Sunday, August 04, 2013

At first we're rocks ...and then we roll.


Onward! 4LAKids
4LAKids: Sunday 4•Aug•2013
In This Issue:
 •  TEACH FOR AMERICA CRITICIZED FOR APPARENT STANCE ON EDUCATION POLICY
 •  L.A. Times v. LAUSD: L.A. UNIFIED TEACHERS RATINGS SHOULD BE DISCLOSED, JUDGE RULES
 •  APPLE HANDED PROPOSED SOLUTIONS FOR E-BOOKS PRICE-FIXING RULING + smf’s 2¢
 •  Closing the tap on the School-to-Prison Pipeline: KIDS BULLIED FOR YEARS MORE LIKELY TO GO TO PRISON
 •  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:
 •  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.
This past week new fissures appeared in the façade of School ®eform, Inc.

TFA (not to be confused with TSA) picked up big bucks from the Waltons and some bad reviews. [See following + Walton Family Foundation Invests $200 Million in Teach For America http://bit.ly/1coyLoQ]

Florida, home of Jeb Bush, sent Ben Austin, Parent Revolution and the Parent Trigger back to whence they came. Which, like street gangs, means back to L.A. [Florida Educators, Parents Shield Students from “Parent Trigger” http://bit.ly/1bPR5JU]

Don’t weep for P-Rev and Ben. The LA Times wrote a nice puff piece so they could have a nice soft landing. [Adelanto School at Center of Parent Trigger Controversy Opens http://bit.ly/1bTecTN]

While Florida was at it they also sent (the other) Tony Bennett – their Commissioner of Education – back to Indiana from whence he came. [Florida Education Chief Tony Bennett Resigns Over How a ‘C’ Became an ‘A’ http://bit.ly/1bUbv4k]

Conservative columnist Michelle Malkin writes in the National Review: “[Bennett's] disgraceful grade-fixing scandal is the perfect symbol of all that’s wrong with the federal education schemes peddled by Bennett and his mentor, former GOP governor Jeb Bush: phony academic standards, crony contracts, and big-government and big-business collusion masquerading as “reform.”

She adds: “Cronyism and corruption come in all political stripes and colors. As a conservative parent of children educated at public charter schools, I am especially appalled by these pocket-lining GOP elites who are giving grassroots education reformers a bad name and cashing in on their betrayal of limited-government principles.” [http://bit.ly/13y6E3s - editing by Diane Ravitch in her blog]

It isn’t all the GOP’s fault. It seems like Tony’s tremendous success in Indiana schools – which got him the Florida gig - was much like the Atlanta superintendent’s ‘success’ there …or Michelle Rhee’s ‘success’ in D.C. …or Crescendo Charter Schools in L.A. …or Rob Paige’s (“The Father of No Child Left Behind”) ‘success’ in Houston.

They teach it at the Culinary Institute of America: When you cook the books the numbers will rise.

The lesson we teach our kids, that “Cheaters never prosper’ is pure hokum of course. But cheaters don’t prosper forever – no matter how many times they reweave+reissue the fabric-of-lies the whole ®eform franchise is based upon: Rob Paige and The Texas Miracle.


CRONY CONTRACTS/GOVERNMENT+BIG-BUSINESS COLLUSION AND POCKET LINING? Apple and iPads and e-books and price-fixing became curiouser-and-curiouser. [Apple Handed Proposed Solutions for E-Books Price-Fixing http://bit.ly/14SjYvp ] Of course, that can’t happen in LAUSD. Unless it already has.

But that is all so last week.


THIS WEEK, ON THURSDAY MORNING AT HOLLYWOOD HIGH SCHOOL Superintendent Deasy will call together all of LAUSD’s principals and administrators and address them in the Annual Superintendent’s Address to Administrators. (Who names these things?)

Dr. Deasy’s work is cut out for him.

He presides over an organization in tumult, recovering from financial hardship, labor unrest, cuts and crisis – with none of those situations solved. Staff morale is at an all time low. The troops are beleaguered. He is not a popular figure; the teachers voted ‘no confidence’ overwhelmingly. His direction of reform has been repudiated at the ballot box. I recall him saying on the radio it would be impolitic for a superintendent to favor one school board candidate over another …but he ‘kinda-sorta’ did and the candidates he supported ‘kinda-sorta’ lost.

● Were he to say he didn’t support Kate Anderson over Steve Zimmer he would be disingenuous.
● If he were to say he didn’t prefer Antonio Sanchez over Monica Ratliff, he would be prevaricating. [CORRECTION: An earlier version version of this story misidentified Ratliff's opponent as Luis Sanchez. Luis Sanchez was Bennett Kayser's ®eform-endorsed  opponent in an earlier election.]
● Yes, his BBF Monica Garcia triumphed over a field of unknown nobodies (I among them) …but even there the playing field was so uneven that the Zimbabwean Election Commission would hold their noses. Deasy’s non-profit put up billboards in Monica’s district saying what a wonderful person she is.

The board majority has shifted, the tide has changed – the wind favors another direction than the course he has been steering. Mayor Tony is gone – appearing on MS NBC as a constitutional policing expert. ¿WWT? Yes, the money is starting to come back in to LAUSD – but the natives are restless – they are tired of being tired …and have grown weary of the New England accent. Some of the things Dr. D has tried haven’t worked. And – even if it’s not fair: Everything bad is his fault. No paper towels in the washroom? Deasy’s doing.

Deasy’s friend Arne Duncan hasn’t tossed him a lifeline: Signing off on the extra special double-dutch-double-dare district waiver application from No Child Left Behind. The very principals and administrators he will be addressing Thursday – nominally his front line troops - are cranky and feel overworked and disrespected.

He’s got to rally the troops to kick off the school year and I’ve seen him give this sort of speech before and (to date) he hasn’t been very good at it. Somehow I don’t think announcing the new iPads and the new school lunch menu are going to cut it! Or the NCLB waiver …if he’s able to pull that off.

There will be coffee and a continental breakfast. The Hollywood High Chorus will probably perform “Don’t Stop Believin’ – and they will knock some socks off. From there the slippery slope tilts in the general direction of gravity.

I have to be somewhere else that morning. If you have to go, go. If you find hope cling to it. ‘Aloha’ means ‘Hello’ and ‘Goodbye’.


THE FAR MORE IMPORTANT MEETING THURSDAY MORNING will be in Downey at the California Dept of Education/Los Angeles Office of Education meeting+training dealing with oversight of the Local Control Funding Formula. It’s important that parents and other school site governance members attend this, get informed first hand and share the information forward. Made more important by the fact that senior LAUSD brass, board members and principals will all be at Hollywood High, listening to another story. Because, we were told, sometimes words have two meanings.

►From the State Board of Ed: HELP ENSURE THE IMPORTANT VOICE OF PARENTS IS HEARD IN YOUR COMMUNITY, FOR YOUR KIDS!

The California State Board of Education and the California Department of Education have announced the dates and locations of regional meetings for those interested in joining the ongoing conversation of how the Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) will be implemented.
These sessions will allow parents and other stakeholders to share ideas, comments and input on the implementation of LCFF and will be connected via video conference to remote locations, ensuring as much inclusion in the discussion as possible.

Locations and dates: Sessions begin at 9:30 a.m. and end at or before noon at each location. The meetings are OPEN TO ALL, with no need for advance registration.

Thursday, August 8, 2013
Primary Location:
Los Angeles County Office of Education
9300 Imperial Highway
Downey, CA 90242

Remote location:
San Diego County Office of Education
6401 Linda Vista Road
Joe Rindone Regional Technology Center, Communications Lab 1-4
San Diego, CA 92111

Please go to this. Take good notes; write an article for your school/PTA/booster club/union newsletter. Send 4LAKids a copy – because I have to miss that one too! (Darn the laws of physics – how effective we all could be if at two or three places at once! The beach and math class - because multitasking works so well!)

I shall be in Sacramento, hearing about the bigger picture. Considering the forest but worrying about the trees. And the bustle in the hedgerow.

Don’t be alarmed now. It’s all about a new beginning.

¡Onward/Adelante! - smf


TEACH FOR AMERICA CRITICIZED FOR APPARENT STANCE ON EDUCATION POLICY

CRITICS SAY TFA HAS STRAYED FROM A CORE MISSION OF HELPING NEEDY URBAN SCHOOLS, FAVORING EFFORTS SEEN AS ANTI-TEACHER UNION.

By Howard Blume, L.A. Times | http://lat.ms/14VU5eb

7:40 PM PDT, August 3, 2013 :: Over its 24-year history, Teach for America has won accolades for taking top college graduates and putting them to work in some of America's toughest schools, creating what it regards as a national model of nonpartisan service in education.

But some former participants and academics, among others, have recently accused the Peace Corps-like organization of taking sides in the education policy wars. They criticize the nonprofit for aligning too closely with its largest private donors and high-profile alumni who have gone into politics. They say the group has diverged too far from a core mission: addressing a teacher shortage with top college grads primed to inject energy and success into low-income, urban campuses.

The key backers of Teach for America include foundations that support efforts to expand charter schools, limit teacher job protections, weaken union clout and evaluate instructors by using student test scores.

The Walton Family Foundation, for example, last week donated $20 million that will help fund about 500 hires in Los Angeles. Funded by the family that began Walmart, the foundation supports both charter schools and government vouchers to subsidize private school tuition for low-income families.

New York-based Teach for America asserts that its financial supporters do not influence its direction. Although the Walton foundation has given more money — $100 million — than any other, its contributions still made up only 4.6% of the education organization's national budget last year. Government funding accounted for about 30% of the nonprofit's revenue.

Critics, however, are unswayed.

"I don't know that it's causation or correlation, but there is so much alignment," said Rigel Massaro, a Teach for America alumna who works as a public interest attorney in San Francisco.

Like other critics, she said she was troubled by the group's five-week crash course in teaching and the fact that its presence in a community allows school districts "to hire teachers who are cheaper and who are pushed to make incredible gains for their students by working seven days a week and then leaving after two years."

As evidence of Teach for America's political bent — intentional or not — critics cite developments in California, Alabama, North Carolina, Louisiana and other states.

In Los Angeles, nonunion charter schools have grown in number, and so has their hiring of Teach for America instructors, even as enrollment in L.A. Unified has shrunk, leading to teacher layoffs. In L.A., 94% of last year's recruits went into charters.

In South L.A., one charter group — ICEF Public Schools — hired two dozen Teach for America instructors last year. Parker Hudnut, who heads the 12 campuses, said the young teachers "bring a tremendous amount of energy, a lot of innate intelligence" to his schools.

Among his hires: Anthony Edholm, 24, who was president of the pre-med society at Creighton University. He's teaching physics and coaching track. "My biggest thing is I wanted to take a kid at a critical point in his life and help him transition from high school into college, into becoming an adult," Edholm said.

Apart from making a difference in the classroom, however, the organization has always had another goal for its alumni: to become leaders who care about education regardless of the field they enter.

"We exist because the education system in America was not meeting the needs of young people growing up in low-income communities," said Teach for America Co-Chief Executive Matt Kramer. "School districts are finding great people through TFA."

Members of the program receive support while they teach, and Kramer noted that many remain in the classroom well beyond their two-year commitment.

Teach for America also has taken on the role of providing a labor pool for districts that want more competition for jobs or need to restaff a school whose teachers were fired or removed.

One example is Huntsville, Ala., where the school district last year hired 30 instructors from Teach for America and has committed to at least 30 more this year, Supt. Casey Wardynski said.

That was not because of a lack of available teachers: The district had 19,000 applicants this year for 200 openings. Wardynski said he chose the Teach for America instructors over other qualified candidates to use as "special forces" capable of turning a school's dysfunctional culture around.

Philip Kovacs, an associate professor of education at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, along with others in schools of education, said resorting to Teach for America can exacerbate faculty turnover. Such instability harms students needlessly when permanent teachers are available, he said.

"I have students with a master's degree who … are phenomenal, who could teach me about teaching, and can't get jobs," he said.

In North Carolina, the Legislature phased out a student loan forgiveness program for top-tier undergraduates who became teachers for at least four years. At the same time, it increased its annual contribution to Teach for America from $900,000 to $6 million.

The state's lawmakers also voted this summer to end teacher tenure and pay boosts for instructors with advanced degrees and to approve tuition subsidies for low-income families to pay for private school.

The governor's senior education advisor, Eric Guckian, once headed Teach for America in North Carolina. Guckian said he does not endorse all the new measures and would like more done to encourage teacher stability. But altogether, he said, the package "creates a foundation for future beneficial reforms for students and teachers."

Former Teach for America instructors hold senior education positions in Louisiana, where they continue the most aggressive school reform policies in the nation. When the state fired nearly every New Orleans teacher in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and converted most schools to nonunion charters, Teach for America provided a share of the replacements.

"I don't think this could have happened without TFA," said assistant professor Kristen Buras, a New Orleans historian at Georgia State University. "You need these on-the-ground organizations that are going to assist the state with these reforms."

And it was Teach for America alumna Michelle Rhee — former head of the Washington, D.C., school system — who established StudentsFirst as a counterweight to teacher unions.

Rhee's views were showcased during a high-profile panel at Teach for America's 20th anniversary summit. The discussion before an audience of 11,000 featured Rhee and like-minded participants such as former New York City schools Supt. Joel Klein and L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy.

The overriding message was a call to social activism, with teacher unions cast as status-quo forces that needed to be overcome. Ditto for many policies that unions support — such as tenure protections.

Kramer, the Teach for America executive, said he regretted the impression left by the panel. His organization, he said, embraces all views.

Some see the nonprofit's alleged political alignment as placing it on the correct side of the education rift.

Charter schools, for example, enjoy bipartisan support and popularity with parents. And the Obama administration backs many of the same policies supported by funders of Teach for America.

However, L.A. Board of Education member Steve Zimmer, who began his teaching career with the group, said he feels marginalized for choosing "a more politically moderate pathway."

"In both message and operation, this is not the organization I joined 21 years ago," he said.

Last month, those opposed to Teach for America hosted a networking session in Chicago that included students, parents, community activists, academics and teachers inside and outside of the organization.

"The desire to make the world a better place is something that Teach for America taps into," said alumna Terrenda White, a graduate student at Teachers College, Columbia University, who also trains instructors.

"When did my willingness to teach in urban communities become translated to this very specific political agenda? It's not what I believe in."


L.A. Times v. LAUSD: L.A. UNIFIED TEACHERS RATINGS SHOULD BE DISCLOSED, JUDGE RULES

By Teresa Watanabe - latimes.com | http://lat.ms/15APv8E

August 1, 2013, 7:33 p.m. :: The performance ratings of individual teachers in the city school district are matters of keen public interest and should be released to the Los Angeles Times, a judge ordered Thursday.

L.A. County Superior Court Judge James C. Chalfant ruled that the public interest in access to the ratings outweighed any teacher expectations of privacy under the California Public Records Act. He rejected arguments by the Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers Los Angeles that the records were confidential personnel information that, if released, would create discord, stigma, embarrassment, difficulty in recruiting teachers and other harm.

“The public has an interest in disclosure of the scores because they reflect on both student achievement and teacher performance, as well as on LAUSD’s choices in allocating time and resources,” Chalfant wrote. However, he said that the decision was a “close call” and that he had been “wringing my hands, Hamlet-like” over it. He also said he personally believed that disclosure was not good public policy, but that “my personal beliefs are not relevant.”

“The court does not set public policy … the court follows the law,” he wrote, adding that the Legislature could change the state law if it found disclosing teacher ratings proved destructive.

The Times sought three years of district data, from 2009 through 2012, that show whether individual teachers helped -- or hurt -- students academic achievement, as measured by state standardized test scores.

Using a complex mathematical formula, the district aims to isolate a teacher's effect on student growth by controlling for such outside factors as poverty, race, English ability and prior test scores. The district sought to use that type of analysis, known in L.A. Unified as Academic Growth over Time, in teacher evaluations but was fiercely resisted by the teachers union, which argues that it is unreliable.

The two sides have agreed not to use individual ratings in evaluations and have joined to fight The Times' request for them.

Jesus Quinonez, an UTLA attorney, said the union would probably appeal the ruling and request that no records be released until the case is settled. “We obviously but respectfully disagree” with Chalfant, he said.

The district and union argued in court that teachers could reasonably expect that their ratings were confidential personnel files. But Chalfant ruled that the ratings don’t contain personal information or specific advice, criticism or other evaluative comments by supervisors that would protect them from disclosure.

Rather, he said, they were statistical tabulations of public data about student peformance in a teacher’s class –- rejecting the district’s contention that its decisions about how to create the formula made it a subjective tool that should be protected.

Rochelle Wilcox, an attorney representing The Times, said the district and union provided no evidence that publishing the information would harm teachers, a point Chalfant accepted in saying that claim was largely speculative.

“The school district is compiling this information to benefit the public and the public has a protected interest in evaluating the district’s performance,” Wilcox said.

Chalfant also wrote that controversy over whether these so-called value-added methods are reliable was irrelevant to whether the public had a right to the information. He noted that courts have previously ruled that information does not have to be reliable to be subject to public disclosure.

“Vigorous public debate about whether teacher AGT [Academic Growth over Time] scores are useful is to be encouraged, not stifled,” he wrote.

The judge scheduled another court date for Aug. 27.

The Times received test score information from the district previously and published a database with individual teacher ratings. The newspaper is seeking to update that database.


LEGAL OPINION: LA Times v LAUSD Petition Granted



APPLE HANDED PROPOSED SOLUTIONS FOR E-BOOKS PRICE-FIXING RULING + smf’s 2¢
by Tiffany Kaiser –Daily Tech | http://bit.ly/1cyEgS8

August 2, 2013 2:43 PM :: hearing to discuss remedies and hold a trial on damages will take place on August 9
(Source: telegraph.co.uk)>>

Apple lost the ebooks battle earlier this month when a judge ruled that the tech giant had conspired to raise prices, and now, Apple has been handed some potential consequences as a result of that ruling.

The U.S. Department of Justice and 33 U.S. states and territories have proposed that Apple be banned from entering anti-competitive e-book distribution contracts for five years; end its business models with the five publishers it conspired with; use an outside monitor to make sure that its antitrust policies are effective, and allow retailers like Amazon and Barnes & Noble to provide links to their options for two years.

"Under the department's proposed order, Apple's illegal conduct will cease, and Apple and its senior executives will be prevented from conspiring to thwart competition," said Bill Baer, head of the Justice Department's (DOJ) antitrust division.

These proposals have to be approved by U.S. District Judge Denise Cote, who is overseeing the ebooks trial.

All of the five book publishers have already settled with the DOJ, while Apple was the only one to go to trial on June 3.

The ebooks fiasco started in April 2012, when the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) sued Apple and the five book publishers over anticompetitive practices concerning e-book sales. These book publishers were Hachette Livre (Lagardère Publishing France), Harper Collins (News Corp., U.S.A.), Simon & Schuster (CBS Corp., U.S.A.), Penguin (Pearson Group, United Kingdom) and Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holzbrinck (owner of inter alia Macmillan, Germany).

The book publishers were accused of partaking in an agency sales model with Apple, which meant that publishers were allowed to set the price of a book and Apple would take a 30 percent cut. In addition, the publishers could not let rivals sell the same book at a lower price. Traditionally, publishers sell physical books to retailers for about half of the cover price, which is considered a wholesale model. Retailers then had the ability to sell those books to customers for a lower price if they wanted to.

But when e-books came along, this model was challenged. Amazon started selling best sellers for as low as $9.99 to encourage its Kindle e-reader sales. Publishers were not happy. Apple then came along with iBooks, and publishers began to worry that it would take over the book industry the way Apple's iTunes took over the music industry, where customers would choose to purchase cheap, digital books instead of physical books.
However, Apple attempted to resolve this when it struck a deal with publishers to implement the agency model in 2010. This helped Apple at the time of its iPad and iBooks launch. But its deal with publishers made it seem like an attempt to thwart Amazon's dominance.

Last month, Lawrence Buterman (a DOJ lawyer) said that Apple's move to increase e-book prices hurt consumers by costing them "millions of dollars."

Cote ruled that Apple tried to raise the prices of e-books through an agency model with other book publishers after a non-jury trial, which ended on June 20.
A hearing to discuss remedies and hold a trial on damages will take place on August 9.

Source: The U.S. Department of Justice



●● smf's 2¢: LAUSD needs to follow this particular legal adventure very carefully.

It has entered into a potential half-billion dollar contract with Apple to provide iPads with embedded educational content to every student in the District.. Those iPads are essentially e-book readers, that content is essentially e-textbooks. And LAUSD is not a party to the content provider's (Pearson Education, the worlds largest publishing company) contract with Apple.

Anybody who attended or watched the LAUSD Board of Ed presentation on the iPad contract saw+heard the warning from the Microsoft attorney threatening suggesting potential legal action. It doesn’t take much imagination to imagine that that contract might also be challenged by other publishers. I’ve been wracking my memory and I still don’t remember the textbook adoption process. I have since heard arguments from senior LAUSD staff contending that that content isn’t really e-textbooks. It’s – uh – something else.

“ If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family Anatidae on our hands.” _ Douglas Adams in Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency


Closing the tap on the School-to-Prison Pipeline: KIDS BULLIED FOR YEARS MORE LIKELY TO GO TO PRISON

By Janice Wood, Associate News Editor.Psych Central NEWS (The American Psychological Association) Reviewed by
BEING BULLIED REPEATEDLY WHEN YOUNG LINKED TO MORE ARRESTS AND PRISON TIME

John M. Grohol, Psy.D. | http://bit.ly/16r5Y0c

August 1, 2013 :: People who are repeatedly bullied as kids and teens are “significantly” more likely to go to prison, according to new research presented at the American Psychological Association’s 121st Annual Convention.

The study found that close to 14 percent of those who reported being bullied repeatedly from childhood through their teens ended up in prison as adults, compared to six percent of non-victims, nine percent of childhood-only victims, and seven percent of teen-only victims.

The study also found that more than 20 percent of those who endured chronic bullying were convicted of crimes, compared to 11 percent of non-victims, 16 percent of childhood victims, and 13 percent of teen victims.

Another finding of the study: Compared to nonwhite childhood victims, white childhood victims faced significantly greater odds of going to prison.

The results also revealed that women who were chronically bullied from childhood through their teens faced significantly greater odds of using alcohol or drugs, and had a greater likelihood of being arrested and convicted than men who had grown up as victims of chronic bullying.

“Previous research has examined bullying during specific time periods, whereas this study is the first to look at individuals’ reports of bullying that lasted throughout their childhood and teen years, and the legal consequences they faced in late adolescence and as adults,” said Michael G. Turner, Ph.D., of the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte.

Turner analyzed data from the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, conducted by the U.S. Department of Labor and the Bureau of Justice Statistics. The survey included 7,335 kids between the ages of 12 and 16 as of Dec. 31, 1996.

His analysis identified four groups: Non-victims (74 percent); those bullied repeatedly before the age of 12 (15 percent); those bullied repeatedly after the age of 12 (six percent); and those repeatedly victimized before and after the age of 12 (five percent).

Accounts of repeated bullying were collected over several periods, Turner said. Legal outcomes were assessed when the participants were in their late teens or adults. The study followed the kids over a 14-year period from early adolescence into adulthood.

The study highlights the important role that health care professionals can play in a child’s life when bullying is not addressed by teachers, parents or guardians, according to Turner.

“With appropriate questions during routine medical checkups, they can be critical first points of contact for childhood victims,” he said. “Programs that help children deal with the adverse impacts of repeated bullying could make the difference in whether they end up in the adult legal system.”


STUDY: Bullying victimization and adolescent mental health: General and typologicaleffects across sex



HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources
APPLE HANDED PROPOSED SOLUTIONS FOR E-BOOKS PRICE-FIXING RULING + smf’s 2¢: by Tiffany Kaiser –Daily Tech |... http://bit.ly/14SjYvp

Opening the tap on the School-to-Prison Pipeline: KIDS BULLIED FOR YEARS MORE LIKELY TO GO TO PRISON: By Janic... http://bit.ly/17qFp8D

FLORIDA EDUCATION CHIEF TONY BENNETT RESIGNS OVER HOW A ‘C’ BECAME AN ‘A’: Tony Bennett stepped down after rep... http://bit.ly/1bUbv4k

P-Rev: ADELANTO SCHOOL AT CENTER OF PARENT TRIGGER CONROVERSY OPENS + smf’s 2¢: Parents used the state law to ... http://bit.ly/1bTecTN

L.A. Times v. LAUSD: L.A. UNIFIED TEACHERS RATINGS SHOULD BE DISCLOSED, JUDGE RULES: By Teresa Watanabe - lati... http://bit.ly/1bT3kW1

ART TEACHER’S ANGRY LETTER PROMPTS SUSPENSION BY LAUSD: The teacher says his punishment and ultimate transfera... http://bit.ly/15kSgO3
Expand

Not On Our Watch, Part 1: FLORIDA EDUCATORS, PARENTS SHIELD STUDENTS FROM “PARENT TRIGGER”: By Amanda Litvinov... http://bit.ly/1bPR5JU

Diane Ravitch asks: “WHY WILL NO MAJOR NATIONAL PAPER PUBLISH JOHN MERROW’S STORY ABOUT MICHELLE RHEE?”: by Di... http://bit.ly/14Jc1s9

AB484 [http://bit.ly/12JteHO ] is pending in CA Legislature to suspend most STAR testing this coming school year | http://bit.ly/auDNT3

$625 million this month, another $625 million in October: STATE READIES BIG DOWN PAYMENT ON COMMON CORE: By To... http://bit.ly/17mNA5M

Lack of accountability, codified: RULING SPOTLIGHTS HOLE IN DISMISSAL OF TROUBLED STUDENTS FROM CHARTER SCHOOL... http://bit.ly/14HOxnm

COACHELLA VALLEY UNIFIED AT FOREFRONT OF iPAD WAVE IN CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS: Jed Kim | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC ht... http://bit.ly/1cs5qKf

LAUSD STEALS WELL-KNOWN NEW YORK ARTS PRINCIPAL TO LEAD CORTINES HIGH: Mary Plummer | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC ... http://bit.ly/16InGdy

LAUSD ADDING KID-FRIENDLY OPTIONS TO CAFETERIA FARE: By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer- LA Daily News http://bit.... http://bit.ly/14Hfd7N

WALTON FAMILY FOUNDATION INVESTS $200 MILLION IN TEACH FOR AMERICA: 700 TFA teachers to come to Los Angeles: W... http://bit.ly/1coyLoQ

Maybe the 3rd time will be the charm? LA ARTS HIGH SCHOOL GETS THE PRINCIPAL IT ALWAYS WANTED …if “it” = Beau... http://bit.ly/1bIy2RO

LOCAL CONTROL FUNDING FORMULA INCLUDES REQUIREMENTS & SANCTIONS LIMITING K-3 CLASS SIZE TO 24:1 …OR LESS: By T... http://bit.ly/17g0PVV

NEW REPORT FINDS ARTS EDUCATION INCREASINGLY HAPPENS OUTSIDE OF SCHOOL: New Opportunities for Interest Driven ... http://bit.ly/14zJzZM

iPads Everyone? Investigation reveals @ least 86 labor rights violations, inc. 36 legal & 50 ethical violations by Apple contractor in China -http://bit.ly/14g12NK

iPads Everyone? Women making Apple products denied maternity leave if they are having 2nd child outside of China’s family planning policies. -http://bit.ly/14g12NK

iPads Everyone? - Pregnant women making Apple products denied maternity leave if they became pregnant out of wedlock -http://bit.ly/14g12NK

iPads Everyone? - ChinaWatch: Apple continues to employ underage+"student" labor under same bad conditions as adults. - http://bit.ly/14g12NK

DEBATE LOOMS OVER HOW TO SPEND LOCAL CONTROL FUNDING FORMULA MONEY FOR HIGH-NEEDS STUDENTS: By Barbara Jones, ... http://bit.ly/1bFBU64


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
Monica.Ratliff@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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