which is roughly equivalent to a student having eight additional months of instruction in a calendar year.
2. Teach for America and Career Ladder teachers have higher math effects on average than other novices in their first year by 0.05 and 0.03 standard deviations respectively, which is roughly equivalent to one to two months of additional learning. These differences persist over time.
3. LAUSD has increased its reliance on extended substitutes in the last several years. Relative to other new hires in middle school, extended substitutes have large positive effects in math, though not in other subjects.
4. First-year teachers are assigned to students who begin the year academically behind students assigned to more experienced teachers.
5. Early-career elementary teachers change grade assignments at higher rates than more experienced teachers. Teachers have slightly lower effects after a change in grade assignment than those who do not change grades.
6. LAUSD math teachers show substantial growth in effectiveness during their first five years in the classroom with a 0.12 standard deviation gain in their average teacher effect, which is roughly equivalent to three additional months of instruction in a calendar year.
7. LAUSD teachers with advanced degrees do not have higher effects, on average, than their colleagues without such degrees.
8. On average, National Board Certified teachers outperform other teachers with the same levels of experience by 0.07 and 0.03 standard deviations in elementary math and English/language arts (ELA) respectively, which is roughly equivalent to two months of additional math instruction and one month of additional ELA instruction.
9. Performance in the first few years of teaching, as measured by teacher effects, is predictive of later performance. In fact, in the third year of teaching, teachers who previously had high teacher effects for two years (the top 25 percent) outperform teachers who previously demonstrated low teacher effects (the bottom 25 percent) by almost seven months of instruction.
10. Teachers who were laid off in 2008-09 and 2009-10 had similar average teacher effects as their colleagues who were not laid off.

••smf’s 2¢:
1. One must take into account the funder of the report. That said, just because the Gates Foundation paid for it doesn’t mean it’s entirely bogus!
2. There are no authors attached to this report, it is an anonymous work.
3. It is not peer reviewed
4. Compounding and publishing data for hire is not the same as scholarly research.
5. The report relies almost exclusively on Math standardized test score results, The report itself says “other research suggest(s) that other factors outside of the classroom have a larger influence on children’s ELA performance (and) current research also suggests that ELA state tests may also be less sensitive to instruction”. One must conclude that “other factors outside the classroom” means poverty, the language spoken in the home and parent’s education. In Los Angeles this means where you live.


The Study: SDP HUMAN CAPITAL DIAGNOSTIC, Los Angeles Unified School District November 2012



TO PREVENT SEX ABUSE SCANDALS, EMPOWER WHISTLE-BLOWERS + smf’s 2¢

by Alexandra Le Tellier | LA Times/Opinion LA | http://lat.ms/QesTqF

November 14, 2012, 3:02 p.m. :: It’s disappointing to see leaders, public figures and CEOs undone by sex scandals. But it becomes a tragedy when these cases are of an abusive nature. And worse yet, when they’re kept quiet, leaving the victims even more powerless.

The Penn State case, in which Jerry Sandusky abused young boys while Joe Paterno and administrators worried more about the institution than the victims, was a harsh reminder that we can’t blindly trust people, even respected members of our communities. Britons are going through a similar shock after allegations surfaced that Jimmy Savile, the BBC’s version of Mister Rogers, sexually assaulted young girls. And then there’s the tragedy of the Boy Scouts, which kept its "perversion files" from 1970 to 1991 under lock and key rather than report sexual abusers to authorities.

Of course, children aren’t the only ones in powerless situations who’re victimized. According to a former Waffle House employee, company Chairman Joseph Rogers Jr. allegedly demanded sexual favors of her in exchange for job security. Rogers says his relationship with the single mother was consensual (and no charges have been filed). But consider this: The woman who brought this situation to light resigned from the company after her son was awarded a full college scholarship.

There’s no easy solution to preventing sexual abuse and harassment. But there are ways to prevent those in power from preying on innocent people. In Tuesday’s episode of “The Story,” Penn State ethics professor Jonathan Marks offered a suggestion: Don’t discourage whistle-blowing. He argued:

If we want to behave, and we want others to behave, in the ways we’d like to imagine we would, we have to structure our institutions to promote those behaviors. And that means, for example, creating not just protections for whistle-blowers but incentives for whistle-blowers; rewarding people for their sort of ethical dissent and helping them realize that the expression of dissent is not disloyalty to an institution. On the contrary, it’s actually a way of demonstrating loyalty to an institution when you speak out against the leadership or you speak out when you see something that is wrong.


••smf’s 2¢: This OpEd was buried in Opinion LA, Observations & Provocations from the Times Opinion Staff – it’s the online burial ground for editorials that didn’t make it into the print edition. If the present issue of child sexual abuse was isolated to the BBC, Penn State that may have been a good decision – but in Los Angeles we have had Miramonte and Telfair and Stephen Rooney – and priestly pedophilia. We need to get out in front of this – or more young people will be led into the hell of abuse.

Last Thursday at the District 2 Candidate Forum in Pico-Union [http://t.co/SIbcNqcS] the issue of Miramonte came up, framed as an issue of teachers denied due process and condemned to rubber rooms. The candidates were outraged (Monica Garcia was not there) and none forgave actual abuse – and I described Supt Deasy’s mass removal+replacement of Miramonte staff as a political gambit and institutional child abuse.

“Think like a second grader: You remove two teachers and say they were bad people …and two weeks later ALL the teachers are gone? Replaced by strangers? ‘For your own safety? ‘
What was the teachable moment? What do you take away from that as a seven-year-old?”

This was unapologetic rhetorical flourish on my part – but I continue to believe that that action from the superintendent is unforgivable – and coupled with his failure to report Miramonte and Telfair to Commission on Teacher Credentialing (and parents) cause for his removal+replacement.

In the trenches the role of Whistle Blowers is critical in this.

IN CALIFORNIA ALL CREDENTIALED EMPLOYEES AND MOST CERTIFICATED ONES ARE MANDATORY REPORTERS OF CHILD ABUSE AND CHILD ENDANGERMENT: They are supposed to have been issued their whistles and should have orders when to use them.

Failure to report suspected abuse in a specified manner is
1. Cause for dismissal and
2. A criminal act.

Under Superintendent Brewer – reacting to the Rooney case – there was mandatory training and an annual test for mandatory reporters and all district employees –and training for parents in a child abuse awareness program called “Darkness to Light.”

Under Supt. Cortines Darkness to Light was ended as being outside the District’s budget priorities. LAUSD couldn’t afford it.

As a result, all the LAUSD mandatory reporters at Miramonte failed to report their suspicions and the concerns brought to them by parents.

The law is unequivocal: If you are aware of or concerned about potential abuse – or concerns are brought to you – you pick up the phone and call the police or Child Protective Services; which one is your only choice. You don’t consult a colleague or the chapter chair or the principal. You do not investigate. You do not delay. You pick up the phone – and there is supposed to be a phone in every classroom – and drop a dime.

Mandatory Reporting eventually did work – the photo processor at Walgreens – a mandatory reporter – called the police when he saw suspicious photos and started to process at Miramonte.

If elected to the Board of Ed I will bring Darkness to Light or something like it back because there is nothing more important than the safety of children.

But the current board and my opponent shouldn’t wait.

Don’t wait to lead. Do it the first thing after Thanksgiving. Take the credit.


Failing a test that really matters: ONLY 31% OF CALIFORNIA STUDENTS ARE PHYSICALLY FIT + smf’s 2¢:

-- Dalina Castellanos LA Times/LA Now | http://lat.ms/U2DS5O

November 15, 2012 | 4:58 pm :: For the second year in a row, California students have tested relatively low in a series of statewide physical fitness tests, the state Department of Education announced Thursday.

About 31% of students received healthy scores in all six of the tested areas, State Supt. of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said in a statement.

"When we can call fewer than one out of three of our kids physically fit, we know we have a tremendous public health challenge on our hands," said Torlakson, a longtime cross-country coach. "It affects more than their health — study after study has demonstrated the very clear link between physical fitness and academic achievement."

The fitness score dropped to 31% last year, after years of steady improvement, the study’s results showed. About 1.3 million fifth-, seventh- and ninth-graders were tested. Of those, only 31% were able to score in what state officials call a "healthy fitness zone."

"While I am glad their fitness levels improve as they make their way through school, we owe it to California’s kids to give them more opportunities for exercise, along with better access to healthy foods and clean, fresh water," Torlakson said.

Torlakson’s office is continuing to push a year-old initiative to promote healthy choices in schools.


FROM THE STATE REPORT (which mistakenly tries to put a positive spin on the slight downturn): http://bit.ly/TRMPwz

“When we can call fewer than one out of three of our kids physically fit, we know we have a tremendous public health challenge on our hands,” State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Torlakson said. “It affects more than their health—study after study has demonstrated the very clear link between physical fitness and academic achievement. While I am glad their fitness levels improve as they make their way through school, we owe it to California’s kids to give them more opportunities for exercise, along with better access to healthy foods and clean, fresh water.”


••smf’s 2¢: OF ALL THE THINGS WE TEST, THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT – only immediately less important than testing the fire alarms and quality of drinking water …and we automatically close down schools that fail those tests without consulting the Board of Ed or the superintendent!

The California Physical Fitness Test assesses the Health, Safety and Wellbeing of Children; individual children and all children. And, I might add, students need to pass the FitnessGram to be waived from mandatory PhysEd in the 11th and 12th grade. I am opposed to that waiver …but at least we are theoretically letting the kids who need it least off the hook!


2011-12 CALIFORNIA PHYSICAL FITNESS REPORT OVERALL - SUMMARY OF RESULTS | Los Angeles Unified District



HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources

EDUCATION GOALS: : From Survival to Excellence and Equity: Themes in the News by UCLA IDEA Week of Nov. 13-16, ... http://bit.ly/1060YtG

UTLA Tuesday Talking Points: VICTORY FOR SCHOOLS: November 13, 2012 LATEST NEWS AND ISSUES | http://bit.ly/SCw1b ... http://bit.ly/ZPhhfc
Expand

TEACHERS’ OBSESSION WITH TECHNOLOGY SEE GADGETS WORTH MILLIONS SIT IN CUPBOARDS: ACROSS THE POND: Millions of po... http://bit.ly/U0SRLH

PROP 30 PASSES: Now what?: STATEMENT FROM SCHOOL BOARD MEMBER BENNETT KAYSER REGARDING BUDGET AFTER PASSAGE OF P... http://bit.ly/U0SSzd

NEW ASSEMBLY EDUCATION CHAIR SKEPTICAL OF PLAN FOR WEIGHTED FUNDING: By John Fensterwald, EdSource Today | http:... http://bit.ly/SxAZ96

YALE UNDERGRAD DATA GEEKS SET SIGHTS ON SCHOOL REFORM …using iPads + plain white paper: Online survey company Pa... http://bit.ly/SxwRGe

A TABLET IN EVERY BACKPACK?: Supt. Deasy wants to give each L.A. Unified student a high-tech device. But his pla... http://bit.ly/Wf8Fyy

Report from the second candidate forum in the second school board district: MONICA GARCIA STILL MISSING: by smf ... http://bit.ly/WeWCRX

Tonight in Pico-Union: LAUSD DISTRICT 2 CANDIDATE FORUM: 6pm 2845 West 7th St Will she be there this time? http://bit.ly/ZAqHLu

SUPERINTENDENT JOHN DEASY'S $17.5M REQUEST FOR COMPUTER TABLET FUNDS NIXED: By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer, LA D... http://bit.ly/W9VLBP

NEXT YEAR’S STATE BUDGET DEFICIT THAT COULD BE AS HIGH AS $16 BILLION LATEST THREAT TO SCHOOLS, EVEN WITH THE PR... http://bit.ly/ZxNBmP

LAUSD SUPT. DEASY DELAYS PLAN FOR TABLET COMPUTERS + smf’s 2¢: by Howard Blume LA Times/LA Now | http://... http://bit.ly/ZNHj1A

LAUSD RESTORES ACADEMIC YEAR AND FULL PAY: The actions were made possible by passage of Proposition 30.: Board a... http://bit.ly/W5mNdC

LAUSD RESCINDS FURLOUGHS, EXTENDS YEAR; REJECTS CHARTER MORITORIUM & OVERSIGHT; APPOINTS NEW FACILITIES + FOOD S... http://bit.ly/SnKmbf

MALDEF JOINS IN FILING DRAFT PLAN TO DESEGREGATE AND IMPROVE EDUCATIONAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR LATINO STUDENTS IN TUCS... http://bit.ly/SjQuRQ

Gloria Romero gets it wrong: HALF THE CALIFORNIA ELECTORATE DIDN’T VOTE: if we are to believe Romero’s fuzzy math... http://bit.ly/Zwhoez

TIME TO INVESTIGATE SCHOOL ‘CONSTRUCTION’ BONDS: Editorial from the San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board | http://bit.ly/ZvKWZS

“The money has already been spent”: PROPOSITION 30 WIN NO GUARANTEE OF FISCAL SAFETY FOR CALIFORNIA …or budget s... http://bit.ly/Zvx5m7

L.A. SCHOOLS SCIENCE CENTER STRUGGLES TO KEEP OPEN: The Christensen Math Science and Technology Center in San Pe... http://bit.ly/ZfPNzd


EVENTS: Coming up next week... 
 
THIS COMING WEEK LAUSD IS PRETTY MUCH CLOSED. HAVE A HAPPY AND THANKFUL THANKSGIVING. INGEST MASS QUANTITIES. GE GOOD TO EACH OTHER. BE SAFE.

...AND THANK YOU! - smf

________________________________________
• 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


• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR



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!.


Who are your elected federal & state representatives? How do you contact them?




Scott Folsom is a parent leader in LAUSD and is Parent/Volunteer of the Year for 2010-11 for Los Angeles County. • He is Past President of Los Angeles Tenth District PTSA and represented PTA on the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee for ten years. He is a Health Commissioner, Legislation Team member and a member of the Board of Managers of the California State PTA. He serves on numerous school district advisory and policy committees and has served as a PTA officer and governance council member at three LAUSD schools. He is the recipient of the UTLA/AFT 2009 "WHO" Gold Award for his support of education and public schools - an honor he hopes to someday deserve. • In this forum his opinions are his own and your opinions and feedback are invited. Quoted and/or cited content copyright © the original author and/or publisher. All other material copyright © 4LAKids.
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