Friday, April 05, 2013

PARENT TRIGGER GROUP RECOMMENDS LAUSD TAKES OVER FAILING LAUSD SCHOOL

●●smf: This article is a-little-more-than-somewhat misleading  - sometimes the spin makes the reporters dizzy.

The recommendation of the 24th St Parents Union is a “recommendation” – not the final parent vote. The LA Parent Union is an unholy owned subsidiary of ®eform Inc., the Broad/Gates/WalMart/Charter School  Kool-Aid is dispensed by the hogshead at every meeting!

By Beau Yarbrough | San Bernardino County Sun | http://bit.ly/ZDXA6f

4/04/2013 08:43:07 PM PDT  ::  LOS ANGELES - A Los Angeles-based parent group that has won the right to remake their failing Los Angeles Unified school wants the district to run the school after it reopens its doors.

The 24th Street Elementary School Parents Union is the third group to use California's parent trigger law, which allows groups that collect enough petitions to force dramatic changes on public schools.

On Thursday afternoon, the group recommended that petition signatories vote for a joint proposal put forth by LAUSD and charter school Crown Preparatory Academy.

Under the proposal, LAUSD would open a new pre-kindergarten program at 24th Street Elementary, and would restart the K-4 program in place at the school. Current LAUSD employees would be required to reapply for their jobs and the district has promised to bring in a "collaborative principal and staff."

Crown Prep, which would continue to operate independently on the 24th Street campus, as it has since 2010, would expand to admit the fifth graders coming out of 24th Street. (Twenty-fourth Street Elementary is currently a K-5 campus.) 24th Street's curriculum would also be realigned to fit in with the charter school's 5-8 curriculum, and all 24th Street students would be given the option to enroll at Crown Prep.

The new would-be operators also vow to provide a tablet computer for every student. LAUSD also says parents and teachers will have more of a decision-making role at the school, including having parents sitting on


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the hiring committee for the school's principal and staff.

Signatories are scheduled to vote accept or reject the proposal on Tuesday.

Southwest of downtown Los Angeles in the West Adams district, 24th Street Elementary received a 667 Academic Performance Index score in 2012, up 6 points from the year before. The score, derived from multiple statewide tests, ranges from 200 to 1,000, and 800 is the state's target for each school. Every one of the 357 students whose test scores were used to create the 2012 API ranking are socioeconomically disadvantaged, according to the California Department of Education. Almost 200 of them don't speak English as their native language. Despite being an elementary school, it has the second-highest suspension rate in the school district, according to officials at Parent Revolution.

Barring unforeseen complications, the 2013-14 school year could see two parent trigger schools opening their doors for the first time: Desert Trails Elementary School in Adelanto will be reopened in August by the operator of a Hesperia charter school.

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