L.A. PARENTS SUE FOR NCLB CHOICE OPTIONS

by Karla Dial for The Heartland Institute

June 1, 2006 — U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings weighed in May 1 on a federal lawsuit against two Los Angeles school districts filed in March by the Alliance for School Choice and the L.A.-based Coalition for Urban Renewal and Education (CURE).

The lawsuit alleges the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) and Compton Unified School District (CUSD) fail to adequately inform parents of children zoned to attend failing schools about their transfer options under the federal No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB). The school districts had until late May to file a response to the allegations, which was pending at press time.

In a May 1 letter to California State Board of Education President Glee Johnson and Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell, Spellings said, "it is usually best to allow matters such as these to be resolved at the local and state level," but she added the federal government is "mindful of our own compliance responsibilities and remedies." If the districts fail to comply with the law, Spellings could cut off their federal funding.

According to a 2004 report from the Citizen's Commission on Civil Rights--a Washington, DC-based watchdog group--only 1 percent of the more than three million children trapped in failing schools nationwide have taken advantage of their government-mandated option to attend a better school. According to the Los Angeles lawsuit, only 527 of the 250,000 students eligible for transfers--0.2 percent--have done so. And in CUSD, none have, because the districts have not told parents about their options.

FAILING SCHOOLS

"Compton has not transferred one student since NCLB became law five years ago. Not one," said John Mancino, CURE's director of external affairs. "I did get a copy [of school choice policies] from Compton that included a letter that supposedly went out to parents notifying them of the school choice options and NCLB, but it makes very little mention of it and goes on to play up the after-school option and tutoring, which is what LAUSD had done.

"When we requested information from Compton before [receiving that policy], the previous letter made absolutely no mention of school choice at all. Not one word, so it's extremely frustrating. Protecting power is more important [to them] than protecting students," Mancino said.

LAUSD is the district with the largest number of students in failing schools who are eligible to transfer under NCLB--not just in California, but nationwide. The situation is so dire that at press time, Los Angeles Mayor Anthony Villaraigosa (D) was taking steps to bypass voters and the local board of education in order to assume direct control of the schools.

CREATING OPTIONS

If the lawsuit is resolved in the complainants' favor, Alliance for School Choice President and general counsel Clint Bolick said, it could result in broader options for parents in Los Angeles. And because the case is filed on federal grounds, citing provisions of the No Child Left Behind Act, it could have ripple effects nationwide.

"I think that the law puts school districts between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, they are obligated to provide public school options in their districts--but in most districts, there are no better-performing public schools," Bolick said. "So something has to give. We predict what will give is the limiting of such options to public schools within the districts. We will see inter-district transfer options, the lifting of obstacles to public charter schools, the expansion of options to include private schools, or some combination of those."

The situation has not gone unnoticed at the federal level. The day before they filed the lawsuit, the Alliance for School Choice and CURE wrote directly to Spellings, asking her to take independent action against the districts for noncompliance with the law. In early April, Spellings announced in a speech that she had directed Henry Johnson, head of the federal Office of Elementary and Secondary Education, to investigate.

PREVENTING CHOICE

Bolick said he was unsure how long the suit might take to resolve, calling it "a really murky process." But it did not appear to be moving fast enough to help Rhonda Mumphrey find a good school for her son by this autumn.

Mumphrey, an insurance agent, has been looking for a better school than the one in her gang-violence-ridden neighborhood since her son was 3. He's 6 now, but Mumphrey hasn't found another public school she likes, her child hasn't been accepted at the private schools she's applied to, and they didn't win the lottery system by which students are selected to attend local charter schools.

"It's not for lack of trying--it just seems like nobody cares," Mumphrey said. "If you call the public schools outside of your area, you're told your child can't go there because you live outside their area. The bottom line is my child doesn't have a school, and it's May and I'd feel better if he had a better option. I don't feel that just because I live in this neighborhood that he has to go to this school. It just seems like the voucher system would be the way to go."

Neither the LAUSD nor the CUSD returned calls seeking comment.

JOINT ORGANIZATIONAL STATEMENT ON NO CHILD LEFT BEHIND (NCLB) ACT

list of signers updated May, 2006

The undersigned education, civil rights, children's, disability, and citizens' organizations are committed to the No Child Left Behind Act's objectives of strong academic achievement for all children and closing the achievement gap. We believe that the federal government has a critical role to play in attaining these goals. We endorse the use of an accountability system that helps ensure all children, including children of color, from low-income families, with disabilities, and of limited English proficiency, are prepared to be successful, participating members of our democracy.

While we all have different positions on various aspects of the law, based on concerns raised during the implementation of NCLB, we believe the following significant, constructive corrections are among those necessary to make the Act fair and effective. Among these concerns are: over-emphasizing standardized testing, narrowing curriculum and instruction to focus on test preparation rather than richer academic learning; over-identifying schools in need of improvement; using sanctions that do not help improve schools; inappropriately excluding low-scoring children in order to boost test results; and inadequate funding. Overall, the law's emphasis needs to shift from applying sanctions for failing to raise test scores to holding states and localities accountable for making the systemic changes that improve student achievement.

RECOMMENDED CHANGES IN NCLB

Progress Measurement

1. Replace the law's arbitrary proficiency targets with ambitious achievement targets based on rates of success actually achieved by the most effective public schools.

2. Allow states to measure progress by using students' growth in achievement as well as their performance in relation to pre-determined levels of academic proficiency.

3. Ensure that states and school districts regularly report to the government and the public their progress in implementing systemic changes to enhance educator, family, and community capacity to improve student learning.

4. Provide a comprehensive picture of students' and schools' performance by moving from an overwhelming reliance on standardized tests to using multiple indicators of student achievement in addition to these tests.

5. Fund research and development of more effective accountability systems that better meet the goal of high academic achievement for all children

Assessments

6. Help states develop assessment systems that include district and school-based measures in order to provide better, more timely information about student learning.

7. Strengthen enforcement of NCLB provisions requiring that assessments must:

· Be aligned with state content and achievement standards;

· Be used for purposes for which they are valid and reliable;

· Be consistent with nationally recognized professional and technical standards;

· Be of adequate technical quality for each purpose required under the Act;

· Provide multiple, up-to-date measures of student performance including measures that assess higher order thinking skills and understanding; and

· Provide useful diagnostic information to improve teaching and learning.

8. Decrease the testing burden on states, schools and districts by allowing states to assess students annually in selected grades in elementary, middle schools, and high schools.

Building Capacity

9. Ensure changes in teacher and administrator preparation and continuing professional development that research evidence and experience indicate improve educational quality and student achievement.

10. Enhance state and local capacity to effectively implement the comprehensive changes required to increase the knowledge and skills of administrators, teachers, families, and communities to support high student achievement.

Sanctions

11. Ensure that improvement plans are allowed sufficient time to take hold before applying sanctions; sanctions should not be applied if they undermine existing effective reform efforts.

12. Replace sanctions that do not have a consistent record of success with interventions that enable schools to make changes that result in improved student achievement.

Funding

13. Raise authorized levels of NCLB funding to cover a substantial percentage of the costs that states and districts will incur to carry out these recommendations, and fully fund the law at those levels without reducing expenditures for other education programs.

14. Fully fund Title I to ensure that 100 percent of eligible children are served.

We, the undersigned, will work for the adoption of these recommendations as central structural changes needed to NCLB at the same time that we advance our individual organization's proposals.

· Advancement Project

· American Association of School Administrators

· American Association of School Librarians (AASL), a division of the American Library Association (ALA)

· American Association of University Women

· American Counseling Association

· American Dance Therapy Association

· American Federation of School Administrators (AFSA)

· American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME)

· American Speech-Language-Hearing Association

· Annenberg Institute for School Reform

· Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund

· ASPIRA

· Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development

· Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN)

· Association of School Business Officials International (ASBO)

· Center for Community Change

· Center for Expansion of Language and Thinking

· Children's Defense Fund

· Citizens for Effective Schools

· Coalition of Essential Schools

· Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism

· Communities for Quality Education

· Council for Children with Behavioral Disorders

· Council for Exceptional Children

· Council for Hispanic Ministries of the United Church of Christ

· Council for Learning Disabilities

· Cross City Campaign for Urban School Reform

· Disciples Home Missions of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)

· Division for Learning Disabilities of the Council for Exceptional Children (DLD/CEC)

· FairTest: The National Center for Fair & Open Testing

· Forum for Education and Democracy

· General Board of Church and Society, The United Methodist Church

· Hmong National Development

· International Reading Association

· International Technology Education Association

· Japanese American Citizens League

· Learning Disabilities Association of America

· League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC)

· Ministers for Racial, Social and Economic justice of the United Church or Christ

· National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

· NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund (LDF)

· National Association for Asian and Pacific American Education (NAAPAE)

· National Association for Bilingual Education (NABE)

· National Association for the Education and Advancement of Cambodian, Laotian and Vietnamese Americans (NAFEA)

· National Alliance of Black School Educators

· National Association for the Education of African American Children with Learning Disabilities (NAEAACLD)

· National Association of Pupil Service Administrators

· National Association of School Psychologists

· National Association of Social Workers

· National Coalition for Asian Pacific American Community Development

· National Coalition for Parent Involvement in Education (NCPIE)

· National Conference of Black Mayors

· National Council for the Social Studies

· National Council of Churches

· National Council of Jewish Women

· National Council of Teachers of English

· National Down Syndrome Congress

· National Education Association

· National Federation of Filipino American Associations

· National Indian Education Association

· National Indian School Board Association

· National Korean American Service & Education Consortium (NAKASEC)

· National Mental Health Association

· National Reading Conference

· National Rural Education Association

· National School Boards Association

· National Urban League

· Native Hawaiian Education Association

· People for the American Way

· Presbyterian Church (USA)

· Rural School and Community Trust

· Service Employees International Union

· Sikh American Legal Defense and Educational Fund

· School Social Work Association of America

· Social Action Committee of the Congress of Secular Jewish Organizations

· Southeast Asia Resource Action Center (SEARAC)

· Stand for Children

· Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages, Inc. (TESOL)

· United Black Christians of the United Church of Christ

· United Church of Christ Justice and Witness Ministries

· Women's Division of the General Board of Global Ministries, The United Methodist Church

· Women of Reform Judaism

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LAUSD SCHOOL BOARD & SCHOOL NURSES HONOR DR. TAYLOR, PTA DENTAL DIRECTOR AND CARLA NIÑO, STATE PTA PRESIDENT

A PUBLICATION OF LAUSD’s NURSING SERVICES DIVISION Fall 2005
	LAUSD School Board members Julie Korenstein and Jon Lauritzen recognizing Dr. Robert Taylor, DDS for 57 years of service to the schoolchildren of Los Angeles.
	School Nurses send their warmest thanks to Dr. Robert Taylor , D.D.S., PTA Dental Director for 10th District and 31st District California PTSA. Karen Maiorca, District Nursing Director, congratulates Dr. Taylor for 57 years of Service to the Students attending LAUSD. Dr. Taylor was recently honored in the LAUSD Boardroom and at the Central PTA Health Center for his life-time of dedicated work providing low-cost Dental care to students in need. His work through the years has allowed many students to receive excellent dental treatment and therefore, remain in school, with daily attendance to classes.
	Dee Apodaca,  LD2 Nursing Coordinator congratulating PTA State President, Carla Nino, who was presented with a Certificate of Appreciation and a beautiful cherry wooden plaque from LAUSD District Nursing Services. The School Nurses from Local District 2honored Ms. Nino at their June Staff Development meeting and applauded her for her role in producing and publishing the School Nurse Proclamation report.