Curious. Curiouser. Most Curious.

4LAKids: Sunday, July 16, 2006 In This Issue: • ANTONIO'S BIG TEST + BULLIED BY TEACHERS • ADVISORY PANEL ISSUES L.A. SCHOOLS REFORM RECOMMENDATIONS AT ODDS WITH MAYOR'S PLAN • BROAD ATTACKS VILLARAIGOSA'S PLAN FOR SCHOOLS: Philanthropist says Villaraigosa-UTLA compromise would muddy LAUSD lines of authority • State Board of Ed: BUDGETLESS, STATE SCHOOL BOARD MEETS TODAY + LATEST FROM THE SCHOOL POLICY SAUSAGE MACHINE + CHARTER OPERATOR MAY GET OWN SAY • News That Doesn't Fit: CALL FOR 'WEIGHTED' STUDENT FUNDING GETS BIPARTISAN STAMP OF APPROVAL • AB 1381 EVENTS!: THE MAYOR'S "TOWN HALLS" & ASSEMBLY EDUCATION COMMITTEE PUBLIC HEARINGS! • What can YOU do? Featured Links: • READING TO KIDS: Read to some kids the second Saturday morning each month. Make a difference. Change some lives (including your own!). • The Blueprint for Effective School Reform: MAKING SCHOOLS WORK — Get the Book @ Amazon.com! • THE BEST RESOURCE ON CALIFORNIA SCHOOL FUNDING ON THE WEB: The Sacramento Bee's series "Paying for Schools." • FIVE CENTS MAKES SENSE FOR EDUCATION- Target one nickel from every federal tax dollar for Education. Things didn't go well for the Mayor's plan this week. • On Wednesday evening there was an acrimonious meeting at UTLA. The Mayor/UTLA Leadership faction prevailed – but only through an Edward G. Robinsonian application of Robert's Rules of Order. Robinson as Johnny Rocco in Key Largo: "You know how we run elections in Florida? We just keep counting the votes until we get the result we want." • Thursday the State PTA voted unequivocally to oppose his plan. Q: Who cares about PTA? A: Legislators in an election year ...California PTA represents one million voters. • Also Thursday: The LAUSD Governance Commission, ignored-to-date by the Mayor, returned the favor and said 'let the people (between the lines: Not the Legislature) decide'. • Friday Eli Broad, he of deep pockets, turned on the plan. • Somewhere in there the County Supervisors joined the six previously declared 'members' of the Council of Mayors in opposition. ■ I hope to see many of you at one or two of the TOWN HALLS and COMMITTEE HEARINGS calendared below! I cannot recall a previous 4LAKids with an article about the State Board of Education; this one has three. It seems the State Board President has quit in a tiff with the legislature over Bilingual Ed – a subject worth fighting over. This squabble has escalated to the point where the legislature has totally eliminated the board's funding. It is reported that the Governor – albeit publicly committed and born again as The Education Governator – has chosen not to get involved. But none of this is standing in the way of Green Dot Public Schools asking the State Board of Ed for the authority to approve its own charters. Think about this: Charter schools spend the taxpayer's money educating the public's children – accountable back to local boards of education for periodic charter renewal on how well they've done spending the money and educating those children. And a single charter operator wants to be authorized to grant its own charters, subject only to oversight by an (unfunded) appointed panel in Sacramento? The word "Accountability" is bandied about in just about every context in public education today. Who exactly is accountable here to whom? And where is the check or the balance? Green Dot founder Steve Barr is asking to be granted quite a franchise. [Unreported in the media: Green Dot's petition was denied by the State Board.] —smf More: STUCK ON FAST FORWARD: The L.A. mayor's mad rush to fix the city's problems. Opinion/Interview by Jill Stewart from The Wall Street Journal ANTONIO'S BIG TEST + BULLIED BY TEACHERS ►ANTONIO'S BIG TEST Written by David Zahniser | LA Weekly Wednesday, 12 July 2006 -- Will teachers give his school plan a passing grade? High school teacher Warren Fletcher had just hung up the phone, finishing yet another call urging a colleague to show up at an emergency meeting of the legislative body that governs United Teachers Los Angeles, the powerful union at the Los Angeles Unified School District. Three weeks after Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa cut a deal with UTLA to rearrange the power structure at L.A. Unified, Fletcher was working furiously to undo the pact, telling anyone who would listen why he considers it a bad piece of legislation: It’s too vague. It’s too hastily written. It asks teachers to take certain promises on faith. Most importantly, Fletcher warned, the Villaraigosa proposal would create an “imperial superintendent,” one who had more authority over budgets and union contracts while retaining power over textbook selection. With the state Legislature slated to vote on Villaraigosa’s L.A. Unified bill next month, Fletcher is pushing for the union’s full membership — not just three UTLA leaders who cut a deal in a room — to vote on the bill. Fletcher watched as the union’s board of directors demanded an explanation for why UTLA agreed to a “superpowered superintendent” — only to be told not to worry. “The response of the leadership was, ‘We’re working with Antonio; he’s someone who’s collaborative,’” Fletcher recalled. “This [bill] is all premised on the idea that Antonio will be mayor for the entire eight years, and I don’t think you can get a casino to take that bet. I certainly don’t think Phil Angelides would.” Angelides, of course, is the Democrat running for governor — a man who Villaraigosa has yet to endorse, to the consternation of the party faithful. The mayor, in turn, spent part of last weekend with Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger at the La Raza conference and is seen as a candidate for governor in 2010 — a scenario that will go much more smoothly if Angelides loses in November, and if Schwarzenegger is forced out by term limits. July is ushering in a season of creeping doubt for the mayor and his plan for L.A. Unified, a complex bill that would give Villaraigosa veto power over the hiring and firing of the superintendent, yet preserve the elected seven-member school board — albeit with a diminished role. Although the bill has the enthusiastic backing of UTLA president A.J. Duffy — one of the men who reached the accord with Villaraigosa in private — a breakaway faction within UTLA demanded and got a special session of its House of Representatives to review the plan. The meeting was scheduled for Wednesday evening, hours after the L.A. Weekly goes to print. And even if the faction loses, its effort to force a special meeting — one triggered by a petition from 50 union leaders — hints at the growing reservations over the mayor’s plan. Six cities within L.A. Unified have already voted to oppose the bill. The Los Angeles Times has published four critical editorials. Then there are the five powerful county supervisors, each of whom would have a seat on Villaraigosa’s 32-member Council of Mayors as representatives of the unincorporated areas within L.A. Unified — communities painted yellow in the Thomas Guide, such as East Los Angeles, Florence and Marina del Rey. Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke, whose district takes in much of South Los Angeles, voiced major misgivings over the bill’s plan for putting Villaraigosa in charge of three of L.A. Unified’s lowest-performing high schools. In fact, Burke, who endorsed the mayor last year, said she does not want any of the schools in her district to fall under his sway. “The high schools in my district have so many problems and so many issues,” she said. “They don’t need to be involved in any new pilot program, as far as governance is concerned.” Teachers have been ambivalent about the Villaraigosa bill for different reasons. Some felt they were made to look foolish by UTLA’s leadership, which hammered out its compromise days after union activists personally implored state lawmakers to reject the mayor’s previous plan for taking control of L.A. Unified. Within days, dozens of teachers at Venice High School produced a petition that criticized the compromise agreement reached by the union’s leaders. “I want the [House of Representatives] to reiterate our original position and tell our president that he went too far in expressing our will,” said English teacher Brad Jones. Other teachers voiced dismay about a change in wording made to the bill hours after Duffy reached his deal with Villaraigosa. The original draft of the L.A. Unified bill, produced on June 21, promised that the curriculum at each school would be chosen by a committee comprised of that school’s teachers, principal and staff. That language was initially viewed as a coup for the union, giving it more say over the selection of textbooks and other teaching materials that had long rested with the school board and superintendent. Two days later, the language was gone. And this week, Duffy said the union never wanted or expected teachers to win the power to select teaching materials at individual campuses. “Anybody who understands the legislative process understands that bills change from the moment they hit the floor of the Legislature to the moment they get out and are voted on, and quite frankly, we are happy about that,” he said. Villaraigosa attorney Thomas Saenz described Fletcher’s warning of an imperial superintendent as a “mischaracterization,” saying such arguments are being made by critics who have not read the bill. Duffy, for his part, argued that there is no need for a membership vote on the bill, since the union took a position favoring a partnership with Villaraigosa in March. “I believe that once our members get the information, they will be overjoyed with this arrangement,” he added. Still, since his election as president last year, Duffy has sometimes had trouble convincing the union’s legislative branch to follow his lead. Five months ago, he pushed without success for the union to endorse school-board candidate Monica Garcia, who had the mayor’s blessing. Weeks later, he asked the union’s leadership to back state Assembly candidate Kevin de León — also supported vigorously by Villaraigosa — and was turned away. Duffy argued that the Villaraigosa school bill will result in reduced bureaucracy. But Fletcher, the UTLA activist, said there is no specific language in the bill to achieve that goal, and suggested that Duffy is asking the membership to go on faith. Instead, Fletcher said he will ask for a full union vote, then recommend that the membership vote no. “At this point, this thing has been done under dark cover of night. It’s a bad bill that will result in bad public policy no matter who wins,” he said. ____________ ►BULLIED BY TEACHERS: Mayor V’s school plan emerges wounded, but still standing after union assault Online follow-up to the above, written by David Zahniser | LaWeekly.com Wednesday, 12 July 2006 -- Democracy isn't pretty, and nowhere was that more true than Wednesday night at the boisterous and occasionally chaotic meeting of the United Teachers Los Angeles, whose leaders booed, hissed and shouted at each other as they debated Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa’s compromise plan for seizing power at the Los Angeles Unified School District. Microphones went dead, members interrupted each other and, in the end, the UTLA’s House of Representatives served up a nailbiter of a vote on whether to embrace the mayor’s plan for rearranging the power structure at L.A. Unified. The House, which serves as the legislative body for 38,000 teachers at L.A. Unified, makes decisions in an Old World fashion; members hold up oversize white cards to show whether they support or oppose a measure. When the union’s leaders asked members if they opposed the mayor’s L.A. Unified legislation, a sea of cards went up. Asked to back the mayor, another sea of white cards went up. To the casual eye, it was hard to tell which side held the upper hand in the debate over L.A. Unified. When the dust had settled, the UTLA’s legislative branch had endorsed the plan by a relatively narrow margin — 101 votes in favor, 89 against. But by then, the plan, and the union leaders who negotiated it, looked a bit battered. “There’s a split on this, and we’re going to have to regain confidence,” said UTLA vice president Josh Pechthalt, who helped negotiate the deal with Villaraigosa. Villaraigosa’s plan for L.A. Unified was the only item on the agenda at the UTLA’s emergency meeting, a session that took place only because 50 union members submitted a petition demanding a discussion of the bill. After working nearly a year to defeat Villaraigosa’s plan for mayoral control, the UTLA went to Sacramento last month and crafted a compromise granting the mayor veto power over the hiring — and contract extensions — of L.A. Unified’s superintendent. The compromise also strengthens the hand of the superintendent and diminishes the role of the elected seven-member school board, denying its members even the ability to select their own staff. A breakaway faction within UTLA quickly branded the deal a sellout, saying the union had resurrected Villaraigosa’s plan just as it was near death in the state Legislature. Nearly half of UTLA’s delegates came to Wednesday’s session furious that the deal had not come before them. More than a few questioned whether it will leave them vulnerable in pending contract talks with the school board, several of whom were elected with the UTLA’s backing. “What I’m curious about,” declared eighth-grade history teacher Tom Skidmore, “is the wisdom of striking a backroom agreement that stabs in the back the very people that we’re negotiating with.” Union negotiators said they struck the deal because they believed it would blunt mayoral control and prevent Villaraigosa from adding 100 charter schools, campuses that don’t have to follow many rules of the Education Code, throughout the district. Meanwhile, UTLA president A.J. Duffy argued that the plan posed a setback to Villaraigosa’s ambitions. “He got hardly anything he wanted to begin with,” Duffy argued. “He wanted full mayoral control. He wanted the Board of Education obliterated. He wanted every little bit of power in his hands.” Pechthalt argued that Villaraigosa’s plan for overseeing 36 underperforming high schools — three high schools and the middle and elementary schools that feed into them — will keep the mayor from allowing an army of charter schools to open. The UTLA vice president also pointed out that Villaraigosa will be a potent ally in the union’s salary negotiations, even if the bill doesn’t go into effect until January 1. “He told us in meetings, ‘I’m going to be an advocate for you at the bargaining table.’ I think we have to take him up on that,” Pechthalt said. Villaraigosa offered support in other ways, sending a letter to the UTLA promising to work with the union to elect school board members, four of whom come up for reelection in March. Meanwhile, Villaraigosa in-house counsel Thomas Saenz pointed out that while some teachers may be unhappy, others are criticizing the bill as too pro-union. “We’re getting hit by both sides, which tells me we’re in the right place, which is the middle,” he said. Still, the union’s criticism may linger. Minutes after the UTLA vote took place, a few frustrated union leaders said they are looking into forcing a full membership vote on Villaraigosa’s plan — a move that would require, among other things, 500 signatures. UTLA delegate Paul Huebner warned that if the bill passes, cities within L.A. Unified that oppose Villaraigosa’s plan may simply try to leave the district. “The breakup of the school district will kill us all, and you all need to realize, that’s what’s coming from this legislation,” Huebner declared. For Villaraigosa, victory comes at a price. Union leaders were quick to call the legislation flawed, a proposal borne of desperation at the thought that state legislators might take up the mayor on his bid for control. And even backers of the plan did not sound like the mayor’s fans. “We have basically taken a bad idea, mayoral takeover, and made it palatable,” said Monroe High School teacher Gregg Solkovits. “I’m not going to tell you I trust Antonio Villaraigosa. I’m not going to tell you I’m going to vote for Antonio again,” Solkovits told the crowd. “But as far as I can see from this bill, he has been defanged.” ADVISORY PANEL ISSUES L.A. SCHOOLS REFORM RECOMMENDATIONS AT ODDS WITH MAYOR'S PLAN by Joel Rubin, LA Times Staff Writer July 14, 2006 - As the debate over control of the Los Angeles Unified School District raged around it, a little-watched commission exploring reforms to the public school system formally agreed Thursday to a set of sweeping recommendations. The 29-member commission, created last year by City Councilmen Alex Padilla and Jose Huizar, a former president of the Board of Education, released its main findings and met to finalize wording on dozens of other less significant proposals. The commission's most striking suggestion was its call to preserve the seven-member elected school board as the "primary governing body" of the school district. The board should retain crucial powers, such as the ability to hire and fire the district superintendent, select principals and decide where to build new campuses, the commission recommended. Those conclusions, which are not binding, come after months of tense jockeying over the district as Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has sought to wrest some control from the school board. A bill currently making its way through the Legislature would, among other changes, give the mayor veto power over the selection of a superintendent and control of three clusters of low-performing schools. The commission, led by former Councilman David Cunningham and former district official Maria Casillas, also recommended that the 727,000-student school district be dramatically decentralized. Teachers and principals at each school would gain increased responsibility over budgets and student performance. Moreover, the group concluded that schools should be reorganized into clusters, in which high schools are grouped with the middle and elementary schools that feed into them. Currently, the district is divided into eight regions, but that cluster system has been attempted in the past. Three of the commission's recommendations have gained some traction in the City Council. This week a council committee approved a motion by Huizar for a ballot measure that would place term limits on school board members, hold them to the same campaign fundraising rules as council members, and increase their annual salaries from the current $24,000. The entire council is expected to vote on the motion next week. If it passes, the measure will be put before voters in November. Beyond that, the effect of the commission's report is uncertain. BROAD ATTACKS VILLARAIGOSA'S PLAN FOR SCHOOLS: Philanthropist says Villaraigosa-UTLA compromise would muddy LAUSD lines of authority by Duke Helfand and Joel Rubin, LA Times Staff Writers July 15, 2006 — Philanthropist Eli Broad, one of the city's most influential civic figures, has told Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa that he opposes the mayor's current plan to wrest control of the Los Angeles school system. Broad, a longtime ally of the mayor, criticized Villaraigosa for striking a deal with teachers unions that he believes would muddle lines of authority in the Los Angeles Unified School District. After months of urging a complete takeover of the district, Villaraigosa struck a compromise last month with United Teachers Los Angeles and the California Teachers Assn. that would allow him to share power with the elected school board and the appointed superintendent. Legislation to put those changes into effect passed its first hurdle last month, when the Senate Education Committee endorsed AB 1381 despite legislators' reservations that it would bypass local voters and possibly touch off power struggles with the school district. Broad made it clear that he was unhappy with the bill, saying in a letter to Villaraigosa that "true mayor control of the Los Angeles Unified School District is vital for the future of our city." "It is regrettable that you did not want to wage a campaign for true mayoral control, but rather saw fit to negotiate with UTLA and CTA," Broad wrote in a letter dated June 30. "I regret that I cannot support, in its present form, the bill that was passed by the Senate Education Committee" last month, Broad wrote. "If significant changes are not made, we may be better off having the bill fail." Moreover, Broad said that the superintendent must have complete control over the hiring and firing of principals and that teacher contracts should be negotiated outside the "union-controlled school board." Broad could not be reached for comment Friday. A Villaraigosa spokesman defended the legislation, saying it "represents the best chance for fundamental reform of our schools." But the mayor's chief of staff, Robin Kramer, said that Villaraigosa continues to entertain suggestions from business leaders, union officials, parent representatives and others who want a say over the new governance structure. The mayor and Broad have not discussed the letter, Kramer said. In a short written response, Villaraigosa said he looked forward to discussing Broad's concerns. "The creation of public policy is always a process in which hearing myriad views is healthy and important," Kramer said. "We welcome all these suggestions. We welcome even those with which we don't agree. We'll consider them all in a thoughtful way." Broad, who runs a foundation on education reform and has given money to independently run charter schools, was a strong supporter of unsuccessful state legislation last year to give the mayor the power to appoint the school board and hire the superintendent. Villaraigosa has made his takeover of the Los Angeles schools a centerpiece of his year-old administration. He pulled back from his initial position and settled for a lesser role after the teachers unions threatened to torpedo his plans. Villaraigosa's staff is working to amend the legislation in hopes of gaining the votes needed for passage. The latest version would give a "council of mayors," made up of the 27 cities served by L.A. Unified, veto power over hiring and firing a superintendent. Villaraigosa, because of his dominant stake on the council, would have the ultimate authority over the superintendent selection. The school board would continue to have final say over the selection and dismissal of principals and would retain sign-off authority over the district's multibillion-dollar budget. The superintendent, meanwhile, would gain greater control over how to spend district funds. Villaraigosa's takeover plan has powerful supporters, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and Assembly Speaker Fabian Nuñez (D-Los Angeles), who co-wrote the legislation. But Villaraigosa's plans have prompted questions from other leaders, particularly those in the business community, about the wisdom of putting the district in so many hands. "It looks unmanageable," said one business leader who like others spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of upsetting Villaraigosa. "It's not doable under the mayor's structure." State Board of Ed: BUDGETLESS, STATE SCHOOL BOARD MEETS TODAY + LATEST FROM THE SCHOOL POLICY SAUSAGE MACHINE + CHARTER OPERATOR MAY GET OWN SAY ►BUDGETLESS, STATE SCHOOL BOARD MEETS TODAY: Its president has quit after squabble with Democrats By Aurelio Rojas – Sacramento Bee Capitol Bureau Wednesday, July 12, 2006 — The California Board of Education, which sets policy for the state's 6 million public school students, will meet today with no money in its budget, no president and feeling neglected by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. On June 30, the same day the Republican governor signed a budget that did not include any money for the board's staff, the panel's president, Glee Johnson, abruptly quit. "I think she felt the Governor's Office was overlooking the significance of the board and what it does," said Roger Magyar, the board's executive director, adding the budget mess was a factor. Johnson, who as an aide to Gov. Pete Wilson helped usher in school standards and accountability, did not give a reason for her resignation and was not available for comment Tuesday. But during her six months as president, the 11-member board split on several matters, including how English learners should be taught -- a recurring issue that has divided Democratic lawmakers and the board. In April, the board voted down a proposal for instructional materials designed to help English learners, angering members of the 27-member Latino Caucus. In response, Democrats stripped $1.6 million for the board's staff from the budget that Schwarzenegger signed -- despite appeals to the administration by board officials, Magyar said. Sen. Martha Escutia, who is carrying legislation, Senate Bill 1769, to expand instructional materials for English learners, said she told the governor late last month that the board would not get funding in the state budget. "I said it in front of his chief of staff (Susan Kennedy) and other people," said Escutia, D-Whittier. "Maybe they made the mistake of underestimating me." The money for the board's staff is now in SB 1769, which also would provide the instructional materials Escutia asked the board to support. Meanwhile, the board's civil service staff is being paid with money from the state Department of Education while other staffers are on the payroll of the Governor's Office, Magyar said. "We want to work with the Legislature to restore the funding as quickly as possible," said Sabrina Lockhard, a spokeswoman for Schwarzenegger. The budget, she said, contains two items for materials for English learners -- a $30 million, one-time appropriation and $20 million to research how best to teach such students. Magyar said that because the overall education budget was not as contentious as in previous years, the board's funding "slipped through the cracks." He said Johnson and other board officials alerted the administration about the issue, to no avail. "There were some people who said, 'Governor, we think you ought to take action against the Legislature,' " Magyar said. But he said the governor's advisers told him it was too late to hold up the budget over the matter. Schwarzenegger, who is running for re-election, had made a strong push to sign the budget before the fiscal year that began July 1. It was the first time since 2000 that the budget had been signed that soon. Lockhard said the board is still carrying out its responsibilities -- and has Schwarzenegger's strong backing. "The governor is proud of the board," she said. "He really supports them, he believes that they're doing an excellent job." Rebecca Parker, a board consultant and civil service employee, said the staff remains committed to its jobs. "We've chosen to continue to do business because the (school) districts in the state depend on us," she said. On Tuesday, Schwarzenegger -- who has been courting Latino voters during his re-election campaign -- appointed David Lopez, president of National Hispanic University in San Jose, to replace Johnson on the board. Today, the board is scheduled to select a new president. A possible candidate is Joe Nuñez, currently the only Latino on the board and an official of the California Teachers Association. Lopez is expected to attend the board meeting, although his appointment to the four-year term requires Senate confirmation. Last year, a Senate panel rejected Schwarzenegger's bid to reappoint Reed Hastings to the board. As head of the panel, the Silicon Valley businessman lost support of Latino lawmakers for bucking their efforts to expand instructional materials for English learners. Lopez, who runs a school whose goal is to increase college attendance of Latino students, should meet less resistance, said Maria Quezada, director of the California Association for Bilingual Education. Last week, former Govs. Wilson and Gray Davis, in a rare show of bipartisanship, sent a joint letter to Schwarzenegger urging him not to retreat from the curriculum standards and testing they pushed through while in office. Escutia said the legislation she is exhorting Schwarzenegger to back would not change standards or expand bilingual education. That issue, she said, was settled by Proposition 227, the 1998 ballot measure that largely eliminated bilingual education in California. "What we're trying to do is provide the materials for these students to learn," she said. "This is not about bilingual education." ____________ ►LATEST FROM THE SCHOOL POLICY SAUSAGE MACHINE Opinion by Peter Schrag, Sacramento Bee Columnist Wednesday, July 12, 2006 — Anyone who thinks the battle over bilingual education or high academic standards is over in California had better think again. Last month the Legislature, in thrall to the bilingual lobby, cut all funding for the staff of the State Board of Education -- a small, but symbolically large, $1.5 million -- from the state budget. The cut was in retaliation for the board's refusal to approve Option VI, a separate curriculum for English learners that might well have begun the formal resegregation of immigrant kids in California schools. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger could have blocked the budget maneuver, which was a slap at him, since the board is the entity that sets his education policy. He could have blue-penciled any number of items dear to the Legislature from the budget and then made a deal to restore the funding. The governor, said Schwarzenegger communications director Adam Mendelsohn, was "disappointed" at the Legislature's action. But clearly the governor doesn't want to resume last year's mud wrestle. Former Gov. Pete Wilson would have whacked a chunk of the Legislature's own funds from the budget and held it hostage until the board's money was restored. Schwarzenegger, in pursuit of his election-year Mr. Nice Guy act, did nothing, despite warnings from some board members about the consequences. The most immediate consequence was the resignation late last month of board President Glee Johnson, a Republican and, like all other board members, an appointee of the governor. Although Johnson never aired her anger publicly, her departure echoed the resignation of board executive director Rae Belisle and the near-resignation of one or more board members in 2004. The two issues are similar. In 2004, the board was incensed that the governor's office had approved a budgetary exemption from board review for materials for English learners -- putting a hole in the state's standards. Both times board members were blind-sided by the administration they were supposed to be serving. The prime target of the board's ire in 2004 was Bonnie Reiss, the Hollywood lawyer and longtime friend of Maria Shriver, the governor's wife, who had been given the education portfolio in the governor's office but probably didn't understand the board's role or the issues involved. This time the governor's meek response seemed to stem largely from the chastening lesson he learned from his failing tough-guy reform campaign last year. Both episodes raise a major issue: whether either Schwarzenegger or legislators understand or care about the ambitious academic standards and accountability measures that California put in place over the past decade. Last week, in an extraordinary act, Wilson and former Gov. Gray Davis sent them a letter trying to remind them of their importance. English learners now must take 2 1/2 hours daily of English-language arts with all other students, plus an extra hour of English immersion keyed to the state's standards. The bilingual crowd wants a wholly separate program. Mendelsohn said that as an immigrant and (perhaps still) an English learner, the governor understands that rather than segregating them in separate programs, "it's more beneficial" for immigrants to learn English in classes with kids who already speak the language. One test of that understanding will be the two new appointments he has to make to the board. A ham-handed piece of legislation, SB 1769 by Sen. Martha Escutia, D-Whittier, restoring the state board's funding in return for approval of Option VI for English learners is pending in the Legislature. People close to the governor say he'll never support Option VI. They say he's talking with legislative leaders about the board's funding, but you can't take that to the bank. The state's academic standards raise important questions -- about local control, about testing, about the best way to move kids from homes where English isn't spoken to English proficiency, about how to teach everything else even as English is being learned. But those are issues for open debate, not budgetary retribution. The backers of Option VI maintain that the state's existing programs have failed. In the words of a legislative staff analysis of SB 1769, "the performance gap between (English learners) and native English speakers has remained virtually constant in most subject areas for most grade levels since the passage of Proposition 227 (the 1998 initiative that sought to eliminate bilingual education for most California students)." But that's a meaningless argument. Students are designated as English learners because they don't speak English well. Once they're proficient -- at least in theory -- they're no longer English learners: High scorers leave the category as new immigrants come in. One can hope that individuals will learn faster and move on more quickly, which in fact seems to be happening. There's no way significantly to raise the average proficiency of the group. But the larger question concerns the making of education policy, which is inherently complex. Zeroing out funding for staff each time some group doesn't like an educational policy decision puts the state on the slippery slope to politicizing everything. _______________ ►CHARTER OPERATOR MAY GET OWN SAY by Naush Boghossian, Staff Writer, LA Daily News Inspired by a brother who dropped out of high school and died young of a drug overdose, Steve Barr devoted himself to creating schools that educate teens in a nurturing environment. Now the founder of the successful Green Dot Public Schools is on the verge of a major breakthrough that could make him the king of Los Angeles charter schools. On Wednesday, the state Board of Education is poised to vote on giving Green Dot the authority to create independent charter schools without having to first get approval from local school districts. It would mark the first time a charter operator in Los Angeles won that power, and only the second time in California. "It's just insurance. We will exhaust all efforts to work with the district but just in case we have this in our hip pocket to use," Barr said Monday. "We're really trying to figure out how to take research and development (at charters), couple it with political will and create systematic improvement. We're not going to create a district with 1,000 charter schools." News That Doesn't Fit: CALL FOR 'WEIGHTED' STUDENT FUNDING GETS BIPARTISAN STAMP OF APPROVAL By David J. Hoff | Education Week July 12, 2006 -- The United States needs a fundamental change in the way it allocates money to public schools—something that will not be easy to achieve even though it is desperately needed, a bipartisan, philosophically diverse group of policy leaders is contending. The ad hoc group—including three former U.S. secretaries of education, two prominent former governors, and many other well-known policymakers—says that schools' budgets should be based on per-pupil allotments that are weighted according to students' educational needs. And it rejects the widely promoted "65 percent solution," an approach that calls for districts to spend at least that percentage of their budgets in the classroom. In its manifesto arguing for what is called weighted-student funding, which its leaders dub the "100 percent solution," the group says the method differs from prevailing budget practices that often shift resources away from the schools that need them most. "The key change from traditional approaches is that money is allocated to schools not based on staffing levels or programs, or just the number of students, but on the characteristics of the students attending the school," the group of more than 70 says in "Fund the Child: Tackling Inequity and Antiquity in School Finance," a 67-page report released in June. "Students with greater needs (poor, disabled, or English-language learners, for example) receive more money as part of their allocation, allowing their schools to provide the education they need." [article continues/link below] • smf notes: Weighted Student Formula may be the next big thing in education reform ...or it may be another flavor of the month. Whether its the real deal or just a scare, we need to pay attention. Click below for the entire article - which contains a lot of good links and background. The complete article - with links to download the report AB 1381 EVENTS!: THE MAYOR'S "TOWN HALLS" & ASSEMBLY EDUCATION COMMITTEE PUBLIC HEARINGS! ►4LAKids gets mail! Dear Scott, This summer, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa will be hosting a series of town halls with parents to discuss his plan to improve our schools, cut the bureaucracy, and provide real accountability at LAUSD. These town halls will provide an opportunity for members of the community to learn more about AB 1381 -- the Mayor’s bill to reform LAUSD -- and get involved in the fight to fix our schools. We invite you to join the Mayor in this historic partnership with parents and teachers to bring excellence to LA’s schools! South Los Angeles Wednesday, July 19, 5:00 – 7:00 PM Victory Baptist Church 4802 S. McKinley Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90011 West Los Angeles Thursday, July 20, 5:00 – 7:00 PM Westwood United Methodist Church 10497 Wilshire Blvd. (Wilshire at Warner) Los Angeles, CA 90024 San Fernando Valley Thursday, August 3, 4:30 – 7:00 PM Los Angeles Valley College Monarch Hall 5800 Fulton Avenue Valley Glen, CA 91401 East Los Angeles Tuesday, August 8, 6:30 – 8:30 PM Sacred Heart High School Auditorium 2201 Griffin Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90031 Since space may be limited, please RSVP to townhall@excellenceinlaschools.com. Simply include your name and the number of people in your party, and we'll be able to make sure we can accomodate everyone interested in finding out more about the Mayor's plan. Thank you so much for your help and support. We look forward to working with you over the coming weeks and months to bring back Excellence in LA Schools! ►SPECIAL INFORMATIONAL MEETINGS OF THE ASSEMBLY EDUCATION COMMITTEE RE: AB 1381 ON LAUSD GOVERNANCE - The Mayor/UTLA Plan. Public Invited. Mon., 7/24 5:00-7:00 Board Room, Beaudry Bldg 333 Beaudry Ave. Los Angeles, CA 90017 Tues. 7/25 5:30-7:30 Birmingham HS Auditorium 17000 Haynes St, Van Nuys, CA 91406 Wed., 7/26 5:30-7:30 South Gate Park Auditorium 4900 Southern Avenue, South Gate, CA 90280 Committee phone (916) 319-2087 • Jackie Goldberg, Chair Dem-45 (916) 319-2045 Assemblymember.Goldberg@assembly.ca.gov • Mark Wyland, Vice Chair Rep-74 (916) 319-2074 Assemblymember.Wyland@assembly.ca.gov • Juan Arambula Dem-31 (916) 319-2031 • Joe Coto Dem-23 (916) 319-2023 assemblymember.coto@assembly.ca.gov • Loni Hancock Dem-14 (916) 319-2014 Assemblymember.hancock@assembly.ca.gov • Bob Huff Rep-60 Phone: (916) 319-2060 assemblymember.huff@assembly.ca.gov • Carol Liu Dem-44 (916) 319-2044 assemblymember.liu@assembly.ca.gov • Gene Mullin Dem-19 (916) 319-2019 Assemblymember.mullin@assembly.ca.gov • Fran Pavley Dem-41 (916) 319-2041 Assemblymember.Pavley@assembly.ca.gov • Keith Richman Rep-38 (916) 319-2038 Assemblymember.Richman@assembly.ca.gov • Tom Umberg Dem-69 (916) 319-2069 .....is the current thinking that if we have a lot of meetings in a just a few days maybe we won't notice we never got to vote/ What can YOU do? ► GO TO A MEETING ...or some of the meetings ...or all of the meetings. Listen to what they say. Have your say. ►CONTACT YOUR ASSEMBLYPERSON AND STATE SENATOR [link below to find them]. Tell them what you think about their wasting their time, effort and the taxpayer's money on the mayor's attempt at takeover or makeover – an effort that is patently unconstitutional and will never survive a court challenge. Their time, the mayor's time, the board of education's time – all of our time, thinking and hard work - is better spent working together rather than at odds to continue and support the very real efforts at reform already begun. Their time is better spent helping LAUSD find a new superintendent, guaranteeing an improved funding stream for all California schools and helping kids in the classroom, on the playground; during, before and after school. • LAUSD ASSEMBLY DELEGATION Assemblymember.Richman@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Montanez@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Levine@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Pavley@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Koretz@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Frommer@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Liu@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Goldberg@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Nunez@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Bass@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Ridley-Thomas@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Chu@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.DeLaTorre@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Richman@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Horton@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Lieu@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Karnette@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Oropeza@assembly.ca.gov • LAUSD SENATE DELEGATION Senator.Alarcon@senate.ca.gov Senator.Scott@senate.ca.gov Senator.Cedillo@senate.ca.gov Senator.Kuehl@senate.ca.gov Senator.Romero@senate.ca.gov Senator.Vincent@senate.ca.gov Senator.Murray@senate.ca.gov Senator.Lowenthal@senate.ca.gov Senator.Bowen@senate.ca.gov Senator.Escutia@senate.ca.gov • TO DETERMINE WHO YOUR ASSEMBLYPERSON & SENATOR IS & GET THEIR ADDRESS PHONE & FAX NUMBERS: http://192.234.213.69/smapsearch/framepage.asp • E-mail, call or write your school board member: Marlene.Canter@lausd.net • 213-241-6387 - office vacant - • 213-241-6180 Julie.Korenstein@lausd.net • 213-241-6388 Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382 Mike.Lansing@lausd.net • 213-241-6385 Jon.Lauritzen@lausd.net • 213-241-6386 David.Tokofsky@lausd.net • 213-241-6383 ...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! 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. • Vote. Who are your elected federal & state representatives? How do you contact them? Scott Folsom is a parent and parent leader in LAUSD. He is President of Los Angeles 10th District PTSA and represents PTA as Vice-chair the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee. He serves on various school district advisory and policy committees and is a PTA officer and/or governance council member at three LAUSD schools. He is also the elected Youth & Education boardmember on the Arroyo Seco Neighborhood Council. • In this forum his opinions are his own and your opinions and feedback are invited. Quoted and/or cited content copyright © the original author and/or publisher. All other material copyright © 4LAKids. • FAIR USE NOTICE: This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. 4LAKids makes such material available in an effort to advance understanding of education issues vital to parents, teachers, students and community members in a democracy. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, the material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving the included information for research and educational purposes. • To SUBSCRIBE e-mail: 4LAKids-subscribe@topica.email-publisher.com - or -TO ADD YOUR OR ANOTHER'S NAME TO THE 4LAKids SUBCRIPTION LIST E-MAIL smfolsom@aol.com with "SUBSCRIBE" AS THE SUBJECT. Thank you.

Random thoughts meet chaos theory; chaos theory meets LAUSD

4LAKids: Sunday, July 9, 2006 In This Issue: • Good News: BUDGET RESTORES SCHOOL COUNSELING • Bad News: BUDGET CUTS KID'S HEALTH CARE • CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS COULD LOSE AID OVER 'NO CHILD' LAW • FAMILY-LIKE PROGRAM OPENS BRAVE NEW CHAPTER FOR BLACK LA STUDENTS: Test scores rise, dropout rates fall since the Village began 3 years ago at SFV HS • HAVE WE FORGOTTEN CIVIC EDUCATION? Two centuries after Jefferson, social studies are lacking at public schools • EVENTS: Coming up next week: A REAL TOWN HALL MEETING! • What can YOU do? Featured Links: • READING TO KIDS: Read to some kids the second Saturday morning each month. Make a difference. Change some lives (including your own!). • The Blueprint for Effective School Reform: MAKING SCHOOLS WORK — Get the Book @ Amazon.com! • THE BEST RESOURCE ON CALIFORNIA SCHOOL FUNDING ON THE WEB: The Sacramento Bee's series "Paying for Schools." • FIVE CENTS MAKES SENSE FOR EDUCATION- Target one nickel from every federal tax dollar for Education. "There is a place in America to take a stand: it is public education. It is the underpinning of our cultural and political system. It is the great common ground. Public education after all is the engine that moves us as a society toward a common destiny... It is in public education that the American dream begins to take shape." —Tom Brokaw ► INSTEAD OF MAYORAL CONTROL OF SCHOOLS, HOW ABOUT MAYORAL CONTROL OF IMMIGRATION POLICY? "It is as if we expect border control agents to do what a century of communism could not: Defeat the natural forces of supply and demand and defeat the natural human instinct for freedom and opportunity. You might as well sit on the beach and tell the tide not to come in." -NYC Mayor Michael Bloomberg, to the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on the House Bill to criminalize illegal immigration, July 6, 2006. ►VILLARAIGOSA'S SCHOOL TAKEOVER PLAN DESERVES "F" By Walter Moore to MS2 | Mayor Sam's Sister City Friday, July 7, 2006 — Should we transfer control of the LAUSD's $7.5 billion annual budget, and the future of its 727,000 students, to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa? No. Here's why: First, the Mayor has failed to produce a scintilla of evidence that he -- or anyone else, for that matter -- can do a better job than the LAUSD is already doing right now. The LAUSD's graduation and drop-out rates do not prove mismanagement. Sure, those statistics may be worse than they were 30 years ago, or worse than other schools in other parts of the nation. But the LAUSD, unlike any school system anywhere in the world at any point in history, has been asked to educate massive numbers of children from a foreign country, who do not speak the language, whose culture does not value education, and whose families' economic plight requires them to spend their time after class on work, not homework. Unless the Mayor can point to another school system with a comparable student body and better statistics, he cannot legitimately criticize the LAUSD based on its graduation and drop-out rates. Second, the Mayor has expressly excluded from his plan the one element that supposedly improved schools in other cities that adopted mayoral control. New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg required all schools to adopt the exact same curriculum. Besides assuring control over the content in the classrooms, this measure was intended to make it easier for children to keep up with their classes if their parents moved from one district to another. By contrast, Villaraigosa's plan specifically eliminates central control over the curriculum, leaving each school free to "do its own thing." Third, the Mayor has neither identified exactly what changes he -- or his appointee -- would make, nor explained why the LAUSD is unable to adopt the same changes right now. Does he have any particular plan, other than to take control of the $7.5 billion annual budget by appointing a proxy? Or are we simply supposed to trust that his "vision" will somehow translate into concrete change at some point? Fourth, this particular Mayor has no special expertise in education. It is not as though he has an advanced degree in education, or ever worked as a teacher. On the contrary, he apparently had his hands full just being a student. Under the circumstances, it seems more reasonable to assume that the LAUSD Board Members, each of whom has had a career in education, will tend to make better education decisions than a busy Mayor who is supposed to oversee the police department, the fire department, the airport, the harbor, etc. Fifth, the plan does not increase accountability, but instead decreases it. Right now, the Superintendent is responsible to the Board, and the Board is responsible to the voters. The voters, in turn, can now vote for a Board Member solely based on his or her educational platform. Under the Mayor's plan, by contrast, the Superintendent will have two masters, namely, the Board and the Mayor; and individual schools will be accountable to no one, apparently, with respect to their curricula. Sixth, the Mayor's plan would put everyone through massive upheaval, only to have us revert to the status quo in six years. Experimental programs are fine, but not when conducted on the entire 727,000-student system. If the Mayor has a few ideas about running schools differently, let him propose a charter school, and let us see how well it works before we hand the whole system over for six years. Finally, the Mayor's plan would violate the City Charter insofar as it calls for the Mayor to take immediate and direct control over the "bottom" five percent of the schools. The plan is therefore guaranteed to result in expensive litigation, with taxpayers likely footing the bill for both sides as the City and the LAUSD "duke it out" in court. Nor does it make any sense to split these schools off from the rest: if Villaraigosa's appointee is going to improve the other 95%, then why not let the appointee control these schools, too? Under the circumstances, the Mayor's plan deserves an "F." Reform for the sake of reform is a mistake. Public policy should rest on informed analysis, not a knee-jerk impulse to "do something." Unless and until the Mayor can show that the LAUSD is mismanaged, and that the Mayor can do a better job, we should focus on real reforms, like smaller class size. ►The Republicans get it: CALLS FOR ARNOLD TO VETO VILLARAIGOSA LAUSD TAKEOVER This letter will be sent to Governor Schwarzenegger today. (Monday, June 26, 2006) I am calling on everyone who opposes the Governor signing legislation giving control of LAUSD to Mayor Villaraigosa to join me and my campaign to unite Republicans in calling for a pledge to Veto the pending bill in the Assembly. Once on the Governors desk, for the Governor to Veto the bill. /s/ David Hernandez The Honorable Arnold Schwarzenegger Governor of California State Capitol Building Sacramento, CA 95814 Dear Governor Schwarzenegger: With both the California State Assembly and Senate controlled by Liberals, the Governor’s Veto is the only hope left for the men, women and families of California. But ability is useless if willingness is not there. The people of Los Angeles County need your assistance. The actions of Mayor Villaraigosa, the California Legislature and the teacher’s union leaders supporting the mayor’s efforts to take over the Los Angeles Unified School District will result in legislation that takes away control of a duly elected board approved by the voters of the district. This legislation needs to be overturned and vetoed. Governor Schwarzenegger, We the People of Los Angeles County ask that you exercise your right and duty associated with the Veto. We the People ask that you announce that any legislation regarding LAUSD that circumvents the rights and vote of the people will be vetoed!! Mayoral takeover may be “bold” but it is destructive to the rights of the people. You yourself have quoted our US Constitution on many occasions and it is “We the People” not a powerful mayor and former legislator twisting arms in Sacramento to gain more power. Please do not let this become an issue in your election such as that created by Gray Davis when he signed the driver’s license bill for illegal aliens. One of the most exciting nights of my political history was spent with you on the Recall Election eve and your election as Governor. Every hour sacrificed away from my business and friends was worth it. Please do not allow this mayoral takeover to occur. Please do not turn me and other Republican supporters into your adversaries. Sincerely, David Hernandez 2002, 2004 Republican Nominee, U.S. House of Representatives, District 28 ►THE SOUTHEAST CITIES SCHOOL COALITION (SCSC), LARGEST BLOCK IN VILLARAIGOSA'S "COUNCIL OF MAYORS", REPUDIATES AB 1381 In a July 5th letter to Assembly Speaker Nuñez and members of their own legislative delegation – copied to the Governor, LA Mayor and the Board of Education — the elected representatives of the Cities of Bell, Cudahy, Huntington Park, Maywood, South Gate and Vernon announced their opposition to the Los Angeles Mayor/UTLA Leadership sponsored takeover/makeover of LAUSD as proposed in AB 1381. With apologies for the quality of the copies, the SCSC's letter and position paper is reproduced here. Good News: BUDGET RESTORES SCHOOL COUNSELING Op-Ed in the San Diego Union Tribune by Trish Hatch June 30, 2006 - Today, as the governor signs the budget into law, school counseling will be institutionalized as an integral part of the total educational program for student success. The Legislature has sent the message that improving the ratio of credentialed school counselors to students is a critical educational priority in California. Today, the student ratio per school counselor in California is dismal. “The USC/UCLA California Educational Opportunity Report 2006: Roadblocks to College” indicates the typical high school counselor in California is expected to serve 790 students, nearly three times as many students as the average nationwide of 284. In California, 92 percent of the high schools have more students per school counselor than the national average. California is 50th among all states in number of students per school counselor. Many schools in California have no school counselors at all – yes, even high schools. Today, however, as the governor signs the budget, a message is being sent. Strengthening school counseling programs in grades seven through 12 is essential to successfully preparing all of our students for their future economic potential and toward achieving the goals required in No Child Left Behind. Parents, the press, administrators and the general public often wonder just what it is that today's school counselors do on a daily basis. Today's counselors are called on to provide a comprehensive and developmentally appropriate standards-based program for every student. They also ensure that all students receive intervention class work and career and personal/social development, so students can become successful learners and citizens. Today's school counselors teach core content guidance lessons in the classroom and measure their impact to ensure that all students receive the knowledge, attitudes and skills necessary to become productive members of society. Typical topics are high school graduation and college preparatory and entrance requirements, financial aid, career interests and technical education options, decision-making and goal-setting, violence-prevention education, and making healthy choices. These topics align with the American School Counseling Association national standards. Today's school counselors are vital members of the education team ensuring equity and access to rigorous educational opportunities for every student. They ensure that students recognize the importance of taking challenging academic courses and know that even when students struggle, they are more likely to do better in life if they are academically challenged and supported. Today's school counselor recognizes that each individual student's planning meeting can impact the student's future economic potential and takes into account the variety of college and career technical opportunities and options available to them. Today's school counselors are trained to recognize early warning signs in at-risk youth, and provide the prevention and intervention services and outside resources necessary to address those issues. Today's school counselors measure the results of their interventions and uses the results to drive program improvement. They also recognize that if a program or service is not working, that it must be revised. Today's school counselors review disaggregated data to identify achievement gaps and determines what additional support a student might need. They intervene with students who are struggling (not passing the California High School Exit Exam, for instance) and provide interventions to improve their attendance, behavior, study skills, test-taking skills, and referrals to tutoring or other assistance. Today's school counselor is a partner with parents in supporting their students' future success guiding them through the process of college and career/vocational educational choices and the decision-making necessary as they enter and exit high school. Until today, California school counselors were unable to provide the comprehensive services of today's school counselor. Today, however, is a new day as the governor signs a bill supported by a bipartisan Legislature investing in school counseling services for California's students. After today, California will no longer be in last place. The ongoing funding stream will ensure that every student receives the benefit of today's school counselor at a ratio that allows students to receive the support and assistance they deserve – one that will also produce results. An investment in school counseling will be an investment in our state's youth and ultimately in California's future. _____________ ▲Hatch is director of the School Counseling Program in the College of Education at San Diego State University. She is co-author of the “American School Counseling Association National Model: A Framework for School Counseling Programs” (2003). Bad News: BUDGET CUTS KID'S HEALTH CARE ● GIVE US YOUR POOR, BUT NOT YOUR SICK: Schwarzenegger and Democrats put budget-compromising over insuring 3-year-old immigrants. Editorial from the Los Angeles Times July 6, 2006 -- until last week, it looked as if Sacramento might use a fraction of this year's multibillion-dollar budget surplus to expand health coverage for more kids in California. But in their final budget negotiations, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the Legislature decided that it was better to cave to a small group of vocal Republicans who believe that sick 3-year-olds should be punished for their parents' actions. There are an estimated 800,000 uninsured children in California. Half are eligible for state-provided insurance but are not enrolled to receive it, for whatever reason. Most of the rest are legal residents whose families earn more than the $48,000-a-year means-test threshold to qualify for Healthy Families, the state program, and about 120,000 kids are undocumented and largely poor. Many uninsured children — documented and undocumented — receive no care until they're sick enough to visit an emergency room, which by law must treat them. If more of them saw primary-care doctors, they'd stay healthier, place far less strain on county hospitals and save taxpayers money over the long haul. Understanding that, 18 of the state's 58 counties, including Los Angeles, have been launching their own insurance plans for undocumented kids. These programs — most of which also are means-tested — are so popular that tens of thousands of kids are on waiting lists. This spring, the governor proposed to clear those lists by using just $23 million from this year's surplus. But neither he nor Democratic legislative leaders were willing to stand up to Republicans like state Sen. Dennis Hollingsworth (R-Murrieta), who believes that "it is reprehensible to offer services to individuals who come to California illegally." What's truly reprehensible is that the immigration brouhaha is bleeding into so many other policy areas. This month, for instance, the federal government began requiring Medicaid recipients to show proof of citizenship because Congress is worried (unfoundedly, according to an inspector general's report) that illegal immigrants are perpetrating a significant amount of Medicare fraud. Now, 3 million legal U.S. citizens who don't have birth certificates, some of whom are poor and incapacitated, face losing their benefits because of anti-immigrant hysteria. Cutting the waiting lines to the county programs offering better healthcare to kids would have cost $23 million in available one-time money. Covering all uninsured children of illegal immigrants who would otherwise qualify for Healthy Families if their parents would have come here legally could cost as much as $60 million a year — a lot, but worth it. Insuring all uncovered children in California remains a public-policy goal worth pursuing. Schwarzenegger and the Democratic leadership were wrong to trade the well-being of children for political compromise. Hopefully the Legislature, which is expected to take up the issue again later this summer, will show more courage once the deadline pressure of budget-making is removed. CALIFORNIA SCHOOLS COULD LOSE AID OVER 'NO CHILD' LAW • DEADLINE LOOMS FOR CALIFORNIA: California has until Aug. 15 to come up with a plan to allow more students to transfer out of low-performing schools in its largest school districts. If the state fails to meet that deadline, the U.S. Education Department has threatened to withhold part of the $700 million it provides California for high-poverty schools FROM National Public Radio | All Things Considered by Claudio Sanchez July 6, 2006 • This week, the U.S. Department of Education threatened to withhold millions of dollars in federal school aid from California because the state has failed to help students transfer out of low-performing schools. The No Child Left Behind Law requires that students in such schools be given the option of transferring elsewhere. But nationwide, some 4 million students eligible for such transfers did not do so, in many cases because there was no place for them to go. GETTING THE SCHOOL DISTRICT'S ATTENTION In Los Angeles, some 250,000 students were eligible for transfers, but only a small percentage actually switched schools. Among those who didn't is Yolanda Decatur's 8-year-old son, Cameron. Like many children in Los Angeles, Yolanda Decatur's three sons attend year-round schools -- a byproduct of crowding in the 800,000-student district. By 6:30 a.m. on a typical school day, Decatur has three bowls of milk and a box of Cap'n Crunch waiting on the kitchen table of her home. Kyron, 5, is still in pajamas, watching Sesame Street. Cameron and Sexton Jr., 14, are dressed. Both boys have struggled academically, Decatur says, but it's 8-year-old Cameron who's having the most trouble at West Athens Elementary School. "He goes through his tantrums," she says, adding that the school is too crowded to give her son the one-on-one attention he needs. "There's too many kids." But it's not just the crowding. Decatur says that Cameron's teachers seem to have given up on him. Last fall, she had nearly lost all hope of getting the school district to pay attention to Cameron's case. Then, John Mancino walked into the fast-food restaurant in south central Los Angeles where Decatur works full time. Mancino, a management consultant by profession, with children of his own, says he became an activist because he hates the way the Los Angeles Unified School District bureaucracy deals with parents who request transfers. "A lot of them have given up," he says. "They don't think they can beat the system. They've basically thrown the towel in." FEW TRANSFER OPTIONS FOR STUDENTS Mancino's organization -- the Coalition on Urban Renewal and Education -- has filed a complaint with the district and the state. It accuses school officials of withholding information from parents about the district's transfer policies and discouraging them from even applying. "According to the law, NCLB [No Child Left Behind], they're supposed to make it very clear and explain it in simple, easy-to-understand terms, and they're not doing that," Mancino says. The district, he says, is "burying" the information about transfers "to get around the requirements of No Child Left Behind." Mancino says about one-third of the district's students were eligible for transfers this past school year, but only 527 students actually did so. The school district has dismissed Mancino's complaint. "We have a massive program of transfer of students throughout this district," says L.A. school district superintendent Roy Romer. URGING PARENTS TO BE PATIENT The L.A. school district has done everything possible to give parents options, Romer says, but it simply doesn't have the room for all of those students to transfer. "We're 160,000 seats short. Where do you transfer to?" he says. "Give us some time. We'll have new buildings built. We're building them now." Romer says the district is building 160 new schools at a cost of $19 billion to deal with the crowding. But, he adds, parents like Decatur have to be patient. "I've got to say to that parent, 'We are making more change in the right direction than any other urban school district in California,'" Romer says. "You can't turn one of these things around in a month, a year or five years. It takes 10 to 12 years to do it." That's not good enough for Yolanda Decatur. "Tell my son, you look in his face and tell him he that he has to wait for a better school," she says. She says parents like her feel that suing the school district will force it to act faster. "We have these rights to demand better schools for our children," she says. FEDERAL FUNDS AT STAKE There is no lawsuit yet, but there will be soon, says Clint Bolick, of the Phoenix-based Alliance for School Choice. Bolick, a longtime advocate of vouchers and school choice, is working with Mancino and his organization to help parents in Los Angeles. He says he's convinced that the threat of a lawsuit will force U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings to deal with the problem. "If she wants school districts to comply with the law, she has got to make an example out of a school district that is in blatant non-compliance, and she could not find a better example than the Los Angeles Unified School District," Bolick says. "She's offered an awful lot of waivers to school districts to get out of from the requirements of the law, and she's threatened a great deal. But so far, she has not made good on a single threat." Chris Doherty of the U.S. Education Department strongly disagrees. "This secretary has made clear that she's unsatisfied with what we're seeing across the country, and she's taking strong steps to bring those numbers up to where we want them to be," Doherty says. Doherty has been monitoring parents' complaints in Los Angeles and across the country. Spellings "has made California aware that she's following this extremely closely," he says. "She's made every state superintendent aware that she's poised to take action, including withholding funds from noncompliant districts and states, if need be." In an unprecedented move, Spellings has given California six weeks to come up with a plan that would allow students in failing schools throughout the state to transfer to a better school this fall. If the state does not submit a plan that Spellings deems adequate, Doherty says the education secretary will withhold part of the $700 million California is due to receive this fall in federal Title I funds, which are earmarked for high-poverty schools. And that, department officials say, is no empty threat. California officials told NPR that what the U.S. Department of Education is asking for is going to be a logistical nightmare: Every failing school -- and every school district -- where parents have tried, unsuccessfully, to transfer their children out now faces a six-week deadline to make sure those students find a new school. California officials said lawyers for the state will likely examine the letter from Washington to see whether they can challenge the Aug. 15 deadline, because under No Child Left Behind, there is supposed to be a process in place that gives states time to review and appeal any complaint or lawsuit. This process now appears to be out the window. Read the U.S. Education Department's letter to California FAMILY-LIKE PROGRAM OPENS BRAVE NEW CHAPTER FOR BLACK LA STUDENTS: Test scores rise, dropout rates fall since the Village began 3 years ago at SFV HS by Carla Rivera, LA Times Staff Writer July 6, 2006 -- When Kandi Boyd was called into a school assembly last year at Cleveland High School, she had no idea she was stepping into an innovative learning program based on the old-fashioned notion that personal attention can make a difference between success and failure in school. What Boyd encountered was an auditorium full of African American students, faculty and staff behaving like a family, talking about race and cultural attitudes, upbraiding one another when needed but also expressing care and respect. The program, named the Village, was created three years ago by African American faculty at Cleveland High, in Reseda, amid some controversy, because it is aimed only at black students. It focuses on forging personal connections with students in a communal setting that epitomizes the African proverb "It takes a village to raise a child." The results in student achievement that have followed have won national plaudits and are drawing interest from school districts in San Diego and San Francisco, and as far away as Little Rock, Ark. The program was recently adopted at Chatsworth High School, and the Los Angeles Unified School District wants to expand it districtwide. The teachers who created the program, meanwhile, are working this summer to find more resources to support their effort, which as it expands will be called the Village Nation. "What's different is that students see they have someone to go to for help besides your classroom teachers," Boyd, 16, said recently as she prepared for finals. The staff, called the Village Elders, "really wanted to teach us stuff and had outside speakers come in who we could relate to. The message was that everyone has potential." The keys to the program are tied to the teachers' abilities to establish a level of trust and rapport with the students, relate to their cultural traditions and convey expectations of high academic achievement. "There's an engagement that goes on," said Village co-founder Fluke Fluker. "Too many of them are in a place, whether at home or in school, where they're not being heard." During the school day, black students gather with teachers in meetings that are often laced with frank discussions about such topics as race, culture, relationships and negative media stereotypes of African Americans. About 315 African Americans attend the 4,200-student Cleveland High. Participation in the Village is not mandatory, but most black students attend. White, Latino and Asian students are not invited. Critics — including some parents and teachers — have called the approach divisive and stigmatizing. They also say it fuels segregation on campuses that are often already racially inflamed. When Pasadena High School recently tried to replicate a Village assembly, some students and parents were caught off guard and complained that African Americans were being unfairly reprimanded for the same issues that confront other racial groups. Those views, however, have been tempered by impressive gains in test scores, reductions in dropout rates and improved behavior among Cleveland's African American students. Scores on the Academic Performance Index jumped 95 points in two years, from 569 in 2003 to 664 in 2005, according to the California Department of Education. The districtwide average among all students in 2005 was 649, department statistics show. In 2003, 36% of black students at Cleveland passed the math portion of the California High School Exit Examination. The figure rose to 81% in 2006. Although Cleveland has shown gains throughout its student body in recent years, those by African American students have been greater than in other groups. Educators at Cleveland, backed by district officials, said they believe that the Village played a large role in those gains. Fueled by these achievements, Cleveland was recognized in 2005 as a California Distinguished School, the first comprehensive high school in L.A. Unified to receive the award. "The statistics are compelling and overwhelming any way you look at it, and you won't find gains like these anywhere in the country," said Bob Collins, the district's chief instructional officer for secondary education. "I'm aware there were some who complained and had been concerned, but I think they've proved the critics wrong." The Village is the brainchild of life-skills teacher and coach Fluker, social studies teacher William Paden and school dean Andre Chevalier. They realized that the uninterested, low-achieving students they knew at school were actually lively and intellectually curious youths when the teachers encountered them off campus. The educators were also angry and frustrated at test scores that perpetually showed black youths doing worse than other groups, often scoring below immigrant children with limited English skills. They held a meeting with other black faculty and staff to brainstorm strategies and then got the OK from then-Principal Al Weiner to hold an assembly. Weiner "understood that as African Americans we could say things to these kids that he as a white man couldn't," Fluker said. At one of their first meetings with students, teachers projected on a big screen test-score comparisons for white, Asian, Latino and black students, and those learning English as a second language. Many of the black students were shocked to see themselves at the bottom. The Village has offered field trips, and guest speakers have included authors, athletes, musicians and businesspeople. On a trip to Pasadena City College, for example, the students heard a seminar on applying for college financial aid and listened to a panel of Chinese Puerto Rican rappers, said Beverly Tate, an assistant English professor there who organized the trip. Meetings typically start with a poetry reading by a student, followed by robust applause, said Chris Chrenko, who just graduated from Cleveland and helped produce a video to promote the program. "People will stand up and give their opinion; it creates a sense of community," Chrenko said. "You're not going to get rid of it completely, but overall there's less fighting and a lot less nonsense on campus." After some initial skepticism, many parents now praise the program. "My kids came home talking about the statistics and how low we were, and it hit them really hard," said Zola Chrenko, Chris' mother. The experience at Cleveland, however, was not replicated at Pasadena High School, where a May assembly provoked a different response from some students and parents. "They were taken out of their homeroom and missed nutrition and third period, and they were yelled at for being disrespectful, for wearing their hats backward and for the style of clothes they wore," said Jill Fernandez, whose 16-year-old daughter attended. "I think the concern was, why am I being lumped in? If you have 10 bad apples, deal with them. If white and Latino students are wearing the same clothes and using slang, why aren't any assemblies called for them?" Assistant Supt. George McKenna of the Pasadena Unified School District defended the assembly and said meetings targeting other ethnic groups, including Latinos, had been held at other schools without incident. The program will continue at Pasadena schools, he said, but students can opt out. The controversy reflects the sensitive nature of the concept and the need for careful planning and training of staff. "I think that may have been a problem in Pasadena," said Village co-founder Paden. "It was haphazard and ill planned. You have to have talk ahead of time about buy-in. We've got kids here at Cleveland who've bought into it." The relatively small number of African American students has also played into Cleveland's success, making it easier for teachers to get to know students. "With the appropriate commitment and staff and extensive training, it can be a model," said Robyn Fisher, an educational consultant for the College Board, which administers the SAT and other assessments. "Not everybody is a Fluke Fluker with that same level of passion and commitment. Kids can see right through someone who is insincere, and not everybody who walks in the door has the same level of respect and credibility." HAVE WE FORGOTTEN CIVIC EDUCATION? Two centuries after Jefferson, social studies are lacking at public schools By Marshall Croddy, from the Los Angeles Times ►Marshall Croddy is director of programs at the Constitutional Rights Foundation, which, with the Center for Civic Education, helped establish the California Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools. CLICK BELOW for news that doesn't fit on STEVE BARR'S PARENT UNION – reportedly composed of mostly his employees, Monica GARCIA'S ASCENDANCE TO THE BOARD OF ED, SKULLDUGGERY IN THE MAYOR/UTLA PLAN FINANCES and MARLENE CANTER'S REELECTION as LAUSD Board President. July 2, 2006 — In the early afternoon of July 4, 1776, church bells rang out in Philadelphia celebrating the official adoption of the Declaration of Independence by the Continental Congress. Of course, the work of establishing the republic was not finished on that July day. Indeed, the nation "conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal" — to use Abraham Lincoln's words — will always be a work in progress. The founders knew this too. By the summer of 1818, their generation was passing away. The survivors fretted about the future of their legacy and whether the republic would endure. They believed that each new generation must be enlightened by the principles of liberty and prepared to fight for the rights that had been won. For all of the founders — and especially for the author of the Declaration of Independence — education was the key. As early as 1779, Thomas Jefferson had written a bill in Virginia proposing a system of public education and arguing that history should be studied by all citizens. In 1817, he again proposed a system of free public education for the state and the establishment of a public university. His attempts met with failure — except the last. The Virginia Legislature deemed universal public education too costly and unnecessary, but it did authorize the creation of a university and appointed a commission made up of 24 prominent Virginians, including Jefferson, to propose a location for it. The commission's members included two former presidents (Jefferson and James Madison) and then-President James Monroe. Jefferson spent the summer of 1818 promoting his vision for the university and for education in general. To escape the sultry heat of the summer in central Virginia, the commission convened in the town of Rockfish Gap in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Jefferson came prepared and quickly persuaded the commission to site the new university in Charlottesville, near his home in Monticello, where he could keep an eye on its development. Before the commission adjourned, Jefferson agreed to write up its findings. This was soon published as the "Rockfish Gap Report." In the report, Jefferson again proposed a system of publicly funded elementary education that would ensure that all citizens knew their rights and their duties to community and country. He wanted students of higher education to be well-versed in political theory, have a strong knowledge of law and government and have the skills to reason and debate the issues. Among other things, he wanted quality history and civic education. Jefferson's university was built, but the Virginia Legislature again ignored the recommendations for a universal education and curriculum. Only later was a system of public education put into place around the country. So how is Jefferson's vision for a sound history and civic education doing today? In California, we have a comprehensive, history-driven social studies framework and standards for all grade levels. Every high school student must take three years of social studies, including a U.S. government course, to graduate. On the surface, things look good. But in truth, social studies is no longer a priority in schools and has not been for some time. Most recently, because of the national No Child Left Behind mandates and the school accountability system, language arts, math and science are emphasized. Resources for history/social science in terms of professional development, materials and even instructional time are scarce. This is particularly true at low-scoring elementary schools serving underrepresented student populations, where instructional time for social studies has been greatly diminished. A cruel irony, really: those least empowered and most in need of the knowledge and skills of effective citizenship and advocacy are the least likely to be exposed to them. Recent studies demonstrate that our nation and state are paying a price for this neglect. The California Survey of Civic Education conducted last year demonstrated that despite taking a course in U.S. government in the 12th grade, graduating seniors' knowledge of the structures and functions of government and of current political issues is very weak. Students averaged only a little over 60% correct on a test of their civics content knowledge, a low "D" on typical grading scales. The survey also revealed that today's graduates are not inclined toward participatory citizenship. Less than half of high school seniors surveyed believed that "being actively involved in state and local issues is my responsibility." Given these findings, it should be no surprise that young people's trust in government is appallingly low. Only 33% of high school seniors said they trusted "the people in government to do what is right for the country," and only 28% agreed with the statement: "I think that people in government care about what people like me and my family need." It is difficult to fault young people for these views and attitudes, and, in truth, a survey administered to adults might well bear similar results. Given the daily fare of political scandal, partisan nastiness and negative campaigning, why would young people be inclined to trust in government or become politically engaged? Studies such as the California Survey have brought to light the need for a renewal of civic education in our nation's schools. These days, there are groups — such as the Alliance for Representative Democracy and the Civic Mission of Schools — working in every state to improve civic education and preserve the social studies. As you enjoy your Fourth of July activities, take a moment to reflect on Jefferson's summer long ago in Rockfish Gap. Then do what you can do make the founders' hopes a reality. CLICK HERE for news that doesn't fit EVENTS: Coming up next week: A REAL TOWN HALL MEETING! ATTENTION PARENTS, STUDENTS, COMMUNITY MEMBERS The United Parents of Los Angeles... • NOT Green Dot parents • NOT UTLA leadership funded parents • NOT handpicked by the Mayor parents - invite YOU to a town hall meeting, held in an actual LAUSD school that is the center of its community! ATTENTION PARENTS, STUDENTS, COMMUNITY MEMBERS PLEASE ATTEND THE TOWN HALL MEETING AT: ARAGON ELEMENTARY SCHOOL 1118 ARAGON AVENUE LOS ANGELES, CA 90065 Thursday July 13, 2006 We will be hearing about Mayor Villaraigosa's plan to take over the LAUSD. We will hear from District Staff, LAUSD Board Members and community activists. THERE WILL BE NO CLOSED DOORS – YOU DON'T NEED TO RSVP - EVERYONE - even Green Dot parents, UTLA leadership funded parents and handpicked by the Mayor parents are WELCOME! Come and find out what is really behind Mayor Villaraigosa's proposal. Be informed! • Map to Aragon Avenue ES What can YOU do? ►CONTACT YOUR ASSEMBLYPERSON AND STATE SENATOR [link below to find them]. Tell them what you think about their wasting their time, effort and the taxpayer's money on the mayor's attempt at takeover or makeover – an effort that is patently unconstitutional and will never survive a court challenge. Their time, the mayor's time, the board of education's time – all of our time, thinking and hard work - is better spent working together rather than at odds to continue and support the very real efforts at reform already begun. Their time is better spent helping LAUSD find a new superintendent, guaranteeing an improved funding stream for all California schools and helping kids in the classroom, on the playground; during, before and after school. • LAUSD ASSEMBLY DELEGATION Assemblymember.Richman@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Montanez@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Levine@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Pavley@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Koretz@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Frommer@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Liu@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Goldberg@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Nunez@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Bass@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Ridley-Thomas@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Chu@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.DeLaTorre@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Richman@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Horton@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Lieu@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Karnette@assembly.ca.gov Assemblymember.Oropeza@assembly.ca.gov • LAUSD SENATE DELEGATION Senator.Alarcon@senate.ca.gov Senator.Scott@senate.ca.gov Senator.Cedillo@senate.ca.gov Senator.Kuehl@senate.ca.gov Senator.Romero@senate.ca.gov Senator.Vincent@senate.ca.gov Senator.Murray@senate.ca.gov Senator.Lowenthal@senate.ca.gov Senator.Bowen@senate.ca.gov Senator.Escutia@senate.ca.gov • TO DETERMINE WHO YOUR ASSEMBLYPERSON & SENATOR IS & GET THEIR ADDRESS PHONE & FAX NUMBERS: http://192.234.213.69/smapsearch/framepage.asp • E-mail, call or write your school board member: Marlene.Canter@lausd.net • 213-241-6387 Monica.Garcia@lausd.net • 213-241-6180 Julie.Korenstein@lausd.net • 213-241-6388 Marguerite.LaMotte@lausd.net • 213-241-6382 Mike.Lansing@lausd.net • 213-241-6385 Jon.Lauritzen@lausd.net • 213-241-6386 David.Tokofsky@lausd.net • 213-241-6383 ...or your city councilperson, mayor, the governor, member of congress, senator - or the president. Tell them what you really think! 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. • Vote. Who are your elected federal & state representatives? How do you contact them? Scott Folsom is a parent and parent leader in LAUSD. He is President of Los Angeles 10th District PTSA and represents PTA as Vice-chair the LAUSD Construction Bond Citizen's Oversight Committee. He serves on various school district advisory and policy committees and is a PTA officer and/or governance council member at three LAUSD schools. He is also the elected Youth & Education boardmember on the Arroyo Seco Neighborhood Council. • 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. 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