THE DENOUEMENT OF PUBLIC SCHOOL CHOICE: The day that was: Tuesday Feb 23rd as of 8:35 pm

`de·noue·ment

/ˌdeɪ|nuˈmɑ̃/  Show Spelled[dey-noo-mahn]|

–noun

1.the final resolution of the intricacies of a plot, as of a drama or novel.

2.the place in the plot at which this occurs.

3.the outcome or resolution of a doubtful series of occurrences.

smf writes for 4lakids:

The board meeting today produced interesting results, some expected – some not. For the most part the superintendent's recommendations were accepted – but there were notable exceptions.

• ICEF, Green Dot and The Alliance for College Ready Schools – powerhouse charter operators with programs recommended for acceptance – were repudiated.

• The Mayor’s Partnership for LA Schools picked up a school that they weren’t recommended for.

• The veracity of evidence and data challenging charter school acceptance of English Language Learners and Special Ed students was intensely questioned – 'good data' supports one's position, 'bad data' is to be denied.

• And though the entire PSC evaluation and review process was supposed to be data driven and evidence based, it t turned out that potential operators were not evaluated on past performance on but on whether they agree to follow the rules in the future.

• The board followed the unwritten 'Don't mess in my bailiwick' rule of following the lead of the member in their district when Boardmember LaMotte offered an amendment that was accepted denying ICEF at Obama Middle School in her district.

• Board President Garcia then violated the same rule on the next vote (denying Green Dot and The Alliance at Estaban Torres High School) by offering an amendment on a school not in her district but in Yolie Flores’. Garcia's amendment carried.

• As Flores is the author of the PSC resolution – and the champion of the superintendent’s recommendations – the tension rose, the board grew more and more divided and the politics got fast and furious.

• Horsetrading happened in the open – and operators denied this time were assured of better treatment next time (unless some wise judge stops them before they choose again!)

• Advance approval was guaranteed of a Pilot School at Gratts Elementary next year even though one wasn't even requested.

Democracy is messy when the sausage is made.

Notable quotes:

NURY MARTINEZ resurrected Connie Rice's metaphor of LAUSD reform as building the aircraft in flight. They have built their plane and it follows the script of Flight of the Phoenix – where it turns out the designer of the plane has only built scale models. Now they have to fly it – and land the puppy!

SUPT. CORTINES: “The Public School Choice process has divided us..... (that's Freudian) ….I mean provided us with an opportunity.....”

STEVE ZIMMER: (On the 'Parent Trigger'): “You can't declare war on people and not expect them to act like combatants.” “The 'red shirts' and the 'white shirts' are not the future. The future is in the plans.”

TAMAR GALATZAN: “Nothing is happening in my district, no Focus Schools, no pilots for individual student funding. You are ignoring half of the valley; successful schools are and need to be part of the wave of the future.”

MARGUERITE LAMOTTE: “It has been said by some that charter schools reestablish segregation; I cannot and will not say to my constituents that the money you gave for the bonds is being given to charter schools.”

RICHARD VLADOVIC: “In the past we have written the best plans in the worlds. We have placed them on the best shelves in the world where they collected the best dust in the world.”

MONICA GARCIA: “No one on this board takes their job lightly; I hope I can say no one in this district takes their job lightly. Tomorrow it takes all of us.”

 

from Google News

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SUPERINTENDENT’S BOARD INFORMATIVE RE LETTERS OF INTENT RE PUBLIC SCHOOL CHOICE - 17 Nov 2009

Psc Letters of Intent Board Informative 11 17 09

GARFIELD HIGH IS ELIGIBLE FOR TAKEOVER: Control of the East L.A. school, setting for 'Stand and Deliver,' could shift because of its low academic standing [+ more]

By Howard Blume | LA Times

September 26, 2009 -- Garfield High, which became nationally known as the real-life setting for the film "Stand and Deliver," will be among the initial 12 local campuses, including six high schools, eligible for takeover because of persistent academic failure, officials announced Friday.

The nation's second-largest school system will invite bidders from inside and outside the district to run these schools next year through a proposal process that is still being developed.

The Los Angeles Board of Education authorized this school-control plan in August; it applies to low-achieving existing schools and to 51 new campuses set to open over the next four years in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

Garfield, which for decades has served a largely immigrant Latino population in East Los Angeles, reached a high-water mark in the 1980s, when math teacher Jaime Escalante built his famed calculus program.

Under his leadership, dozens of students passed the Advanced Placement calculus test every year, a rare feat even at the nation's elite schools.

Last year, only 5% of Garfield students tested as "proficient" in any math class.

"All these schools need the attention that this will focus on them," said board member Yolie Flores Aguilar, author of the policy.

Other schools include:

* Maywood Academy in the southeast Los Angeles County city of Maywood. The school opened four years ago. Maywood city officials are interested in obtaining substantial control over the school, said City Councilman Felipe Aguirre.

* Jefferson High in Central-Alameda. District officials successfully opposed a previous charter conversion attempt by Steve Barr and his Green Dot Public Schools. Barr later engineered a takeover of Locke High.

* Lincoln High in Lincoln Heights. Teachers helped staff a volunteer summer school after budget cuts slashed district offerings. One potential course that failed to attract sufficient enrollment was an activism seminar with the proposed class project of recalling Flores Aguilar because she voted for budget cuts that resulted in layoffs.

* Burbank Middle School in Highland Park, where parents have long worried about gang influence on campus. The school also has two new magnet schools that, some argue, already are the basis of a promising reform.

* San Fernando Middle School, the only Valley campus.

The other schools are Gardena High, San Pedro High, Carver Middle School in South Park, Griffith Joyner Elementary in Watts, Hillcrest Elementary in Baldwin Hills/Crenshaw, and Hyde Park Elementary in Hyde Park.

L.A. schools Supt. Ramon C. Cortines said that being on the list "should not be viewed as a negative" and that "this process is about providing our schools with the appropriate supports."

More than 250 schools are eligible under the board resolution, which applies to schools that consistently failed to meet federal benchmarks for at least three years.

Cortines refined the formula as recently as midweek, finally deciding that the "focus" schools, as he called them, would meet additional criteria: fewer than 21% of students proficient in math or English and no school-wide improvement on the state's Academic Performance Index, which is largely based on standardized test scores.

In addition, high schools would have a dropout rate greater than 10%.

Garfield qualified easily.

The school also owns the lowest rank, 1 of 10, when compared with schools statewide. But that does not make Garfield's selection incontestable.

When compared with schools that serve similar students, Garfield rates a 6 of 10, which puts it in the upper half of state schools.

And although Garfield dropped three points on this year's Academic Performance Index, it had improved by 44 and 25 points the previous two years, among L.A. Unified's better gains.

Garfield's uncertain future has engendered fear and anger among the faculty, said social studies teacher Brian Fritch.

"We have a lot of teachers confused about what the next step will be," he said. "People don't feel included in the process and feel rushed."

Fritch is hustling to organize an internal reform proposal.

Junior Karen Flores, 16, said she and her classmates are worried about the loss of cherished Garfield traditions and a disrupted senior year, with the potential to affect classes and college applications.

"It feels like people are giving up on us," she said.

Garfield became a reform battleground as a target of the Parent Revolution, which emerged out of Green Dot.

Its organizers have asserted that they have signatures from dissatisfied community parents equal in number to more than half the Garfield student body and that the district must either improve Garfield or face competition from start-up charter schools that would surround it.

Green Dot has agreed to step aside and let another charter group, the Alliance for College-Ready Public Schools, manage new charters near Garfield.

Alliance chief executive Judy Burton said she's interested in submitting a proposal both for Garfield and for a new high school, under construction, that will relieve Garfield's overcrowding.

more:

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Gardena and San Pedro schools are high on takeover list

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... schools in the South Bay - could be taken over by independent operators next year under a Los Angeles Unified reform plan, district officials said ...

AMID FISCAL CRISIS, L.A. GIVES SCHOOL SITE COUNCILS REINS

Published Online: July 14, 2009

Published in Print: July 15, 2009

By Stephen Sawchuk | Education Week

Los Angeles -- In theory, it is every school’s dream to control its own destiny, rather than having administrators impose spending plans and reform initiatives from the central office.

At Jefferson High School, one of the largest high schools here, a governing body made up of teachers, nonclassroom-based educators, parents, and Principal Michael Taft appears to be living the dream, to the extent such a thing is possible during a staggering fiscal crisis.

The leadership team, officially known as a “school site council,” has mainly used an infusion of federal stimulus funding to keep class sizes around 25 students. With its remaining money, it has preserved a successful “eighth period”—a mandatory after-school class for students struggling to pass the California High School Exit Exam, or CAHSEE, a graduation prerequisite.

The example sums up the goal of district leaders, who have allotted nearly $114 million in Title I economic-stimulus funds to school site councils like the one at Jefferson High to spend on their own needs.

Decentralized Decisionmaking

According to the California Education Code, school site councils are elected bodies charged with setting and measuring the effectiveness of improvement strategies at the school, seeking input from other school advisory committees, revising strategies and expenditures, and creating and monitoring the approved “single plan for student achievement”—a consolidated plan requested of schools receiving state or federal school improvement funding.

The councils are made up of:
• The principal
• Representatives of teachers selected by teachers at the school
• Other school personnel selected by peers at the school
• Parents of students attending the school selected by such parents
• Students selected by students attending the school (at the middle and high school levels)

Middle and high school councils are composed to ensure parity among the principal, classroom teachers, and other school personnel. additionally, they must ensure that equal numbers of parents or other community members selected by parents and students serve on the council.

SOURCE: California Education Code

“If parents and the community feel they have some responsibility, they’ll be accountable for the direction of the school,” said Ramon C. Cortines, the superintendent of the district. “When [a school] is faced with the draconian cuts I’ve made, ... [it] needs parents and the community to be engaged and involved on an ongoing basis.”

Decentralization has long been a rallying cry among constituents in this sprawling district of 700,000 students. But as some Los Angeles educators are discovering, it pays to be careful what you wish for.

The influx of money this year through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act carries much higher stakes for the site councils for several reasons. First, the funding will double some schools’ typical Title I allocations, and thus it will be closely scrutinized.

These are not funds for a rainy day; they are a stopgap. In preparing budgets, the councils have had to determine how many teaching positions to preserve, how small they can afford to keep class sizes, and which local initiatives are worth saving. Many are making those decisions for the first time.

In effect, the district has spread the decision about cutting programs and personnel from seven school board members to 700 councils.

The decentralization has been praised by some Los Angeles administrators for moving instructional policy closer to the schools. But it has raised the hackles of other administrators, some parent groups, and the teachers’ union.

“There was no transition plan to develop the capacity of these schools that in some cases received an embarrassment of riches,” said Bill Ring, who heads TransParent, a grassroots organization that seeks to increase parents’ voices in school decisions.

Back and Forth

Required by the California Education Code, the school site councils have been around since the 1970s. But the discretionary pots of money they oversee typically wax and wane depending on the current district leadership. Some superintendents have funneled more discretionary funding, including federal Title I aid for disadvantaged students, to the councils; others have chosen to manage those funds centrally.

Mr. Cortines, who became the district chief in 2008, has generally favored a more localized approach to school instruction. Previously, during a stint as Los Angeles’ interim superintendent, in 2000, he broke the district into subdistricts, each overseen by a superintendent.

His latest push for decentralizing is unusual, though, not only for the amount of money involved, but also in its timing.

As the councils geared up to meet this spring, Los Angeles officials watched as their tax revenues dropped and as Sacramento made a succession of cuts to state funding. To reduce the resulting shortfall, the school board canceled programming, sent out more than 4,000 layoff notices to teachers, and pared the central-office staff. Upon receiving its first stimulus allocations, the district put most of its state-stabilization money and eligible money from the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act toward its bottom-line deficit. But officials also decided to pass the Title I stimulus dollars to the councils, rather than filling in holes centrally.

With the money, schools could, for instance, “buy back” classroom teaching positions that had been eliminated under the central budget. Alternatively, they could choose to maintain after-school tutoring, preserve the jobs of school psychologists and counselors, or hire instructional coaches to help teachers make sense of the data from periodic student assessments.

More Discretionary Aid

In addition, the district liquidated a centrally run coaching program and federal Title II teacher-quality funding and disbursed those dollars to schools—a change officials said provided more discretionary aid to schools receiving small or no allocations under Title I.

The district, the Los Angeles teachers’ union, and others collaborated on a series of training sessions for school-site-council personnel, beginning last winter. Part of that training included mock council meetings to give educators clear examples of good and poor collaborative decisionmaking.

Mr. Cortines also gave each school a lot of data on student demographics and test scores to help the councils as they set their budgets.

Mr. Taft, the Jefferson High principal, and members of that school’s team—while not in agreement on every detail—felt it was worthwhile to maintain classroom teaching positions and the eighth period, and they had three years of higher scores to back up their decisions.

“Because of the success we’ve had, our parents are getting more involved in their child’s education,” Mr. Taft said. “When their child comes home and says he passed the math portion of the CAHSEE, that’s like handing them a $20 bill. They can see it, they can feel it, they understand it.”

But others say that Mr. Taft’s experience has been the exception, not the norm. Mr. Ring of the parents’ group said that the district’s efforts to build schools’ capacity to spend the money wisely have so far only scratched the surface.

“It’s exposure, not culture change,” he said of the training.

The teachers’ union, meanwhile, has grown increasingly critical of the plan, saying it has unnecessarily compromised teachers’ jobs and raised class sizes. District figures show that schools have kept a significant number of nonclassroom positions, such as coaches.

The district, officials of United Teachers Los Angeles say, shouldhave spent the stimulus money centrally to ensure a minimum class size for all elementary students and to preserve more classroom teaching positions.

“I honestly don’t think Ray [Cortines] understood that you can’t just snap your fingers and go turn an authoritarian system into a decentralized one,” said Daniel Barnhart, a UTLA board member.

The union has also accused the district of pressuring principals on the councils to maintain reading coaches over classroom teachers, and it has filed 17 grievances alleging that schools didn’t staff or conduct their councils in accordance with state law.

“Decentralization is illusory,” said Sean Leys, a teacher at Lincoln High School who went on a well-publicized hunger strike to protest the layoffs. “Without a doubt, there are hundreds of school councils that show no oversight because they have no idea what the role of the council is.”

District Response

Monica Garcia, the president of the Los Angeles school board, concedes that the district has more work to do on training. But she argues that the district’s centrally mandated strategies were not always effective for all schools.

Schools likely to benefit most under the shift are big high schools like Jefferson, which serves 2,800 students, many disadvantaged. At Jefferson, Mr. Taft estimates that during the upcoming school year, the council will oversee a total of $8 million to $9 million in regular Title I money, stimulus funding, and other state and federal bilingual education grants, for instance.

“For the first time, our large high schools have a good chunk of money to do things with,” Ms. Garcia said. “I think that is probably the silver lining, that these large underperforming high schools got attention on what they needed, rather than what we prescribed.”

And district officials flatly deny the union’s charge that they have acted as puppetmaster over councils and principals.

“It’s very frustrating because [the union] supported decentralization in 2000,” Mr. Cortines said. “But it came to the bottom line. If [the council] didn’t spend the money the way UTLA wanted, it was wrong.”Michelle King, a local area superintendent in west Los Angeles, said that schools there did make classroom teachers a priority.

But councils nevertheless struggled with the buy-back process because of seniority provisions in the district contract, she said. Local schools budget classroom “positions,” so buy-backs do not guarantee the return of beloved instructors—merely teachers who fit the appropriate categories and are next on the seniority roll.

“I think of all the messages, that was the one we had to repeat over and over,” Ms. King said.

Still, Ms. King expects councils to take on more responsibilities over time, such as promoting school safety and ensuring spending is aligned with academic goals.

“[Decentralization] was a shock to the system, but it’s something the community has been asking for a long time,” she said.

Observers hope for the best, but some harbor doubts. David Tokofsky, a consultant for the principals’ union and a former school board member, worries not just about the logistics of the move, but has a philosophical concern, too.

While it may complete Mr. Cortines’ long-held decentralization plans, it may not satisfy the reform-minded rhetoric coming from President Barack Obama’s administration on the use of stimulus funds, he suggested.

“They say all politics are local politics. Well, in Los Angeles, we say all politics are ‘loco’ politics,” Mr. Tokofsky said. “And right now, the politics of the past are racing forward at the very time that Obama is putting more money and attention toward education.”

Coverage of leadership is supported in part by a grant from The Wallace Foundation, at www.wallacefoundation.org.

2 from The Wave: BREWER’S FORCED EXIT STUNS BLACK EDUCATORS + RUSH TO REMOVE: ANOTHER TAKE ON THE BREWER EXIT

 

- Photo by Gary McCarthy

Brewer's forced exit stuns Black educators

The impending departure of Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent David L. Brewer leaves only 13 Black superintendents in school districts across California, down from 23 in 2007.

Five black supes have lost their jobs in the past eight weeks.

By OLU ALEMORU, Staff Writer  Los Angeles Wave Newspapers

As L.A. school board moves to oust superintendent, African-Americans wonder how big a factor race will play in charting the district's future.

11.DEC.08 -- A group representing Black school superintendents in California has criticized the actions of the Los Angeles Unified School District school board, after it effectively fired Supt. David L. Brewer III on Monday by voting to buy out the remaining two years of his contract.

Dwight Bonds, acting executive director of the California Association of African-American Superintendents, reacted with “disappointment” to the news after a week of heated speculation over Brewer’s future. “We were pleased with the process he was making,” said Bonds, “especially in test scores and other areas of growth — particularly in African-American male improvement.”

In an interview, Bonds also voiced concerns about a recent decline in the number of Black superintendents across the state. He said five have lost their jobs in the past eight weeks, leaving only 13 in place, compared to 23 in 2007.

“So, our challenge and mission,” he said, “is to garner support for our members and make sure we are continued to be represented within the 1,140 school districts within California.”

The LAUSD board met behind closed doors for over two hours before announcing it had voted 5-2 in support of the $500,000 buyout, which included an annual salary of $300,000, $45,000 a year in expenses and a $3,000 a month housing allowance. Board members Marguerite Poindexter LaMotte and Julie Korenstein were the dissenting votes.

“I do not believe that a buyout of $500,000 during a budget crisis was appropriate,” said Korenstein in a statement. “We are in the worst possible times, and we’re going to have to cut millions of dollars and positions, and I believe this was a waste of taxpayers’ money.”

LaMotte declined “to comment at this time.”

“I serve at the pleasure of the Los Angeles Board of Education,” Brewer said in a statement after the vote. “I plan to continue my role until Dec. 31. No matter what happens next, I will remain a champion for the children, teachers and staff of the LAUSD.”

The 62-year-old former U.S. Navy vice admiral had vowed last week to stay on the job in the wake of a plan to discuss buying out his contract two weeks ago. However, LaMotte, the only African-American member of the board, forestalled proceedings when she refused to return from a previously scheduled education conference in San Diego.

But Monday, he announced that even though things had improved under his leadership, he would accept a buyout in order to avoid a racially charged confrontation with the school board, whose president — one of his most vocal detractors — is Latina. Some have speculated that racial considerations were key to the board’s desire to fire Brewer and replace him, at least temporarily, with Deputy Superintendent Ramon Cortines.

“We have a lot of work to do,” said board President Monica Garcia, who had also thanked Brewer for his hard work and dedication. “The district is facing the worst financial outlook in 20 years.”

In a Tuesday morning television interview on KTLA, a defiant Brewer described the buyout as “an ouster” and admonished “the press to do your job.”

“Student achievement went up dramatically,” he said.

Second District County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas, who sat on a special selection committee that helped choose Brewer for the job in 2006, said he took “ownership” of that decision but wouldn’t draw any racial implications.

“It wasn’t working out, and they mutually agreed that severance was appropriate,” he said. “It’s back to the drawing board and they need to open up another search and try to get it right. LAUSD needs a leader of credibility to bring the enterprise of public education to the L.A. region in a significant way.”

 

Rush to Remove: Another Take on the Brewer Exit

By BETTY PLEASANT, Contributing Editor the WAVE Newspapers. 11.DEC.08Soulvine  Betty Pleasant writes Soulvine for THEWAVE

11 Dec 2008 — What happened to LAUSD Superintendent David Brewer wasn’t so much racist as it was a naked power play on the part of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who never liked Brewer from jump street.

He never liked him because he wasn’t his.

This wasn’t the first time an ambitious Los Angeles mayor orchestrated the ouster of the superintendent of schools: Mayor Richard Riordan commanded then-school board President Genethia Hayes to get rid of Superintendent Ruben Zacarias in 1999 and now nine years later, Villaraigosa’s handmaiden, school board President Monica Garcia, carried out her assignment to do the same to Brewer, with Villaraigosa’s toxic water-carrier, former Councilman Richard Alatorre, aiding and abetting the whole mess. (Remember the firing of Franklin White as the CEO of the M TA in 1995? Remind you of anything you see today?)

The school board names have changed, but the purported issues remain the same — “the need to improve the quality of education dispensed by the Los Angeles Unified School District.” That’s what Riordan, Hayes, et al. said then, and that’s what Villaraigosa, Garcia, Alatorre, et al. are saying now.

But the real issue is power. Brewer had the misfortune of being hired by a school board which was in a bitter fight with Villaraigosa over who would run the school district — the board or the mayor — so the mayor did what politicians do best: He politicized the school district, bought himself a school board and assumed the power over everyone except Brewer. Villaraigosa wanted very much to oust Brewer, but he couldn’t.

Until recently, the mayor had a potential formidable rival to his bid for re-election in the form of former Police Commission President Rick Caruso. Villaraigosa had to have known that if he caused Brewer’s removal, he would trigger an instant replay of what happened to former Mayor James Hahn when he fired then-Police Chief Bernard Parks. Black people would elect Caruso, just like Black people elected Villaraigosa.

But, Caruso decided not to run for mayor, thus freeing Villaraigosa to rid himself of Brewer with little concern about a racial backlash, since he has no viable competition in his re-election race. Well, absent a nice big backlash, the only thing for those of us to do who are uncomfortable about what happened this week is to vigorous repudiate assertions that Brewer hasn’t done anything during his two years as school superintendent, as the data begs to differ.

According to LAUSD’s own reports, the academic performance of the district’s elementary school pupils was noticeably improving during the six years Roy Romer served as superintendent, but middle and high school students struggled. That is where Brewer put his emphasis and it showed, as API scores rose 74 points in the middle schools and 62 points in the high schools under Brewer. Nearly 70 elementary schools made gains of 40 or more points on the API last year, with 122nd Street School making the greatest progress — 70 points.

Jefferson High School made the greatest improvement among high schools with a 60-point gain, and Dorsey also showed strong improvement with a 30-point increase. Standardized test scores went up in the double digits at every level last year, as the district’s overall progress outpaced every other public school district in California.

Brewer’s detractors admit these successes, but they say Brewer had nothing to do with them. Nonsense! He’s the head of the joint! It’s his tenure, his leadership and all that that entails. That’s like saying when the nation’s economy starts to improve, President Barack Obama will have had nothing to do with it!

In Brewer’s two years on the job, he has dealt with round after round of devastating budget cuts, which caused LAUSD to lose $800 million this year, a total that would easily result in school closures in other districts. Yet, no LAUSD school has closed; no teachers have been sent home, no children have been put on the street. The district eliminated 650 positions at its Beaudry headquarters and managed to keep the cuts out of the classroom. When it comes to leadership, this ought to count for something.

But I reiterate, Brewer’s ouster is not about his job performance, his management style or the academic performance of the students. It’s about that old bugaboo: political power.

Therefore, I wholeheartedly agree with Councilwoman Janice Hahn’s proposal to seek a change in the City Charter allowing the superintendent of schools to be elected by the people rather than being hired by the board of education and manipulated by the mayor.  

This article also appeared in LA CityWatch Dec 12

SUPERINTENDENT BREWER’S STATEMENT

Statement from Superintendent David L. Brewer, III, made in the LAUSD Boardroom at 2PM on December 8^th:

 

I’ve scheduled this press availability to set the record straight about the accomplishments of the wonderful students, employees, and parents under my leadership over the past two years.

· Two years ago, I took the helm of the Los Angeles Unified School District with vision and optimism. You see, I firmly believe that every child can learn. Every child can succeed. Every child can do great things. I know the power of education. My grandparents, the grandchildren of slaves, graduated from college. I know the power of opportunity. As an admiral in the Navy, I saw thousands of sailors, including high school dropouts; earn college degrees while in the service and master skills that would lead to prosperous and productive futures.

· As a leader, I came to the Los Angeles Unified School District, with many goals, chief among them - results. I walked through this door with my eyes wide open. I did so with the belief that, together, we could take this District from good to great. We have many good schools. I wanted to support them so they could become great schools. I wanted to help our students read, write, think and speak their way into great futures.

· As an experienced warrior, I came ready to fight the battles on behalf of all of our LAUSD students. When I think of this current battle, I think of the students who have no one to fight for them. I challenge every adult in this District and every adult in Los Angeles, to fight on behalf of our students. Fight for their right to a world-class education. Fight for a future that includes college and a career. Their success is the only thing worth fighting for. What our students need—not what adults want—must be LAUSD’s guiding priority.

· To the people of Los Angeles, demand that political and adult agendas take a back seat to student agendas. The winners—today, tomorrow and every day--must be our students. The most important question we must answer is how to build on their most recent successes.

· I knew the students of the Los Angeles School District could do better, and they proved that on the 2008 Academic Performance Index.

· LAUSD students had the highest academic gains of any other major school district in the state last year. Elementary schools, middle schools, and high schools had record gains - and not just by a point or two, but by double digits.

· All of our ethnic groups, with one exception, exceeded the academic gains of their state counterparts.

· I am especially proud of one our high schools. For years, Jefferson High School had languished at the bottom in academic achievement. In 2008, thanks to great leadership and teachers, their scores soared and went up 59 points.

· There is much more good news at the high school level. LAUSD has the largest class of 12th graders – 34,768 students – since 1979. That means more high school students are staying in school. More high school students are passing the high school exit exams. More high school students are graduating and going to college.

· I am proud of these accomplishments, and so much more.

· Our students also deserve world-class campuses.

· In that regard, last month, thanks to the voters’ overwhelming confidence in LAUSD, we passed Measure Q - $7B - the largest school bond measure in the history of the nation, with nearly a 69% margin of voter approval. Because of that $7 billion investment, soon more of our students will study in traditional classrooms, not portables crowding on playgrounds. Soon, more of our students will attend schools that have state-of-the art computer centers, chemistry labs and modern cafeterias.

· To increase the safety of our students and decrease gang violence, we opened the first-ever Boys & Girls Club on one of our campuses at Markham Middle School.

We will open a YMCA on the campus of University High School in the near future.

· I would like to thank all who have contributed to these successes. All of the students, all of the parents, all of the teachers, all of the principals, librarians, custodians, cafeteria workers, bus drivers—everyone who works for the Los Angeles Unified School District and every one who supports our students.

· The current debate about my leadership and the performance of the district has been contentious. It has been demoralizing and debilitating, not only to our valued employees, but has spilled over into the community. As an African-American, I’ve experienced my share of discrimination. When I joined the Navy as an officer over 37 years ago, there were only 250 African-American officers out of 72,000. I know what it looks like, smells like, and the consequences. Although this debate is disconcerting and troubling, it must not become an ethnic issue. When adults fight, it can manifest itself in our children. This must not become an ethnic or racial battle that infests our schools, our campuses, our playgrounds. This is not about settling an old score; this must be about what is best for every LAUSD student.

· Therefore, I have decided to do what I think is in the best interest of the children, to put all of our students first. Although my two years of service as superintendent contain an undeniable record of significant accomplishments, I am asking the Los Angeles School Board to shield our students from this contentious debate and honor the buy-out provisions of my contract.

· Regardless of the Board’s decision, I will continue to work for the children of LA and this nation.

· There’s still so much work to be done. We’re facing the worst budget crisis in since 1929; we must continue to have leadership in Sacramento. I have been leading this fight for the past year. This fight must continue.

· Gang violence persists. Too many of our young boys are dying or being maimed in the streets of LA. That’s why I’ve launched a Single Gender Academy initiative, with an emphasis on boys. Last month, I went to New York and visited two boys’ academies and one girls’ academy to benchmark and replicate in this District. Jordan High School, King-Drew Magnet School, Audubon Middle School and Tom Bradley Elementary School have very promising single gender pilot programs. We must continue this work to save our boys.

· One of my guiding principles in Life’s Little Instruction Book.. Let me quote: “Never deprive someone of hope, because that may be all that they have.” Let me give you an example. Harris Rosen, CEO of Rosen Hotels, is providing hope in Tangelo Park in Orlando, Florida, where he has established a Pre-kindergarten to College program for the poorest children in that city. He invests $1 million per year to provide educational and other services to these children and their families. He guarantees a college education to any Tangelo Park student who is accepted to college. Many of the District’s children are living in similar neighborhoods with no hope. That’s why I have solicited the support of various community leaders to work with me in bringing the Tangelo Park program to the District. This work must continue.

· We have the best students in the nation. One of the best and most rigorous academic

programs in the world is the International Baccalaureate program. When I took the helm at LAUSD, there were 82 of these programs in California and zero in LAUSD. We now have nine programs, but we need to do more. LAUSD students deserve Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate programs in our secondary schools.

· My passion and commitment have not and will not diminish.

· I am proud and grateful that the Los Angeles Unified School District is better than I found it. As a third-generation college graduate who has benefited from his education, I want the same for all the students of this district. I’m reminded of my favorite hymn: “If can help somebody as I pass along, If I can show somebody that he’s traveling wrong, if I can cheer somebody with a word or song, then my living is not in vain.”

Live for our children.

Randomly observed: SOMETIMES WHEN YOU TAKE ROLL YOU NEED TO COUNT WHO'S NOT THERE.

randomly observed by smf

May 31 - Saturday afternoon there was a marvelous celebration at Jefferson High School, celebrating the dedication of a new playing field, celebrating the end of the school year, their small learning communities, a beautiful day in the neighborhood.

Whitmanesque: celebrating themselves.

The community turned out, happy and joyous - proud to be Democrats. Old Democrats turned out, stars in their firmament: football players, track and field guys. Gray and smiling, proud - they never got over being winners. The quarterback from the undefeated and unscored upon team of 1938. The track star that set the school records and is still running and still winning at 80. You win every race you enter when you're 80.

The principal pointed out whom among the celebration and celebrants thatwasn't there: The news crews and reporters who come without fail to the latest fracas or altercation ...but have no interest in the good news, in the sunny day. In the sweet smell of success and tacos e empanadas.

Also absent: Superintendent Brewer. And Mayor Villaraigosa - even though Jeff - a school already coming up - will be his school in a month.