Sunday, June 27, 2010

Waiting in the wings


4LAKids: Sunday 27•June•2010
In This Issue:
LOCKE HIGH: School Is Turned Around, but $15 Million Cost Gives Pause
LIBRARIES FADING AS SCHOOL BUDGET CRISIS DEEPENS
MAYOR WANTS TO CHANGE HOW LAUSD CHOOSES OUTSIDE OPERATORS + VILLARAIGOSA BACKS CHARTER SCHOOL BIDS, RIPS CORTINES + ●● smf's 2¢
EDITH SHAIN, RETIRED LAUSD KINDERGARTEN & FIRST GRADE TEACHER DIES AT 91; She was the nurse in iconic Times Square V-J Day kissing photo
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?


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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.
On Tuesday afternoon the Board of Education hired a new Deputy Superintendent: Dr. John Deasy.

• They also passed a very a very harsh budget,
• Superintendent Cortines promised worse to come
• ...and Deasy will be paid more than Cortines.

4LAKids has a problem with the process of his hiring - especially as the week wore on and became apparent in comments from Superintendent Cortines that Deasy is the heir-apparent/superintendent-presumptive.

What little public input there was on the process of the hiring - and there was little (Feed the story to the press on Monday; do the deal on Tuesday) - the job description posted and recruited was that of Deputy - NOT General Superintendent of the Los Angeles Unified School District.

And elsewhere Mayor Tony intimated that Superintendent Cortines was not working out.

It seems to me I've heard that song before
It's from an old familiar score - Styne/Cahn

A few weeks ago there was a open process with public interviews in the hiring of the last direct-report-to-the superintendent in the person of the Chief Facilities Executive. What happened here ...did we spend all of our accountability budget?

Dr. Deasy comes from the Gates Foundation. The involvement of Foundations like Gates, Walmart and Broad is well known and well documented - most recently in this summer's required reading assignment: Diane Ravitch's The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education. These are not the beneficent philanthropies like Carnegie, Ford, MacArthur and Rockefeller that encourage and foster new thinking - these are funders of their own thinking and drivers of their own agendas. Agendae for classical grammarians.

By all appearances Dr Deasy is "the player to be named later" in a the trade for Yolie Flores with Gates. Flores denied this - but correctly recused herself from voting on Gates hiring.

Dr Deasy is a true believer in the charterization/ reconstitution/ Arne Duncan donut-ization of American public education: choice and competition and testing/carrot and stick/reward and punish. Public Schools with Private Agendae - with much talk of accountability ...but accountability to the outside partners: the foundations, the philanthropists, the billionaires.

Dr. Deasy also brings some potentially worrisome and embarrassing personal baggage, all of it unsubstantiated, unproven and circumstantial. That said, one wonders how much the Board of Ed was aware of the allegations ? Guilt by association is McCarthyesque - but we are known by the company we keep.
• Was due diligence done? By whom?
• How much did the board know and when did they know it?
• In their closed session interview with Dr. Deasy (he was the only candidate interviewed) did they ask the questions that needed asking?
The unlovely thing about closed sessions is that we will never know.

The process was about as open and transparent as a acre-foot of water off the Louisiana coastline.

WELCOME DR. DEASY TO THE PUZZLE PALACE; welcome back to Southern California. - we are still not Seattle or Virginia. Hopefully in your BlackBerry you have some contacts at Gates and Microsoft that can help bring this technology-and-communications-challenged District into the mainstream ...and then into the forefront of educational technology. Think e-textbooks and online learning and universal connectivity and scalable bandwidth to match our mission. Think social networking though email and phone apps and Twitter and Skype between parents and schools. Deasy's former boss Microsoft founder Bill Gates may have eclipsed IBM's founder Tom Watson - but Watson's single syllable mission statement still resounds: THINK.

Apologetically this welcome is left-handed - but the future is a blank page. In a letter elsewhere in this blog [http://bit.ly/akBCTL] the writer takes my fellow parents to task for expecting miracles. We expect them from you.

¡Onward/Adelante! -smf


_________________

CODA/CAVEAT: From a 2008 Louisville Courier-Journal article that outlines allegations about Deasy and his history before he joined the Gates Foundation: FELNER OK'D EX-CLIENT'S QUICK PH.D. AT U OF L - Educator Deasy received doctorate in one semester | http://bit.ly/dagReH

"Deasy, a nationally recognized school-reform advocate, won the Prince Georges County job in 2006 over two candidates with more experience in large, urban districts.

"The Washington Post said in a story published then that Deasy presented himself as a leader free of ethical taint.

"'Do your LexisNexis,' he challenged the Prince Georges County board, referring to the database of news stories. 'Not going to find a thing.' "


LOCKE HIGH: School Is Turned Around, but $15 Million Cost Gives Pause
By SAM DILLON | New York Times

June 24, 2010 -- LOS ANGELES — As recently as 2008, Locke High School here was one of the nation’s worst failing schools, and drew national attention for its hallway beatings, bathroom rapes and rooftop parties held by gangs. For every student who graduated, four others dropped out.

Now, two years after a charter school group took over, gang violence is sharply down, fewer students are dropping out, and test scores have inched upward. Newly planted olive trees in Locke’s central plaza have helped transform the school’s concrete quadrangle into a place where students congregate and do homework.

“It’s changed a lot,” said Leslie Maya, a senior. “Before, kids were ditching school, you’d see constant fights, the lunches were nasty, the garden looked disgusting. Now there’s security, the garden looks prettier, the teachers help us more.”

Locke High represents both the opportunities and challenges of the Obama administration’s $3.5 billion effort, financed largely by the economic stimulus bill, to overhaul thousands of the nation’s failing schools.

The school has become a mecca for reformers, partly because the Department of Education Web site hails it as an exemplary turnaround effort.

But progress is coming at considerable cost: an estimated $15 million over the planned four-year turnaround, largely financed by private foundations. That is more than twice the $6 million in federal turnaround money that the Department of Education has set as a cap for any single school. Skeptics say the Locke experience may be too costly to replicate.

“When people hear we spent $15 million, they say, ‘You’re insane,’ ” said Marco Petruzzi, chief executive of Green Dot Public Schools, the nonprofit charter school group that has remade Locke. “But when you look closely, you see it’s not crazy.”

Locke High, with 3,200 students, sprawls across six city blocks in south-central Los Angeles. The school’s principal in 2007 complained publicly that the Los Angeles Unified School District had made it a dumping ground for problem teachers.

Kevin Rauda, a senior, recalled a teacher who read newspapers in class instead of teaching. In spring 2008, only 15 percent of students passed state math tests.

Green Dot, which operates charter schools in Los Angeles and one in the Bronx, won control of Locke from the district in 2008 and began a turnaround effort.

In August 2008, Kevin King, a retired police lieutenant hired by Green Dot, toured Locke’s campus and found broken windows, smashed lights, and security cameras that did not work. Teachers’ cars were parked helter-skelter, including on some handball courts; gang members were selling drugs on others.

“Kids couldn’t even go to the bathroom without being pocket-checked or hassled,” Mr. King said.

He put together a new security force to expel the gangs. Green Dot fixed the lights and cameras, painted over graffiti, reorganized the parking, and hired bus companies to transport 500 students who previously walked dangerous streets to school.

Green Dot divided Locke into small academies. Several, modeled on the charters it operates elsewhere, opened in fall 2008 with freshman classes of 100 to 150 students and are to reach full enrollment of 500 to 600 students by fall 2011.

Other academies concentrate on remedial classes for older students, including some returning from jail. Another focuses on preparing students for careers in architecture.

Green Dot required Locke’s 120 teachers to reapply for their jobs. It rehired about 40, favoring teachers who showed enthusiasm and a belief that all Locke students could learn. The campus stays open each day until early evening for science tutoring, band and other activities.

Although state test scores administered in spring 2009, just months after the Green Dot makeover began, showed modest gains, Locke remained among California’s lowest-performing schools. Still, a dozen students said in recent interviews that the school was safer and instruction had improved.

Hundreds of school districts across the nation will soon be trying makeovers, prodded by the Obama administration’s push to remake the nation’s 1,000 worst schools, and the availability of $3.5 billion in federal money.

But if they rely on federal money alone, they will have to spend less than Green Dot.

Under rules set by Congress, districts can apply for up to $6 million for each failing school, to be spent over three years.

During a Senate hearing in April, Senator Al Franken, Democrat of Minnesota, congratulated Mr. Petruzzi on the Locke transformation, but also suggested its reliance on philanthropic donations would make it difficult to imitate.

“I’m thinking, how scalable is this?” Mr. Franken said.

In interviews, Mr. Petruzzi and other Green Dot officials offered a budget overview. Before and since Green Dot’s takeover, tax dollars have financed Locke’s annual operating budget of upward of $30 million, which during the four-year turnaround will total about $115 million, he said.

By then, expenditures will have exceeded that four-year, taxpayer-supported budget by about $15 million, with philanthropies making up most of the difference.

Over the four years, Green Dot is set to spend about $2 million on increased security and busing. It spent about $700,000 to create a classroom for a new architecture academy.

Green Dot has also spent several million dollars for additional classroom space because hundreds of students who had cut school or dropped out now show up for class, Mr. Petruzzi said.

Dividing Locke into academies resulted in extra personnel costs, Mr. Petruzzi said, because each academy has its own principal and other staff members.

Another cost: the salaries of two psychologists and two social workers who help students endure hardships like losing a sibling to gang warfare, or being evicted. They have helped prevent several suicides this year, said Zeus Cubias, an assistant principal.

Some new services for students have cost Green Dot nothing. Ms. Maya’s grades have improved since a teacher noticed she could not see the blackboard. Her parents are unemployed, and she had no money for glasses. But she had her eyes tested at a mobile eye clinic that visited Locke in October, where Vision Service Plans, a nonprofit provider, donated eyeglasses to her and 200 other students.

Experts are debating whether Locke is a good model for other turnarounds.

Justin Cohen, a turnaround expert at MassInsight, a Massachusetts nonprofit organization, said most districts could expect to spend $2 million to $3 million over three years to overhaul a failing school. Costs often include teacher training and extending the school day, he said.

“I don’t doubt they’re putting all those resources to good use,” Mr. Cohen said of Locke’s $15 million costs. “But that’s high.”

Tim Cawley, a managing director at the Academy for Urban School Leadership, a nonprofit group leading several turnaround efforts in Chicago, disagreed, arguing that even expenditures surpassing $15 million on a big school could be a smart national investment.

“We’re wasting billions every year by not fixing these schools,” Mr. Cawley said, “because the students they’re not educating end up filling our prisons.”


LIBRARIES FADING AS SCHOOL BUDGET CRISIS DEEPENS
By DONNA GORDON BLANKINSHIP | Associated Press

24 June 2010 -- BELLEVUE, Wash. — Students who wished their school librarians a nice summer on the last day of school may be surprised this fall when they're no longer around to recommend a good book or help with homework.

As the school budget crisis deepens, administrators across the nation have started to view school libraries as luxuries that can be axed rather than places where kids learn to love reading and do research.


No one will know exactly how many jobs are lost until fall, but the American Association of School Administrators projects 19 percent of the nation's school districts will have fewer librarians next year, based on a survey this spring. Ten percent said they cut library staff for the 2009-2010 school year.

A trip to the school library may be a weekly highlight for children who love to read, but for kids from low-income families, it's more of the necessity than a treat, according to literacy experts and the librarians who help kids struggling in high school without a home computer.

Unlike the overflowing bookshelves of wealthier families, 61 percent of low-income families own no age-appropriate books, according to a 2009 study commissioned by Jumpstart on "America's Early Childhood Literacy Gap." They depend on libraries to keep them from falling behind in school.

While the American Association of School Librarians says some states like California, Michigan and Arizona have been hit especially hard, a map of cutbacks on the organization's website shows jobs are disappearing across the nation.

"We're doing a disservice to our kids, especially those in poverty, if we don't have the resources they need," said association president Cassandra Barnett, who is also the school librarian at the Fayetteville, Ark., High School library.

Since few state or federal laws mandate school libraries or librarians, and their job losses are small compared with classroom teacher layoffs, library layoffs may seem minor to some observers. But librarians say few administrators or parents understand how involved they are in classroom learning and school technology.

"We have really cut off our noses to spite our face because we are denying access to the very resources we say our kids need," Barnett said.

Rosemarie Bernier, president of the California School Library Association, says she doesn't know how students doing complex online research projects could complete their assignments without the guidance they get in school libraries.

"The people who control the purse strings are out of touch. They don't understand what the kids really need," said Bernier, who is the librarian at Hamilton High School in Los Angeles.

She spoke of a student with a first period English class who came to her in tears because she didn't have enough time to transfer and reformat the essay she had written on her cell phone. Since she doesn't have a computer at home, the student's cell phone is her only hope of completing assignments that need to be typed.

The number of California school libraries that won't have teacher librarians next year is changing daily, but she says many students will be surprised next fall when they find their school library closed or staffed by someone who can check out books but not help them with their school work.

Los Angeles eliminated all its elementary school librarians a few years ago and has left next year's staffing of middle school libraries up to the schools. Of 77 middle schools, about 50 have found the money to pay for a teacher librarian, according to Esther Sinofsky, who is in charge of libraries for the district.

Sinofsky, a former school librarian, says Los Angeles Unified School District recognizes the connection between student achievement and school libraries, but the district is also struggling to close a $640 million budget gap for the 2010-2011 school year.

Teacher-librarians have been disappearing from Michigan schools gradually over the past decade, with a drop of nearly 1,500 to not quite 500 since 2000, according to Tim Staal, executive director of the Michigan Association for Media in Education.

Those who remain are doing the jobs done by two or three people a few years ago.

Gigi Lincoln, the librarian at Lakeview High School in Battle Creek, Mich., since 1973, was told she would have to leave the library and start teaching French because the district needed to make drastic cuts in the middle of the school year.

Lincoln, who was honored in 2008 by the American Library Association with one of just 10 national "I love my librarian" awards, hasn't taught French since 1972, when she and her husband were living in Australia.

"That was a real wake-up call," said Lincoln, 61, who called the ALA for help and managed to keep her job. Now she's working part-time at two school libraries and says she will do her best to do more than just check out books.

Even wealthy Seattle suburbs have identified the library as a target for budget cuts so they could avoid increases in class sizes.

Sandy Livingston retired this year after the Bellevue School District eliminated all its high school and middle school librarians.

"Information literacy is just so important for kids to be more successful in college," said Livingston, 66, who worked in the Sammamish High School library for about a decade. "The kids are being hurt."



●● smf's 2c: There is no more important classroom in the school than the library. None.

I feel a strange illiberal nostalgia for the George W. Bush administration; after all is said and done, Laura Bush was a school librarian

Where are you now Laura Bush? -- a nation turns its lonely eyes to you -smf


MAYOR WANTS TO CHANGE HOW LAUSD CHOOSES OUTSIDE OPERATORS + VILLARAIGOSA BACKS CHARTER SCHOOL BIDS, RIPS CORTINES + ●● smf's 2¢
MAYOR WANTS TO CHANGE HOW LAUSD CHOOSES OUTSIDE OPERATORS
Daily News Wire Services

06/25/2010 -- Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa wants Los Angeles Unified to change how it chooses organizations to put in charge of new schools and troubled campuses, but his recommendations weren't embraced by the superintendent.

Under the district's Public School Choice program, groups of teachers and administrators, charter operators and a nonprofit organization controlled by the mayor can compete against each other for a chance to run schools within the LAUSD.

Villaraigosa said the current selection process is "not good enough" and called for several changes, such as giving more weight to an applicant's track record and requiring innovative governance structures as part of the reform strategy.

In a letter to Superintendent Ramon Cortines dated June 9, Villaraigosa submitted a list of recommendations, the first being: "If there is no satisfactory application for a focus school, then reconstitution of the school should be the default action."

Cortines deflected each of the recommendations. In his reply, dated June 18, he said, "I believe that reconstitution or restructuring should be the last resort, not the default. Our goal is to support our schools so that they may improve the outcomes for our students. I will use all available options to improve a school under No Child Left Behind, if necessary."

Still, Cortines added, "We agree ... there are areas of the Public School Choice process that could be strengthened; with this in mind, staff has worked and continues to work diligently to ensure that all issue raised and others that might be raised are addressed so that this round of the process is far more effective than the previous."

In February, when LAUSD decided to turn over control of 18 new schools and 12 troubled ones to outside operators, the teacher-administrator groups backed by United Teachers Los Angeles claimed the vast majority of them.

Charter operators were awarded four of the schools, while Villaraigosa's nonprofit ended up with one.

The mayor said the selection process "doesn't stand the test of transparency, accountability, commonality of standards, the governance models, a track record that demonstrates a plan is more than just a piece of paper."

Cortines' decision to "summarily dismiss" his recommendations was "frankly, just unacceptable," Villaraigosa said, and called for changes before another set of schools is turned over.

When asked whether he would withdraw support for LAUSD officials who rejected his recommendations, Villaraigosa said, "I'm absolutely committed to seeing this process through, and I won't let anyone who opposes transformative reform get in the way."

LAUSD board President Monica Garcia said: "We welcome today's call by Mayor Villaraigosa and representatives of the charter and higher education communities to continually strive for reform, innovation and excellence."

"We appreciate the feedback we received today, and we invite all community members and stakeholders to partner with us to do more, better, and faster," she said.

Letters of intent to participate in the Public School Choice program are due Wednesday. Full applications are due in December.
________________

VILLARAIGOSA BACKS CHARTER SCHOOL BIDS, RIPS CORTINES: THE MAYOR SAYS L.A. UNIFIED DIDN'T GIVE CHARTERS A FAIR CHANCE IN AN EARLIER BID FOR CONTROL OF NEW AND LOW-PERFORMING CAMPUSES.
By Howard Blume, Los Angeles Times

June 25, 2010 -- The mayor of Los Angeles sided publicly with local charter schools Thursday in their latest bid to take over new and low-performing campuses, while sharply criticizing the L.A. schools superintendent, his onetime deputy.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa spoke one week before a deadline for applicants to submit bids for nine new campuses and eight low-performing ones in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

In the first round of the groundbreaking competition, groups of teachers in February defied early expectations to claim the vast majority of campuses. Charters, which are independently run and exempt from some rules that govern traditional schools, emerged with only four successful bids.

Villaraigosa castigated L.A. Unified for giving schools to groups from the very campuses that were up for bid because of poor performance. This time, he said, an organization's track record should be paramount.

"You can write a great plan, but if you don't have a history ... of proven results, that plan is just a piece of paper," Villaraigosa said.

The teacher groups, which had only weeks to put together proposals, received logistical support both from the district and United Teachers Los Angeles, the teachers union. The union then rallied local support behind teacher-led plans to dominate nonbinding community balloting over rival plans.

Villaraigosa said outside groups never had a fair shot at access to resources and parents.

In February, the mayor lobbied vigorously only for bids submitted by the nonprofit group that runs schools on his behalf, district officials told The Times. In its final decision, the school board majority he helped to elect gave him most of what he wanted, but favored even fewer charters than Supt. Ramon C. Cortines.

At the mayor's side Thursday were representatives from charter groups knocked out in the earlier round: one from ICEF Public Schools and three with ties to Green Dot Public Schools. Shane Martin, dean of the Loyola Marymount University School of Education, chairs the Green Dot board; Ben Austin heads a charter-allied parents organization spun off from Green Dot; and Steve Barr started Green Dot and headed it for years.

For schools with inadequate reform plans — and no competing outside bids — Villaraigosa called for reconstitution, a process in which all members of the staff are replaced or must reapply for their jobs.

Cortines called reconstitution a last resort rather than a default option. This year, he required staff at Fremont High School in South Los Angeles to reinterview, but he said such efforts fail unless handled with persistence and care. The example of Fremont, he said, was enough to move other schools into reform mode.

The teachers union has vigorously opposed the Fremont initiative, calling it unfair and unsupported by research.

Villaraigosa accused Cortines, a former deputy mayor and top education advisor, of dismissing his suggestions and straying from their shared reform fervor.

"Frankly, that's unacceptable," the mayor said. "We've got to stop biting around the edges.... We've got to be transformative."

Cortines said he found the mayor's suggestions, which Villaraigosa outlined in a June 9 letter, helpful, but added, "I don't think we would have given the mayor additional schools based on a track record."

"I looked at this process as an incentive to motivate and challenge and raise the bar for teachers and parents and administrators in this district, and they stepped up to the plate," Cortines said.

________________

●● smf's 2¢: Mayor Tony is entitled to his opinion. But the courts - the Superior Court, the Court of Appeal and the California State Supreme Court – ruled in Mendoza v. California /aka/ LAUSD v. Villaraigosa that he is not entitled to run the schools. Unconstitutional they said.

* The best board of education (his) money could buy has given him some schools to run anyway, And he has …poorly.
* The same board has given him the superintendent of his choosing; who is now dismissive of Mayor Tony’s suggestions and questioning of his track record.

Somehow this experience and investment and fervor has made him an expert and an authority

…or maybe picking on the schools might take the public’s attention off the fact that he’s gone to all those sporting events, concerts and award shows without paying for the tickets. Ya think?


EDITH SHAIN, RETIRED LAUSD KINDERGARTEN & FIRST GRADE TEACHER DIES AT 91; She was the nurse in iconic Times Square V-J Day kissing photo
SHE WAS A MARRIED, PART-TIME NURSE WHEN SHE JOINED THE JUBILANT CROWD CELEBRATING V-J DAY AND WAS KISSED BY A YOUNG SAILOR. THE PHOTO BY LIFE MAGAZINE'S ALFRED EISENSTAEDT WAS SEEN BY MILLIONS | http://bit.ly/7a4Gi

June 24, 2010 -- It's one of the most iconic images to emerge from World War II.

Life magazine photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt's photograph of an anonymous young sailor in a dark-blue uniform dipping a white-uniformed nurse backward while giving her a long kiss in the middle of Times Square on Aug. 14, 1945, symbolized the euphoria surrounding the news that the Japanese had surrendered and the war was finally over.

Edith Shain, a retired Los Angeles elementary school teacher who claimed to be the mystery nurse in the photo seen by millions around the world, died of cancer Sunday at her home in Los Angeles, said her son, Michael. She was 91.

Shain was a married, 27-year-old part-time nurse at Doctors Hospital in Manhattan when she joined the jubilant crowd in Times Square celebrating V-J Day.

"You can imagine how people felt. They were just elated," Shain said in a 2005 interview with The Times. "Someone grabbed me and kissed me, and I let him because he fought for his country. I closed my eyes when I kissed him. I never saw him."

When Eisenstaedt's photo ran in Life magazine the following week — he had neglected to get the names of his subjects, whose faces are obscured in the picture — Shain recognized herself but was too embarrassed to tell anyone it was her.

"But I knew it was me," she said. "I was wearing the same kind of shoes, and I had the same kind of seams in my stockings. And a little bit of my slip was showing."

Immediately after the sailor kissed her, Shain said, she encountered a soldier who also wanted a kiss. But that was enough for her, and she and the friend she was with left Times Square.

Shain later moved to Los Angeles, where she worked as a nurse before becoming a longtime kindergarten and first-grade teacher at Hancock Park Elementary School. She was married and divorced three times and had three sons.

In 1980, no longer embarrassed by her Times Square encounter with the anonymous sailor and wanting a copy of the famous photo, Shain wrote to Life magazine and identified herself as the nurse.

Eisenstaedt himself flew out to meet her.

"He looked at my legs and said I was the one," Shain recalled.

Eisenstaedt gave Shain a copy of the photo and, according to The Times article, Life flew her to New York for a luncheon.

In one of his books that he later inscribed for her, Eisenstaedt wrote that she was "the one and only nurse" whom he had photographed in Times Square.

But Bobbi Baker Burrows, a Life editor familiar with the subject, told the Associated Press in 2008 that Eisenstaedt, who died in 1995, was never sure that Shain was the nurse in the photo.

Burrows recalled that when interest in the photo was renewed, Life ran an article saying, "If you are the sailor or the nurse in the picture, please step forward."

"We received claims from a few nurses and dozens of sailors, but we could never prove that any of them were the actual people, and Eisenstaedt himself just said he didn't know," she said.

Carl Muscarello, a former New York City police detective, was one of the men who have claimed to be the sailor in the photo.

"Everything points to him," Shain told the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel in 1995. "He was tall enough that he could execute that form."

During the 60th anniversary of V-J Day in 2005, Shain and Muscarello appeared together in Times Square, where they exchanged a kiss for photographers and a large crowd.

Shain, however, was still not convinced that Muscarello was the sailor who had bussed her.

"I can't say he isn't," she said. "I just can't say he is. There is no way to tell."

Born July 29, 1918, in Tarrytown, N.Y., Shain graduated from a nursing school in New York and earned a bachelor's degree in education at New York University. She retired from teaching in 1985.

"The famed kissing nurse," as the New York Daily News once called her, often served as honorary grand marshal of Veterans Day and Memorial Day parades and spoke to World War II veterans' groups.

She was scheduled to appear in Times Square in August for a V-J Day celebration.

She also had been serving as national spokesperson for a grassroots initiative to establish a permanent national day of remembrance on the second Sunday of every August to honor the men and women of the World War II generation.

"She used to call herself an accidental celebrity, and she felt she should use that celebrity for the common men and women of the World War II generation," said Warren Hegg, national supervisor of the Keep the Spirit of '45 Alive initiative.

In addition to her son Michael, Shain is survived by her sons Justin and Robert; six grandchildren; and eight great-grandchildren.


HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources
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SUPERINTENDENT CORTINES BACKS COMMUNITY PLAN TO IMPROVE TROUBLED FREMONT HIGH: “It was really good of him to agree... http://bit.ly/ai5Upf

BOARD OKs LAUSD BUDGET WITH THOUSANDS OF LAYOFFS: By Connie Llanos, Staff Writer | LA Daily News LA Unified Sch... http://bit.ly/bUDCtd

In+Out/Coming+Going: A GOLDEN APPLE AND A PINK SLIP + L.A. UNIFIED HIRES GATES FOUNDATION OFFICIAL AS DEPUTY SUPER... http://bit.ly/dk64Ea

►New 4LAKids Feature BRIDGING DIFFERENCES: Ongoing dialog between Diane Ravitch and Deborah Meier now embedded in education news postings on 4LAKidsNews... http://bit.ly/cvitTD

Themes in the News for the week of June 14-18: CALIFORNIA’S BUDGET IS GETTING REDDER: By UCLA IDEA Staff Californ... http://bit.ly/diUJIP

FIGHT BREWING OVER NEW CONTROLS ON CHARTER SCHOOLS: By John Fensterwald in The Educated Guess June 22nd, 2010 --... http://bit.ly/9wgOXd

Clock Ticking: STATES – INCLUDING “WINNERS” DELAWARE & TENNESEE -WAIT FOR ‘RACE TO THE TOP’ MONEY: By Lesli Maxwel... http://bit.ly/birbVH

KIPP MIDDLE SCHOOLS FOUND TO SPUR LEARNING GAINS. KIPP commissioned study finds few signs that schools were 'cr... http://bit.ly/a119LT

FINAL L.A. UNIFIED BUDGET DEALS ESPECIALLY HARD BLOW TO NON-TEACHING EMPLOYEES: by Howard Blume | LA Times LA Now ... http://bit.ly/aua6HX 8:32 PM

TODAY IN LAUSD: Nada: from the LAUSD Communications Office Webpage | http://bit.ly/aR0dWb Reality takes a furl... http://bit.ly/cATnJq 2:45 PM Jun 22nd via twitterfeed

L.A. SCHOOL SYSTEM POISED TO HIRE SENIOR GATES FOUNDATION OFFICIAL (UPDATED: He's Hired!): By Howard Blume | LA Ti... http://bit.ly/964oLj

LAUSD BOARD MAY FILL NO. 2 POSITION: By Connie Llanos Staff Writer | LA Daily News 06/22/2010 | The Los Angeles ... http://bit.ly/dn7NT4

Lest we forget: SCHOOL'S NEVER OUT @ YEAR ROUND SCHOOLS: A Principal Friend Writes TO 4LAKids re: Schools? OUT! | ... http://bit.ly/deYNY1


EVENTS: Coming up next week...
*Dates and times subject to change. ________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 213-241-5183
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213-241.8700


• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR



What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Yolie.Flores.Aguilar@lausd.net • 213-241-6383
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Nury.Martinez@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385
Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • Find your state legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor 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.
• 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.


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




Scott Folsom is a parent leader in LAUSD. He is Past President of Los Angeles Tenth District PTSA and represents PTA on the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee. He is an elected Representative on his neighborhood council. He is a Health Commissioner, Legislation Team member and a member of the Board of Managers of the California State PTA. He serves on numerous school district advisory and policy committees and has served as a PTA officer and governance council member at three LAUSD schools. He is the recipient of the UTLA/AFT 2009 "WHO" Gold Award for his support of education and public schools - an honor he hopes to someday deserve. • In this forum his opinions are his own and your opinions and feedback are invited. Quoted and/or cited content copyright © the original author and/or publisher. All other material copyright © 4LAKids.
• FAIR USE NOTICE: This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. 4LAKids makes such material available in an effort to advance understanding of education issues vital to parents, teachers, students and community members in a democracy. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes.
• To SUBSCRIBE e-mail: 4LAKids-subscribe@topica.email-publisher.com - or -TO ADD YOUR OR ANOTHER'S NAME TO THE 4LAKids SUBSCRIPTION LIST E-MAIL smfolsom@aol.com with "SUBSCRIBE" AS THE SUBJECT. Thank you.



Sunday, June 20, 2010

Schools? OUT!


4LAKids: Sunday 20•June•2010 Fathers' Day
In This Issue:
FREMONT SE JUEGA SU FUTURO e mas | FREMONT STAKES ITS FUTURE + more
LAWSUIT CHALLENGES SCHOOL FUNDING SYSTEM: State has week to respond to group's claims
CHILDREN'S LEMONADE STANDS RAISE MONEY FOR SANTA MONICA-MALIBU SCHOOLS
smf's REMARKS AT THE RIBBON CUTTING OF RAMONA OPPORTUNITY HIGH SCHOOL
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:
4 LAKids on Twitter
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.
YOU ARE EITHER IN.... OR YOU'RE OUT. - Heidi Klum.

SCHOOL'S OUT FOR SUMMER. - Alice Cooper

SCHOOL'S OUT A WEEK EARLY - courtesy of Dr. Cortines and Mr. Duffy - negotiated not as educational policy but an amendment to the union contract ...but really thanks to the California State Government's total ineptitude.. Maybe they have an excuse. After all - most of them - whether their gang/party colors are Crips/Democrat Blue or Bloods/Republican Red - were mostly publicly educated - many in post-Prop 13 California.

And while I'm picking on the governor and the lege: The constitutional deadline for a state budget was last Tuesday. In real life - and in turning in assignments for school - there is a word for those who miss deadlines: Dead..

4LAKids REUSES/RECYCLES/REDISTRIBUTES NEWS STORIES AND OPINION PIECES from the media and we go to great lengths and pains to remove paid advertising from those stories. Following in a link to a full-page paid ad from page B-10 of Thursday’s LA Times, placed there by the Campaign to Save Arts Education in the LAUSD.

http://bit.ly/ddCD1r - please go there.

The placers of this ad approached me and approached Los Angeles Tenth District PTA about being signatory to this campaign and this ad. With apologies to them, to the campaign, the arts education community and the greater membership of PTA - the ball was dropped.

Mea culpa: PTA should have been a signer of this letter. This is our mission, we had the necessary PTA votes and board support.

PRESERVING ARTS & MUSIC EDUCATION IS THE OFFICIAL POLICY AND POSITION OF PTA IN LA. And, not coincidentally: 4LAKids.

Gentle readers: Please support the campaign to save Elementary Arts Education in LAUSD, a program that was - until now - an award winning national paradigm of success - studied and emulated in other school districts elsewhere.

MEANWHILE: How ' bout those Lakers? How 'bout that US Soccer Team? How 'bout that questionable call at the end of Slovenia v. USA? How bout the 6th graders at Mt. Washington ES crushing the staff and facuty in the End of Year Softball Game? And how 'bout Lt Governor and CSU Trustee Abel Maldonado voting against the fee increase for CSU students? Maybe Abel was voting the GOP party line (No tax increases, no fee increases) but that vote was the right vote. The trustees who voted and prevailed in raising fees voted wrong; a compromise too far. But how do I really feel?

Happy Fathers Day/Dia de los Padres + ¡Onward/Adelante! -smf

_____________________________________________________
STORYBOOK THEATER: You can make a difference in Arts Ed in LA Right now, while sitting at your computer -- Vote for the Arts for Los Angeles Schoolchildren + Your vote = $ | http://bit.ly/bgw5Uc !

_____________________________________________________


TAKE ACTION TO SAVE ELEMENTARY ARTS AND MUSIC EDUCATION BY SENDING A LETTER TO THE LAUSD SCHOOL BOARD



FREMONT SE JUEGA SU FUTURO e mas | FREMONT STAKES ITS FUTURE + more
Fremont High School: ANTE EL CAMBIO HAY GRAN ÉXODO DE ALUMNOS Y MAESTROS

by Yolanda Arenales| La Opinión

2010-06-14 -- A sólo unas semanas de que entre en vigor el nuevo plan de reestructuración interno para revertir los pobres resultados académicos en la escuela Fremont High, lo único que todos tienen claro es que en este nuevo experimento del Distrito Escolar Unificado de Los Ángeles (LAUSD) están enfrentando a una verdadera lucha de poder.

Entre los padres y estudiantes existe el temor de que el cambio se convierta en un "experimento" más en el que los alumnos sean, de nuevo, los más perjudicados.

Paola López, una estudiante de Fremont, cuenta que algunos jóvenes han pedido el traslado a otras escuelas del distrito para evitar la presión que puede acarrear los cambios, y en busca de escuelas donde los mejores resultados son ya una realidad.

"Yo me quedo porque creo que tengo derecho a una buena educación aquí, donde vivo", dice López.

Muchos estudiantes como Paola reclaman que los cambios dejen de ser una lucha de poder entre el distrito y los sindicatos y se centren en lo que de verdad importa: el progreso de los alumnos.

El próximo 1 de julio comenzará oficialmente la nueva etapa de la secundaria Fremont, siguiendo el plan de restructuración anunciado por el LAUSD a fines del año pasado.

El objetivo es sacar a la escuela de la situación de bajo desempeño en la que ha estado sumida por los últimos 12 años, pero la transición no está libre de polémica.

"Queremos despolitizar el proceso", dice Carla Vega, madre de un alumno en Fremont.

Siendo madre de tres hijos educados en las escuelas del distrito, Vega ha luchado ya en muchas batallas en busca de mejores opciones educativas en su comunidad, y ahora se enfrenta a ésta con optimismo.

"Creo que el cambio va a ser para bien", dice basando en parte su esperanza en los fondos adicionales que la escuela pueda recibir como apoyo para implementar su reforma interna.

Por ejemplo, según el Departamento de Educación de California, Fremont encaja en los criterios federales para recibir una Beca de Mejora Escolar (SIG) de $6 millones en los próximos tres años, de los cuales tres cuartas partes deberían destinarse a la plantilla de enseñanza.

Sin embargo, el hecho de que todos los maestros actuales de Fremont deben solicitar de nuevo su puesto para poder continuar enseñando en esta escuela bajo el nuevo plan de reestructuración, ha ahuyentado a muchos con amplia experiencia.

En torno al 40% de los 250 maestros de este plantel no han renovado su solicitud para el puesto, según explica Joe Vaca, un ex alumno de Fremont y maestro de la escuela desde hace 10 años.

"Yo crecí en el barrio y mi sueño siempre fue jubilarme en esta escuela", dice Vaca, quien optó por buscar trabajo en otra escuela donde comenzará a impartir clases el próximo otoño.

"Como alumno viví en primera persona los problemas a los que se enfrentan ahora sus estudiantes, pero la restructuración va a ser un cambio impuesto por el distrito ignorando a los que afrontan la realidad diaria de esa comunidad", sostiene Vaca.

Algunos maestros sienten que el procedimiento se ensaña con ellos al culparlos por resultados sobre los cuales, dicen, tienen un control limitado.

La escuela tiene un índice de desempeño de 524 puntos, frente al objetivo de 800 y el promedio de 694 en LAUSD y sólo un 13.6% de los estudiantes alcanzó el nivel de aprendizaje correspondiente a su grado según, los estándares de California (CST), o más alto el año pasado.

Hasta ahora, y a unas semanas de que empiece el nuevo ciclo escolar, los maestros que sí optaron por seguir las reglas impuestas por el LAUSD y solicitaron de nuevo su puesto, aún no saben quiénes serán readmitidos y quienes no, tampoco se sabe quienes reemplazarán a los maestros que irán.

"Hay demasiadas interrogantes. No creo que nos estén informando bien", sostiene Liz Rivera, una residente del área, quien percibe la restructuración como una maniobra política para "quedar bien" ante el gobierno estatal y federal.

Por su parte, Rafael Balderas, director de la escuela Fremont no contestó a los reiterados intentos de este periódico por conseguir información actualizada sobre la situación de su escuela, y se limitó a decir que lo hará en el futuro próximo.

Para Siris Barrios, de la organización Community Coalition, que aboga por el progreso del Sur de Los Ángeles, uno de los efectos positivos del proceso es la atención que ha despertado.

"Lo importante ahora es que se incluya la participación de la comunidad", dice Barrios, señalando que su organización está programando reuniones con LAUSD para conseguirlo. Entre las prioridades que quieren plantear destacan la recuperación de "los olvidados’ –los chicos que abandonaron la escuela sin terminarla-, conseguir servicios de terapia familiar, e incluir academias de enseñanza práctica a nivel universitario que faciliten él éxito de los jóvenes

Fremont, el reto es mejorar las "calificaciones" actuales:
Indice de desempeño: 524, frente al objetivo de 800 y el promedio de 694 en LAUSD.
Sólo un 13.6% de los estudiantes alcanzó el nivel de aprendizaje correspondiente a su grado según los estándares de California (CST), o más alto.
De entre 3, 226 estudiantes examinados en matemáticas en 2009, sólo 45 estaban al nivel requerido en todos las pruebas y sólo dos sobresalieron.
Tasa de abandono de estudiantes: 34.2% (2007-08)

________________________________________________

Fremont High School: BEFORE THE CHANGE THERE IS GREAT EXODUS OF STUDENTS AND TEACHERS

by Yolanda Arenales | La Opinión ....with apologies, automatic translation by Google Translate - cleaned up (somewhat) by smf

2010-06-14 -- In the couple weeks before the new internal restructuring plan to reverse the poor academic performance at Fremont High School comes into effect the only thing that is clear is that this new experiment at Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) is facing a real struggle for power.

Among parents and students there are concerns that the change will become an "experiment" in which most students are, again, the hardest hit.

Paola Lopez, a student at Fremont, says that some young people have requested a transfer to other schools in the district to avoid the pressure that can lead to changes, and are looking for schools where the best results are now a reality.

"I choose to stay because I believe I have the right to a good education here, where I live," says Lopez.

Many students like Paola desire that the reform cease to be a power struggle between the district and the unions and that the focus shift to what really matters: the progress of students.

Next July 1 will officially begin the new regime at Fremont High School, following the restructuring plan announced by the LAUSD late last year.

The aim is to get to school out of the situation of poor performance in which it has been mired for the past 12 years ...but the transition is not without controversy.

"We want to depoliticize the process," says Carla Vega, mother of a student at Fremont.

As the mother of three children educated in district schools, Vega has already fought in many battles in search of better educational options in their community, and it now faces this one with optimism.

"I think the change will be for good," she says partly basing her hopes on the additional funds that the school may receive as a support to implement its internal reform.

For instance, under the California Department of Education,, Fremont fit the federal criteria to receive a School Improvement Grant (SIG) of $ 6 million over three years, of which three quarters should be directed to the teaching staff.

However, under the new restructuring plan the fact that all current teachers must reapply for their jobs at Fremont has alienated many with extensive experience.

About 40% of the 250 teachers of the faculty have not renewed their application for their positions, says Joe Vaca, a former student of Fremont and school teacher for 10 years.

"I grew up in the neighborhood and my dream always was to retire at this school," says Vaca, who chose to seek employment in another school where he will begin to teach next fall.

"As a student I experienced first-hand the problems that students now face, but the restructuring will be a change imposed by the district ignoring those who face the daily reality of this community," says Vaca.

Some teachers feel that the procedure is implacable and leads to results to which, they say, they have no control.

The school has a Academic Performance Index (API) of 524 points, against a target of 800 and average 694 in LAUSD and only 13.6% of students are performing a grade level according to the California Standards Tests (CST) or higher last year.

Until now, a few weeks from the start of the new school year, even teachers who do chose to follow the rules imposed by the LAUSD and reapplied for their jobs - do not yet know who will be readmitted and who will not; further it is not known who will replace teachers who leave.

"There are too many questions. I do not think we are well informed," said Liz Rivera, an area resident, who sees the restructuring as a political maneuver to "save face" by the state and federal government.

For his part, Rafael Balderas, principal of the Fremont did not respond to repeated attempts by this newspaper to get an update on the status of the school, saying only that he will in the near future.

To Siris Barrios, of the organization Community Coalition, which advocates the advancement of South Los Angeles, one of the positive effects of the process is the attention it has attracted.

"The important thing now is to include the participation of the community," Barrios said, noting that his organization is planning meetings with LAUSD to get it.

Among the priorities they want to raise include the recovery of "the forgotten", the boys who left school without finishing," to get family therapy services and include practical teaching academies at university level to facilitate the achievement of young people

At Fremont, the challenge is to improve the "skills" :

Academic Performance Index: 524, against a target of 800 and average 694 in LAUSD.
Only 13.6% of students are performing at grade level or higher according to the California
Among 3, 226 students tested in mathematics in 2009, only 45 were proficient in all tests and only two were above proficient..
Student dropout rate: 34.2% (2007-08)

_________________
additional content:
UTLA responds to Cortines plan to restructure Fremont HS under NCLB | http://bit.ly/d1INsW

United Teacher articles
- Fremont High takes fight to the School Board (5/21/10) by UTLA staff
- We are all Fremont (4/23/10) by UTLA members
- Fremont High calls for reform,not reconstitution (3/26/10) by UTLA staff
- Fighting the good fight (1/26/10) by the Save Fremont Committee
- Why Fremont Matters (1/22/10) by UTLA/AFT Vice President Josh Pechthalt
- Reconstitution: Publicity stunt, not real reform (1/22/10) by the Save Fremont Committee

Background – from UTLA
In a letter dated December 9, LAUSD Superintendent Ramon Cortines announced the restructuring of Fremont HS. The Superintendent cited continued poor performance at Fremont as the reason to invoke the provisions of NCLB to begin restructuring the High School.
- See Cortines' restructuring letter
The school will report directly to Cortines beginning July 1, 2010.
UTLA is outraged that this takeover was brought to the attention of the teachers and UTLA leadership at the last minute. “At this point, we are not sure what form this restructuring will take. We will insist that teachers, parents, community members, UTLA and other bargaining units must be a part of the process,” said UTLA president A.J. Duffy.
UTLA remains committed to positive change at schools. We believe that change must occur collaboratively between teachers, parents, community members and the District along with other bargaining unit partners.
UTLA is making an official request to negotiate the details of this process.

Confusion at Fremont High School for axed teachers | http://bit.ly/bnbG9z
Jose Lara | The South Los Angeles Report
4-5-2010 | Los Angeles school officials decided at the end of 2009 to close Fremont High School in South Los Angeles and start afresh. All the teachers were fired, but some are confused as to why they have been asked to re-apply for their jobs.


LAWSUIT CHALLENGES SCHOOL FUNDING SYSTEM: State has week to respond to group's claims
Canan Tasci, Staff Writer | Contra Costa Times

6/13/2010 -- State officials have about a week to respond to a lawsuit that could force lawmakers and the governor to overhaul California's school finance system and policies.

The suit says the current education financing system is unconstitutional and asks the court to require the establishment of one that provides the proper funding for all of the state's programs.

The case was filed in Superior Court in Alameda County on May 20 by more than 60 students and their families, nine school districts, the California School Boards Association, the state PTA and the Association of California School Administrators.

The state has 30 days to respond.

"We have tried many avenues as an education coalition to let the governor know that what they're doing to education is harmful to education and to the generation, and they have done nothing to remedy the problem," said Caryn Payzant, Alta Loma School District board member and California School Boards Association's key communicator for San Bernardino County.

"This is a last resort to get their attention and to let them know about what they're doing is wrong."

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger said he has instructed his lawyers to work with the court and with the plaintiffs to "really make sure that we are working and going in the right direction.

"We are interested in funding and the money that goes into the classroom. That is the important thing. I think that we need funding. We need to go and straighten out our funding mechanism. I think that we've got to straighten out our budget system, our tax system.

"And also, we have to concentrate on that we have equal education for every child and that we have accountability. There is no such thing as increasing funding and just throwing more money at that broken system."

California's revenue and expenditure system makes schools almost completely dependent on the state.

California ranks 47th in per-pupil spending, with an average of $7,500 spent per student, in comparison to the national average of $9,900.

With class sizes increasing, and summer school, arts, music, librarians, nurses and counselors being cut, state Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell said failing to fund programs and resources will threaten students' need to thrive and compete in a competitive global economy.

"According to the Legislative Analyst's recent analysis on per capita real general fund spending in the governor's proposed May budget revision, `The level of spending proposed by the administration would continue the recent drop in state spending, as adjusted for growth in population and inflation. In 2010-11, the inflation adjusted per capita spending level would be similar to that of 1993-94 - also a low point due to a recession,"' O'Connell said.

"If the political will to protect our future is faltering, perhaps this lawsuit and the courts will be the catalyst to meet our obligation to the more than 6 million students in our state."

The suit itself has been a year in the making, said Deborah Caplan, attorney for the plaintiffs.

Time was spent developing the legal theory and making sure whatever action was taken made a solid argument.

"Any time you bring a constitutional challenge to the state education finance system, it's a big challenge," Caplan said.

Caplan said this suit is special because of its approach. Some states have tried to create a similar suit that asks the courts to define what type of education is needed and determine how much it would cost for the education it deemed necessary, she said.

"We think the state has defined the educational program that it thinks is necessary to prepare students to go to college, get a job and be productive in the 21st century, but we are saying that once you define the program ... (you) also have a duty to fund it," Caplan said.

"I think districts have been increasingly concerned because they're the ones who are responsible for delivering the program, but they don't have the any additional resources to meet those needs."

State Secretary of Education Bonnie Reiss said all agree that funding is important, but countless studies show that more money alone will not help students.

"The Governor's Administration stands ready to work with the courts and the plaintiffs on reviewing the state's school finance system, however, we must look at the entire education system and reform the way that money is spent to put the needs of students first and maximize funding in the classroom," she said.

Payzant has extended an offer to visit other school districts, service organizations and chambers of commerce to discuss the suit.

"The education of our next generation affects all of us as a community, and that's why it's not just the education community that should be aware of this, because having an educated population makes us strong," she said.


More about the lawsuit: http://www.fixschoolfinance.org/

* Press Release: Historic Lawsuit Challenges California’s Unconstitutional Education Finance System - May 20, 2010
* California School Funding Lawsuit Press Kit
* Complaint: Robles-Wong v. California
* Press Statements from San Francisco and Sacramento Press Conferences


CHILDREN'S LEMONADE STANDS RAISE MONEY FOR SANTA MONICA-MALIBU SCHOOLS
SMMUSD'S $7.1 MILLION IN BUDGET CUTS INCLUDES ALL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL LIBRARIES AND SOME MUSIC PROGRAMS - 'A lot of my past teachers have gotten a pink slip and I want to save them,' one girl says.

by Ann M. Simmons, Los Angeles Times

June 20, 2010 -- A group of children manned a lemonade stand on a Santa Monica street corner Saturday morning, waving posters urging passersby to buy a beverage and a cookie and help "Save Our Teachers." A woman pulled up in an SUV, ordered five cookies and handed over a $100 bill. She told the youngsters to give her only $50 in change.

The gesture, met with cheers and applause, gave a generous boost to Project Lemon-Aid — a fundraising initiative inspired by students and aimed at helping offset budget cuts to the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District.

"A lot of my past teachers have gotten a pink slip and I want to save them," said Emily Newberry, 11, who worked at the lemonade stand at Stanford Street and Montana Avenue.

"The classes will get bigger and it's going to be harder for the teachers to teach," added 8-year-old Weston MacWilliams.

The lemonade stand was one of dozens that were expected to be set up in Santa Monica and Malibu over the weekend.

They hoped to raise funds for the cash-strapped school district, which had to slash $7.1 million from the budget of the upcoming academic year after a local school funding measure was voted down in May.

The cuts include the elimination of 65 teacher and other staff positions; the closing of all elementary school libraries; and the axing of some elementary school music programs. Larger class sizes are also expected.

In an effort to provide "a critical stop-gap," the Santa Monica-Malibu Education Foundation has launched a 60-day fundraising campaign called Save Our Schools.

So far, the campaign has raised more than $200,000, with an additional $100,000 in pledges, according to Linda Greenberg Gross, the foundation's executive director.

Gross acknowledged that it was unlikely that all the funds needed would be raised by the Aug. 15 deadline, but said whatever was collected would go toward partial restoration of positions and programs.

"Every little bit counts," said Gross.

That's why when first-grader Ezra Krieger told his mother that he, Weston and a few other pals wanted to sell lemonade to try to raise funds for teachers, Jennifer Roth Krieger was eager to help them give it a shot.

Last weekend they set up lemonade stands at two separate corners. In just a few hours, the children took in $250.

"We realized that we had really tapped into something," said Krieger, who has three children in Santa Monica schools. "It's an opportunity to teach our kids ... that whatever part you play can go a long way."

So this weekend, Krieger decided to take the initiative districtwide. Word was spread by mouth, over the Internet and through fliers. Scores of parents chipped in to help their children set up lemonade stands throughout the district.

"It's really a grassroots effort among the kids," said Bruce MacWilliams, Weston's father. "We're the ones who are following the kids. They are the ones who are leading."

While most parents praised the children's efforts, some blamed state legislators for a budget crisis that has resulted in cuts to public schools, forcing constituents to come up with ways to foot education bills in the first place.

"I think it's a shame that parents and kids have to do this," Michael Conn, who has two children in Santa Monica schools, said of the Project Lemon-Aid initiative. "It's irresponsible for the state not to watch their finances."

Choir enthusiasts Caitlin Kerwin, 15, and Chloe Abarbanel, 14, who joined other high school friends at a lemonade stand at the corner of Santa Monica's Washington Avenue and Harvard Street, said they were hoping that any money they raised would at the very least help elementary schools' music programs.

"Music is the thing that makes me want to come to school in the morning," said Chloe. "Without the foundation you get in elementary school, you can't reach the highest level."

They were grateful when neighbor Dean Stackel and his 12-year-old son Ben arrived at their stand to donate $20. They didn't want any lemonade, cookies or Rice Krispies treats. They simply wanted to help.

The young fundraisers who dotted the district Saturday were hopeful that such generosity would help them reap a bounty.

By 2 p.m., the stand at Stanford and Montana had taken in $800 — and sold out of lemonade.


smf's REMARKS AT THE RIBBON CUTTING OF RAMONA OPPORTUNITY HIGH SCHOOL
Background - from the California Department of Toxic Substances Control "Success Story" website |
http://bit.ly/a2VPSk: - The New Ramona Opportunity High School (ROHS) project is a collaboration between the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). MTA’s plan to complete construction of its Metro Gold Line Eastside Extension will encroach upon one acre of the existing ROHS site. The agreement between MTA and LAUSD allows MTA to move forward with its plan to extend the Gold Line by acquiring one acre of the existing ROHS and replacing it with the subject site for construction of a replacement school.

The ROHS serves pregnant teenage mothers, providing education programming for 240 special needs female high school students in grades 7-12 within LAUSD.

The one-acre project is located at the northeast corner of East Third Street and South Alma Avenue.


June 17, 2010 -- "RAMONA" - the unique California story of star-crossed love.

What happens, the great hypothetical asks, when an irresistible force meets an immovable object?
Utter chaos?
Total Destruction?
A tear in the Space-Time continuum?
Nothing?

Look Around you. two giant self-absorbed autonomous and unaccountable bureaucracies - the Metropolitan Transit Agency and the School District - have collided. And this wonderful new school has happened. And I rode here today from my home on the Gold Line.

Teen aged girls, historically ignored Teen Mothers and Mothers-to-Be today have increased Opportunity and A New Chance today - as do their children and children-to-be. And this historically underserved community is now served by rapid transit.
I would like to say that all of this happened without drama - but drama there was. And politics and schoolyard bullying and conflict and both sides picking up their ball and going home.

And in the end there was Compromise - but NOT at the expense of these young women or this community or the missions of public education or public transit.

In the end there was this school for these young ladies - and a great continued future for this school and for the community it serves.

Building schools and investing in its future is the greatest thing any community does; schools and education and opportunity are the greatest gifts we give ourselves.

We will have have built and opened 110 schools in the bond program when schhol opens in Septemeber; I have made speeches at many if not most of them.
Every new school makes my heart sing - this one in a sweeter key because of the mission of this school and the unlikely harmony of the implausible partners -- and the glorious conclusion of the drama.

I have a confession to make: today is my birthday - but this gift is for all of us. This is the continued and continuing gift of Hope - Esperanza - for young women caught up unexpectedly in life -- and for that life itself.

Thank you Los Angeles - voters and taxpayers and educators and transit workers, riders and students, politicians, parents and community members. Occasionally we glimpse the angels all around us.


HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest of the Stories from Other Sources

# ‘PRESENT!’ FOR THIRTEEN YEARS: 10 South Gate Senior High School students have unblemished records.: By Esmeralda B... http://bit.ly/bVxKnL

ARTS FOR LA CAMPAIGN TO SAVE ARTS EDUCATION: LA Times Advertisement 4LAKids redistributes news stories and opinio... http://bit.ly/a0VGmA

LAUSD to UTLA: STOP FAVORING TENURE OVER STUENT’S RIGHTS: By Ken Alpern: ALPERN AT LARGE | l..A. City Watch – an ... http://bit.ly/c2Uplk

SOUTH L.A. SCHOOLS FAILING TO PREVENT DROPOUTS: by Ariel Edwards Levy | Intersections LA ::The South Los Angeles R... http://bit.ly/9WT5ks

SAN DIEGO SUPERINTENDENT FINALISTS ANNOUNCED: One is Dale Vigil, tapped as Local District 4 Supe yesterday: San Di... http://bit.ly/9LXYhk

QUEST FOR BEST COULD KILL GOOD KINDERGARTEN BILL: By John Fensterwald | The Educated Guess June 16th, 2010 || Fo... http://bit.ly/cQx6Hf

LOS ANGELES UNIFIED SAYS IT IS SAVING NEARLY 2,500 JOBS: District officials attribute the development to employee ... http://bit.ly/byOHw3

MAYWOOD ACTIVISTS OPPOSE LAUSD EMINENT DOMAIN: Adolfo Guzman-Lopez | KPCC Download Audio Feed

TRICKLE-DOWN EFFECT HITS LOCAL PREP SPORTS: By Courtney Jones | FOX Sports West & PRIME TICKET June 16, 2010 | Yo... http://bit.ly/bTB2Pm

'Largely symbolic': LAUSD MOVES TO ALTER TEACHER LAYOFFS: By Connie Llanos, Staff Writer | LA Daily News 6/16/201... http://bit.ly/bcPCYb

CARPENTER AVENUE ELEMENTARY A NEW CHARTER SCHOOL: Connie Llanos | L.A. Daily News 6/16/2010 -- Los Angeles Unifie... http://bit.ly/bUnfru

ASSIGNMENT OF LOCAL DISTRICT SUPERINTENDENTS 2010-2010: http://bit.ly/d6oEJL

LAWSUIT CHALLENGES SCHOOL FUNDING SYSTEM: State has week to respond to group's claims: Canan Tasci, Staff Writer |... http://bit.ly/d5Aguo

SYMANTEC CHAIRMAN CALLS FOR PROP 13 REFORM "to provide more money for public schools.": By John Fensterwald | The ... http://bit.ly/9Qrtgy

SELECTIONS FROM CALIFORNIA EDUCATION NEWS ROUNDUP: Grad rate falls 5%, Ed reform meets politics, Bill would keep k... http://bit.ly/d9bHOK

CHARTER SCHOOL LEADERS CHARGED WITH STEALING OVER $200,000 IN PUBLIC FUNDS: The Russian couple faces 38 felony and... http://bit.ly/aXvSpT

STORYBOOK THEATER: Vote for the Arts for Los Angeles Schoolchildren :: Your vote = $ !: by smf for 4LAKids June ... http://bit.ly/bgw5Uc

Letters to the editor: WHY MEASURE E DIDN’T MAKE IT: Letters to the Editor of the LA Times Re "L.A. Unified fails... http://bit.ly/aVRNTK

1,100 STUDENTS LATER, SOME THOUGHTS ON TEACHING: Jane Schwanbeck is leaving after 37 years as a kindergarten teach... http://bit.ly/cJqgzc

VOTERS ARE TRYING TO MAKE GOVERNMENT WORK: Legislative redistricting and open primary measures have become law. Con... http://bit.ly/cJQOCJ


EVENTS: Coming up next week...
*Dates and times subject to change. ________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 213-241-5183
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213-241.8700


• LAUSD BOARD OF EDUCATION & COMMITTEES MEETING CALENDAR



What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Yolie.Flores.Aguilar@lausd.net • 213-241-6383
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Nury.Martinez@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385
Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • 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.
• 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.


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




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