Saturday, September 27, 2008

Welcome to the Dichotomy


4LAKids: Sunday, Sept 28, 2008
In This Issue:
After 85 days …what?: JACK O'CONNELL COMMENTS ON FINAL BUDGET'S IMPACT ON PUBLIC EDUCATION + A STATE WITHOUT A BUDGET, A GOVERNMENT WITHOOUT A CLUE
CALIFORNIA’S NEW 8TH GRADE ALGEBRA RULE GETS SOME POOR MARKS
L.A. UNIFIED CLERKS MUST DO WINDOWS: School district office workers whose jobs were cut must show computer competence for a shot at reemployment.
CSBA, ACSA & CASBO FILE SUIT TO BLOCK PROP 39 CHARTER RULES FROM TAKING EFFECT THIS FALL
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
What can YOU do?


Featured Links:
FLUNK THE BUDGET, NOT OUR CHILDREN Website
PUBLIC SCHOOLS: an investment we can't afford to cut! - The Education Coalition Website
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.
Half the people are stoned,
and the other half are waiting for the next election.
Half the people are drowned,
And the other half are swimming in the wrong direction.
— from the Gloria of Leonard Bernstein's Mass, lyric by Paul Simon

______


4LAKids for the most part redistributes the news: What other people thought and wrote about events that appear to have relevance, significance or import to public education in Los Angeles. I read this stuff and forward it to you. I pick and choose based on a whim, add a thought or two of my own and that's it.

When the news media miss an event I thought was important I sometimes comment on the omission. I understand and chafe at the fact that good news doesn't sell newspapers or advertising. Imparting education to 700,000 children and 400,000 adults is good news. Doing it badly/wrong/indifferently is bad — ergo the news reported and forwarded is predominantly bad.

The real news, the authentic events, the stuff that happens day-today, day-in-and-day-out in classrooms and schools and even in the school boardroom is predominantly good. Welcome to the dichotomy.

Last Thursday I attended and spoke at two events that I wish the rare good-news reporters had covered – "good stuff happens/film at eleven!" …but alas. What I said or thought isn't important but what was being celebrated - and I mean that in the ecclesiastical context - is.

THURSDAY AT NOON there was a rubber chicken luncheon at the Biltmore - honoring the builders and contractors who have been building and modernizing our schools. They were honored for doing the jobs safely and well, on-time and on-budget, with quality and pride. Guys and rare gals in suits – some awkward in coats and rare ties – some comfortable in t-shirts and work boots, accepting awards for doing their jobs well. For building schools in communities that definitely need them for kids whose curiosity needs housing - but never containing. In building schools in those communities they are building the communities themselves; they are the building a foundation for the future and for future generations.

Good Job. Well Done. …not that you're done yet!

THURSDAY AFTERNOON was the dedication for Roy Romer Middle School in North Hollywood. Roy was there - back in his own work boots - and his singular contributions to this school district and the building program were recognized and honored by educators and public officials alike. Superintendent Brewer acknowledged that much of the credit for recent academic accomplishment rightly belongs to Superintendent Romer. More telling were the numbers of quality of folks who showed up to honor Roy: Builders of schools, business people, educators, politicians, and school boardmembers - friends of Roy who weren't on the program ….but were with the program.

The school itself is a proud structure - neither a monument nor a memorial but a living testament to Roy's vision. A slide show celebrated his accomplishments, an early campaign broadsheet when he was running for the Colorado Legislature said to "Remember your 3 'R's": Roy R. Romer. Readin', 'ritin and 'rithmetic; Rigor, Relevance and Relationships.

The highlight was when the enthusiastic eighth graders took the enthusiastic Romer on the grand tour; the excitement and appreciation and pure energy was mutual and contagious. By the end of the tour only the eighth graders, the namesake and the plant manager with her keys were still standing.

Good Job. Well done …not that you're done yet!

¡Onward/Hasta adelante! - smf


After 85 days …what?: JACK O'CONNELL COMMENTS ON FINAL BUDGET'S IMPACT ON PUBLIC EDUCATION + A STATE WITHOUT A BUDGET, A GOVERNMENT WITHOOUT A CLUE
STATE SUPERINTENDENT JACK O'CONNELL COMMENTS ON FINAL BUDGET'S IMPACT ON PUBLIC EDUCATION

California Department of Education Press Release

September 23, 2008 — SACRAMENTO — State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell today issued the following statement regarding the budget signed today by Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and its impact on public schools.

"While no one will applaud the final budget agreement, it is a relief to have a state budget in place. I have directed my staff to immediately distribute funds owed to child care centers and schools that were on hold during the longest budget stalemate in our state's history.

"I am pleased that this budget includes an appropriation of federal funds intended for local education agencies that are in Program Improvement Corrective Action. I have directed my staff to work with districts and county offices of education, and to act with speed to appropriately direct these resources to minimize the funds that will revert back to the federal government.

"I am also pleased that the budget includes a one-time appropriation of $12.5 million for a collaboration between the California Department of Education and the California Community Colleges to develop California Partnership Academies focused on the development of green technology.

"While the budget that Governor Schwarzenegger signed today does include a modest cost of living adjustment, schools and districts continue to grapple with increasing costs and greater responsibilities under our state and federal accountability systems. With costs continuing to rise, budgets being squeezed, and the fact that this budget is predicated on uncertain revenues, the signing of the budget brings only temporary relief for local education agencies.

"The Governor and the Legislature must continue with budget discussions now to find ways to address the needs of our students. I urge policy makers to craft a budget for the next fiscal year that includes new revenues that will allow us to truly address the needs of students in our public education system. We must provide funding that will help us increase the achievement of all students, close the achievement gap, and prepare students for success in the increasingly competitive global economy."

▼For what?: The nightmare begins a new chapter:
THE WAKE FOR A STATE WITHOUT A BUDGET, A GOVERNMENT WITHOUT A CLUE

Tuesday, September 23, 2008
►WHY IS THIS MAN SMILING? WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE – AND WHY ARE THEY CLAPPING?

Photo: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger holds a copy of the 2008-2009 state budget after signing it during a small ceremony in his Sacramento office. Representatives from California counties stand behind the governor.

LONG AGO, earlier this year in a meeting room in Sacramento the legislation team from the State PTA met and discussed the state budget as it impacts Education and the Welfare of Children - back when the budget was first proposed. Before the May Revise. Before the Crisis of 85 days. We were strong and we had powerful friends on our side: the legislative majority, almost a million members who are united and vocal - every one a likely voter. We had The Truth on our side; we were in the majority and we were set out to do the right thing for kids and the future of the state.

We also knew that politics is the Art of Compromise - and that ultimately we and the children would be compromised by our legislative friends. The Republican minority had signed a pledge to Not Raise Taxes …and we knew that that was not the workable option. That determination was shared by our friends and ultimately by the governor himself - we shared his dedication to reach a long term solution rather than a quick fix to postpone the crisis to next year. We were committed in his proclaimed Year of Education Reform to NOT do things the way things had always been done.

Now as the dust clears, we and the children have been compromised. The governor claims that Education has been kept whole - but Education hasn't been whole since 1978. It has been cut and reduced and slashed and nibbled at since the passage of Proposition 13. Proposition 98, which is supposed to be the floor for Education funding is looked at as being the ceiling by most - and as being an outrageous burden on the taxpayers by a few. It was that few who won in the end. Taxes were not raised. The problems were put off to next year. California moves a little lower into the Cellar of Education Funding, perhaps from 46th to 47th in the nation - it remains to be seen.

• 2007 was the year of Healthcare Reform.
• 2008 is the Year of Education Reform.
• 2009 will be the Year of Budget Reform.
• Don’t let me ruin it for you but I have a feeling I know how that turns out.

Onward nonetheless! - smf

►Day 85 and Done! CALIFORNIA BUDGET IS SIGNED, 85 DAYS LATE AND DESPISED
“The governor, however, proclaimed the budget a victory.”

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER – New York Times

September 24, 2008 -- LOS ANGELES — Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Tuesday signed California’s budget, a document that was 85 days late and among state lawmakers, perhaps the most universally despised budget in the nation.

State Controller John Chiang used the occasion to move quickly to dispense with some 80,000 in claims that have gone unpaid since the state began its fiscal year on July 1.

“This record-setting budget stalemate has been an enormous burden on so many small businesses and health care providers who care for our most vulnerable Californians: the sick, elderly, disabled and children,” Mr. Chiang said in a statement. “I will quickly pay all backlogged claims, and I am asking state agencies for their assistance to ensure that we get payments into the hands of those who most desperately need them as quickly as possible.”

The $143 billion spending plan, which the governor signed without the usual public ceremony, was the subject of heated debate and intense last-minute haggling among Democrats, who control the Legislature, Republicans and the governor, a Republican who was at odds with lawmakers from both parties over how to close a $15 billion gap.

The budget, $68 million larger than last year’s, sets $1.7 billion in reserves should state revenues come in below estimates, highly likely in California’s, and the country’s, volatile economy.

Mr. Schwarzenegger also vetoed $510 million in line items, including $944,000 from the Department of Fair Employment and Housing, a cut that means the loss of nine enforcement jobs; $8 million from the state’s Alcohol and Drug Program’s program for preventing crystal meth trafficking; and $2 million from a California Conservation Corps work training program.

The budget relies heavily on accounting maneuvers — moving tax receipts from one year to a next — as well as a plan to borrow $5 billion against future lottery earnings, which requires the approval of voters in a ballot measure in a special election next year. If the lottery plan is defeated, midyear cuts and other measures to rein in spending are likely.

The government will also increase the penalty on corporations that understate their tax liability by at least $1 million, to add a 20 percent penalty in addition to a 10 percent interest rate on underreported taxes. But the spending plan contains no substantive changes to the state’s expenses or its revenue-raising structure, which might have staved off another hole next year.

“We have always said this really does just kick the can down the road,” said Alicia Trost, a spokeswoman for Don Perata, the Senate president pro tem, a Democrat. “The only thing good is that we fully fund education, we prevent borrowing, and we avoid the most onerous cuts to the neediest communities.”

The governor, however, proclaimed the budget a victory — one he squeezed from the Legislature after rejecting an earlier plan and after Democrats and Republicans could not agree on a sales tax increase.

He said he was particularly pleased by the budget’s proposed increase in the size of California’s rainy day fund, to 12.5 percent of the state’s general fund expenditures from 5 percent. That provision, too, requires a nod from voters in the special election.

Mr. Chiang’s office may begin writing checks as early as Friday, a spokeswoman said, beginning with $3.6 billion in Medicaid payments to hospitals, nursing homes and other health care providers that had been held up under the standoff. Further payments to vendors and other state creditors will follow.

Monday, September 22, 2008
►Day 84: CALIFORNIA’S BUDGET – EVERYONE IS A WINNER AND A LOSER
by Jon Fleischman -Publisher FlashReport | Fleischman is Vice Chairman (South) of the California Republican Party.

As Governor Schwarzenegger prepares to sign the California State Budget, we hear at the FlashReport are prepared to say that everyone involved in the process were winners AND losers.

The winners:

Legislative Republicans, led by Senate Republican Leader Dave Cogdill and Assembly Republican Leader Mike Villines, draw a bright line in the sand and said that the problems caused by massive over-spending in state government WILL NOT be resolved by increasing taxes on Californians. In the face of Democrats who made as a top priority a hike in the state's income taxes, and a Governor of their own party pushing a multi-billion dollar sales tax increase, GOP legislative solidarity won the day.

Legislative Democrats, due to their gerrymandered majority, managed to get through this budget season without a serious overhaul of California's government. Decades of dominance by liberals in Sacramento has grown state government into a grotesque and massive one - in need of serious reforms. Despite all of the hoopla, this new budget spends MORE than last year's - a testament to power of a party committed to growing government.

Governor Schwarzenegger's budget reform measures, after some political muscle-showing, were ultimately placed into this final package - which is to say that it will be placed before the voters (where presumably public-employee unions will pony up millions to try and kill it). While these reforms are short of the kind of absolute spending cap that is needed to reign in the insatiable appetite of Democrats to increase spending, they are certainly a step in the right direction.

Only in California are the winners also the losers...

The big loser was Arnold Schwarzenegger. First and foremost, the Governor demonstrated that his form of flip-flop governance only made him less relevant to the process. While he ultimately got a last-minute demand for some budget reform in the final budget, the only reason there is a budget is because eventually legislative leaders correctly saw the Governor as a nuisance and ineffective in putting together a budget deal. We'll write more on this in the weeks to come, but if the Governor wants to be relevant, he needs to be a part of a team, as opposed to trying to be all things to all people (or nothing to anyone, depending on your perspective). His gross violation of his no-new-taxes pledge has taken his credibility with the California political community, especially Republicans, to an all-time low.

The failure to increase taxes makes California Democrat legislators losers. Clearly Democrats were backed off of a strongly desired tax hike (or as they call it, "revenue increases") as part of a budget solution. They also caved to the Governor's demands for budget reform. Perhaps they are the biggest losers because this year's successful play by the GOP to fend off tax increases pretty much means no new taxes in the foreseeable future. Assembly Speaker Karen Bass was widely looked at as ineffectual and a "B" player in budget negotiations, with the more seasoned and spirited (despite being term-limited) Senate President Don Perata being looked at as the "King Fish" of the left.

Finally, legislative Republicans, despite the win on the tax issue, were forced to put up votes for a budget that increases total state government spending, fails to really include real reforms of the process, and largely continues the status-quo of California's modern-day welfare state. It is unclear if, given the partisan make-up of the legislature, any budget deal could have been better. But it doesn't change the fact that when you get passed the hoopla of holding the line in taxes, no Republican can be proud of the vote they were forced to cast on this budget.

►DAY 84 - STANDIN’ AROUND AN’ WAITIN’ FOR THE NEXT SHOE TO DROP: WHAT’S NEXT?
AM Alert: SacBee CapitolAlert | Mon Sept 22

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger could sign the state budget as early as today, a record 84 days into the fiscal year.

But state lawmakers are already looking at a multibillion-dollar deficit next year. And the year after that. And the year after that.

"I don't see much of a signing ceremony," Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger declared Friday, "because there's nothing to celebrate."

The next year's state budget will start out $1.5 billion in the hole.

And that includes $5 billion in funds borrowed from future state lottery earnings. If those don't materialize (the money depends on passage of a ballot measure that the education community is leery about), the state starts off in a $6.5 billion hole.

And that's if the economy holds up, which, well, who knows.

"We have simply rolled the problem into the next year," Senate President Pro Don Perata said last week.

Minority legislative Republicans, meanwhile, have been emboldened by the 2008 impasse, as they fended off calls for tax hikes from a GOP governor and from majority Democrats.

"So it's a W for the reps," wrote ex-Assemblyman Ray Haynes, a conservative Republican, on the FlashReport. "They should go home proud of their accomplishment, apologize to no one for what they have done, and gird their loins for next year's fight. It is going to be even nastier."

For their part, Democrats are ramping up the rhetoric to turn the Big Five into the Big Three, pushing a potential ballot measure to eliminate the two-thirds vote for passage of new taxes and budgets.

Such a measure could go on the 2009 special election ballot.

There's also the matter of the 800-plus bills lawmakers are dumping on Schwarzenegger's desk. He has until the end of the month to sign or veto them.



▲Relive the entire Misadventure: A STATE WITHOUT A BUDGET, A GOVERNMENT WITHOUT A CLUE



CALIFORNIA’S NEW 8TH GRADE ALGEBRA RULE GETS SOME POOR MARKS
CRITICS WARN THAT THE REQUIREMENT WILL BE BAD BOTH FOR STUDENTS WITH SOLID MATH SKILLS AND THE UNPREPARED

Critics warn that the requirement will be bad both for students with solid math skills and the unprepared.
By Howard Blume | Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

September 22, 2008 -- The new state policy of requiring algebra in the eighth grade will set up unprepared students for failure while holding back others with solid math skills, a new report has concluded.

These predictions, based on national data, come in the wake of an algebra mandate that the state Board of Education, under pressure from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, adopted in July. That decision won widespread praise from some reform advocates and the Bush administration, putting California out front in a national debate over improving mathematics instruction.

The policy also led to a lawsuit filed this month by groups representing school districts and school administrators. They contend that the state board adopted the new rules illegally. Their underlying concern is that the algebra policy is unworkable and unfunded.

The new study, released today by the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., looked at who is taking eighth-grade algebra and how they are doing.

And there was some ostensibly good news. Nationwide, more students are taking algebra than before. Over five years, the percentage of eighth-graders in advanced math -- algebra or higher -- went up by more than one-third. In total, about 37% of all U.S. students took advanced math in 2005, the most recent year in the analysis.

Yet some 120,000 of these students -- about 8% -- are scoring in the lowest 10% on the eighth-grade National Assessment of Educational Progress. Many thousands more are performing well below grade level.

And when students perform poorly in a math course where they don't belong, no one benefits, said Tom Lawless, a senior fellow at Brookings.

Across the country, "you have 120,000 kids sitting in algebra and geometry classes and they don't know how to multiply and divide," Lawless said. "That's an absurd situation. They're not going to learn anything. And the kids who are sitting next to them, who are well prepared, are not going to learn anything either" because their learning will be slowed down.

On average, there are at least two students in every eighth-grade algebra class with second-grade math skills. That number rises in urban school systems where these students are more likely to attend overcrowded schools with teachers who are less experienced and less likely to have math degrees or college-level advanced math. These students also are disproportionately low-income minorities.

For many, algebra has become a civil rights issue. Students who take algebra early have a leg up on college and career. And minorities and the poor have a glaringly lower enrollment rate in early algebra. But just taking the course is not enough.

As evidence, Lawless pointed to the District of Columbia, which rates near the top in eighth-grade algebra enrollment and dead last on the math portion of the eighth-grade national assessment. Near the top in math achievement are Vermont and North Dakota, which enroll a comparatively small percentage of students in advanced math. There is no correlation nationwide between eighth-grade algebra policies and performance in algebra, Lawless said.

At Horace Mann Middle School in Los Angeles, 214 eighth-graders, nearly half, took algebra and four tested as proficient.

Lawless attributed California's incremental progress to improved curriculum and standards. In 2008, 42% of eighth-graders in algebra tested as proficient, compared with 38% the year before. And in 2002 less than a third of eighth-graders took the class. Today, just over half do.

The underlying goal is learning algebra, Lawless said. And that should be reinforced by adding more-difficult algebra questions to the state's mandatory high school exit exam. He said the real work needs to be accomplished in elementary school, so students are ready for algebra.

The new California policy grew out of efforts to create a math test for all eighth-graders that would satisfy federal officials. The state could have developed a new test that incorporated less-challenging algebraic concepts.

But critics characterized this approach as "algebra lite," a watering-down of math instruction. Intensely lobbied from all sides, Schwarzenegger decided, just before the state board met, that all eighth-graders should take a full algebra test. And the governor-appointed state board granted his wish.

This last-minute decision is the basis for a lawsuit by the California School Boards Assn. and the Assn. of California School Administrators. They argue that the state board failed to vet the algebra policy, as required by law, and also illegally circumvented the state process for changing curriculum standards.

State Supt. of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell said he'd need more than $3 billion to get the schools ready for mandatory eighth-grade algebra by 2011. Such funding is unlikely given the state's budget woes.

State board member Yvonne Chan, a school principal, sided with Schwarzenegger. But even though she requires algebra of all eighth-graders, she said only 30% are testing as proficient at her school, the Vaughn Next Century Learning Center in San Fernando. She said she wished she could afford smaller classes, grouped by ability, where teachers could slow down and re-teach difficult material.

"And the shortage of math teachers exacerbates whatever you want to do," Chan said. "Everybody knows there needs to be resources. That has been very clear from Day 1."


L.A. UNIFIED CLERKS MUST DO WINDOWS: School district office workers whose jobs were cut must show computer competence for a shot at reemployment.
FOR SOME, IT'S A TALL ORDER.

by Jason Song, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

September 25, 2008 -- Seventy-one-year-old Peggy McIntyre needs to learn as much as she can about Windows before 8 a.m. Or else.

McIntyre is one of about 40 L.A. Unified School District employees, mainly women nearing retirement age, whose jobs were eliminated in budget cuts in June. For a chance at another position with the district, the clerks need to pass a test proving that they can manage a spreadsheet and type a letter.

That's a tall order for McIntyre, who's spent almost six years entering data by hand for the district's transportation department and has rarely used a computer during her career. Her son gave her one several years ago, but she mainly used it to surf the Internet and watch soap operas before it stopped working and she never replaced it.

McIntyre has been taking computer classes four times a week to prepare for the test, but she isn't sure if she can make up enough ground before today's test.

"She's really cramming, but she needs a little more time," said Ellena Anderson, an instructor at the Venice Skills Center who teaches McIntyre on Mondays and Wednesdays. "I wish I could take it for her."

As daunting as the upcoming test appears, it isn't unexpected. The district cut nearly $400 million from its budget in June, eliminating nearly 500 positions. The Board of Education wanted to keep cuts away from classrooms, so about half of the jobs lost were clerical, including 40 positions from the transportation department. At the same time, the district has been trying to automate its record-keeping.

Connie Moreno, a labor relations representative, said she knew this day was coming when the district implemented an expensive computer program last year to manage its complex payroll system. Although it was a fiasco, with thousands of employees being paid the wrong amount or not at all, Moreno said the writing was on the wall.

"I begged them to take computer classes," said Moreno, who sent a flier to her California School Employees Assn. members that read "Don't wait until you find a layoff notice in your mailbox."

"The secretaries of yesterday are gone," she said, "even in L.A. Unified."

With her hip sunglasses and fashionable retro half-boots -- "I think I got them in the 1970s," she said -- McIntyre doesn't look 61, much less 71. But, in any case, she says, "I'm too old for computers."

It didn't help that her district job entailed logging bus drivers' hours by hand in a small ledger. Virtually all of the test-takers worked for the transportation department, one of the least technology-reliant departments in the district.

Michele Bryant, 43, who also works as a transportation clerk and is due to take her test soon, said she has never had to use a computer. Although she has one at home, "I just use it for solitaire," Bryant said.

When McIntyre heard earlier this month that her job was in danger, she signed up for computer literacy courses in Gardena and Venice.

On a recent Wednesday, she took a seat at one of the 18 computers in Anderson's classroom. McIntyre quickly ran into problems when she tried to organize a column, but Anderson already was working with one of the other six students.

McIntyre leaned back in her chair.

"Teacher," she whispered. "Teacher, hey. Miss Anderson. . . . "

Finally, one of the other students came over to help, clicking a few buttons to make the column line up. "You have to go to 'preview,' then 'set up,' " she told McIntyre.

"Oh, you're so good," she replied as she scribbled notes.

Then McIntyre got off on the wrong foot when she started typing a letter.

"What's the first thing you do?" Anderson asked her. After McIntyre fumbled for the answer, Anderson told her to hit the "enter" button six times.

"Remember in the old days, when you had to roll the paper down on a typewriter? That's what you're doing here," she explained.

Even with numerous pointers from Anderson, it took McIntyre almost an hour to type two short letters. She did a small dance in her chair when she finished. "I even did the check spell," she said triumphantly.

"The spell check," Anderson said softly.

Later, McIntyre admitted she was worried.

"I gotta pass that test," she said. "I try to make light of it, but it's all up to me whether I pass it."

Employees can take the test once every four months, but they run the danger of their jobs being eliminated if they fail the first time.

McIntyre said she wasn't sure what she would do if she doesn't pass. She makes about $1,100 a month and already lives on a tight budget. She's taped the heel of her right boot rather than spend the money to repair it, and even if she gets hired at another district job, it could be a part-time position without benefits.

"A district job is my best option," she said.

Others are just as concerned.

Bryant spent nearly 15 years as a homemaker before getting a job with the district 2 1/2 years ago. She knows that she needs to take the computer literacy test but hasn't scheduled an appointment. She estimates she's only 40% ready, but she's not taking a class to help her prepare.

"If I don't get another position with the district, then it's unemployment," said Bryant, who has a teenage son and daughter.

Lydia Calhoun, 54, who has worked for the district for nearly 30 years and is the longest-tenured clerk, has been practicing her typing at night. "I'm up to about 40 or 50 words a minute," she said.

If employees don't pass the test, there is another district option available. L.A. Unified has some bus driver positions open, although the training would be unpaid and the hours difficult.

"I'm physically able to do it, Calhoun said, "but I'd really prefer not to.


CSBA, ACSA & CASBO FILE SUIT TO BLOCK PROP 39 CHARTER RULES FROM TAKING EFFECT THIS FALL
by smf for 4LAKids

The California School Boards Association (“CSBA”), together with its Education Legal Alliance and the Association of California School Administrators (“ACSA”) and the California Association of School Business Officers (“CASBO”), has filed a lawsuit to block new State regulations governing how school districts assign facilities to charter schools from taking effect this fall.

Prop. 39 requires school districts to provide facilities for students from their districts that attend charter schools located in the district. Despite the remaining concerns raised by CSBA and many other groups, the SBE approved the revised regulations at its January ['08] meeting, thus beginning the formal rulemaking process. The plaintiffs have filed suit to challenge implementation of the new regulations.

Plaintiff objects to certain proposals in the new regulations:

• The current requirement to furnish and equip charter facilities for in-district students has been expanded to include providing
o front office equipment
o and the nebulous phrase “student services that directly support classroom instruction.”
• The heart of the matter is the new regulations reduce district discretion over facilities requests.

The case will be heard in Sacramento County Superior Court on Oct 3rd.


►ACSA Press Release: PROP. 39 SUIT CASTS DOUBT ON CHARTER REGS


►ACSA Press Release: PROP. 39 SUIT CASTS DOUBT ON CHARTER REGS + more



HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
►EARLY BEDTIMES WORK, TOO, FOR SLEEP-DEPRIVED TEENS + SLEEP ISSUE FOR HIGH-SCHOOLERS WON'T REST
from Columnist Jay Michaels education column EXTRA CREDIT in the Washington Post
BACKGROUND: Scientific Studies and Observed Reality (done correctly, the same thing!) show that adolescents are not morning people. Duh. Scientists with government and foundation grants have proved this obvious fact in recent years and have even proved why: Teenager's Circadian Cycles are still locked up in the bike rack back at school in the AM: their melatonin levels are all gaflooey (excuse the scientific jargon) in the morning.
And gentle readers, so are their test scores.
We obviously don’t care about teens' health and well being - look at the way we let them dress - but (excuse the algebra) Later Start Times = Better Student Achievement.
Often when scary Red Teams take over poor performing school districts the first thing they do is set start times later. And it works!
Of course teachers tend to be morning people - and they set bell schedules per their union contracts.
I am kinda/sorta the left coast correspondent for Fairfax County S.L.E.E.P. They have fought the battle against long odds - eventually getting a sympathetic school board elected. But the Early Bedtime/Status Quo/Change is Inconvenient contingent is up in arms!
If this rant has failed to antagonize anyone I apologize. - smf

►STATE, LAUSD, SOUTH BAY DROPOUT FIGURES IMPROVE – State Improves 3%, LAUSD 5%
Los Angeles Unified showed a drop to 27.5 percent. Critics have said districts are under-counting dropouts. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said in July he believed more than half of LAUSD students drop out. The district rates include charters which can have a higher number of dropouts.
By Melissa Pamer, Staff Writer | Daily Breeze
Sept 26 -- There were fewer public high school dropouts at most South Bay school districts than was recently reported by state education officials, according to revised data released this week.
The statewide dropout rate fell to 21.5 percent from the 24.2 percent reported two months ago, state schools Superintendent Jack O'Connell said Thursday.
"To see a reduction of about 3 percent is clearly a step in the right direction," O'Connell said. "But, that said, it's still too high. It's unacceptable."

►SAN FERNANDO, SYLMAR, ARLETA HIGH SCHOOLS WILL RECEIVE BENEFIT OF $2.2 MILLION TO IMPROVE GRADUATION RATES
by Diana Martinez, Editor | San Fernando Valley Sun
Thursday, 25 September 2008 -- Ellen Pais, Executive Director of the Urban Education Partnership based in Los Angeles describes the graduation rate at San Fernando, Sylmar and Arleta High Schools as "horrific" and starting next week the agency, with money from a federal grant, will begin work first at San Fernando High to identify resources that can help students graduate.

►L.A. UNIFIED CLERKS MUST DO WINDOWS: School district office workers whose jobs were cut must show computer competence for a shot at reemployment. For some, it's a tall order
by Jason Song, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer
September 25, 2008 -- Seventy-one-year-old Peggy McIntyre needs to learn as much as she can about Windows before 8 a.m. Or else.
McIntyre is one of about 40 L.A. Unified School District employees, mainly women nearing retirement age, whose jobs were eliminated in budget cuts in June. For a chance at another position with the district, the clerks need to pass a test proving that they can manage a spreadsheet and type a letter.

►Dangerous Thinking: RESTRUCTURING INNER-CITY SCHOOLS FOR THE GLOBAL MARKETPLACE
by Reggie Dylan / Revolution / SF Bay Area Independent Web Collective
Tuesday Sep 23rd, 2008 3:30 PM -- Locke High School in Watts made national news last May when a fight broke out on campus between hundreds of Black and Latino students. The melee was reported in the New York Times, the Chicago Tribune, USA Today, and in Time Magazine. The Los Angeles Times treated it as though an alarm had been sounded—a radical solution to the problems at Locke and similar inner-city schools was urgently needed.
●SAVAGE INEQUALITIES
The conditions of the inner city schools today perfectly reflect the conditions of the inner cities.
●BRINGING FORWARD MODELS OF “REFORM”
The ruling class has approached this crisis in urban education not from the perspective of how to provide a good education for every child, but through a collection of changes that have made the situation worse.
●THE GREEN DOT MODEL: MAKING A BAD SITUATION WORSE
Green Dot Public Schools is among the many non-profit charters being championed and guided by some of the most influential and “far-sighted” of the business world, civic leaders and leaders of the education establishment, and people in the world of politics.
● “TOUGH CHOICES OR TOUGH TIMES”
“The New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce,” a panel made up of former Cabinet secretaries and governors in addition to federal and state education officials and business and civic leaders, issued a report in December 2006 titled “Tough Choices or Tough Times.” The report “warned that unless improvements are made in the nation’s public schools and colleges by 2021, a large number of jobs would be lost to countries including India and China, where workers are better educated and paid much less than their U.S. counterparts.”
● “THEY MADE IT, WHY COULDN’T YOU?”
The rulers of this country believe they face a powerful compulsion, coming from the fundamental needs of this system, to raise the education level of the U.S. labor force as a whole. Not to enable everyone to become a “knowledge worker,” which they know is impossible, but in order to maintain this country’s competitiveness in the world economy as much as possible.
*****
● “Determination decides who makes it out of the ghetto—now there is a tired old cliché, at its worst, on every level. This is like looking at millions of people being put through a meatgrinder and instead of focusing on the fact that the great majority are chewed to pieces, concentrating instead on the few who slip through in one piece and then on top of it all, using this to say that “the meatgrinder works”!” -- Bob Avakian,
●●smf's 2¢: Just because 4LAKids republishes it doesn't mean I endorse it …and the Green Dot and Mayor's Partnership efforts have been very successful at getting their word out and into The Times on a weekly basis! The 'Dangerous Thinking' in the title might be about this article or it might be about the subject of the article; inevitably it is about both. But to not confront the dangerous thought is undoubtedly the most perilous pathway of all. The quote above - about Determination and the Meatgrinder - appeared as the coda in the article – but is pulled from revcom.com: the website of the Revolutionary Communist Party. If you've been ruined by this exposure to the Marxist Dialectic I apologize — but you've read this far and the Republicans are nationalizing Wall Street anyway!

►Day 85 and Done! CALIFORNIA BUDGET IS SIGNED, 85 DAYS LATE AND DESPISED
from The New York Times
“The governor, however, proclaimed the budget a victory.”

►WARY EYES MONITORING WALL STREET + TIME TO SELL REAL ESTATE ASSETS? + THE SELL OFF OF COMMERCIAL REAL ESTATE BEGINS
After years of channeling money into in mortgage backed securities and collateralized debt obligations portfolios of mortgages bundled and sold as debt securities the total size of pension fund securitizations are massive. Thomas Martin, president of the Homeowners Consumer Center estimates pension funds will take a 1 trillion dollar hit from devalued securities.
The nation’s largest public pension fund - the California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPers) - could take a hit as large as their $2 Billion dollar residential mortgage portfolio.

►SCHOOLS FAIL TO MEET ‘NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND’ GOALS + Press release + Report
Tuesday, September 23, 2008 | 02:20 PDT -- If the system mandated by No Child Left Behind to fix thousands of failing schools were subjected to its own rigorous standards, it too could fail.
That's the conclusion of the first large study examining whether school-restructuring programs required by the federal No Child Left Behind education act are actually working.

►EDUCATION TAKES BACK SEAT IN ELECTION YEAR
Editorial | Visalia Times Delta/Tulare Advance-Register
●●smf 2¢: It’s no different in Visalia or Tulare. Schools have not attained the level of excellence we expect. There is further improvement needed in serving students. Schools don’t have the resources they need. Teachers are not fully trained and competent. Schools haven’t achieved the optimal ratio of administrators to teachers.
September 23, 2008 -- In an energetic election year with no loss of stimulating candidates and controversial issues, one issue has been missing: education.

►EDUCATION AND THE ARTS: Is it the job of our schools to create an appreciative audience for higher culture?
LA Times Editorial

►TUITION AND ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS: A court ruling that illegal immigrants can't get in-state tuition rates will harm many students.
LA Times Editorial
September 22, 2008 -- For the last seven years, illegal immigrants attending California's public university and community college systems have been eligible for in-state tuition rates. The thinking behind this practice was that, regardless of their parents' actions, children had no choice in crossing the border illegally; academically gifted immigrant students shouldn't be condemned to a permanent underclass.


The news that doesn’t fit from September 28th



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: 213-893-6800


• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR



What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Yolie.Flores.Aguilar@lausd.net • 213-241-6383
Marlene.Canter@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Julie.Korenstein@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385

...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • 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 Schwarzenegger: 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.
• Register.
• Vote.


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




Scott Folsom is a parent and parent leader in LAUSD. He is immediate past President of Los Angeles Tenth District PTSA and represents PTA as Vice-chair on the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee. He is a Community Concerns Commissioner, Legislation Team member and a member of the Board of Managers of the California State PTA. He serves on various school district advisory and policy committees and is a PTA officer and/or governance council member at three LAUSD schools.
• 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.
• To SUBSCRIBE e-mail: 4LAKids-subscribe@topica.email-publisher.com - or -TO ADD YOUR OR ANOTHER'S NAME TO THE 4LAKids SUBCRIPTION LIST E-MAIL smfolsom@aol.com with "SUBSCRIBE" AS THE SUBJECT. Thank you.

Saturday, September 20, 2008

The Rainy Day Fund in the Eye of the Pefect Storm


4LAKids: Sunday, Sept 21, 2008
In This Issue:
CALIFORNIA'S COSTLY BUDGET: The state finally has a budget, but Californians paid a high price in money and faith in their lawmakers.
If Elected ...OBAMA LOOKS TO LESSONS FROM CHICAGO IN HIS NATIONAL EDUCATION PLAN + McCAIN CALLS FOR LIMITED U.S. ROLE IN EDUCATION
IS THE BOARD BEING BYPASSED ON EXPENDITURES?
MYVOTE CALIFORNIA | STUDENT MOCK ELECTION
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
What can YOU do?


Featured Links:
FLUNK THE BUDGET, NOT OUR CHILDREN Website
PUBLIC SCHOOLS: an investment we can't afford to cut! - The Education Coalition Website
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.
Oh, a storm is threatening
my very life today.
If I don't get some shelter
oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away
—Mick & Keith

I'm a fan of non-traditional non-fiction writing; how could I not be? I may misinterpret it sometimes, but I don't make this stuff up!

There is a part of Sebastian Junger's "A Perfect Storm" that describes in the idiom of fiction the simultaneous occurrence of meteorological phenomena that became the title killer storm. There is much the same kind of writing in "The Hot Zone", as Richard Preston describes the mutation of the virus and the African genesis of the Ebola Plague. And the first chapter of Michener's "Hawai'i" is as good as writing gets — describing the volcanic birth of the islands and how the first seeds arrived on the rocks and grew to be greenest place imaginable, a triumph of nature and of fiction unpopulated by man.

Junger's 'Perfect Storm' - the 1991 Hurricane Grace/Halloween Nor'easter hybrid - has become a much abused metaphor - Wikipedia reports the phrase was awarded the top prize by Lake Superior State University in their 2007 list of words that deserve to be banned for overuse.

However the expression exquisitely describes the concurrent convergence of events to amplify the consequences, it’s an allegory too apropos to discard just yet.

THE FIRST EVENT IS THE ECONOMY: what "Bad Money" author/economist Kevin Phillips describes as the "Las Vega-ization" of the formerly staid mortgage banking and investment system - with every dollar: yours, mine, the pension fund's and the Chinese'; earned, borrowed and lent, – leveraged, packaged and leveraged again in a scheme to make Signore Ponzi blush — with the risk concentrated in Wall Street and spread to Main Street by institutions who knew better. Securities aren’t, and 'illiquidity' has become a word o' th' moment. Last Sunday Alan Greenspan, once the guru and now the goat of this economic cycle, predicted there was more to come. And as the week rolled on: Fannie, Freddy, Lehman, Merrill Lynch, AIG, the Big Bail Out – he was proved correct on a daily basis.

THE SECOND EVENT IS THE STATE BUDGET: a colossal mess, complicated by the above and by partisan politics in what the governor declared to be the 'post-partisan' age. But it was supposed to be the 'Year of Education' too. And Russia is no longer a threat.

The long playing budget debacle played out, ended, was resurrected and ended again this week - in a 'compromise' in some sort of twisted Victorian meaning of the word. i.e.: the maiden was 'compromised' by the biker gang. - the storm is all around us and the inaction figure governor clings to his rainy day fund.

The State PTA has declared this budget "not good enough for California’s children or for California’s future" — yet for all the hand-wringing the show of fairness at the end was political posturing. The Republicans held their 'no new taxes' line and as an education advocate and a lifelong Democrat I can only observe that education was sold out by Democrats in a bizarre show of Jell-O-like solidarity. I suppose they figure we won't vote the entire slate of rascals out in November - and I suppose they're right.

Already we are hearing that things will be worse next year. You can bank on it - if there still are any banks next year.

THE THIRD EVENT IS THE PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION. It seems like it will never end, but in truth it does end on November 4th -. It will be decided six weeks and two days from today in the voting booth – or in the Supreme Court soon thereafter. (See "If elected…" below)

All politics being local, THE FOURTH EVENT - the figurative small boat sailing into the maelstrom - IS LOCAL POLITICS. On November 4th there will be lots of other issues on the ballot, including our own local school bond: Measure Q: $6 Billion over the next ten years to continue the school building and modernization efforts already well begun.

There are lots of Q's about Q …and not enough A's.

It hasn't been reported in the media anywhere but last week the Bond Oversight Committee voted to support Measure Q. That’s not extraordinary, the BOC has voted to support all the recent Bonds: K, R and Y. We voted unanimously for all of those; Q was supported 4 to 3.

• While the Facilities Division and the District has done an excellent job so far, the Board of Education has not lived up to promises made to the voters in Measure Y about compensation for building program managers - this has made senior positions hard to fill and has forced the District to employ consultants in jobs that should be held by direct employees.
• The Board has refused to promise to build new bond-funded charter schools to the Field Act earthquake standards – reserving the right to investigate and possibly pursue other less expensive (and by extension less safe) options. • Studies have shown that Field Act structures have a much higher survivability than structures built to the Uniform Building Code (UBC). • Field Act structures serve as post disaster relief shelters by design - not a requirement of UBC buildings. • Per the Charter School Act of 1992 charter schools financed with private money are built to the UBC, this in itself creates two unequal levels of safety for traditional v. charter schoolchildren. • Conversely (or perhaps perversely) the Private Schools Act of 1990 requires Field Act protection for all new private school construction. • Remember: Charter Schools ARE Public Schools; operationally funded with taxpayer's dollars. • And sooner or later there will be an earthquake. [see: http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2008/1150/]
• There are questions as to whether the allocation of funds to specific projects conforms to the legal requirements of the Prop 39/ 55% bond. The legal precedent says: "a list of projects submitted to the voters must be specific enough that the voters know what it is they are voting for and the auditors know how to evaluate the district’s performance." I'm not convinced that standard is met.
• It would've been preferable to go for the money in better-defined/smaller bites - in quieter times. The District has a documented long term need for $60 Billion in Improvements and Repairs — though $7 Billion over ten years is a lot of money it may not be enough.

Do not make too much about my lack of support for the BOC resolution on the Q Bond; my objection is to process, not need or the ability to deliver. I will vote YES on Q on Nov 4th - as should you - but I will watch the expenditure and the District and the Board of Education …and anyone who would help spend the money - like a hawk! And I ask that each and every one of you do the same. Watch for things like Boardmember Galatzan describes in her article ("Is the Board Being Bypassed…" below). In the end there are-and-will-be babes in the schools; in the new schools we build, in the old schools we fix up – in the charter schools and the preschools.

AND SO THE FOUR EVENTS CONVERGE. Perhaps the convergence will be harmonic, and perhaps it will not matter. From engineering we know that harmonics themselves can lead to failure.

¡Onward/Hasta adelante! - smf


The Devil in the Details: The Field Act and Related Legislation/Comparison of the Field Act & Uniform Building Code + The Field Act: History & Issues



CALIFORNIA'S COSTLY BUDGET: The state finally has a budget, but Californians paid a high price in money and faith in their lawmakers.
LA Times Editorial

September 20, 2008 - It's not over. The 2008-09 state budget is so late, and so lame, that it won't really be finalized until next year -- if then. Its passage Friday and expected signature by the governor early next week provide some relief to the clinics that were about to close for lack of state reimbursements, and for employees wondering how to get by on emergency pay lower than the state minimum wage. But the reprieve is simply a brief intermission. Work begins immediately on the budget for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2009, and nothing in the spending plan passed this week will result in a more timely or responsible budget next year.

In fact, the 2009-10 plan will rest less on a solid foundation than on crossed fingers -- that the economy will recover more quickly than even the most hopeful forecasters believe, that voters will accept a plan to securitize the state lottery, and that the lottery move will produce the very optimistic figures that the governor's finance staff is banking on.

Two key differences separate the end-of-the-week budget from the one Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger threatened to veto a few days earlier. One is undoubtedly a step forward -- or, rather, a reversal of a step backward. The budget is no longer balanced on borrowing from taxpayers in the form of early withholding. Instead, money will (the budgeteers hope) come from increased penalties on corporations that underpay their taxes. There's a qualitative difference between taking money from Californians who did nothing wrong and penalizing anyone -- in this case, corporations -- for failing to pay what they owe.

'Rainy day' reserve

The second difference is Schwarzenegger's coup -- a set of changes he calls "budget reform." For the people of California, it's a mixed bag. Three percent of the budget will automatically be deposited into a "rainy day" fund and can't be taken out except when revenues fall below the projected spending level. Though the governor failed to impose the spending caps he floated earlier this year, the Legislature's ability to respond to some of the state's deepest problems will be compromised by the rainy day fund. It's hard, though, to stand up for protecting lawmakers' discretion, given their poor performance on the budget this year.

How poor? They were supposed to complete the budget by June 15. They set a record, missing the mark by a full fiscal quarter, and in the process cost the state millions of dollars by, for example, blowing the chance to get parts of the budget that need voter approval onto the Nov. 4 presidential ballot and forcing a special election next year. Tax revenue was also lost from businesses that slowed down because they depend on state contracts. Perhaps worse than the lost money is the lost faith of citizens in their representatives' ability to manage the state.

Among the other losers, count Schwarzenegger's vaunted post-partisanship. He began his second term with an appeal to Democrats and his own Republicans to set aside their partisan differences to accomplish great things for the state. But in doing so, he alienated GOP lawmakers and undermined his power to wrangle votes from his party for a compromise budget. Post-partisanship remains an intriguing goal, but this year -- like last year -- it backfired on the governor.

Democrats too lost big. They are the majority party in the Assembly and the Senate, and they can pass bills without so much as a by-your-leave from Republicans. But that counts for nothing at budget time, when they need GOP votes to help them muster two-thirds of each house.

Democrats believed they could outmaneuver their rivals across the aisle by emphasizing education and asking Republican voters to pressure their representatives to do something -- like agree to tax increases -- to save funding for public schools. It didn't work. New Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) did fend off deeper cuts to education, transportation, foster care and other programs, but her inability to move Republicans from their no-taxes, no-way stance weakens her as she goes into the coming budget year. Outgoing Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata (D-Oakland), for all his experience in Sacramento, fared no better.

In California's upside-down budget world, where majority power and willingness to cross party lines are signs of feebleness, the winners continue to be the state's Republican lawmakers. They cling to just over a third of the Assembly and the Senate, yet they are able to drive the budget by their willingness to say no. Every day that the state is unable to pay its bills, Republican lawmakers win short-term gains in reducing the power of government. In the long term, though, they damage their own fleeting reputations as guardians of fiscal prudence.

In the end, of course, the biggest losers are Californians, who once boasted the best-run state government in the nation. Now they are caught in indecision about which way to go -- cut back on their demands for state services or ante up with new taxes for high-quality government. Their punishment comes in budget years like this one and ballot measures that ask them to tweak here, reform there, and hope everything works out in the end. It is an endless loop, and it will bring us a 2009 special election, in March or June, to manage problems that Sacramento could not deal with in this budget. See you next year.


If Elected ...OBAMA LOOKS TO LESSONS FROM CHICAGO IN HIS NATIONAL EDUCATION PLAN + McCAIN CALLS FOR LIMITED U.S. ROLE IN EDUCATION
►If Elected ...OBAMA LOOKS TO LESSONS FROM CHICAGO IN HIS NATIONAL EDUCATION PLAN
____________________________
If Elected ... Education
This NY Times series examines how the presidential candidates would handle the issues they would confront as president.
NOTE: Senator Obama’s two daughters do not attend Chicago public schools.
____________________________

by Sam Dillon | NY Times | Published: September 9, 2008

CHICAGO — Senator Barack Obama learned how hard it can be to solve America’s public education problems when he headed a philanthropic drive here a decade ago that spent $150 million on Chicago’s troubled schools and barely made a dent.

Drawing on that experience, Mr. Obama, the Democratic nominee for president, is campaigning on an ambitious plan that promises $18 billion a year in new federal spending on early childhood classes, teacher recruitment, performance pay and dozens of other initiatives.

In Dayton, Ohio, on Tuesday, Mr. Obama used his education proposals to draw a contrast with Senator John McCain, his Republican opponent, and to insist to voters that he, more than his rival, would change the way Washington works.

Were he to become president, Mr. Obama would retain the emphasis on the high standards and accountability of President Bush’s education law, No Child Left Behind. But he would rewrite the federal law to offer more help to high-need schools, especially by training thousands of new teachers to serve in them, his campaign said. He would also expand early childhood education, which he believes gets more bang for the buck than remedial classes for older students.

Mr. Obama added a new flourish to his stump speech, promising for the first time on Tuesday to double federal spending on public charter schools while holding those with poor records accountable.

But more than most campaign blueprints, Mr. Obama’s education plan reflects his own work with Chicago’s public schools, campaign staff members and people who have worked with him said in interviews. His plan signals that he is looking to apply those lessons nationwide.

“Barack has been very engaged, very inquisitive about the dynamics of how do you improve public schools,” said Scott Smith, a former publisher of The Chicago Tribune who has collaborated with Mr. Obama on education projects here for a decade.

One of the biggest lessons Mr. Obama drew from his experiences in Chicago, associates said, is that student achievement is highly dependent on teacher quality.

In the two decades since Mr. Obama arrived in Chicago, its public schools have undergone a sweeping turnaround, from an education wasteland to a district that, while still facing major challenges, is among the most improved in the nation. The city has closed many failing schools and reopened them with new staffs, making it an important laboratory for one of the country’s most vexing problems.

The city closed the failing Dodge Elementary School, for example, in 2002 and reopened it as an academy where candidates for advanced degrees in education work in classrooms under master teachers while studying at a local university. Mr. Obama visited the school in 2005, liked what he saw and now proposes to create 200 such teacher residency programs nationwide. The goal, he says, would be to turn out 30,000 teachers a year to work in the toughest schools.

Mr. Obama’s views have drawn heavily from a cast of experts who helped mold the Chicago experience. Strategies for overhauling failing schools have come from Arne Duncan, who as chief executive of the Chicago public schools led the turnaround efforts. The senator derived his views on early childhood education in part from the work of a Nobel Prize-winning economist based in Chicago.

The scope of Mr. Obama’s plan has impressed many educators, but not everyone.

Michael J. Petrilli, a former Education Department official under Mr. Bush, said Mr. Obama’s plan was more comprehensive than Mr. McCain’s.

“That’s because Obama is proposing what somebody called a Christmas tree of new programs,” Mr. Petrilli said. “McCain is suggesting a couple of new things, but doesn’t think Washington should spend more on education than we already are.”

Mr. Obama’s interest in education extends back to his work as a community organizer here in the mid-1980s. In his memoir, “Dreams From My Father,” he describes a school system plagued by textbook shortages and teacher strikes. He carried those experiences with him to Harvard Law School, where he took courses on school issues taught by Christopher Edley Jr.

“Barack became committed to the notion that progress in school reform can’t come through volunteerism and professional aspiration alone,” said Mr. Edley, now dean of the law school at the University of California, Berkeley. “It has to be undergirded with a legal and regulatory structure that rewards success and goes after failure.”

Mr. Obama immersed himself in education issues after his return to Chicago, where he began lecturing at the University of Chicago Law School and joined the boards of two education foundations.

Chicago received $49 million from a $500 million endowment by Walter H. Annenberg, the billionaire publisher, for school reform efforts nationwide, and the city added $98 million in matching funds for the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a philanthropic campaign that financed enrichment projects at a third of the city’s 600 schools.

Mr. Obama was nominated to the Challenge board and was elected chairman in 1995, said Ken Rolling, executive director of the group, which operated through 2001. Mr. Obama continued to teach law during his five-year unpaid tenure as board chairman, and he was twice elected to the Illinois Senate.

Several board members, including two university presidents, far outranked Mr. Obama in education experience.

“Let me say the room had no shortage of egos, including my own,” said Stanley O. Ikenberry, a board member who at the time was president of the University of Illinois. “It was unusual: here you had a person trained in the law chairing a board on school reform.” Still, he said, Mr. Obama won his colleagues’ respect.

Supporters of Mr. McCain have been trying to taint Mr. Obama by highlighting his ties to William Ayers, a member of the violent Weather Underground in the 1960s, by pointing out that they worked on the Challenge project together. Mr. Ayers was indicted on conspiracy charges that were later thrown out for prosecutorial misconduct.

Mr. Obama has acknowledged that he is a friend of Mr. Ayers but has sought to minimize their interactions. Records show that Mr. Ayers, now a professor of education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, helped write the Challenge proposal. The records also show that he and Mr. Obama worked on the Challenge project together and that they attended some of the same meetings.

The Challenge’s overall approach — supporting many diverse education projects rather than a coordinated school improvement strategy — had been established before Mr. Obama was named board chairman, and the board came under immediate pressure to approve grant proposals quickly.

“If you throw $10 on the table in Chicago, people are going to fight over it, and we had $50 million,” Mr. Rolling recalled.

Proposals poured in and the board eventually financed projects involving 210 schools. Some were imaginative: one, for example, connected schools with museums in the Chicago area so that students learned science from a paleontologist at the local dinosaur exhibit. But many were not.

“The project proposals by and large were awful,” one board member told an evaluation team in 1998.

Relations with school authorities were difficult. Just as the Challenge got under way, the Illinois Legislature gave Mayor Richard M. Daley control of the school district, and he began an improvement campaign based on high-stakes testing and other measures. Annenberg’s let-a-thousand-flowers-bloom approach often seemed at cross-purposes with that strategy.

Ben LaBolt, a spokesman for the Obama campaign, said the reading and math scores of the lowest-achieving students improved in the years when the Challenge was investing in the Chicago schools.

But a final report on the Challenge concluded that the huge effort had brought little change.

“The Challenge’s ‘bottom line’ was improving student achievement,” the report said. “Among the schools it supported, the Challenge had little impact on student outcomes.”

But the experience gave Mr. Obama an appreciation for the multiple problems facing urban schools, Mr. Rolling said. The city has been a pioneer ever since in exploring ways to recruit, train and support teachers.

This has been especially true since leadership of the city schools passed in 2001 to Mr. Duncan, a friend of and sounding board for Mr. Obama. The two also frequently play basketball.

Mr. Duncan accompanied Mr. Obama on his visit in 2005 to the Dodge school, now the Dodge Renaissance Academy, on the West Side of Chicago. After the school’s makeover, student scores rose significantly, and Mr. Obama wanted to know why.

The two men arrived with no entourage and sat down with the staff in a library. Mr. Obama asked about the best way to train teachers, according to those who participated. What would it take to keep qualified teachers from leaving the profession? Would merit pay help? “He wasn’t checking his Palm Pilot,” recalled Karla Kemp, a teacher.

Mr. Obama has brought a similar intensity to discussions of early childhood education, on which he proposes to spend $10 billion a year. A Chicago expert who has influenced his thinking on this is the Nobel laureate, James J. Heckman, an economist at the University of Chicago. Mr. Obama’s plan cites Dr. Heckman in connection with research that found that for every dollar spent on prekindergarten education and the care of infants and their families, there is a $7 to $10 decrease in spending on special education, remedial education and prisons.

The two men have never met, even though they live so close to each other in the Kenwood neighborhood that they use the same dry cleaner and it occasionally sends Mr. Obama’s suit coats to Dr. Heckman’s home.

Last year, when Mr. Obama started his presidential campaign and began preparing his education plan, an assistant to Mr. Obama contacted Dr. Heckman and asked him to react to an early draft of the early childhood plan.

“I completely redrafted the section,” Dr. Heckman said. “Most striking about the campaign was that they listened to what I said.”

Jeff Zeleny contributed reporting from Dayton, Ohio.
______________________

►If Elected… McCAIN CALLS FOR LIMITED U.S. ROLE IN EDUCATION: In comparison to Senator Barack Obama’s education plan, Senator John McCain’s is downright terse.

by Sam Dillon | NY Times
If Elected ... Education - This series examines how the presidential candidates would handle the issues they would confront as president.

NOTE: None of Senator McCain’s children attended public schools.

September 10, 2008 -- Among his short list of initiatives, Mr. McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, includes bonus pay for teachers who raise student achievement or who take jobs in hard-to-staff schools, an expansion of after-school tutoring, and new federal support for online schools and for the voucher program in Washington, D.C.

The brevity of Mr. McCain’s plan reflects his view that the federal government should play a limited role in public education, and his commitment to holding the line on education spending, said Lisa Graham Keegan, a McCain adviser and former Arizona education commissioner.

“Education is obviously not the issue Senator McCain spends the most time on,” Ms. Keegan said, adding that his plan’s limited scope should not be interpreted as a lack of commitment to education and school reform. “He’s been a quiet and consistent supporter of parents and educators who he thinks are making a difference.”

Mr. McCain would make it easier for students in failing schools to get taxpayer-financed after-school tutoring by private companies. Under President Bush’s No Child Left Behind law, students at schools that have repeatedly missed testing goals are eligible, but few parents nationwide have taken advantage of those services. That is because, in Mr. McCain’s view, local school districts often set up a cumbersome process for certifying the tutors and do a poor job of getting the word out to parents.

Under Mr. McCain’s plan, the federal government would certify tutoring companies, letting them market directly to parents.

Both the McCain and Obama plans acknowledge that the No Child Left Behind law has helped the nation focus on closing the achievement gap between minorities and whites, but they also promise changes to the law without offering many specifics. And both are silent on the law’s deadline requiring that all students be proficient in reading and math by 2014.

Both plans also propose performance pay initiatives. Mr. McCain would reallocate 60 percent of the $3 billion in current federal spending on teacher quality programs to finance direct payments to “high-performing teachers” who take jobs in high-needs schools and to those who improve achievement.

Mr. Obama’s plan would offer federal financing to districts that negotiate performance pay programs with teachers unions. It would allow bonuses for veteran teachers who help novice colleagues as well as those who teach in hard-to-staff schools or demonstrate high levels of performance.

Both national teachers unions have endorsed Mr. Obama, and last month, Mr. McCain painted him as a pawn, saying he “continues to defer to the teachers unions instead of committing to real reform.” But there is little in Mr. Obama’s record to suggest such deference. Many union members bitterly oppose all performance pay schemes, even those that, as in Mr. Obama’s plan, are negotiated with teachers.

In July 2007, when Mr. Obama addressed an annual convention of the National Education Association, some union members booed him. He repeated his proposal at this year’s convention in July, and was booed.


IF ELECTED: Complete articles with photos and graphics.



IS THE BOARD BEING BYPASSED ON EXPENDITURES?
• A Note from the Board Member from the Galatzan Gazette
by Boardmember Tamar Galatzan

September 19, 2008 -- The laudable goal of training District employees to run the new computer system has been periodically compromised by expensive consultant contracts that are presented to the Board. The most recent example occurred at our meeting of September 9, when my colleagues and I were asked to approve a contract in excess of 2 million dollars to EPI-USE, a company that supplies experts to train LAUSD staff on the SAP system.

As Board members discovered a scant few days before the vote, $249,000 had already been allocated to EPI-USE without our knowledge. Although District rules stipulate that the Board only ratifies contracts of more than $250,000, in this case the sum was part of a much larger allocation of money. Compounding my frustration, the Board never seems to get a clear answer as to when, or if, the work will be turned over entirely to LAUSD information technology specialists.

There have not been any reports back to the Board on the success of previous consulting contracts for staff training. We are now hearing talk that the District will need to purchase several more upgrades of SAP, each of them requiring outside consultants to provide assistance and training.

In the end, I could not justify approving the money for EPI-USE. I cast the lone "no" vote; Board Member Richard Vladovic abstained. I will continue to oppose any of these contracts that have either been partially implemented or do not offer a clear path to self-sufficiency.

A bad deal is a bad deal, regardless of whether the purpose is sound.
_______

●●smf's 2¢: When the contract limit for board approval is $250,000. and contracts are being awarded for $249,000. it seems to indicate a possible 'end around' the board rule. When multiple contracts are awarded to the same vendor it becomes a pattern from a bad playbook.

$250,000., gentle readers, is what we used to call "a quarter of a million dollars" in the old days — about the cost it takes today pay three teachers for a year .

The pattern of paying vendors to fix the same problem with a multiple contracts moves from "hide the ball" to "waste, fraud and abuse" pretty darn fast. "Sixty Minutes" will be shown in its entirety immediately after the game, except on the west coast when it will be aired at its regular time.


MYVOTE CALIFORNIA | STUDENT MOCK ELECTION
The Los Angeles County Office of Education
is proud to announce

DEADLINE EXTENDED!!
MY VOTE CALIFORNIA
STUDENT MOCK ELECTION
Thursday, October 30, 2008

Sponsored by Secretary of State Debra Bowen
and State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell

To encourage students to be active voters once they are old enough to cast a ballot, Secretary of State Debra Bowen and Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell are inviting high school and middle school students, teachers and principals to participate in the MyVote California Student Mock Election, which takes place on Thursday, October 30, 2008, only a few days before California’s November 4 Presidential General Election.

The MyVote California Student Mock Election is a civic engagement project designed to help young people discover the importance of elections and the power of their vote in our democracy. It gives high school and middle school students firsthand experience with the electoral process by giving them a chance to make their voices heard on the candidates and issues of importance to them and their families.

This fall, the MyVote California Student Mock Election will tap into the excitement of the presidential election with a Student Mock Election to be held on Thursday, October 30, less than one week before California’s November 4, 2008, General Election. With engaging lesson plans and activities chosen by MyVote California Student Mock Election partner the California Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools, teachers will have the tools they need to help their students become informed and involved voters in 2008 and beyond.

DEADLINE EXTENDED TO SEPTEMBER 19, 2008
to receive free materials by mail!

After September 19, schools may register and print materials from the website.

ALL CALIFORNIA MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOLS ARE WELCOME TO REGISTER ONLINE UNTIL OCTOBER 29
TO HAVE THEIR VOTES COUNTED!


TO REGISTER CLICK HERE



HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
Sept 19 - The Budget, The Economy, The War, The School District, The Election
Forget them. Today's International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

SEVENTH GRADER SHINES WITH SOLAR CELL RESEARCH: William Yuan won a $25,000 scholarship for his graduate level work
Sep 11, 2008 [Updated Sep 16, 2008] -- William Yuan’s bright idea to create a new, more efficient solar cell earned him top honors as Oregon’s only 2008 Davidson Fellow.
As part of the honor, the 12-year-old Bethany boy will be flown to Washington, D.C., for a reception Sept. 24 at the Library of Congress where he will receive his award and a $25,000 scholarship from the Davidson Institute for Talent Development.

FIRST STOP FOR 'MY FIRST VOTE' IS NORTH HOLLYWOOD HIGH SCHOOL | 50 DÍAS HASTA LA ELECCIÓN PRESIDENCIAL
First Stop for 'My First Vote' Tour is North Hollywood HS
Thursday, 18 September 2008 -- A bus stopping at North Hollywood High School Wednesday isn't so unusual, but Wednesday morning, a bus with a message for students to "Express Yourself" about the upcoming election is encouraging students to think about voting, campaigns and the political process. North Hollywood High School was the first stop.

LAUSD TALKS WITH TEACHERS UNION AT AN IMPASSE
Sept 18. 2008 -- Los Angeles Unified School District and its teachers union have reached an impasse in their latest contract talks and are calling in an outside mediator, after the district declined to offer a salary increase, district and union officials said Wednesday.
Once a state board officially confirms that an impasse exists, a mediator will be called in by October to help the talks.

PROPOSED K-5 SCHOOL A HIT WITH PLAYA VISTA RESIDENTS
Sept 17, 2008 -- Los Angeles Unified officials received a shock at a crowded meeting Monday to discuss plans for a new elementary school in Playa Vista: Residents love it.
It's on the perfect site and it will make Playa Vista more complete, they said.
They want it to open as soon as possible.
"We don't get this a lot," said LAUSD development team manager Susan Cline, to laughter.

TEACHING KIDS A FINANCIAL LESSON: Recent upheavals provide a dramatic backdrop for the launch of a U.S. Treasury program to educate children about credit.
September 16, 2008 -- See Sally. See Sally run from the bank. Run Sally run.
In the midst of one of the worst banking crises in decades, the U.S. Treasury Department today will launch a long-planned program to teach young Americans about credit and other financial matters.
The theme of the campaign: "Don't let your credit put you in a bad place."

TESTING OF SPECIAL ED STUDENTS SHOULD BE RE-EXAMINED: Almost half of children with special needs failed their high school exit exam this year. Legislation calls for identifying new ways to assess performance and devising new methods.


►A STATE WITHOUT A BUDGET, A GOVERNMENT WITHOUT A CLUE

Day 81+: SENATE PASSES BUDGET …AND THE ASSEMBLY TOO (meaning also and again) But the clock is still ticking until the Governor signs and The Lege decides to do nothing about the inevitable line item vetoes.
Day 81: SCHWARZENEGGER: “A budget deal, but not structural change” + “Special election in '09”
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger told a Capitol press conference this afternoon that the budget the Legislature will consider tonight is "an improvement" over earlier versions, but still fails to solve California's structural financial problems.

Schwarzenegger: Special election in '09
After three elections in 2008, California voters better start gearing up for another election in 2009.

State's Top Education Leaders Urge Everyone to JOIN THE PTA!
SACRAMENTO, CA- California’s top education leaders, State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell and Secretary of Education David Long, today called on parents, teachers, and administrators to join the PTA.

80 Days 16 Hours 51 Minutes: BUDGET STANDOFF OVER - Governor and lawmakers agree on spending plan
(09-18) 16:51 PDT SACRAMENTO -- California's longest-ever budget standoff ended this afternoon when Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders struck a deal, avoiding the governor's promised veto of a budget the Legislature approved earlier this week.

Day 80 4:06PM: BUDGET DEAL APPEARS IMMINENT
CALIFORNIA LEGISLATURE WORKING TO HEAD OFF BUDGET VETO

Day 80: ANGER BOILING INSIDE CAPITOL
Sources close to all four legislative leaders – two Democrats and two Republicans – said their bosses believe the governor has been deliberately deceptive, and they are prepared to go on a joint public offensive against the governor.

Day 80: MORNING BUDGET MEETING ENDS ABRUPTLY
Sep 18, 2008 12:48 pm US/Pacific
It used to be "The Big Five" ...now it's "The Big Four +1"?
SACRAMENTO (AP) ― This morning's budget meeting between Governor Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders ended abruptly after 20 minutes with the Governor threatening an immediate veto of the current budget.

AROUND THE BUDGET IN 80 DAYS + OVERRIDING SCHWARZENEGGER'S VETO WON'T BE SIMPLE
Lawmakers and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger met on Wednesday afternoon to discuss ways to sidestep a budget veto and an override showdown.

CALIFORNIA STATE PTA URGES GOVERNOR TO VETO THE BUDGET
Day 79: League of California Cities Statement: FINAL BUDGET UNDERSCORES DRASTIC NEED FOR REFORM

Day 79: TORLAKSON ON THE BUDGET "COMPROMISE"

79 Days + the clock is ticking: SCHWARZENEGGER VOWS TO VETO BUDGET - the view from two Times zones

[Transcript of Gov. Schwarzenegger's press conference vowing to veto state budget]

On the cusp of Day #79: SHARON RUNNER: "I won't override the veto"

LT. GOV. GARAMENDI SUPPORTS BUDGET VETO
" All levels of education remain on a starvation diet that is sapping the strength of tomorrow's workforce and leaving California employers with insufficient skilled workers, ill-prepared to compete in the world's economy. Furthermore the most vulnerable in our society, the poor, the aged, the blind and the disabled are denied the basic needs that they deserve. We are the sixth wealthiest economy in the world - we can and we must do better - for our future and our children's future."

Day 78: UNIONS ALREADY LOOKING TO REPEAL PORTIONS OF BUDGET DEAL
“The fact that this deal was three months overdue and had more smoke and mirrors than a David Copperfield show is a direct result of our broken budget process. Unless we change the threshold to pass budgets and raise revenues, we’ll never move beyond real budget cuts and fake budget solutions.”
Art Pulaski, executive secretary-treasurer of the California Labor Federation

Day 78 ...and still counting – SURPRISE#1: GOVERNOR WILL VETO BUDGET PROPOSAL!
Surprise #2: Governor's website crashes and cannot handle live webcast of veto press event!
Surprise#3: If lege overides his veto he threatens to veto every bill on his desk!
The move extends the state's record-setting budget impasse and sets up what could be an unprecedented override attempt.

78 Days: VETO WEBCAST @ 3?
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has scheduled a 3 p.m. news conference at the Capitol to "discuss the budget"

78 DAYS: A BIT OF THE OLD S&M
"This budget has enough smoke and mirrors to play the main room in the Magic Castle." Patt Morrison | KPCC-FM 89.3 | 1:16PM

78 days ...and now what? THE LATEST BUDGET NEWS as of 12:30PM Tuesday 16 Sept
Lawmakers worked into the wee hours of Tuesday morning to pass a state budget. But they didn't include one of the three demands Gov. Arnold Schwazenegger made to earn his support.
Capitol Alert has a rundown on what lawmakers passed and what's next:
What's happened:
• Who voted for the budget
• 'Yacht tax' loophole closed
• High-tech overtime exemption passed
• The Schwarzenegger demand lawmakers didn't meet
• Lawmakers react to budget
What's next:
• Will Republicans vote for override?
• Special election in 2009 likely

78 days and holding: VETO BAIT
16 September -- Today we will see what Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger does with a budget that doesn't meet his demands for systemic change.

78 days later: SQUANDERED CHANCE ON BUDGET – Three months late, this poor excuse for a spending plan is a waste of our time, money and goodwill.
Tuesday morning, September 16 , 2008 -- It's tempting to tell state lawmakers, "Thanks for nothing," but that requires a generous definition of the word "nothing."

78 Days and almost done: BUDGET COMPROMISE REACHES GOVERNOR'S DESK AFTER 78-DAY DELAY
After a 78-day delay, a state budget compromise has finally reached the desk of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger after it was passed by the California State Assembly early this morning.

77 Days, 21¾ hours later: LATEST STATE BUDGET IS THE WORST IN MEMORY
Nobody could have dreamed up a less responsible, more gimmicky, sure-to-backfire state budget than the one California's political leaders cobbled together and were jamming through the Legislature to end a months-long stalemate.

SCHWARZENEGGER'S THREE DEMANDS
8:35 PM Sept 15

CALIFORNIA LAWMAKERS TO VOTE ON PATCHWORK BUDGET PLAN
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — State lawmakers on Monday were considering a compromise plan to end California's longest-ever budget stalemate, a proposal that includes increasing the paycheck withholding for state income taxes.

Editorial: SCHWARZENEGGER SHOULD VETO THIS BUDGET
If this is the best the Legislature could do, California voters should be wondering what their lawmakers have been up to all summer.

77 Days and counting: LAWMAKERS IN CALIFORNIA (appear to) REACH BUDGET COMPROMISE
September 15, 2008 -- LOS ANGELES — California lawmakers appeared to have resolved the state’s budget impasse Sunday, but it was far from clear whether Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger would sign the proposal into law.

LA Times: CALIFORNIA LAWMAKERS REACH COMPROMISE ON BUDGET: The proposed state spending plan involves no new taxes. Votes on the plan are scheduled for Monday.

77 Days without a budget: DON PERATA'S PRIVATE E-MAIL
The story of the weekend was the private e-mail Senate leader Don Perata sent to his Democratic colleagues late last week.


The news that didn't fit from Sept 21



EVENTS: Coming up next week...
• Monday Sep 22, 2008
EAST LA AREA NEW HIGH SCHOOL #1: Fun Fence Art Exhibit
Event will begin at 10:00 a.m.
Pueblo del Sol - Community Services Center
1300 Plaza Del Sol
Los Angeles, CA 90033

• Tuesday Sep 23, 2008
SOUTH REGION MIDDLE SCHOOL #3: CEQA Draft EIR (Environmental Impact Report) Meeting
Time: 6:00 p.m.
Location:
Walnut Park Elementary School
2642 Olive St.
Walnut Park, CA 90255

• Wednesday Sep 24, 2008
CENTRAL REGION ELEMENTARY SCHOOL #20
CEQA Draft EIR (Environmental Impact Report) Meeting and Presentation of Design Development Drawings
Time: 6:00 p.m.
Location:
Virgil Middle School - Auditorium
152 N. Vermont Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90004

• Wednesday Sep 24, 2008
VALLEY REGION SPAN K-8 #2: CEQA Draft EIR (Environmental Impact Report) Meeting
6:30 p.m.
Germain Elementary School - Auditorium
20730 Germain St.
Chatsworth, CA 91311

• Thursday Sep 25, 2008
ROY ROMER MIDDLE SCHOOL (EAST VALLEY MS #1): RIBBON-CUTTING CEREMONY
Ceremony will begin at 4:00 p.m.
Roy Romer Middle School
6501 Laurel Canyon Blvd.
North Hollywood, CA 91606

*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: 213-893-6800


• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR



What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Yolie.Flores.Aguilar@lausd.net • 213-241-6383
Marlene.Canter@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Julie.Korenstein@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385

...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • 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 Schwarzenegger: 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.
• Register.
• Vote.


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




Scott Folsom is a parent and parent leader in LAUSD. He is immediate past President of Los Angeles Tenth District PTSA and represents PTA as Vice-chair on the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee. He is a Community Concerns Commissioner, Legislation Team member and a member of the Board of Managers of the California State PTA. He serves on various school district advisory and policy committees and is a PTA officer and/or governance council member at three LAUSD schools.
• 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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