In This Issue:
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Getting Real: GROUNDING VERGARA IN THE REALITIES OF TEACHING IN CALIFORNIA |
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DRAFT REVISION OF LCAP MOVES FORWARD AT STATE BOARD OF ED + LCAP LIBRARY NOW OPEN FOR READERS + smf’s 2¢ (x2) |
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FREE LUNCH FOR ALL STUDENTS IN CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS STARTS IN SEPTEMBER |
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PRIVATE SUMMER SCHOOLS ON PUBLIC CAMPUSES PROMPT DEBATE ON EDUCATION INEQUALITY |
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HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but
not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources |
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EVENTS: Coming up next week... |
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What can YOU do? |
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Featured Links:
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The first stories out of Governor Brown’s address to
the American Federation of Teachers convention in L.A. on Friday weren’t
about education or teachers or school reform - or red v. blue politics - they were about unaccompanied alien minors. As they should’ve been.
►JERRY BROWN CALLS BORDER CROSSING CONTROVERSY 'HUMAN TRAGEDY' -- In his
first public remarks about recent border crossings of young immigrants
into the United States, Gov. Jerry Brown on Friday called children
fleeing violence in Central America a “tragedy” and accused critics of
exploiting the situation for political gain. David Siders in the
Sacramento Bee | http://bit.ly/VV4mdW
►BROWN ADDRESSES INFLUX OF IMMIGRANTS | Katie Orr | Capital Public Radio | http://bit.ly/1kMVcpI
THERE’S A LITTLE GAME WE PLAY with children at the borderline between
the American Dream and American Reality, governed by rules we change at a
whim.
• If you are a child and you make it across the finish line it’s Game Over.
• If you make it across the line unnoticed and uncaught you may be a
winner. Or you may die in the desert. Or you may be a victim of human
trafficking. Or you may be reunited with your family and live
undocumented ever after.
• If you are caught and you are from Mexico you lose - we send you back to where you came: Back to Go.
• If you are from Salvador or Guatemala or Honduras we invite you to
play another game in extra time - you take your chances with judges and
bureaucrats. If you don’t have a lawyer one won’t be appointed for you.
• If you are from Cuba and we catch you in the water we send you back,
on dry land you get to stay, an Instant Winner. Unless you are Elián
González.
ONCE UPON A TIME, not so long ago, other young refugees from previous
wars in the same places came to America and were granted amnesty. Tired
and poor, huddled masses, wretched refuse, homeless, tempest-tossed. The
usual.
“Somewhere, somehow, somebody must have
kicked you around some
Who knows, maybe you were kidnapped,
Tied-up, taken away, and held for ransom.”
They came as children and young adults to America, refugees from very
dirty, very un-civil wars - and things didn’t go well for them here.
Strangers, they were unwelcome in the Promised Land. They fell into bad
company, they were denied opportunity, they were led into temptation.
The City of Angels failed them and the lesser angels of our nature
prevailed – street gangs opened their arms and let them in or closed
their fists and kept them out – the cause+effect was the same. The
Salvadoreños learned the lessons of the street and learned them all too
well. They started their own gangs and in time their gangs became the
baddest of the bad. Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13 was+is more violent and
more feared than the Crips or Bloods or Avenues or Frogtown Boys. ¡Estos
chicos son más loco que el más loco!
They became everything the honest citizenry most fear about foreign immigrants; they became vectors of evil.
When we caught them they caused trouble in the jails and prisons,
disturbing the uneasily balanced power and electric peace between Brown,
Black and White prison gangs - and the imprisoned and imprisoners. The
powers-that-be-in-that-time-that-was had made Incarceration a growth
industry (much like public education has become today) …and these
crazies were upsetting everything!
So we – or those acting on our behalf – began rounding them up and
sending them back to whence they came. An MS tattoo was a deportable
offence. Tattooed, organized, institutionalized and criminalized –
three-time-losers with skill sets in the dark arts of crime, extortion,
human trafficking, drug dealing, and violence carefully honed
…returned to a post-apocalyptic land they no longer knew – lands still
reeling from abandoned proxy wars fought to a draw between homegrown
oligarchs and homegrown leftist zealots. We deported entire Mareros
cells into a vacuum where power was the only thing MS 13 understood.
What we did, as a foreign policy initiative of the City+County of Los
Angeles, was to forcibly export one of our greatest products to the
three small nations of the Triángulo del Norte: Organized street gangs.
MS-13 soon formed international alliances with the Sinaloa Mexican drug
cartel and proved themselves in blood in the wars with the Zetas cartel
even as they consolidated their criminal power in the Triángulo – in the
narrow waist of the Americas that separated the drug cartels of Mexico
from the drug cartels if Columbia.
Welcome to Dystopia. What could possibly go worse?
THE TRANSPLANTED AMERICAN NIGHTMARE FESTERED. And fear (along with the
false promise of welcoming arms at the Finish Line) entices the next
generation of frightened children to make the pilgrimage to El Norte.
And the next children’s crusade begins anew and the new refugees begin
the migration. The MA-13 is selling Golden Tickets to A Better Life.
Behold: The welcoming colossus in the harbor, the Mother of Exiles,
lifts her lamp, however dim, for her children.
We see and hear the echoes of the previous Salvadoreños y Guatemaltecos y
Hondureños - and the memories of Mariel; and boatpeople of Southeast
Asia meet the current reality of the North African and Middle Eastern
migrants to Lampedusa - and Sri Lankans to Australia - and every Syrian
fleeing sniper fire and barrel bombs to somewhere/anywhere else.
WE ARE ALL FROM SOMEWHERE ELSE, many times over/over countless
generations. Every one of us carries the genes of refugees seeking
asylum and amnesty and sanctuary from somewhere or someone or something.
We come From the Rift Valley of Africa, across the Bering Land Bridge
from Asia, from Ur to Canaan and the exodus across Sinai from Egypt with
our matzo and our covenant; dispersed again to the Waters of Babylon we
weep - always remembering Zion. Persian and Greek and Roman pushed out
in conquest; Hun and Visigoth conquered in. Tamerlane and the Mongol
Hordes; we rode with them or away. Pict and Scot and Dane and Celt and
Viking expanded outward; Saxon and Norman consolidated in. In 1492 Moor
and Jew fled the Spanish Unification+Inquisition as their Catholic
Majesties moved out to search for paths-to-the-Indies, for gold and
God’s greater glory. Some bought passage on Mayflower; some were sold
into the Middle Passage. Others sought or fled other interpretations of
the same God: Catholics and Huguenots and Puritans and Pilgrims and
Quakers gained a toehold on the Atlantic, crossed the Alleganies and the
Adirondacks and the Ohio Valley to the Mississippi and across the
prairies and the plains, from Nauvoo to the Great Salt Lake, across the
Rockies and the Sierra to the Pacific.
Manifest Destiny and the Dream of the New Jerusalem meet the mythical paradise:
“Know ye that at the right hand of the Indies there is an island called
California, very close to that part of the Terrestrial Paradise, which
was inhabited by black women without a single man among them, and they
lived in the manner of Amazons. They were robust of body with strong
passionate hearts and great virtue. The island itself is one of the
wildest in the world on account of the bold and craggy rocks.
The English Enclosures, the Highland Clearances, the Irish Famine forced
immigration; as did the Pogroms and the Polish Partition.
Land+Birthright were no-less-fairly-and-squarely stolen from Native
Americans and Mexicans – the Acadian Expulsion, The Indian Removal Act,
and the Trail of Tears. The forced relocation of native born Chicanos
from L.A.’s Chavez Ravine happened in the late 1950s. Japanese-American
property confiscated in 1942 in San Pedro and Los Feliz was never
returned. Dislocation and resettlement are euphemisms for darker
things. The Oklahoma land rush redistributed Indian land. For every
Gold+Land Rushing adventurer and Chinese railroad builder there were
five or ten who had no choice.
Wikipedia’s List of Diasporas includes 165 entries, from the Afghan
Diaspora to the Zoroastrian Diaspora (the 7th Century one and the 1979
one count as a single entry.)
Scholars say Forced Migration or forced displacement refers to the
coerced movement of a person or persons away from their home or home
region. It often connotes violent coercion. Hard line semanticists
claim “’In the strictest sense migration can be considered to be
involuntary only when a person is physically transported from a country
and has no opportunity to escape from those transporting him. Movement
under threat, even the immediate threat to life, contains a voluntary
element, as long as there is an option to escape to another part of the
country, go into hiding or to remain and hope to avoid persecution.’ On
the other hand, some scholars of migration, especially those of the
Marxian school, argue that much of the population mobility which is
conventionally seen as being voluntary occurs in situations in which in
fact the migrants have little or no choice.” (1)
Scholars don’t get to decide; it’s neither Choice nor Chance. Children
fleeing out of fear - fear of murder/ mayhem/ MS-13 /starvation or
trafficking into the sex trade or domestic service have little or no
choice- and no chance at all. Parents who bring or send or call for
children have no other option. (We need to accept the ‘human
trafficking’ is a euphemism for slavery as commercially evil as that
practiced on the Middle Passage. We also need to accept that smuggling
refugees , children or adults, is a lucrative business for organized
criminals. And that the pattern of taking refugees’ money, smuggling
them – and then selling them into slavery is not uncommon – made all the
more easy because the system criminalizes the victims.
And the nativist yahoos who wave their America-for-the-Americans flags
and spew hatred as they stop the buses and the children at Murrieta are
the descendents of the yahoos who stood at the state line during the
Dust Bowl to keep the Okies out.
And they are, of course, the descendents of the Okies too.
And the children on the buses and the children in the refugee camps in
Jordan and in the detention centers in Port Hueneme and Brownsville –
the kids wading the Rio Grande or staring across the Mediterranean to
the rocky cliffs of Lampedusa are, first-and-foremost: Children. Refugee
or Deportee they are our children; they are us. We have waded that
river and crossed that sea and confronted that hated and dreamed that
dream since before the beginning of time.
“Oh, we come on the ship they call the Mayflower
We come on the ship that sailed the moon
We come in the age’s most uncertain hour
And sing an American tune”
¡Onward/Adelante! - smf
_______________
(1) Forced migration in Indonesia : Historical perspectives | http://bit.ly/1jwv6wd
Getting Real: GROUNDING VERGARA IN THE REALITIES OF TEACHING IN CALIFORNIA
By guest bloggers Julia Koppich and Daniel Humphrey | On California | Education Week | http://bit.ly/1mSWSne
July 10, 2014 11:12 PM | The recent ruling by Los Angeles Superior Court
Judge Rolf Treu striking down parts of California's long held teacher
tenure laws has roiled California's educational landscape. Whatever the
impact of the ruling, one thing is clear. Whether one supports or
opposes the Vergara decision the ruling raises critical issues regarding
teaching quality with which California policymakers soon must grapple
in order to strengthen the state's system of teaching and learning.
Addressing these issues will require thoughtful and careful state action
that builds on a foundation of solid understanding of teachers'
experiences in school districts throughout the state.
A year ago we released a study titled, "California's Beginning Teachers:
The Bumpy Path to a Profession." (follows) That work focused on
California policies, including tenure (called permanence in the
Education Code) and evaluation, which shape beginning teachers' careers.
Our findings reveal how California policy has failed early career
teachers. Legislative remedies for these inequities could serve as a
precursor to addressing the challenges posed by the Vergara decision.
Teachers Don't Get Tenure after Two Years
First, contrary to assertions about a too quick path to tenure, our
research shows that most California teachers do not experience getting
tenure as a 2-year process.
State policy assumes that teachers are hired into probationary positions
and, after 2 years of successful teaching as measured by performance
evaluations, are awarded tenure (permanence). This description does not
match the reality for most California teachers.
According to available state data, most teachers are hired into
temporary or other non-probationary status, and do not reach
probationary status for many years. This pattern has continued for more
than a decade. Under the California Education Code, districts
replacing a teacher on leave of absence or filling a position supported
by temporary funds (e.g., grants, non-mandatory categorical funds) can
hire teachers on temporary status. Our study showed, however, that some
districts cannot specify the teacher on leave teacher for whom the
temporary teacher is filling in or the grant or special fund that is
paying for the temporary teacher's position.
Teachers who are classified as temporary do not accrue time toward
tenure. As a result, in 2000, only 31% of third-year teachers and, in
2012, only 45% of third-year teachers had permanent status. The
2-years-to-tenure policy bears little relationship to the experience of
the majority of California's teachers. The amount of time it should
take to earn tenure remains a valid topic of debate. What is not
debatable is that, with regard to tenure, many teachers' realities do
not match current state policy.
Evaluation Does Not Differentiate Between Effective and Ineffective
Second, evaluation does not adequately differentiate between effective
and ineffective teachers. Moreover, for most teachers, evaluation is
not useful, accurate, fair, or meaningful.
The Vergara decision states that 1% to 3% of teachers are "grossly
ineffective." But not only is there no empirical evidence as to the
number of ineffective teachers, our "Bumpy Path" study found that the
current evaluation system does a poor job of determining teacher
effectiveness. Most teachers find the evaluation system that is
supposed to determine their effectiveness to be inadequate and
inconsistent. More importantly, teachers say their evaluation is
largely unhelpful in diagnosing their needs or designing support for
them. Many principals we interviewed concur with this view.
To better understand the quality of teacher evaluations, we examined a
sample of beginning teachers' official evaluation records. We found
that these files contained little documentation of teacher performance
and almost no guidance to the teacher about how to improve. The vast
majority of teachers received an "effective" rating, though the basis
for that rating, however legitimate, was unclear.
Compounding this dilemma, whether a teacher is supported or evaluated at
all depends on the teacher's employment status. State policy requires
only that probationary teachers--those on the path to tenure--be
evaluated. Teachers serving in temporary status, even for several
years, often are neither supported nor evaluated.
Remedying the challenges raised by Vergara hinges on an accurate and
meaningful evaluation system. California should require that all
teachers, regardless of status, be supported and evaluated.
Policymakers, working with stakeholders should develop a system that
ensures teachers are fairly and consistently evaluated and given
opportunities to improve. Once teachers are identified as ineffective,
they should enter a peer assistance and review program that offers a
thorough assessment of areas of weakness, deep support, and a targeted
path to improvement or exit.
Absent clear and consistently applied tenure regulations, accurate and
meaningful evaluation focused on support and improvement, and a program
for addressing ineffective teachers, California will be hard-pressed to
successfully address the policy challenges that lie at the heart of
Vergara.
● Julia Koppich is President of J. Koppich & Associates, a San
Francisco-based education consulting firm. Daniel Humphrey is a Senior
Researcher at SRI Education, a division of SRI International in Menlo
Park, CA.
DRAFT REVISION OF LCAP MOVES FORWARD AT STATE BOARD
OF ED + LCAP LIBRARY NOW OPEN FOR READERS + smf’s 2¢ (x2)
By John Fensterwald | EdSource | http://bit.ly/1r4JKNJ
July 10, 2014 :: Members of the State Board of Education uniformly
praised the way school districts have created plans to comply with
California’s new school improvement and accountability system, but said
Thursday that students should have more of a voice in the process. They
agreed to move ahead with modest proposed changes in regulations while
counseling patience before making more.
“Trust the process, be patient and thoughtful, not precipitous,” said board member Patricia Rucker.
“We’re close, with narrow areas of disagreement,” board member Sue Burr
said, referring to regulations governing the Local Control and
Accountability Plans, or LCAPs, that all school districts and charter
schools passed for the first time last month.
The LCAP is a three-year master plan that lays out a district’s budget
and academic improvement priorities. It’s a critical piece of the Local
Control Funding Formula, the landmark school funding law that
reallocates more money for “high-needs” students – low-income children,
students learning English and foster youth – and transfers
decision-making authority from the state to districts. As part of the
shift to local control, the Legislature required that districts reach
out to parents, teachers and others in the community in creating their
LCAPs.
“We have never seen so much engagement and reaching out. We have
changed California with the LCAP,” said Wes Smith, executive director of
the Association of California School Administrators.
The state board is in the process of revising the regulations setting
out what must be in each LCAP and defining how much flexibility
districts have in spending the supplemental dollars generated by
high-needs students.
Based on public comments and early LCAP reports from the field, the
staff of the state board is proposing changes in the LCAP format to make
it easier to read and determine whether a district is meeting its
commitments. The staff is also proposing two seemingly small changes in
wording that are generating some debate.
One change would make explicit the existing requirement that districts
consult with students about the LCAP. About 150 students in a Student
Voice coalition attended Thursday’s hearing. They included a contingent
from Long Beach and Los Angeles that drove all night to make the case
that the proposed language doesn’t ensure that districts will involve
students in creating their LCAPs, rather than giving them the plans
after the fact.
“We no longer want to be students sitting silently behind a desk with
our hand held high, waiting to be called on,” said Maurice Lemons, a
junior at Hamilton High, an arts magnet school in the Los Angeles
Unified School District. “No, we want the opportunity to give input into
the system that most directly affects our lives and our futures.”
Board members agreed, encouraging further tweaking of the proposed
language. “The intent of the statute was to engage students early in the
process and not merely present (the LCAP) toward the last week of
school,” said board member Bruce Holaday.
The other proposed addition of a half-dozen words reflects ongoing
disagreement between advocates for low-income children and organizations
representing school boards and superintendents. The advocates want a
detailed accounting of how money is spent on high-needs students, while
the school officials’ groups argue the LCAPs should focus on academic
results for underserved students, not dollars. Gov. Jerry Brown and the
state board have sought a balance between the two camps, and the current
regulations reflect that tension and ambiguity.
The proposed change, which the advocates groups support, would require
districts to spend supplemental dollars in ways that are both
“principally directed” toward high-needs students and “effective in
meeting the district’s goals” for those students.
Brian Rivas, director of policy and government relations for Education
Trust-West, which advocates for low-income and minority children, said
the intent was to prevent districts from steering supplemental dollars
toward across-the-board staff raises or debt payments that don’t
primarily benefit high-needs students. John Affeldt, managing attorney
for the nonprofit legal organization Public Advocates, said the new
wording wouldn’t hinder the flexibility of districts to spend money on
programs benefiting all students, but it would force them to justify the
rationale to the community.
But more than two dozen superintendents and school board members
testified that the proposal would be too restrictive. They said it would
be the first step toward turning the LCAP into “just another
compliance-based document” and a potential source of litigation.
Josephine Lucey, president of the California School Boards Association,
warns that proposed language governing LCAP spending would be
counterproductive.
“In our view, the term ‘principally’ is subjective and its insertion
will result in less, rather than greater, transparency,” said Josephine
Lucey, president of the California School Boards Association. “This term
distracts from the goal (of the funding formula) – to improve student
outcomes and close achievement gaps – and begins an erosion of local
decision-making.”
The issue remains unresolved. The proposed changes will be open to an
additional 15 days of public comment. Burr said she wants
superintendents to be specific about how “principally” would limit their
decision-making. The state board will vote on the language in either
September or, if there are further changes, in November. A coalition of
civil rights and advocacy groups is expected to propose additional
changes, including a requirement that the LCAP detail all expenditures
using supplemental funding.
Superintendent after superintendent praised the LCAP process and said it
is working to engage parents and create new goals for student
achievement.
Holding up a copy of his district’s LCAP, Morgan Hill Unified
Superintendent Steve Betando said, “We made a commitment to engage our
community and we did,” through six months of intensive meetings and
daily conversations.
“We have never seen so much engagement and reaching out,” said Wes
Smith, executive director of the Association of California School
Administrators. “We have changed California with the LCAP.”
Board member Carl Cohn didn’t stop there. “This is the most exciting
thing in American education today and makes me proud of our state. This
is really big change.”
But there also critics and skeptics – parents who complained that their
districts ignored them and that the LCAPs weren’t translated or written
in plain language. San Jose Unified parent Jackie Gamboa said she didn’t
understand her district’s LCAP after reading it a half-dozen times. In
Stockton Unified, said Cynthia Chagolla, an attorney with California
Rural Legal Assistance, “Parents had been told there was a place at the
table but promises were broken.”
Dolores Huerta, the civil rights leader who cofounded the National Farm
Workers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers, also
spoke at the board meeting. Kern High School District – her local
district – has one of the highest student suspension and expulsion rates
in the state, she said. Instead of adding counselors, it is spending
money on security. Instead of directing money to low-income students it
is spreading supplemental money across all students, she said.
“What more can we do to make our high school district follow the guidelines?” she asked.
Board members struggled with the same issue – what to do about those
districts that don’t follow the rules and are, in Cohn’s words “a poster
child for bad behavior.” Who should respond, he asked: the state, the
county office of education, the California School Boards Association?
“If I were a member of CSBA, I would be on the phone with them,” Burr said. “’How can we help you?’”
It’s the job of county offices of education to monitor districts and
respond to problems, other members said. However, they said at this
point they didn’t want to change regulations in response to the worst
cases.
“We should not remediate too fast,” said board member Ilene Straus. “We have 1,000 districts.”
●●smf’s 2¢ re LCAP draft revision: ● A special tip o’ th’ 4LAKids cap
to the students from Long Beach and L.A, - and from up+down the state
who ”drove all night to make the case that the proposed language doesn’t
ensure that districts will involve students in creating their LCAPs,
rather than giving them the plans after the fact.” It is disheartening
that students in LAUSD+elsewhere were treated exactly like the LCAP
Parent Advisory Committee was ….and heartening to see the students took
action.
● “What to do about those districts that don’t follow the rules and are,
in Cohn’s words ‘a poster child for bad behavior’?”: The public comment
window is open for an additional 15 days – and I would hope that the
LAUSD LCAP Advisory Committee takes the opportunity to shout out that
open window that they’re mad as hell and not going to take it anymore!
___________
►LCAP LIBRARY NOW OPEN FOR READERS
By John Fensterwald | EdSource Today | http://bit.ly/W8YkXG
July 8, 2014 | There is now an Internet site that lets you look up
hundreds of districts’ Local Control and Accountability Plans – and to
add your district’s LCAP to the mix.
“The state embarked on the LCAP effort and asked everyone to have faith
that it would meet the goals of the new funding system,” said Valerie
Cuevas, Education Trust-West’s interim executive director. “LCAP Watch
is an opportunity to make early observations of whether we are hitting
the mark.”
The LCAP is a three-year plan, updated annually, that lays out how a
district will meet the conditions for school improvement and goals for
student success that the Legislature set out in creating the new school
funding formula. It also lays out a process of community engagement that
is integral to the shift from state to local control.
LCAP Watch is the creation of Education Trust-West, a nonprofit group
that advocates for low-income, minority students, along with three-dozen
organizations and groups that have agreed to share information on
districts’ newly passed accountability plans and to spread the word
about the new repository.
LCAP Watch [http://lcapwatch.org]
currently has LCAPs from about 250 districts and charter schools and
plans to add hundreds more. It is collecting each district’s LCAP
drafts, the version that school boards approved and eventually the final
LCAPs that county offices of education have signed off on. There is
also a demographic profile of each district. State law also requires
that the state Department of Education provide links to districts’ and
county offices’ LCAPs on its web site.
Education Trust-West plans to do a first-year LCAP evaluation to see
what districts are planning for student improvements. It will include an
in-depth analysis of a dozen districts’ LCAPs, said Carrie Hahnel, the
organization’s director of research and policy analysis.
●● smf’s 2¢: RE CCTP WATCH- A commenter on the EdSource webpage points
out that CCTP Watch was started by Education Trust – West (we must
remember that ‘nonprofit’ is NOT a synonym for ‘altruistic’) …and that
ET-W is funded by Bill and Melinda Gates, James Irvine, and Walton
Foundations.
That said, as long as CCTP Watch is only a library of all CCTPs: no harm/no foul.
But let us tread lightly lest we be deceived. Yes, ET-W has “Trust” as their middle name.
“Trust …but verify!” – Ronald Reagan
Later on, when ET-W does that first-year LCAP evaluation - and when they
pick and then do those in-depth analyses of a dozen districts’ LCAPs,
let us pay particular attention to which districts they pick… and
exactly how they say what they say.
FREE LUNCH FOR ALL STUDENTS IN CHICAGO PUBLIC SCHOOLS STARTS IN SEPTEMBER
CPS OFFICIALS SAY FEDERAL PROGRAM WILL SAVE DISTRICT
MONEY. The free lunches are part of a federal program to reduce
paperwork for large low-income districts.
Published on WBEZ 91.5 Chicago | http://bit.ly/1tBNsQF
July 3, 2014 :: Lunch money may be a thing of the past at Chicago Public Schools.
Under a relatively new program called the Community Eligibility Option
(CEO) all school meals will be free starting in September 2014, the
district confirmed to WBEZ Thursday.
Although the CPS initially rejected the program in 2011, it had expanded it to 400 schools by last fall.
This September, however, will be the first time "well-off" schools join
the program as well. Entirely free meals reduce the labor of cash
collection and tracking which students have to pay full and reduced
prices for their food. This tiered system (with incentives for schools
reporting higher poverty levels) led to fraud among CPS employees in the
past.
“This transition will also allow us to improve quality of food and
infrastructure in our lunchrooms, allowing us to redirect the dollars we
no longer have to subsidize back to the classroom,” the district said
in an email to WBEZ Thursday.
Under the CEO program, the federal government reimburses the district
based on its percentage of low-income students, and CPS officials say
that the continued rollout of the program has already meant savings.
“Our predominantly high [low-income] population—nearly 90 percent—allows
us to meet the threshold to ensure that reimbursement rates won’t cost
the district revenue,” a CPS spokeswoman said in the email . “In FY14,
due to our expanded participation in the Community Eligibility Option
(CEO) program (from 200 to 400 schools this year), we no longer had to
subsidize the program with general fund dollars. We've also received a
larger blended reimbursement this year of $2.93, up from $2.76 last
year.”
CPS representatives also says a swipe card payment system will be rolled
out for all students in the district by the end of 2014.
PRIVATE SUMMER SCHOOLS ON PUBLIC CAMPUSES PROMPT DEBATE ON EDUCATION INEQUALITY
by Stephen Ceasar | Los Angeles Times | http://lat.ms/1m78ywG
July 13, 2014 :: In Beverly Hills, high school students can take a
U.S. history course for $798 this summer; in La Cañada Flintridge,
Spanish is offered for $775, and in Arcadia, a creative writing course
costs $605, plus a $25 registration fee.
While summer programs in many California public school districts have
been scaled back or eliminated, scores of students in predominantly
affluent areas can pay for courses, bolstering their transcripts to be
more attractive to colleges.
The classes, which have gained popularity in recent years, are offered
by nonprofit foundations on leased high school campuses. They often are
taught by district instructors and run by administrators hired by these
groups.
The foundations carefully structure their programs to sidestep state law
that bars public schools from charging for educational activities, by
remaining independent of the school district.
They say, 'We just care about our kid's education' and you can
understand that, but so do poor parents. - Sarah A. Hill, political
science professor at Cal State Fullerton
Critics say the foundations, though well-intentioned, privatize public
school, undercut California's guarantee of a free public education for
all and contribute to an already wide inequity in educational
opportunity by offering public school credit at a cost only some can
afford.
"What about the kids whose parents can't create a foundation and pour
money into it?" said Cal State Fullerton political science professor
Sarah A. Hill, who studies public education finance. "They say, 'We just
care about our kid's education' and you can understand that, but so do
poor parents — they just don't have the resources to pay for summer
school."
Jinny Dalbeck, who oversees the La Cañada summer program, said because
the La Cañada Unified School District has cut summer school, her group
is filling the void.
Students enroll for a variety of reasons: some seek to get a head start
on the coming school year, or clear up space for more advanced courses,
and others want to retake classes for a better grade, Dalbeck said.
"It's truly a stand-alone, private school for five weeks," Dalbeck said.
"We're not a public school. We're meeting a need that the students have
— to be able to work ahead."
About 675 local education foundations operate in the state, according to
the California Consortium of Education Foundations. The groups raise
money from parents as well as some local businesses with the express
purpose of addressing shortfalls in state funding.
They have become a crucial fundraising arm for some schools, donating tens of millions of dollars each year.
A review of tax documents by Hill and others found that some of the more
affluent groups provide campuses with thousands of dollars per student
in addition to state per-pupil funding.
In 2011, the Manhattan Beach Education Foundation's total revenue was
nearly $7.5 million; the Hillsborough Schools Foundation, which supports
a 1,500-student elementary school district in the Bay Area, brought in
about $4.2 million.
When local districts are most in need, the foundations spring into action.
The groups have saved or brought back services and programs such as
music and art that were cut during steep budget shortfalls in recent
years.
During those lean times, some school officials attempted to maintain
programs and activities by charging students for such things as
workbooks and extracurricular activities. Some districts provided summer
school — for a price.
The ACLU sued the state in 2010 over these costs, but dropped the case
two years later after a law was passed requiring the state Department of
Education to ensure that schools don't charge illegal fees. The law
also created a complaint process to challenge possible violations.
As a result, the foundations began offering classes on their own.
Dozens of complaints have been filed around the state in the past year
by parents and others who contend districts are essentially outsourcing
summer school, dictating class offerings and in effect charging students
for credit.
The state has not found a school district or foundation in violation of the law.
The foundations contend that while there is communication with the local district, they remain separate entities.
"They're a public school and we're a fee-based school program," said
Andrea Sala, executive director of the Peninsula Education Foundation.
"They don't have any say in our curriculum — though it's the same
curriculum because it's the same teacher — we run it independently."
David Sapp, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union, said
the state must ensure that districts aren't complicit in offering
education programming for a fee.
"That would explicitly conflict with the free-schools guarantee," he said.
It is a line that can be easily crossed, said Claremont attorney Ronald T. Vera, who advises foundations.
Vera said he has declined to work with organizations that did not
legally operate their programs. In one case, he said a district paid
teachers to work in the foundation's summer school. He counsels groups
who charge fees to be aware of the law and to maintain a distinct
division.
"It's murky waters," he said.
Caroline Kim, 14, is taking biology at the Peninsula High campus in
Rolling Hills Estates for $670 to get a head start on her sophomore
year. In the fall, she plans to take physics. Caroline and about 1,200
of her peers are attending classes offered by the Peninsula Education
Foundation.
The cost wasn't an issue for her family and it is well worth the price, she said.
"I'm really lucky to be in this school district and have this
opportunity," Caroline said. "Summer school allows me to take advantage
of all these opportunities and I'll be a lot more prepared for college."
Many summer programs are not approved by the Western Assn. of Schools
and Colleges, which accredits public and private high schools in
California. For credits to be placed on a student transcript, a
principal must approve them.
High school students have long taken community college courses — at a
cost of $46 per unit — and they also can take online courses to fulfill
graduation requirements.
Many districts, such as Los Angeles Unified, have had little to no support from these types of foundations.
In 2007, the nation's second-largest system had a budget of about $40
million to offer summer classes at all levels, said Javier Sandoval, an
administrator with the district's Beyond the Bell program, which
coordinates after-school and summer programs.
Last year, funding plummeted to about $1 million and L.A. Unified could
accommodate only about 6,000 high school students who needed credits to
graduate. This year, the district is offering classes to about 36,000
students; about 198,000 high school students are enrolled in L.A.
Unified.
Sandoval said families of students in L.A. Unified, nearly 80% of whom
are considered low-income, are at a competitive disadvantage to their
peers elsewhere.
"Those who have money can have their students go to summer school, and
those who can't are stuck," he said. "It sets up an inequitable system."
The cost can be high even for some families in these more affluent
areas, said Ronit Stone, president of the Beverly Hills Education
Foundation. Some foundations offer scholarships.
"Nobody is required to take summer school," she said.
________
●●: Them that's got shall have
Them that's not shall lose
So the Bible said and it still is news
Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own
Yes, the strong gets more
While the weak ones fade
Empty pockets don't ever make the grade
Mama may have, Papa may have
But God bless the child that's got his own
That's got his own
- Billie Holiday, Arthur Herzog Jr
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T
FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other
Sources
George McKenna endorsed by LA County Democratic Party
in LAUSD District 1 runoff Aug 12 | @electMcKenna | @LADemocrats | http://bit.ly/1klshZM
SATURDAY (…and Friday recapped) @ THE AFT CONVENTION | http://bit.ly/1klqN1J
GOV. BROWN HIGHLIGHTS STATE’S APPROACH TO EDUCATION, says “No!” to testing every child, every year. | http://bit.ly/1sN6Juo
Stete Board of Ed debates what to do about districts that don’t follow
the LCAP rules and are "poster child(ren) for bad behavior" http://bit.ly/TY9soa
DRAFT REVISION OF LCAP/LCFF MOVES FORWARD AT STATE BOARD OF ED | http://bit.ly/TY9soa
L.A. UNIFIED REQUESTS HEARING TO ENFORCE SETTLEMENT IN TELFAIR MOLESTATION LAWSUIT OVER MOTHER'S OBJECTIONS | http://lat.ms/1mHzHKU
Contrary to what you’ve been (mis)led to believe: MOST CALIFORNIA TEACHERS DON'T GET TENURE AFTER TWO YEARS | http://bit.ly/1q4ogkr
Getting Real: GROUNDING VERGARA IN THE REALITIES OF TEACHING IN CALIFORNIA http://bit.ly/1q4ogkr
MOVE BY AMERICAN FEDERATION OF TEACHERS TO CHALLENGE COMMON CORE IS BLOW TO THE WHITE HOUSE | http://ti.me/1zuuOum
Time reports from #AFT14: TEACHERS UNION PULLS FULL-THROATED SUPPORT FOR COMMON CORE | http://tl.gd/n_1s2eumr
FULL TEXT OF PRESIDENT RANDI @RWEINGARTEN'S KEYNOTE ADDRESS TO #AFT14 ANNUAL CONVENTION TODAY | http://bit.ly/1kMoyUV
"Surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold higher those who think alike than who think differently". –Nietzsche
@rweingarten spending significant time urging community outreach to
parents and students to strengthen schools. #AFT14 #doittogether
@rweingarten: We will fight Vergara in the courtroom and in the court of public opinion. #aft14
@rweingarten: "Between NCLB and Race to the Top, fed educ accountability
efforts have taken a very, very,very... very wrong!" turn #aft14
PUBLIC EDUCATION: "Not for Profit ...and for Free!" @rweingarten #aft14
smf: It's almost as fun–but not quite as funny–to watch the #AFT14
convention online as it is to watch a LAUSD Bd of Ed meeting! http://bit.ly/1nfsBZY
"We—teachers & our unions—must engage and involve parents and the community in.. Read: http://tl.gd/n_1s2et0j
Ed Code requires ALL schools to teach ALL K-6 students ALL four art forms. Only 70 of 500+ in LAUSD do, to some kids! http://bit.ly/1nfDwrh
L.A. SCHOOL-BY-SCHOOL ARTS INSTRUCTION BREAKDOWN: Check your school here. | http://bit.ly/1nfDwrh
MYSTERY GROUP SUES TWO DOZEN SCHOOL DISTRICTS, INCLUDING LAUSD, OVER INADEQUATE PHYSICAL EDUCATION | http://bit.ly/1lRKttv
WILL AFT PICK UP ‘DUMP DUNCAN’ MOVEMENT @ CONVENTION, WHICH STARTS FRIDAY IN LA? Read: http://tl.gd/n_1s2dhgi
NEA AIMS TO DUMP DUNCAN, CURB TESTING; Creationists aim to curb evolution. Read: http://tl.gd/n_1s2d8nj
“The vast majority of white students, including poor students, are in
classrooms with other students who aren't poor. But most minority
students are in classrooms with other students living in poverty.” |
The Economic Policy Institute: http://bit.ly/TmoGmC .
STANDARD&POORS SAYS THAT CHARTER SCHOOL RATINGS WILL CONTINUE TO
SLIP AS MORE SCHOOLS ISSUE DEBT EARLIER IN THEIR LIFE CYCLE: http://politico.pro/1jRnFtS .
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
Monday July 14 is Bastille Day. Rise up and overthrow
the status quo, storm the dark fortress and free the prisoners of
narrow mindedness. In the end it was the very troops guarding the Bastille
joining the citoyens of Faubourg Saint-Antoine that led to the fall of
the fortress. Just sayin'.
*Dates and times subject to change. ________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 213-241-5183
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213-241.8700
What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Bennett.Kayser@lausd.net • 213-241-5555
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
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!.
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