In This Issue:
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TEACH FOR AMERICA CRITICIZED FOR APPARENT STANCE ON EDUCATION POLICY |
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L.A. Times v. LAUSD: L.A. UNIFIED TEACHERS RATINGS SHOULD BE DISCLOSED, JUDGE RULES |
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APPLE HANDED PROPOSED SOLUTIONS FOR E-BOOKS PRICE-FIXING RULING + smf’s 2¢ |
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Closing the tap on the School-to-Prison Pipeline: KIDS BULLIED FOR YEARS MORE LIKELY TO GO TO PRISON |
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HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T FIT: The Rest (but
not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other Sources |
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EVENTS: Coming up next week... |
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What can YOU do? |
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Featured Links:
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This past week new fissures appeared in the façade of School ®eform, Inc.
TFA (not to be confused with TSA) picked up big bucks from the Waltons
and some bad reviews. [See following + Walton Family Foundation Invests
$200 Million in Teach For America http://bit.ly/1coyLoQ]
Florida, home of Jeb Bush, sent Ben Austin, Parent Revolution and the
Parent Trigger back to whence they came. Which, like street gangs, means
back to L.A. [Florida Educators, Parents Shield Students from “Parent
Trigger” http://bit.ly/1bPR5JU]
Don’t weep for P-Rev and Ben. The LA Times wrote a nice puff piece so
they could have a nice soft landing. [Adelanto School at Center of
Parent Trigger Controversy Opens http://bit.ly/1bTecTN]
While Florida was at it they also sent (the other) Tony Bennett – their
Commissioner of Education – back to Indiana from whence he came.
[Florida Education Chief Tony Bennett Resigns Over How a ‘C’ Became an
‘A’ http://bit.ly/1bUbv4k]
Conservative columnist Michelle Malkin writes in the National Review:
“[Bennett's] disgraceful grade-fixing scandal is the perfect symbol of
all that’s wrong with the federal education schemes peddled by Bennett
and his mentor, former GOP governor Jeb Bush: phony academic standards,
crony contracts, and big-government and big-business collusion
masquerading as “reform.”
She adds: “Cronyism and corruption come in all political stripes and
colors. As a conservative parent of children educated at public charter
schools, I am especially appalled by these pocket-lining GOP elites who
are giving grassroots education reformers a bad name and cashing in on
their betrayal of limited-government principles.” [http://bit.ly/13y6E3s - editing by Diane Ravitch in her blog]
It isn’t all the GOP’s fault. It seems like Tony’s tremendous success
in Indiana schools – which got him the Florida gig - was much like the
Atlanta superintendent’s ‘success’ there …or Michelle Rhee’s ‘success’
in D.C. …or Crescendo Charter Schools in L.A. …or Rob Paige’s (“The
Father of No Child Left Behind”) ‘success’ in Houston.
They teach it at the Culinary Institute of America: When you cook the books the numbers will rise.
The lesson we teach our kids, that “Cheaters never prosper’ is pure
hokum of course. But cheaters don’t prosper forever – no matter how many
times they reweave+reissue the fabric-of-lies the whole ®eform
franchise is based upon: Rob Paige and The Texas Miracle.
CRONY CONTRACTS/GOVERNMENT+BIG-BUSINESS COLLUSION AND POCKET LINING?
Apple and iPads and e-books and price-fixing became
curiouser-and-curiouser. [Apple Handed Proposed Solutions for E-Books
Price-Fixing http://bit.ly/14SjYvp ] Of course, that can’t happen in LAUSD. Unless it already has.
But that is all so last week.
THIS WEEK, ON THURSDAY MORNING AT HOLLYWOOD HIGH SCHOOL Superintendent
Deasy will call together all of LAUSD’s principals and administrators
and address them in the Annual Superintendent’s Address to
Administrators. (Who names these things?)
Dr. Deasy’s work is cut out for him.
He presides over an organization in tumult, recovering from financial
hardship, labor unrest, cuts and crisis – with none of those situations
solved. Staff morale is at an all time low. The troops are beleaguered.
He is not a popular figure; the teachers voted ‘no confidence’
overwhelmingly. His direction of reform has been repudiated at the
ballot box. I recall him saying on the radio it would be impolitic for a
superintendent to favor one school board candidate over another …but he
‘kinda-sorta’ did and the candidates he supported ‘kinda-sorta’ lost.
● Were he to say he didn’t support Kate Anderson over Steve Zimmer he would be disingenuous.
● If he were to say he didn’t prefer Antonio Sanchez over Monica Ratliff, he would be prevaricating. [CORRECTION: An earlier version version of this story misidentified Ratliff's opponent as Luis Sanchez. Luis Sanchez was Bennett Kayser's ®eform-endorsed opponent in an earlier election.]
● Yes, his BBF Monica Garcia triumphed over a field of unknown nobodies
(I among them) …but even there the playing field was so uneven that the
Zimbabwean Election Commission would hold their noses. Deasy’s
non-profit put up billboards in Monica’s district saying what a
wonderful person she is.
The board majority has shifted, the tide has changed – the wind favors
another direction than the course he has been steering. Mayor Tony is
gone – appearing on MS NBC as a constitutional policing expert. ¿WWT?
Yes, the money is starting to come back in to LAUSD – but the natives
are restless – they are tired of being tired …and have grown weary of
the New England accent. Some of the things Dr. D has tried haven’t
worked. And – even if it’s not fair: Everything bad is his fault. No
paper towels in the washroom? Deasy’s doing.
Deasy’s friend Arne Duncan hasn’t tossed him a lifeline: Signing off on
the extra special double-dutch-double-dare district waiver application
from No Child Left Behind. The very principals and administrators he
will be addressing Thursday – nominally his front line troops - are
cranky and feel overworked and disrespected.
He’s got to rally the troops to kick off the school year and I’ve seen
him give this sort of speech before and (to date) he hasn’t been very
good at it. Somehow I don’t think announcing the new iPads and the new
school lunch menu are going to cut it! Or the NCLB waiver …if he’s able
to pull that off.
There will be coffee and a continental breakfast. The Hollywood High
Chorus will probably perform “Don’t Stop Believin’ – and they will knock
some socks off. From there the slippery slope tilts in the general
direction of gravity.
I have to be somewhere else that morning. If you have to go, go. If you
find hope cling to it. ‘Aloha’ means ‘Hello’ and ‘Goodbye’.
THE FAR MORE IMPORTANT MEETING THURSDAY MORNING will be in Downey at the
California Dept of Education/Los Angeles Office of Education
meeting+training dealing with oversight of the Local Control Funding
Formula. It’s important that parents and other school site governance
members attend this, get informed first hand and share the information
forward. Made more important by the fact that senior LAUSD brass, board
members and principals will all be at Hollywood High, listening to
another story. Because, we were told, sometimes words have two
meanings.
►From the State Board of Ed: HELP ENSURE THE IMPORTANT VOICE OF PARENTS IS HEARD IN YOUR COMMUNITY, FOR YOUR KIDS!
The California State Board of Education and the California Department of
Education have announced the dates and locations of regional meetings
for those interested in joining the ongoing conversation of how the
Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) will be implemented.
These sessions will allow parents and other stakeholders to share ideas,
comments and input on the implementation of LCFF and will be connected
via video conference to remote locations, ensuring as much inclusion in
the discussion as possible.
Locations and dates: Sessions begin at 9:30 a.m. and end at or before
noon at each location. The meetings are OPEN TO ALL, with no need for
advance registration.
Thursday, August 8, 2013
Primary Location:
Los Angeles County Office of Education
9300 Imperial Highway
Downey, CA 90242
Remote location:
San Diego County Office of Education
6401 Linda Vista Road
Joe Rindone Regional Technology Center, Communications Lab 1-4
San Diego, CA 92111
Please go to this. Take good notes; write an article for your
school/PTA/booster club/union newsletter. Send 4LAKids a copy – because I
have to miss that one too! (Darn the laws of physics – how effective we
all could be if at two or three places at once! The beach and math
class - because multitasking works so well!)
I shall be in Sacramento, hearing about the bigger picture. Considering
the forest but worrying about the trees. And the bustle in the hedgerow.
Don’t be alarmed now. It’s all about a new beginning.
¡Onward/Adelante! - smf
TEACH FOR AMERICA CRITICIZED FOR APPARENT STANCE ON EDUCATION POLICY
CRITICS SAY TFA HAS STRAYED FROM A CORE MISSION OF HELPING NEEDY URBAN SCHOOLS, FAVORING EFFORTS SEEN AS ANTI-TEACHER UNION.
By Howard Blume, L.A. Times | http://lat.ms/14VU5eb
7:40 PM PDT, August 3, 2013 :: Over its 24-year history, Teach for
America has won accolades for taking top college graduates and putting
them to work in some of America's toughest schools, creating what it
regards as a national model of nonpartisan service in education.
But some former participants and academics, among others, have recently
accused the Peace Corps-like organization of taking sides in the
education policy wars. They criticize the nonprofit for aligning too
closely with its largest private donors and high-profile alumni who have
gone into politics. They say the group has diverged too far from a core
mission: addressing a teacher shortage with top college grads primed to
inject energy and success into low-income, urban campuses.
The key backers of Teach for America include foundations that support
efforts to expand charter schools, limit teacher job protections, weaken
union clout and evaluate instructors by using student test scores.
The Walton Family Foundation, for example, last week donated $20 million
that will help fund about 500 hires in Los Angeles. Funded by the
family that began Walmart, the foundation supports both charter schools
and government vouchers to subsidize private school tuition for
low-income families.
New York-based Teach for America asserts that its financial supporters
do not influence its direction. Although the Walton foundation has given
more money — $100 million — than any other, its contributions still
made up only 4.6% of the education organization's national budget last
year. Government funding accounted for about 30% of the nonprofit's
revenue.
Critics, however, are unswayed.
"I don't know that it's causation or correlation, but there is so much
alignment," said Rigel Massaro, a Teach for America alumna who works as a
public interest attorney in San Francisco.
Like other critics, she said she was troubled by the group's five-week
crash course in teaching and the fact that its presence in a community
allows school districts "to hire teachers who are cheaper and who are
pushed to make incredible gains for their students by working seven days
a week and then leaving after two years."
As evidence of Teach for America's political bent — intentional or not —
critics cite developments in California, Alabama, North Carolina,
Louisiana and other states.
In Los Angeles, nonunion charter schools have grown in number, and so
has their hiring of Teach for America instructors, even as enrollment in
L.A. Unified has shrunk, leading to teacher layoffs. In L.A., 94% of
last year's recruits went into charters.
In South L.A., one charter group — ICEF Public Schools — hired two dozen
Teach for America instructors last year. Parker Hudnut, who heads the
12 campuses, said the young teachers "bring a tremendous amount of
energy, a lot of innate intelligence" to his schools.
Among his hires: Anthony Edholm, 24, who was president of the pre-med
society at Creighton University. He's teaching physics and coaching
track. "My biggest thing is I wanted to take a kid at a critical point
in his life and help him transition from high school into college, into
becoming an adult," Edholm said.
Apart from making a difference in the classroom, however, the
organization has always had another goal for its alumni: to become
leaders who care about education regardless of the field they enter.
"We exist because the education system in America was not meeting the
needs of young people growing up in low-income communities," said Teach
for America Co-Chief Executive Matt Kramer. "School districts are
finding great people through TFA."
Members of the program receive support while they teach, and Kramer
noted that many remain in the classroom well beyond their two-year
commitment.
Teach for America also has taken on the role of providing a labor pool
for districts that want more competition for jobs or need to restaff a
school whose teachers were fired or removed.
One example is Huntsville, Ala., where the school district last year
hired 30 instructors from Teach for America and has committed to at
least 30 more this year, Supt. Casey Wardynski said.
That was not because of a lack of available teachers: The district had
19,000 applicants this year for 200 openings. Wardynski said he chose
the Teach for America instructors over other qualified candidates to use
as "special forces" capable of turning a school's dysfunctional culture
around.
Philip Kovacs, an associate professor of education at the University of
Alabama in Huntsville, along with others in schools of education, said
resorting to Teach for America can exacerbate faculty turnover. Such
instability harms students needlessly when permanent teachers are
available, he said.
"I have students with a master's degree who … are phenomenal, who could teach me about teaching, and can't get jobs," he said.
In North Carolina, the Legislature phased out a student loan forgiveness
program for top-tier undergraduates who became teachers for at least
four years. At the same time, it increased its annual contribution to
Teach for America from $900,000 to $6 million.
The state's lawmakers also voted this summer to end teacher tenure and
pay boosts for instructors with advanced degrees and to approve tuition
subsidies for low-income families to pay for private school.
The governor's senior education advisor, Eric Guckian, once headed Teach
for America in North Carolina. Guckian said he does not endorse all the
new measures and would like more done to encourage teacher stability.
But altogether, he said, the package "creates a foundation for future
beneficial reforms for students and teachers."
Former Teach for America instructors hold senior education positions in
Louisiana, where they continue the most aggressive school reform
policies in the nation. When the state fired nearly every New Orleans
teacher in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and converted most schools to
nonunion charters, Teach for America provided a share of the
replacements.
"I don't think this could have happened without TFA," said assistant
professor Kristen Buras, a New Orleans historian at Georgia State
University. "You need these on-the-ground organizations that are going
to assist the state with these reforms."
And it was Teach for America alumna Michelle Rhee — former head of the
Washington, D.C., school system — who established StudentsFirst as a
counterweight to teacher unions.
Rhee's views were showcased during a high-profile panel at Teach for
America's 20th anniversary summit. The discussion before an audience of
11,000 featured Rhee and like-minded participants such as former New
York City schools Supt. Joel Klein and L.A. schools Supt. John Deasy.
The overriding message was a call to social activism, with teacher
unions cast as status-quo forces that needed to be overcome. Ditto for
many policies that unions support — such as tenure protections.
Kramer, the Teach for America executive, said he regretted the
impression left by the panel. His organization, he said, embraces all
views.
Some see the nonprofit's alleged political alignment as placing it on the correct side of the education rift.
Charter schools, for example, enjoy bipartisan support and popularity
with parents. And the Obama administration backs many of the same
policies supported by funders of Teach for America.
However, L.A. Board of Education member Steve Zimmer, who began his
teaching career with the group, said he feels marginalized for choosing
"a more politically moderate pathway."
"In both message and operation, this is not the organization I joined 21 years ago," he said.
Last month, those opposed to Teach for America hosted a networking
session in Chicago that included students, parents, community activists,
academics and teachers inside and outside of the organization.
"The desire to make the world a better place is something that Teach for
America taps into," said alumna Terrenda White, a graduate student at
Teachers College, Columbia University, who also trains instructors.
"When did my willingness to teach in urban communities become translated
to this very specific political agenda? It's not what I believe in."
L.A. Times v. LAUSD: L.A. UNIFIED TEACHERS RATINGS SHOULD BE DISCLOSED, JUDGE RULES
By Teresa Watanabe - latimes.com | http://lat.ms/15APv8E
August 1, 2013, 7:33 p.m. :: The performance ratings of individual
teachers in the city school district are matters of keen public interest
and should be released to the Los Angeles Times, a judge ordered
Thursday.
L.A. County Superior Court Judge James C. Chalfant ruled that the public
interest in access to the ratings outweighed any teacher expectations
of privacy under the California Public Records Act. He rejected
arguments by the Los Angeles Unified School District and United Teachers
Los Angeles that the records were confidential personnel information
that, if released, would create discord, stigma, embarrassment,
difficulty in recruiting teachers and other harm.
“The public has an interest in disclosure of the scores because they
reflect on both student achievement and teacher performance, as well as
on LAUSD’s choices in allocating time and resources,” Chalfant wrote.
However, he said that the decision was a “close call” and that he had
been “wringing my hands, Hamlet-like” over it. He also said he
personally believed that disclosure was not good public policy, but that
“my personal beliefs are not relevant.”
“The court does not set public policy … the court follows the law,” he
wrote, adding that the Legislature could change the state law if it
found disclosing teacher ratings proved destructive.
The Times sought three years of district data, from 2009 through 2012,
that show whether individual teachers helped -- or hurt -- students
academic achievement, as measured by state standardized test scores.
Using a complex mathematical formula, the district aims to isolate a
teacher's effect on student growth by controlling for such outside
factors as poverty, race, English ability and prior test scores. The
district sought to use that type of analysis, known in L.A. Unified as
Academic Growth over Time, in teacher evaluations but was fiercely
resisted by the teachers union, which argues that it is unreliable.
The two sides have agreed not to use individual ratings in evaluations and have joined to fight The Times' request for them.
Jesus Quinonez, an UTLA attorney, said the union would probably appeal
the ruling and request that no records be released until the case is
settled. “We obviously but respectfully disagree” with Chalfant, he
said.
The district and union argued in court that teachers could reasonably
expect that their ratings were confidential personnel files. But
Chalfant ruled that the ratings don’t contain personal information or
specific advice, criticism or other evaluative comments by supervisors
that would protect them from disclosure.
Rather, he said, they were statistical tabulations of public data about
student peformance in a teacher’s class –- rejecting the district’s
contention that its decisions about how to create the formula made it a
subjective tool that should be protected.
Rochelle Wilcox, an attorney representing The Times, said the district
and union provided no evidence that publishing the information would
harm teachers, a point Chalfant accepted in saying that claim was
largely speculative.
“The school district is compiling this information to benefit the public
and the public has a protected interest in evaluating the district’s
performance,” Wilcox said.
Chalfant also wrote that controversy over whether these so-called
value-added methods are reliable was irrelevant to whether the public
had a right to the information. He noted that courts have previously
ruled that information does not have to be reliable to be subject to
public disclosure.
“Vigorous public debate about whether teacher AGT [Academic Growth over
Time] scores are useful is to be encouraged, not stifled,” he wrote.
The judge scheduled another court date for Aug. 27.
The Times received test score information from the district previously
and published a database with individual teacher ratings. The newspaper
is seeking to update that database.
APPLE HANDED PROPOSED SOLUTIONS FOR E-BOOKS PRICE-FIXING RULING + smf’s 2¢
by Tiffany Kaiser –Daily Tech | http://bit.ly/1cyEgS8
August 2, 2013 2:43 PM :: hearing to discuss remedies and hold a trial on damages will take place on August 9
(Source: telegraph.co.uk)>>
Apple lost the ebooks battle earlier this month when a judge ruled that
the tech giant had conspired to raise prices, and now, Apple has been
handed some potential consequences as a result of that ruling.
The U.S. Department of Justice and 33 U.S. states and territories have
proposed that Apple be banned from entering anti-competitive e-book
distribution contracts for five years; end its business models with the
five publishers it conspired with; use an outside monitor to make sure
that its antitrust policies are effective, and allow retailers like
Amazon and Barnes & Noble to provide links to their options for two
years.
"Under the department's proposed order, Apple's illegal conduct will
cease, and Apple and its senior executives will be prevented from
conspiring to thwart competition," said Bill Baer, head of the Justice
Department's (DOJ) antitrust division.
These proposals have to be approved by U.S. District Judge Denise Cote, who is overseeing the ebooks trial.
All of the five book publishers have already settled with the DOJ, while Apple was the only one to go to trial on June 3.
The ebooks fiasco started in April 2012, when the U.S. Department of
Justice (DOJ) sued Apple and the five book publishers over
anticompetitive practices concerning e-book sales. These book publishers
were Hachette Livre (Lagardère Publishing France), Harper Collins (News
Corp., U.S.A.), Simon & Schuster (CBS Corp., U.S.A.), Penguin
(Pearson Group, United Kingdom) and Verlagsgruppe Georg von Holzbrinck
(owner of inter alia Macmillan, Germany).
The book publishers were accused of partaking in an agency sales model
with Apple, which meant that publishers were allowed to set the price of
a book and Apple would take a 30 percent cut. In addition, the
publishers could not let rivals sell the same book at a lower price.
Traditionally, publishers sell physical books to retailers for about
half of the cover price, which is considered a wholesale model.
Retailers then had the ability to sell those books to customers for a
lower price if they wanted to.
But when e-books came along, this model was challenged. Amazon started
selling best sellers for as low as $9.99 to encourage its Kindle
e-reader sales. Publishers were not happy. Apple then came along with
iBooks, and publishers began to worry that it would take over the book
industry the way Apple's iTunes took over the music industry, where
customers would choose to purchase cheap, digital books instead of
physical books.
However, Apple attempted to resolve this when it struck a deal with
publishers to implement the agency model in 2010. This helped Apple at
the time of its iPad and iBooks launch. But its deal with publishers
made it seem like an attempt to thwart Amazon's dominance.
Last month, Lawrence Buterman (a DOJ lawyer) said that Apple's move to
increase e-book prices hurt consumers by costing them "millions of
dollars."
Cote ruled that Apple tried to raise the prices of e-books through an
agency model with other book publishers after a non-jury trial, which
ended on June 20.
A hearing to discuss remedies and hold a trial on damages will take place on August 9.
Source: The U.S. Department of Justice
●● smf's 2¢: LAUSD needs to follow this particular legal adventure very carefully.
It has entered into a potential half-billion dollar contract with Apple
to provide iPads with embedded educational content to every student in
the District.. Those iPads are essentially e-book readers, that content
is essentially e-textbooks. And LAUSD is not a party to the content
provider's (Pearson Education, the worlds largest publishing company)
contract with Apple.
Anybody who attended or watched the LAUSD Board of Ed presentation on
the iPad contract saw+heard the warning from the Microsoft attorney
threatening suggesting potential legal action. It doesn’t take much
imagination to imagine that that contract might also be challenged by
other publishers. I’ve been wracking my memory and I still don’t
remember the textbook adoption process. I have since heard arguments
from senior LAUSD staff contending that that content isn’t really
e-textbooks. It’s – uh – something else.
“ If it looks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, we have at least to
consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family
Anatidae on our hands.” _ Douglas Adams in Dirk Gently's Holistic
Detective Agency
Closing the tap on the School-to-Prison Pipeline:
KIDS BULLIED FOR YEARS MORE LIKELY TO GO TO PRISON
By Janice Wood, Associate News Editor.Psych Central NEWS (The American Psychological Association) Reviewed by
BEING BULLIED REPEATEDLY WHEN YOUNG LINKED TO MORE ARRESTS AND PRISON TIME
John M. Grohol, Psy.D. | http://bit.ly/16r5Y0c
August 1, 2013 :: People who are repeatedly bullied as kids and teens
are “significantly” more likely to go to prison, according to new
research presented at the American Psychological Association’s 121st
Annual Convention.
The study found that close to 14 percent of those who reported being
bullied repeatedly from childhood through their teens ended up in prison
as adults, compared to six percent of non-victims, nine percent of
childhood-only victims, and seven percent of teen-only victims.
The study also found that more than 20 percent of those who endured
chronic bullying were convicted of crimes, compared to 11 percent of
non-victims, 16 percent of childhood victims, and 13 percent of teen
victims.
Another finding of the study: Compared to nonwhite childhood victims,
white childhood victims faced significantly greater odds of going to
prison.
The results also revealed that women who were chronically bullied from
childhood through their teens faced significantly greater odds of using
alcohol or drugs, and had a greater likelihood of being arrested and
convicted than men who had grown up as victims of chronic bullying.
“Previous research has examined bullying during specific time periods,
whereas this study is the first to look at individuals’ reports of
bullying that lasted throughout their childhood and teen years, and the
legal consequences they faced in late adolescence and as adults,” said
Michael G. Turner, Ph.D., of the Department of Criminal Justice and
Criminology at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte.
Turner analyzed data from the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of
Youth, conducted by the U.S. Department of Labor and the Bureau of
Justice Statistics. The survey included 7,335 kids between the ages of
12 and 16 as of Dec. 31, 1996.
His analysis identified four groups: Non-victims (74 percent); those
bullied repeatedly before the age of 12 (15 percent); those bullied
repeatedly after the age of 12 (six percent); and those repeatedly
victimized before and after the age of 12 (five percent).
Accounts of repeated bullying were collected over several periods,
Turner said. Legal outcomes were assessed when the participants were in
their late teens or adults. The study followed the kids over a 14-year
period from early adolescence into adulthood.
The study highlights the important role that health care professionals
can play in a child’s life when bullying is not addressed by teachers,
parents or guardians, according to Turner.
“With appropriate questions during routine medical checkups, they can be
critical first points of contact for childhood victims,” he said.
“Programs that help children deal with the adverse impacts of repeated
bullying could make the difference in whether they end up in the adult
legal system.”
HIGHLIGHTS, LOWLIGHTS & THE NEWS THAT DOESN'T
FIT: The Rest (but not necessarily the best) of the Stories from Other
Sources
APPLE HANDED PROPOSED SOLUTIONS FOR E-BOOKS
PRICE-FIXING RULING + smf’s 2¢: by Tiffany Kaiser –Daily Tech |... http://bit.ly/14SjYvp
Opening the tap on the School-to-Prison Pipeline: KIDS BULLIED FOR YEARS MORE LIKELY TO GO TO PRISON: By Janic... http://bit.ly/17qFp8D
FLORIDA EDUCATION CHIEF TONY BENNETT RESIGNS OVER HOW A ‘C’ BECAME AN ‘A’: Tony Bennett stepped down after rep... http://bit.ly/1bUbv4k
P-Rev: ADELANTO SCHOOL AT CENTER OF PARENT TRIGGER CONROVERSY OPENS + smf’s 2¢: Parents used the state law to ... http://bit.ly/1bTecTN
L.A. Times v. LAUSD: L.A. UNIFIED TEACHERS RATINGS SHOULD BE DISCLOSED, JUDGE RULES: By Teresa Watanabe - lati... http://bit.ly/1bT3kW1
ART TEACHER’S ANGRY LETTER PROMPTS SUSPENSION BY LAUSD: The teacher says his punishment and ultimate transfera... http://bit.ly/15kSgO3
Expand
Not On Our Watch, Part 1: FLORIDA EDUCATORS, PARENTS SHIELD STUDENTS FROM “PARENT TRIGGER”: By Amanda Litvinov... http://bit.ly/1bPR5JU
Diane Ravitch asks: “WHY WILL NO MAJOR NATIONAL PAPER PUBLISH JOHN MERROW’S STORY ABOUT MICHELLE RHEE?”: by Di... http://bit.ly/14Jc1s9
AB484 [http://bit.ly/12JteHO ] is pending in CA Legislature to suspend most STAR testing this coming school year | http://bit.ly/auDNT3
$625 million this month, another $625 million in October: STATE READIES BIG DOWN PAYMENT ON COMMON CORE: By To... http://bit.ly/17mNA5M
Lack of accountability, codified: RULING SPOTLIGHTS HOLE IN DISMISSAL OF TROUBLED STUDENTS FROM CHARTER SCHOOL... http://bit.ly/14HOxnm
COACHELLA VALLEY UNIFIED AT FOREFRONT OF iPAD WAVE IN CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS: Jed Kim | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC ht... http://bit.ly/1cs5qKf
LAUSD STEALS WELL-KNOWN NEW YORK ARTS PRINCIPAL TO LEAD CORTINES HIGH: Mary Plummer | Pass / Fail | 89.3 KPCC ... http://bit.ly/16InGdy
LAUSD ADDING KID-FRIENDLY OPTIONS TO CAFETERIA FARE: By Barbara Jones, Staff Writer- LA Daily News http://bit.... http://bit.ly/14Hfd7N
WALTON FAMILY FOUNDATION INVESTS $200 MILLION IN TEACH FOR AMERICA: 700 TFA teachers to come to Los Angeles: W... http://bit.ly/1coyLoQ
Maybe the 3rd time will be the charm? LA ARTS HIGH SCHOOL GETS THE PRINCIPAL IT ALWAYS WANTED …if “it” = Beau... http://bit.ly/1bIy2RO
LOCAL CONTROL FUNDING FORMULA INCLUDES REQUIREMENTS & SANCTIONS LIMITING K-3 CLASS SIZE TO 24:1 …OR LESS: By T... http://bit.ly/17g0PVV
NEW REPORT FINDS ARTS EDUCATION INCREASINGLY HAPPENS OUTSIDE OF SCHOOL: New Opportunities for Interest Driven ... http://bit.ly/14zJzZM
iPads Everyone? Investigation reveals @ least 86 labor rights
violations, inc. 36 legal & 50 ethical violations by Apple
contractor in China -http://bit.ly/14g12NK
iPads Everyone? Women making Apple products denied maternity leave if
they are having 2nd child outside of China’s family planning policies. -http://bit.ly/14g12NK
iPads Everyone? - Pregnant women making Apple products denied maternity leave if they became pregnant out of wedlock -http://bit.ly/14g12NK
iPads Everyone? - ChinaWatch: Apple continues to employ underage+"student" labor under same bad conditions as adults. - http://bit.ly/14g12NK
DEBATE LOOMS OVER HOW TO SPEND LOCAL CONTROL FUNDING FORMULA MONEY FOR HIGH-NEEDS STUDENTS: By Barbara Jones, ... http://bit.ly/1bFBU64
EVENTS: Coming up next week...
*Dates and times subject to change. ________________________________________
• SCHOOL CONSTRUCTION BOND OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE:
http://www.laschools.org/bond/
Phone: 213-241-5183
____________________________________________________
• LAUSD FACILITIES COMMUNITY OUTREACH CALENDAR:
http://www.laschools.org/happenings/
Phone: 213-241.8700
What can YOU do?
• E-mail, call or write your school board member:
Tamar.Galatzan@lausd.net • 213-241-6386
Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180
Bennett.Kayser@lausd.net • 213-241-5555
Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382
Monica.Ratliff@lausd.net • 213-241-6388
Richard.Vladovic@lausd.net • 213-241-6385
Steve.Zimmer@lausd.net • 213-241-6387
...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress,
senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! • Find
your state legislator based on your home address. Just go to: http://bit.ly/dqFdq2 • There are 26 mayors and five county supervisors representing jurisdictions within LAUSD, the mayor of LA can be reached at mayor@lacity.org • 213.978.0600
• Call or e-mail Governor Brown: 213-897-0322 e-mail: http://www.govmail.ca.gov/
• Open the dialogue. Write a letter to the editor. Circulate these
thoughts. Talk to the principal and teachers at your local school.
• Speak with your friends, neighbors and coworkers. Stay on top of education issues. Don't take my word for it!
• Get involved at your neighborhood school. Join your PTA. Serve on a School Site Council. Be there for a child.
• If you are eligible to become a citizen, BECOME ONE.
• If you a a citizen, REGISTER TO VOTE.
• If you are registered, VOTE LIKE THE FUTURE DEPENDS ON IT. THEY DO!.
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