Cajuns get it!: LOUISIANA DISTRICTS WEIGH COST vs. BENEFIT OF ‘RACE TO THE TOP’ BID

Several Louisiana school districts are undecided about whether to support the state's bid for federal Race to the Top funds, as they are uneasy about agreeing to mandates without long-term commitments for funding. "Considering these difficult economic times and declining local revenues, it is hard to know where our district and our state will be in four years," one district's superintendent said. "We cannot absorb any more unfunded mandates." The News-Star (Monroe, La.) (1/10)

INNOVATION COMES NATURALLY TO BASKETBALL HALL OF FAMER JERRY LUCAS: As a player he was the first to win championships at high school, college, NBA and Olympic levels. Today, at 69, he champions his Lucas Learning System and a new website he says will ‘revolutionize the education process.’

Hall of Fame basketball player Jerry Lucas next to his gold medal from the 1960 Olympics at home in Templeton, Calif. (Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times / December 30, 2009)

Jerry Crowe  LA Times Columnist

E-mail | Recent columns

 

January 11, 2010 -From Templeton, Calif. - Jerry Lucas never abided the mundane.

It wasn't enough for Lucas, in the early stages of an athletic career that would earn him enshrinement in the Basketball Hall of Fame, to merely launch 5,000 shots a day as a youngster.

He challenged himself by visualizing a clock face atop the rim, not counting a shot made, for instance, unless it grazed 3 o'clock -- or 9 o'clock or 12 o'clock, wherever he was aiming -- before falling through the net.

Other times, to improve his rebounding, he'd purposely miss shots while mentally cataloging where the ball caromed, insight that Lucas claims made boxing out unnecessary.

"I did things," he says, "that I found out later on no other basketball player in the history of the world ever did."

But Lucas didn't stop there.

With an incredible capacity for retaining information that earned him the nickname Dr. Memory, he didn't content himself with feats such as memorizing the Bible or the Manhattan phone book, which he did, or identifying hundreds of studio-audience members he'd only just met moments before appearing on "The Tonight Show," which he did to Johnny Carson's astonishment.

He wanted to share his gift.

For years he has traveled the country to demonstrate his Lucas Learning System, which is based on the ability to store pictures in the mind and retrieve them simply by thinking of them.

But that wasn't enough either.

And now, his 70th birthday approaching in March and his final NBA season more than 35 years behind him, the restless Lucas says he is nearing completion on a Pixar-quality interactive website that will "totally revolutionize the education process."

He and wife Cheri, a dog trainer who has appeared on TV's "The Dog Whisperer," live in a hilltop log cabin on their rural 20-acre property about 30 miles north of San Luis Obispo.

It's an idyllic, peaceful setting, but Lucas is far from idle.

"My mind has never been inactive my entire life," he says during an interview in a cozy den outside his home office. "When I had nothing to do physically, I began to invent all sorts of mental games, hundreds of varieties, to keep my mind occupied."

In basketball, the 6-foot-8 Lucas was a prodigy who led Middletown High to two Ohio state championships. At Ohio State, which he insisted on attending on an academic scholarship, he led the Buckeyes to a national title and two other championship-game appearances in three varsity seasons.

In 11 NBA seasons with the Cincinnati Royals, San Francisco Warriors and New York Knicks, he averaged 17 points and 15.6 rebounds, twice averaging "20 and 20" in a season.

Later voted one of the top 50 players in NBA history, Lucas was the first basketball player to win championships at the high school, college, pro and Olympic levels, a feat that has since been matched only by Quinn Buckner and Magic Johnson.

Sports Illustrated, noting that his arching outside shot found the net so consistently that it became known as the Lucas Layup, suggested that Lucas "may be the best-rebounding shooter, and best-shooting rebounder, ever to play the game."

Since leaving the Knicks after the 1973-74 season, however, Lucas has had virtually nothing to do with the game, even turning down offers to work as a TV commentator.

"I enjoyed basketball," he notes, "but it wasn't life-changing. What I'm doing now is life-changing."

When he retired, Lucas says, he embarked on a 25-year plan to develop education curricula that would "make learning practically automatic" by giving tangible identities to intangible concepts. Thirty-five years later, he's still at it.

"To do what I set out to do is an overwhelming task," he says. "It takes time -- like, when I did grammar and punctuation, I read 300 grammar books over a period of a couple years -- but the end result is going to be remarkable."

Lucas says it probably won't be up and running for two more years, but his animated website, Doctor M's Universe, will highlight all he has written and created over the last 3 1/2 decades in an effort to make learning "fun, simple and exciting."

As Lucas explains the site, students will build their own planets on which they will virtually live, flying spaceships to learning destinations in the universe such as an alphabet planet, a reading planet, a spelling planet, a math planet, and so on.

So far, Lucas says, he has developed more than 120 games, created hundreds of characters and written lyrics to about 300 songs that will be incorporated into the project.

"What Jerry's been able to do," says Jeffrey Varab, a Disney-trained animator helping to build the site, "is to take something incredibly complex and make it accessible to anybody."

This year, Lucas notes, he will start to seek funding, estimating it will cost about $20 million to launch the site.

Lucas, though, says his pet project does not occupy his every waking moment. He has spent much of his time the last two years in Erlanger, Ky., with his younger brother, Roy, who has been diagnosed as having a malignant brain tumor.

Lucas continues to lead seminars, and he also found time to write a screenplay about a formative summer in his youth.

"I guess I'm a typical type-A personality," he says, laughing. "Maybe quadruple-A, I don't know."

NEW RULES ON TAP FOR CHARTER SCHOOLS: Critics say tougher standards could lead to more bureaucracy.

By Connie Llanos, Staff Writer | LA Newspaper Group/Daily News

1/11/10 -- With charter school enrollment at an all-time high locally, Los Angeles Unified officials are expected to set tougher standards this week for the publicly funded and independently run campuses.

Agenda for Tuesday Jan 12 1PM  Bd of Ed Meeting

The new rules come as the district is expected to add even more charters under a reform plan that allows outside operators to run new and failing campuses.

But charter school advocates and other critics say the district's new rules will drown the innovative schools in paperwork, defeating the purpose of having campuses that are supposed to operate outside of normal red tape restrictions.

District officials who see the growth of charter schools as healthy argue that nonetheless much of the accountability and oversight has been lax and inconsistent.

They say the changes are necessary to ensure that students in both charters and district-operated campuses receive the same quality of education.

"People want charter schools to be treated separate and then the same, depending on what works to their advantage ...," said LAUSD Superintendent Ramon Cortines. "I'm trying to create a level playing field for all the children in Los Angeles."

Los Angeles Unified used to oppose the launching of new charters, but has gradually embraced the reform model in recent years under pressure from parents and politicians.

Over the past decade the number of charter schools approved within LAUSD has more than tripled, reaching 158 charter campuses this year serving nearly 58,000 students - or about 8 percent of all students in the LAUSD attendance area.

Late last year, the LAUSD board approved a sweeping reform plan that allows charters and other outside operators to take over district schools beginning this fall.

The policy to be considered this week will streamline the process for charter school approvals and enforce more oversight on the campuses, including more frequent visits by district officials.

Cortines said the intention is to make the process consistent so there is little room for debate when a school is being considered for approval or closure.

The plan also strengthens building safety standards on the maintenance and operation of charters to match those met by district-operated schools.

It will also require members of charter school boards to fill out conflict-of-interest forms, similar to those filed now by elected school board members.

Folded into the new policy is also a major push to have charter schools meet all the requirements placed on district-operated schools for special education.

District officials want to see an increase in the enrollment of students with disabilities at charter schools, along with more funding for their programs.

Charter school advocates say that while they appreciate LAUSD embracing the growth of charters, this plan will inundate the schools with paperwork and bureaucracy at a time when the reform model is being praised for innovation.

Jed Wallace, president of the California Charter School Association, said while he welcomes higher standards, he disapproves of restrictions that attempt to make the independent schools more like district-run campuses.

"We want to play on the field that is healthiest for kids," Wallace said.

"For the district to impose the same restrictions on charters as they have is ridiculous. ... That's why the movement started, because we wanted freedom from those restrictions."

Wallace said the push back comes at a time when charter school operators feel a real sense of change at LAUSD. Specifically, Wallace praised the district for moving forward with its School Choice plan, allowing charter operators, nonprofits and teacher collectives to apply to run district schools.

"There is a larger trend toward greater receptiveness to charters and that should be acknowledged and seen by all as an encouraging sign," Wallace said.

"Yet within this charter policy there is clearly still a tendency ... towards excessive regulation, and the reason charters have been so successful is because of the flexibility and autonomy they have."

A.J. Duffy, president of United Teachers Los Angeles, argued that the increased access to district facilities that charters now have means restrictions need to be imposed.

"Anybody who uses public monies should have public oversight," Duffy said.

LAUSD board member Marguerite LaMotte, who is introducing a motion to tighten special education requirements on charter schools, said that not implementing restrictions could create a two-tiered school system.

"Since we are no longer defending one public school system but we've become a system of different kinds of public schools, there needs to be equity and access," LaMotte said.

Even supporters of charters and school choice agree that some regulations have to be placed on the schools, largely because the district failed to do so years ago when the charter movement began.

"Since I have been here I have seen about six different directors for the charter school office," said LAUSD Board President Monica Garcia.

"With every new cohort of staff we got different processes and rules ... this effort is about getting that process done."

“AN UNPLANNED REVOLUTION?” Please!

smf opines re: Sundays Front page puff pieces on charter schools in the Times

Calling the ‘revolution’ ”unplanned” is like calling reality television “real”. Or even “unscripted”. What of the premeditation and designs of Villaraigosa, Barr, Riordan, Broad, Gates, Garcia and Co?  Helped by Schwarzenegger, Mitchell, Hastings, Romero, etc.?  Do the names Gates and Walmart ring a bell?

Not to mention the Times Editorial Board, which is playing LAUSD like the Chandlers played the City and the DWP back in the day.

An unplanned revolution in L.A.’s public schools

By Mitchell Landsberg, Doug Smith and Howard Blume - Enrollment is up, and overall, standardized test scores outshine those at traditional campuses. Even the L.A. Unified board has eased its resistance.  [smf: …being bought and paid for – however fair and squarely -  has that effect]

County gives Los Angeles International Charter High School a second chance

By Mitchell Landsberg - The charter had a rough start with L.A. Unified but is gaining strength with a county charter.

REVOLUTION IN U.S. EDUCATION IS IN LAUSD SAYS VOUCHER ADVOCATE

by Alan Bonsteel | OpEd in the San Francisco Chronicle

<< photo of Mayor Villaraigosa

Sunday, January 10, 2010 - The greatest revolution in education in the United States today is taking place in Los Angeles. It is the mandate of the Los Angeles Unified School District School Board to convert almost a third of its schools either to charter schools, the public schools of choice that are the one shining light in an otherwise dysfunctional system, or other alternatives such as magnet schools. The change is not only a mighty one for the state's largest school district, but in time it could double the number of public schools of choice in California.

What is remarkable is not just the magnitude of this earth-shaking change, but the complete shift of the paradigm about how we think about public education. The driving force behind this revolution is Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, who is not only a Democrat but also a former organizer for the United Teachers of Los Angeles, Los Angeles teachers' union. Villaraigosa took his nontraditional stand because, as he noted, LAUSD was racked with violence and plagued with a dropout rate of 50 percent, and showed no signs of improving.

Even more astounding: With the doors open to making bids to the school board to launch pioneering schools, groups of public school teachers and the teachers' unions themselves are submitting proposals. "This is the power that teachers have always been asking for, the authority to choose what is happening in our schools," Monterey Park English teacher Patricia Jauregui told the Los Angeles Times. She added, "With power comes responsibility. We are accountable for the results, and I don't mind that."

In his 1978 book, "Education by Choice," John Coons, UC Berkeley School of Law professor and father of the American charter school movement, predicted that one day public school teachers would see the benefit of teaching in schools in which they had professional autonomy, and in which every child wanted to be there and valued what that school had to offer. It has taken 32 years for that prediction to come to pass.

California public schools, once the envy of the nation, have students performing on some tests of reading skills barely above Mississippi students. Our once-vaunted high technology sector must import engineers from Asia. And our state budget has been busted in large part because of a bulging prison system, with more than 85 percent of the convicts high school dropouts.

At the state level too, school choice has become a far more bipartisan issue than could have been imagined even a year ago. Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg and his colleague Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, teamed up to get legislation passed that mandates more complete reporting of dropout rates.

Four of the candidates for governor of California, Republicans and Democrats both, are charter school advocates.

This is public education's fall of the Berlin Wall. The old model of the compulsory, one-size-fits-all, factory-style public school is being tossed on the scrap heap of history, to be replaced by upholding the U.N. Charter of Universal Human Rights, which guarantees the right of parents to direct the education of their children.

Someday soon, all of our children will be enrolled in schools that their families have freely chosen and that give them the sense of community, even of family, that will keep them in school and get them safely to graduation day.

 

Alan Bonsteel, M.D., is president of California Parents for Educational Choice, www.cpeconline.org.

Connect the Dots - Choice to Charters to Vouchers to Deregulation to Privatization of public schools: California Parents for Educational Choice (CPEC) has its  roots in the  1993  campaign   for   Proposition  174,  the  School Voucher Initiative.

 

This article appeared on page E - 6 of the San Francisco Chronicle

AN OBJECT LESSON: It CAN happen here …and it is!

Leonie Haimson, Executive Director, Class Size Matters writes

Throughout the city, students, parents and teachers are outraged at the unilateral decision of the DOE to close their neighborhood schools and/or put charter schools in their buildings.

These closings will likely cause skyrocketing discharge rates among those students left behind, lead to hundreds of more teachers put on Absent Teacher reserve, and create even worse overcrowding and increased class sizes for the majority of NYC students. 

The most affected will be our most vulnerable students, especially those with special needs and/or English language learners, relatively few of whom attend the small schools or charters that are slated to replace the closing schools.

The Panel on Educational Policy will vote on these proposals on Jan. 26 at Brooklyn Tech HS.

Parents want to know what can be done. 

Class Size Matters is hosting an emergency citywide conference about the proposed school closings by the Department of Education. We will be hearing from parents, students and teachers at the affected schools, and will share strategies and legal options.

When: Saturday, Jan. 16, 2010 from 9:30 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
Where: School of the Future, 127 East 22nd Street, NYC. (take the #6 to 23 St.)

Norman Siegel, famed civil rights attorney, will be one of the speakers.

Here is a flyer you can distribute to other parents. It is posted at http://www.classsizematters.org/Jan__16_2010_Parent_Conference.pdf

The conference planning committee includes Lisa Donlan, Shino Tanikawa, Khem Irby, William McDonald and Monica Major; all active parent leaders from Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx.

For more information or to volunteer to help out, please contact Leonie Haimson, Class Size Matters, at classsizematters@gmail.com; 212-674-7320 or Monica Major, Event co-chair at majorm766@gmail.com; 347-664-6712.

Please forward this message to others who care, and hope to see you there!

Leonie Haimson
Executive Director
Class Size Matters
124 Waverly Pl.
New York, NY 10011
212-674-7320
classsizematters@gmail.com
www.classsizematters.org
http://nycpublicschoolparents.blogspot.com/

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonie-haimson

Make a tax-deductible contribution to Class Size Matters now!

Subscribe to Class Size Matters news by emailing classsizematters-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

Subscribe to the NYC education news by emailing nyceducationnews-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

LAUSD IN THE NEWS: Friday, January 8, 2010

from LAUSD

LOS ANGELES TIMES

Opinion

Better teachers, the union way

United Teachers Los Angeles leaders offer ways to improve teachers and the education system.

By A.J. Duffy, Julie Washington and Gregg Solkovits

January 8, 2010

Great teachers aren't born -- they evolve. They must have certain things starting out, of course: a passion for knowledge and a love of working with children, to cite two. But it then takes years of study and practice to master the art of teaching.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-duffy8-2010jan08,0,5514515,print.story

Schwarzenegger signs school legislation

The bills, meant to increase the state's eligibility for federal grants, call for districts to take aggressive steps to improve failing schools. Teachers unions and other groups fought the measures.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is applauded by a history class at Bethune Middle School in Los Angeles after signing two education bills there. The legislation is intended to improve California's eligibility for federal Race to the Top school funding by encouraging districts to take tough action to improve failing campuses. Teachers unions and other groups opposed the bills. (Lawrence K. Ho / Los Angeles Times / January 7, 2010)

By Howard Blume

January 8, 2010

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger visited a Los Angeles middle school Thursday to celebrate legislation that sets the course for future school reforms and improves the state's chances at qualifying for federal money to carry them out.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-race8-2010jan08,0,7273172.story

Magnet school deadline moved up for L.A. Unified

November 9, 2009 |  6:00 am

The application deadline for the popular local magnet-school program is three weeks earlier this year. Parents will have only until Dec. 18 to turn in applications for their choice among 173 magnet programs in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/11/magnet-school-deadline-moved-up-in-la-unified.html

DAILY NEWS

State board gives more control to charter schools for students with special needs

By Connie Llanos, Staff Writer

Updated: 01/08/2010 01:07:39 AM PST

The State Board of Education approved a plan Thursday that gives independent charter schools statewide more control over how they educate their special-needs students.

http://www.dailynews.com/ci_14146286

Worst schools: Letters for Friday, Jan. 8

Updated: 01/07/2010 08:47:00 PM PST

Worst schools

Re "Assembly backs broadening parents' powers to change worst campuses" (Jan. 6):

Siphoning off top students by charter, religious, private, home and magnet schools leaves many public schools with below-average student bodies. Some are labeled 10 worst.

Obtaining good test scores from below-average student bodies requires more than good teaching. In fact, teaching in the worst schools, being very challenging, is likely to create the best teaching.

Blaming teachers for the low grades is failing to understand that intelligence is genetic and unalterable, and that some student bodies fall on the lower end of the Bell curve.

- FRED COBLE

North Hills

SAN FRANCISCO GATE

'A' for education effort

Friday, January 8, 2010

As far as education reform is concerned, 2010 is off to a good start. The California Legislature approved important reforms for California's application for federal Race to the Top funds on Tuesday, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed them on Thursday.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/01/08/EDBL1BEFD2.DTL&type=printable

State education plan makes parents responsible

Nanette Asimov, Chronicle Staff Writer

Friday, January 8, 2010

Giving parents their choice of schools. Making sure teachers are qualified. Forcing bad schools to improve.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/01/08/MNT41BEGO3.DTL&type=printable

USA TODAY

California passes major school-reform package

SACRAMENTO (AP) — The California Legislature has sent Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger landmark education reforms designed to overhaul the state's worst schools.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2010-01-06-California-education_N.htm

COURT(?) TO DECIDE LAUSD’S BATTLE WITH CHARTERS: “The debate is more about adult politics than improving children's education”

smf: The State Board of Ed , made up of Schwarzenegger appointed charter proponents, is a court only in the same sense as as a medieval warlord’s was!

By Connie Llanos Staff Writer | LA Daily News

Thursday, 1/07/2010 11:11:59 AM PST -- A battle between Los Angeles Unified and charter groups could be decided today when the State Board of Education is expected to rule whether charters statewide can take complete control of educating their special needs students.

Publicly funded and independently run charters have argued that they should control special education funding, as they do for their general education student population. They accuse large school districts like LAUSD of controlling federal special education dollars and obstructing charters from getting their fair share.

But L.A. Unified officials say charters traditionally cherry pick special education students with less severe disabilities and leave LAUSD with severely disabled students who are more expensive to teach.

That was essentially the conclusion of a summer report by the Office of the Independent Monitor, set up to oversee a federal consent decree placed on the district for special education services.

"There is no research that shows how (the charter) plan will better serve students with disabilities," said Sharyn Howell, LAUSD's executive director of special education.  The debate, she said, is more about adult politics than improving children's education.

Howell said she will ask the state board to delay its vote on a plan that she said could further cripple LAUSD's ability to meet the needs of all special education students.

The issue comes as LAUSD, which already has the largest number of charter schools of any district in the country, is expected to allow more of the independent campuses to open under a new plan that lets outside operators apply to run district schools.

Charter school advocates say LAUSD and other large urban districts need to understand that the independent schools have a legal right to seek federal and state special education money.

"The heart of charter law is flexibility and autonomy in exchange for accountability and, if you go back to the law, you'll see that includes special education services," said Jed Wallace, president of the California Charter Schools Association.

LAUSD officials though, believe that this plan could simply strip the district of more special education funding, without reducing the number of special education students the district has to serve.

While federal and state law requires school districts to provide a complete menu of services to all students with disabilities, the cost to run the program exceeds available funding.

At LAUSD that deficit is about $700 million.

Currently special education is funded based on a district's total enrollment - not on the number of special education students.

So as LAUSD loses more students to increasing charter enrollment, families moving out of Los Angeles and other factors, it loses funding for special education. But district statistics show that the special education population is not dropping at the same rate.

According to the Office of the Independent Monitor report, students with special needs made up 11.2 percent of LAUSD's population in the 2008-2009 school year while they made up 7 percent of the population at charter schools.

The report also found that students with severe disabilities only make up 1 percent of the total enrollment at charter schools - within LAUSD they make up 3 percent - and the largest number of those students can be found at dependent charter schools, which are still managed by LAUSD.

 

[story continues http://bit.ly/4r5sF2]

 

UTLA v. LAUSD: Lawsuit filing contending the Public School Choice Resolution

UTLA v LAUSD

HORSES WITH FEATHERS

response to email to 4LAKids

A longtime 4LAKids reader – a retired teacher/administrator/union leader (once an educator/always an educator!) - writes, apropos of last week's “Cheerio” rant [http://bit.ly/7K282r] - about NCLB/Race2theTop/Public School Choice (all horses of the same feather) - and the previous one “Y2K+10” [http://bit.ly/4GG9Ys] and the Grab4theMoney rush to deregulate Public Education:

“Good analysis of the trend in education in the first decade of the new millennium.  We have a new breed of politician/educators or politicators.  We used to have the Deweys and Hunters of the world who were actually looking at how children learned....now we have the Cortines and Mitchells of the world who are looking for ways to placate their political benefactors.  You are correct.....actual student learning is not discussed or considered.....that is too much like pragmatic work.”

●● 4LAKids wrote previously about the penchant for US Secretaries of Education and the presidents they serve to look wistfully upon their previous employment as Civic Miracles/Paradigms of Wonderfulness. [IOUs ON IOUs 12July09 http://bit.ly/A7Yax]  That penchant and those paradigms are further developed in a series of articles in the Washington Post here. http://bit.ly/92k8J7

Race to the Top/Grab for the Money: LAUSD AGREES TO STATE MANDATE + ASSEMBLY OK’s BILLS TO CHANGE CA SCHOOLS + More

●●smf’s 2¢: Now that NCLB has left the station – and the train wreck has already occurred – California & LAUSD climb aboard!    Other districts aren’t s anxious for the one time money.

LAUSD agrees to state mandate

By Connie Llanos, Staff Writer | LA Daily News

01/05/2010 08:32:48 PM PST -- The Los Angeles Unified school board agreed in principle Tuesday to accept new state accountability standards for teachers, principals and schools, potentially making the district eligible for millions of federal dollars.

At least 800 other school districts statewide have also agreed to implement new reforms in exchange for a shot at the $4.35 billion available in competitive federal "Race to the Top" grants. Those reforms could include using test data to evaluate teachers and pushing for the shutdown of low-performing schools - policies long opposed by teacher unions.

The board's approval came as the state Legislature also voted on two bills to change state law to allow some of the controversial reforms required by the Obama administration to qualify for the grants.

"What I am asking you to do today is to approve a placeholder for LAUSD so that if the state gets Race to the Top dollars, we are there to receive them," said LAUSD Superintendent Ramon Cortines.

While it is not clear how many states will ultimately qualify for the grants, it is expected that between 10 to 20 states will receive money during the program's first round. It is estimated that California could earn up to $700 million if it qualifies.

Since LAUSD students represent about 10 percent of the state's student population and the largest portion of California's low-income students who are targeted by the federal grant, the district stands to receive a substantial portion of what the state receives. 

ENTIRE STORY: http://bit.ly/5aef4d

---

Assembly OKs bills to change California schools

By Patrick McGreevy and Howard Blume | LA Times

Parents would be given more power to transfer children out of poorly performing campuses and petition for changes, including removal of the principal. Teachers unions oppose the provisions.

ENTIRE STORY: http://bit.ly/6cbjEG

---

• Education reform: California to join Race to the Top rush Christian Science Monitor

• Calif. Education Reform Bills Before State Senate ABC News

• San Francisco Chronicle 

•  New York Times 

• abc7news.com 

• Pasadena Star-News

L.A. UNION SUES OVER CHARTER PLAN

News in Brief In Ed Week Vol. 29, Issue 16, Page 4| By Lesli A. Maxwell

Published Online: January 5, 2010  | Published in Print: January 6, 2010 --The Los Angeles teachers’ union has sued to block a policy of the Los Angeles Unified School District that will potentially allow outside managers, including charter school operators, to run dozens of new and existing public schools.

United Teachers Los Angeles, a 48,000-member affiliate of both the National Education Association and the American Federation of Teachers, contends in the Dec. 21 lawsuit that the district’s school choice resolution—passed by the board of education in August—violates state law because it would allow charter school operators to take over campuses and hire their own nonunion teachers. Union leaders say California’s education code requires that a majority of tenured teachers at a school site must sign a petition calling for the school’s conversion to charter status.

The union does not object to the new policy’s provision that allows for noncharter entities, such as groups of teachers, to bid for managing the targeted schools.

The lawsuit was filed three weeks before a deadline for proposals to operate the first 30 schools that Superintendent Ramon C. Cortines has identified for new management next fall. He will review the management proposals and make final recommendations to the school board, which is slated to vote next month.

COURT RULES THAT SCHOOL BOARD E-MAILS ARE PUBLIC INFORMATION

Massachusetts court also finds that superintendent’s performance review is not a personnel matter

By The Associated Press

January 4, 2010 – Boston --The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has ruled e-mails exchanged by members of the Wayland School Committee must be made public under the state's open meeting law.

Thursday's ruling stemmed from a 2005 complaint lodged by a reporter for the Wayland Town Crier.

The district attorney argued the committee violated the law by holding two closed door meetings on the fate of the superintendent and circulating e-mails before the meetings.

The committee argued the e-mails were exempt because they were preliminary communications and the meetings were exempt because they dealt with personnel issues.

The SJC disagreed, ruling the meetings dealt with professional competence, not salary or contract issues.

The court also ruled the e-mails are public since the substance of the exchanges would have been stated orally at the meeting.

LEGAL OPINION: DISTRICT ATTORNEY FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT vs. SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF WAYLAND. SJC-10406

High court rules that Wayland board violated open meeting law

By Martin Finucane, Boston Globe Staff

December 31, 2009 02:36 PM -- In the final chapter of a long legal saga, the state's highest court ruled today that an exchange of e-mails among Wayland School Committee members about the performance of the school superintendent violated the state's open meeting law.

The "private e-mail exchange ... violated the letter and spirit of the open meeting law," the Supreme Judicial Court ruled.

"Governmental bodies may not circumvent the requirements of the open meeting law by conducting deliberations via private messages, whether electronically, in person, over the telephone, or in any other form," the court said in a five-page opinion written by Justice Francis X. Spina.

The court rejected the School Committee's argument that "preliminary e-mail communications" between the school committee members were not considered "records of a meeting" and were not subject to the open meetings law disclosure requirements.

The school committee chairman sent out a request for input on the superintendent's performance in June 2004. Three of the four members responded, either to the superintendent or the whole committee.

A reporter for the Wayland Town Crier filed a complaint with the Middlesex district attorney's office alleging that the process of evaluating the superintendent had violated the open meeting law. The district attorney found that the e-mails and two subsequent executive sessions violated the open meeting law and sued in Superior Court.

The Superior Court ruled in favor of the school committee, but the Supreme Judicial Court reversed that ruling today.

“We are pleased with the Supreme Judicial Court's decision in this matter and with the clarification the Court has given regarding the public's important right to access meetings of governmental bodies. We intend to work with school systems in Middlesex County when and where necessary to help ensure their full understanding of the Court’s findings and its resulting implications," District Attorney Gerry Leone said in a statement.

Regina Williams Tate, the attorney representing the school committee, did not return a message seeking comment this afternoon.

Robert Ambrogi, who filed an amicus brief on behalf of the Massachusetts Newspaper Publishers Association, said the opinion was important, among other reasons, because it affirmed that discussion of a government employee's professional competence had to be conducted in public and because it affirmed that an exchange of emails among members of a government board can constitute an open meeting.

He said the latter point had already been generally accepted, but it was the first time the court had specifically ruled on the issue.

LEGAL OPINION: DISTRICT ATTORNEY FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT vs. SCHOOL COMMITTEE OF WAYLAND. SJC-10406

MORE HEADLINES: Knowledgeable parents trigger autism, Another emergency session, Union leaders plead for education, Poor education investment = Poor literacy

from Rough&Tumble

Autism cluster found in Santa Clara County linked to parent education, not neighborhood toxins -- Researchers have identified a cluster of autism cases in the South Bay — but the elevated regional incidence seems linked to parents' ability to gain a diagnosis for their child, rather than any geographic risk. Lisa M. Krieger in the San Jose Mercury -- 1/5/10

Governor to call emergency session for current budget -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger intends to call the Legislature into emergency session to confront a nearly $6.3 billion budget gap in the current fiscal year. The governor is expected to outline his proposed solutions by Friday – when he will unveil his new budget for the 2010-11 fiscal year that begins July 1. John Howard and Anthony York in Capitol Weekly -- 1/5/10

Union leaders ask governor not to cut education funds -- State labor leaders held a conference call today to urge Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger not to propose education funding cuts when he releases his budget later this week. Jason Song in the Los Angeles Times -- 1/5/10

California's literacy drops in national rankings -- California's oft-documented social and economic ills have a new symptom: A declining level of literacy, at least as measured by an annual study by Central Connecticut State University. Dan Walters SacBee Capitol Alert -- 1/5/10

The ‘Houston Miracle’ + Rod Paige revisited? EDUCATION CHIEF ARNE DUNCAN’S LEGACY AS CHICAGO SCHOOLS CHIEF QUESTIONED

By Nick Anderson |Washington Post Staff Writer

Tuesday, December 29, 2009; -- CHICAGO -- Soon after Arne Duncan left his job as schools chief here to become one of the most powerful U.S. education secretaries ever, his former students sat for federal achievement tests. This month, the mathematics report card was delivered: Chicago trailed several cities in performance and progress made over six years.

Miami, Houston and New York had higher scores than Chicago on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Boston, San Diego and Atlanta had bigger gains. Even fourth-graders in the much-maligned D.C. schools improved nearly twice as much since 2003.

The federal readout is just one measure of Duncan's record as chief executive of the nation's third-largest system. Others show advances on various fronts. But the new math scores signal that Chicago is nowhere near the head of the pack in urban school improvement, even though Duncan often cites the successes of his tenure as he crusades to fix public education.

"Chicago is not the story of an education miracle," said Chester E. Finn Jr. of the Thomas B. Fordham Institute, an education think tank in Washington. "It is, however, the story of a large urban system that has made some gains and has made some promising structural changes."

For more than seven years, starting in 2001, Duncan tried to rejuvenate his city's struggling schools: jettisoning staff, hiring turnaround specialists, shutting down those deemed beyond hope. He pushed a back-to-basics curriculum, spawned dozens of charter schools and experimented with performance pay. State and federal test scores and graduation rates rose on his watch, and Chicago became a laboratory for innovation. As a result, the reputation of its schools has improved markedly since 1987, when an earlier education secretary, William Bennett, called them the worst in the country.

'Focused on outcomes'

Yet questions have arisen this year about the magnitude of Duncan's accomplishments. The Civic Committee of the Commercial Club of Chicago, which represents business, professional, education and cultural leaders, concluded in June that gains on state test scores were inflated when Illinois relaxed passing standards and that too many students still drop out of high school or graduate unprepared for college. The Consortium on Chicago School Research, a nonpartisan group at the University of Chicago, reported in October that Duncan's closure of low-performing schools often shuffled students into comparable schools, yielding little or no academic benefit.

"Obviously, you always want to get better faster," Duncan said in an interview when asked about the federal math scores. "I was focused on outcomes -- improving graduation rates, making sure that students who graduated had a chance to pursue higher ed. You can have the best test scores in the world, but if kids aren't going that next step, you're not changing their lives."

Duncan also said he had adjusted his school closure policy a few years ago to ensure better opportunities for students. He said that he was unhappy that the state had relaxed passing standards and that graduation rates remain unacceptable. About half of Chicago students fail to graduate on time with their peers.

In January, Duncan said at his Senate confirmation hearing: "We're proud to have made significant progress . . . and to really be a model of national reform. But again, hard work is going to continue there and is far from done."

In the interview, Duncan said he is careful not to exaggerate his record. Critics, however, say his legacy is routinely overblown.

"There's been this rhetoric about dramatic gains, dramatic success, that we have to replicate this model because of its dramatic success," said Julie Woestehoff of the advocacy group Parents United for Responsible Education. "And here in Chicago, we're looking at these schools and going, 'Uh . . . ' "

In 2003, President George W. Bush's education secretary, Rod Paige, faced similar, perhaps stronger, criticism when his much-highlighted record as leader of Houston's schools in the 1990s came under scrutiny. Questions were raised that year about the reliability of Houston's reported dropout rates.

Duncan's record is of more than historical interest. He wields considerable power through the combination of his Chicago connections, shared with President Obama, and his oversight of billions of dollars in reform funding. The Education Department is dangling an unprecedented $3.5 billion in grants for school systems to turn around weak schools and $4 billion for states to pursue innovation.

Huge challenges

With 418,000 students in 675 schools, Chicago faces challenges on a scale exceeded only in Los Angeles and New York. Eighty-five percent of students come from poor families, and 12 percent have limited English skills.

Tours in a handful of Chicago schools this month found educators pushing against formidable obstacles to establish a climate of learning. For some, simply asserting control over a campus represents a big victory.

In the North Lawndale neighborhood west of downtown, dotted by decaying rowhouses and apartments, Johnson Elementary School was given a new staff this year and renamed the Johnson School of Excellence. Duncan, in one of his last actions before leaving Chicago, proposed the restart in January because of the school's perennially low test scores. The nonprofit Academy for Urban School Leadership, which pairs master's degree candidates with teaching mentors in a residency program, runs the school and 13 others under contract. Johnson serves 300 students from pre-K through grade 8.

In the last school year, officials said, police were called to the campus nearly every day to deal with angry parents or disruptive students.

"It was a war scene," said Jennifer Earthley, mother of a fourth-grader and a fan of the new regime. "The administrators were afraid of the children. The children did what they wanted to do. We have been on the low end for a long time. All we have been looking for is a passionate group of people who care."

Now, attendance is up and fights are down. Students are drilled on respect, manners and lining up in the halls. In one fourth-grade classroom, teacher Katelyn Funderburk counted "5-4-3-2-1" after asking students to pull out their textbooks. "Steven Earthley got it opened fast and folded his hands," she said. "Thank you."

Hitting the reset button

At William R. Harper High School in West Englewood, loudspeakers blared the theme to "Beverly Hills Cop" one afternoon and students swirled in the hallways as the principal shooed stragglers to class. "Let's go! Let's go!" Kenyatta Stansberry called out. "Y'all are going to be late. Let's go, baby! You need to run!"

The 700-student school, in an area blighted with crime and boarded-up houses, had fallen on hard times when Stansberry took over in 2007. She said she spent much of her first year dashing to altercations -- the intercom alert "10-10 on 2," for example, would mean a fight on the second floor -- and extracting the campus from the Crash Town gang's grip.

Then Duncan hit the reset button (another purge a decade earlier had failed to yield much improvement). Stansberry stayed, although most of the staff was let go. She was given extra resources, including three deans to help manage students, money for gifts and incentives, and a reading catch-up program. Misconduct fell, attendance rose and test scores edged up a bit. More ninth-graders were rated on track to receive a diploma.

Neighborhood troubles remain a deep concern. Stansberry said four of her students died violently off campus in the last school year. Such killings became a national issue this fall after a student, Derrion Albert, was beaten to death near Christian Fenger Academy High School on the city's South Side. Duncan returned to Chicago in October with Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to pledge a campaign against youth violence.

As if in solidarity with that goal, posters of Gandhi and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. flank the whiteboard in English teacher Fadia Afaneh's room at Harper. She high-fived her ninth-graders as they placed commas correctly in sentences, transforming street lingo into standard English. Much of what she teaches is remedial, Afaneh said, but she is determined to help students advance. First, she teaches them to write a complete sentence. Then, a paragraph.

"Basically, all kids deserve an excellent education," she said, "and that doesn't always happen in this country. I know."

• Read Answer Sheet blogger Valerie Strauss on why Arne Duncan's record from Chicago matters.
• For all the Post's Education coverage, please see http://washingtonpost.com/education. Or follow us on Facebook on the Post's Education News fan page.
• View all comments that have been posted about this article.

1●5●2010 UCLA/IDEA CALIFORNIA EDUCATION NEWS ROUNDUP

Districts ready to Race …but will they really sign?

Blog by John Fensterwald/Educated Guess

California will have some impressive numbers to show the feds, if most of the districts that have expressed interest in the federal Race to the Top competition follow through this week and sign the dotted line to participate in the state’s as yet unfinished application. Nine of the state’s 10 largest school districts – every one but San Diego Unified — and 23 of the top 30 districts sent in letters of intent to join the program. In total, 798 of the approximately 1,800 school districts, county offices of education and charter schools showed interest. They educate 3.8 million of the state’s 6.25 million public school students – 61 percent.Not bad numbers, especially considering that the state provided the wording of the memorandum of understanding to commit to the program only a few weeks ago. (more...)

Class size reduction: California drops the ball

Opinion by Delaine Eastin/San Francisco Chronicle

I am heartsick that some California school districts are backing away from class size reduction, a reform that is being whittled away in this terrible budget climate. I believe today as I did when I was elected in 1994, that the budget of a state is like the budget of a family: it is a statement of values. I believe that class size reduction is even more important today than it was in the mid-1990's when we implemented it. The decision to undermine class size reduction, to lower the number of days in the school year, to lay off teachers, counselors, nurses, crossing guards, to close schools, to reduce preschool, to reduce honors classes and even to raise fees at our colleges and universities is a shame and a disgrace. It is being done in a state that was suckered into recklessly passing a high-speed rail so the rich could ride in style while our poor children are being starved educationally. I will come back to this, but first let me say a few words about how we got here. (more...)

Rules of (child) engagement

By Jennifer Torres/San Joaquin Record

More American children are engaged in school - they are interested in their assignments, they work hard, they enjoy attending - and more are involved in the kinds of extracurricular activities that help keep them engaged than were about a decade ago, according to a recently published report from the Census Bureau. But the census also found that student engagement is related to parent education, family income and other factors with which San Joaquin County has tended to struggle. In "A Child's Day," Census Bureau analysts surveyed parents - mothers, for the most part - on their children's attitudes toward and performance at school, as well as on details about their home lives: Are there rules established for watching television? Do the children eat dinner with their parents most nights? Do parents praise their children regularly? Do the children take part in sports and other out-of-school activities? (more...)

Race to the Top coming down to the wire

By Mina Kim/California Report (audio file)

As the state legislature reconvenes this week, one of the most pressing items on the agenda is passing the so-called Race to the Top bill. That's California's bid for a share of billions of dollars the federal government is offering to push change in public education. The deadline is in two weeks. (more...)

California set to pass education overhaul plan

By Marisa Lagos/San Francisco Chronicle

The California Legislature is poised to pass an education plan today that makes far-reaching changes to how public schools are governed, giving parents the power to transfer their kids out of failing schools and to force districts to overhaul bad schools. The dramatic changes to California's education policies have been debated for months. They are intended to make the state competitive for up to $700 million in federal dollars under President Obama's $4.3 billion Race to the Top program, which promises funding to states that embrace education policies outlined by the president by a Jan. 19 application deadline. Millions more dollars may also be at stake for the financially struggling state, as the Obama administration is expected to tie future education funding to some of his Race to the Top provisions. (more...)

Where's the 2009 love?

Blog by Patrick Riccards/Eduflak

Yes, I recognize that we have started a new year. But Eduflack is also mindful of the words of Winston Churchill that "those who fail to learn from history, are doomed to repeat it." [smf: uh, oh! – Churchill didn’t say that; It was philosopher-poet, Georges Santayana, who said "those who do not study history are doomed to repeat it." --sometimes called Santayana's Law of Repetitive Consequences.] So I can't start the new year without looking over those lovely Year in Review editions put out by Time and Newsweek last week. Those of us who have been hip deep in the education improvement movement often operate with blinders on, believing that the topics and issues that we are focused on are what the entire world are most concerned with. About a month ago, Brookings came out with a study calculating that only 1.4 percent of the national news coverage in 2009 was education-related. (Personally, as painful as the statistic was, I'd hate to see that number if we excluded coverage of Teach for America and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation). (more...)

Schools are facing new round of cuts

By Cheri Carlson/Ventura County Star

Months after losing hundreds of teachers, raising class sizes and cutting school days, public school officials likely will again be faced with budget deficits heading into 2010-11. Even without further state funding cuts, school districts will have to find ways to fill holes left by short-term fixes to deal with this year’s steep state cuts, including one-time federal stimulus cash handed out in 2009. “The quality of education in California is going to be affected because of the financial problems at the state level,” said county Associate Superintendent Ken Prosser.This month, California school districts had to hand in their first revised budgets of the fiscal year, a multi-year financial plan. Local districts turn in reports to the Ventura County Office of Education, which provides an independent review before certifying results for the state. (more...)

District needs a leader / Dropping superintendent post would be calamitous

Editorial/Sign On San Diego

Continuing its radical consolidation of power, the San Diego Unified school board majority has scheduled a special meeting today at which members are expected to take the first step toward eliminating the position of superintendent. This would be a calamitous mistake, one that would make city schools a national laughingstock. Parents of students in San Diego Unified aren’t the only ones who should be up in arms. Everyone who cares about San Diego’s future should be alarmed. Board members Shelia Jackson, Richard Barrera and John Lee Evans will pretend the decision to adopt an “alternative school district leadership model” is about efficiency or reform or even saving money, but no one should have any illusion about what’s going on. This is a power grab, plain and simple. (more...)

Students in need get bus fare help

By Leonel Sanchez/San Diego Union-Tribune

When Consuelo Manriquez arrived as a new principal at San Diego High School this fall, she noticed a problem with attendance and tardiness and quickly learned a sad truth. Many students who live in the low-income neighborhoods that the downtown school draws live far from the campus and can’t afford public transportation. “There’s no money,” she said. “Parents are unemployed, got laid off and the rent is so high.” The San Diego Unified School District provides transportation to the school only for special education students and students attending magnet programs. And many students who aren’t within walking distance can’t afford the $36 monthly bus and trolley passes from the Metropolitan Transit System. Manriquez believes her school’s low-academic standing would improve with better attendance and appealed to friends to help raise money for passes for students who applied for transportation scholarships. (more...)

Charter school focusing on Hmong children proposed in Sacramento

By Diana Lambert/Sacramento Bee

A group of Sacramento parents, educators and business professionals wants to open a charter school that will focus on teaching Hmong children, who have largely fallen through the cracks at regular public schools. Hmong students in the Sacramento City Unified School District had the lowest scores – collectively – of all the district's ethnic groups on the English language arts section of standardized tests last year and the year before. Studies show Hmong struggle in school districts throughout the nation. The result: A large number of Hmong youths are relegated to a life of gangs, crime or low-paying jobs, said Dennis Mah, president of the Urban Charter School Collective, formed to start the school. This can be a perplexing problem in a region that is home to 30,000 Hmong. (more...)

Error could cost CVUSD millions

By Neil Nisperos/Inland Valley Daily Bulletin

The Chino Valley school district is hoping for the best but preparing for a possible state decision to penalize the district $8 million for missing instructional minutes last year at two elementary schools. An accounting error led to the amount of instructional time at Rolling Ridge and Dickson elementary schools last year falling short of state requirements. The estimated penalty by the state Department of Education is a potential loss of about $1 million in state funding for each of the next eight years, said Geri Partida, Chino Valley Unified School District assistant superintendent of business services. District officials plan to appeal to the state to minimize the penalties, though there is also the potential for affected students to be required to attend additional extended school days, officials said. (more...)

The California Education News Roundup is a daily publication that highlights news and commentary about California educational policy, educational reform, and related items of interest to California's educational justice community. Included are brief summaries and links to full articles from mainstream media, ethnic media, and select blogs. The News Roundup also features local education stories related to statewide education issues or to local advocacy campaigns. Finally, the Roundup includes selected national stories that may affect California educational policy and reform.

1●4●2010 UCLA/IDEA CALIFORNIA EDUCATION NEWS ROUNDUP

Assembly should pass bill to name, repair 10 worst California schools

Editorial/San Jose Mercury News

01-04-2010 - Of the many education reforms proposed recently in the Legislature, Senate Bill 742 is not the most sweeping. But it's one of the smartest. The bill, which would require the state to identify and fix the 10 worst public schools, sailed through the Senate in June but is stuck in the Assembly Appropriations Committee. It should be passed. It may seem surprising that this law would be necessary. Why doesn't the state already have to name and repair all its badly performing schools? In the face of opposition to broader reform from teachers unions and administrators, the bill's authors say, they had to start somewhere. The beauty of this approach is that while it seems like a small step, it's likely to have a tremendous impact beyond just these 10 schools. Year after year, nearly 1,000 schools have failed to improve on a range of key measures despite billions of extra taxpayer dollars. (more...)

 

New year, new priorities?

National Journal

01-04-2010 - During 2009, the various educational programs and grant competitions fueled by economic stimulus funds dominated the national education agenda. The Obama administration's $4.35 billion Race to the Top competition garnered significant attention and is thought to provide a blueprint for the upcoming reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. Going forward into 2010, what should the No. 1 education priority be for Congress and the administration? What do you predict will define education policy this year? How much attention will Washington pay to education issues in an election year in which many other high-profile issues are already crowding the agenda? (more...)

 

Behind-the-scenes maneuvers on parental reforms

Blog by John Fensterwald/Educated Guess

01-04-2010  - There likely will be action today in the Assembly on compromise Race to the Top legislation, as scheduled. But instead of one big bill, two reforms opposed by the school boards association and the state teachers union will be shoved into a separate bill, which the lobbies hope to kill. At least that’s the word I got late last night, after a day of intense negotiations. Both reforms would give more power to families in chronically failing schools. So Democrats in the Assembly will find themselves having to choose between the interests of the union and that of parents. When last we left it, before Christmas, SBX5-4 has passed the Senate and was awaiting action in the Assembly. It still is. The bill would put California on firmer ground in competing for a piece of the Obama administration’s $4.3 billion school reform grant program. (more...)

 

Massive budget cuts to education

By Gloria Penner, Ana Tintocalis/KPBS San Diego

01-04-2010  - GLORIA PENNER (Host): The state’s budget also hit close to home this year on the education front, where massive cuts were made to both K-12 and higher education. So with me now to look at the impact of these cuts is KPBS education reporter Ana Tintocalis. Welcome, Ana. ANA TINTOCALIS (KPBS Education Reporter): Thank you. PENNER: Give us a sense of how much education actually was cut locally in K-12 school districts. TINTOCALIS: Well, I would say hundreds of millions of dollars in San Diego County. And it’s difficult because it varies among public school districts. So take San Diego Unified for example. Over the past year they saw about $200 million cut, a state funding shortfall of that amount of money. And so what they were able to do this past year, which bailed them out basically, was that they put out an early retirement plan for veteran teachers. So veteran teachers took this deal and they left. And that was one way for the district to avoid teacher layoffs. (more...)

 

Are students languishing in English learner programs?

By Shirin Parsavand/Intersections L.A.

01-04-2010 -- Students who enter school knowing little English often remain in English learner  programs for their entire school careers. That students remain in these programs for years without becoming fluent in English has long been known, but there is little agreement on what to do about it. A recent report looked at the problem in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Nearly 30 percent of students who start first grade as English learners in Los Angeles Unified are not reclassified by eighth grade, according to the report from USC’s Tomas Rivera Policy Institute. Those who remain in English learner programs when they enter high school do worse in school and are more likely to drop out than students who are reclassified, even after controlling for past academic performance, according to the study released in October, “Qué Pasa?: Are English Language Learning Students Remaining in English Learning Classes Too Long?” (more...)

 

Cuts choking area school libraries

By Michelle Hatfield/Modesto Bee

01-04-2010  - The heart of most schools is the library. It's a place to check out the latest vampire book, print an English essay, learn about the differences between fact and opinion, unearth that last source for a history paper, or find refuge and quiet time to read. But as the recession squeezes funding from schools, officials have cut back on nonacademic support programs, including libraries. Take Davis High School, where librarian Stephen Walker's annual supplies budget has been stripped from $76,000 to $4,000 to cover the cost of copy paper, printer ink, magazine and newspaper subscriptions, college guides and Advanced Placement test preparation books. "When they do these cuts, they always say 'students come first,' " said Walker, noting that the library records 80,000 to 100,000 contacts with students each year. "But if you go down to the district office, you're going to see flat screens, the newest software and the newest computers." (more...)

'Race to Top' viewed as template for a new ESEA

By Alyson Klein/Education Week (subscription required)

01-04-2010  -- Educators hoping for a glimpse at the next rendition of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act may want to take a close look at the rules for the Race to the Top program, which pushes states to adopt education redesign principles that federal officials say are likely to be the cornerstone of the Obama administration’s plans for a new ESEA. The $4 billion Race to the Top competition, created under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, aims to reward states for making progress on a series of redesign “assurances,” including turning around low-performing schools, improving teacher quality and distribution, bolstering state data systems, and improving the use of data and assessments. Those themes are likely to inform the U.S. Department of Education’s plans for reauthorization of the ESEA, of which the 8-year-old No Child Left Behind Act is the most recent iteration, said Carmel Martin, the department’s assistant secretary for planning, evaluation, and policy development, in an interview with Education Week reporters late last year. (more...)

 

A good move for South L.A. neighborhood

By Scott Gold/Los Angeles Times

01-04-2010  -- As part of a plan to bring affordable housing to a gritty part of town, city officials want to relocate a metal finishing firm charged with illegal dumping. She suspected that the source of their troubles was the little plant across from the school. She began poring over government documents. She knew little English at the time, but some words jumped out, such as "emissions." And yet, at every turn, officials kept telling her the area was safe. "I just thought: 'But how do you know that?' " she said. She joined forces with the nonprofit Assn. of Community Organizations for Reform Now, known by its acronym ACORN, becoming president of her neighborhood chapter. That gave her a bigger platform. City Hall began taking notice. Government regulators came next. (more...)

 

Natomas budget cuts hit classrooms; parents worried

By Diana Lambert/Sacramento Bee

01-04-2010  -- Natomas Unified School District officials have reached deep into classrooms to balance their budget. They have cut days from the school year, reduced class periods for most juniors and seniors, relaxed graduation requirements and eliminated summer school. And parents are worried. "They need to start putting the kids first," said Elena Quintero, president of the Inderkum High School Parent Teacher Student Association. She is concerned about the district's decision to reduce the number of units required for graduation and to cut counselors. "Counselors now don't even have the time to go over a schedule with kids, let alone go over graduation requirements and college applications," said Quintero, whose son is a freshman at the school. (more...)

 

Beverly Hills schools want to boot out-of-district 'opportunity' students

By Christina Hoag/San Jose Mercury News

01-04-2010 -- Threats on Facebook, name-calling, security guard escorts — tempers are running high around schools these days in this normally sedate enclave of ostentatious wealth. The reason: The Beverly Hills school board is preparing to boot out 10 percent of its students as it ends a decades-old practice of allowing out-of-district pupils to attend city schools on "opportunity permits." The move has upset many so-called permit parents — mostly middle-class families living in the tonier areas of Los Angeles who are loath to send their children to the beleaguered Los Angeles Unified School District, where more than a quarter of high-schoolers drop out. "Every family on permit is outraged," said Simy Levy, a Los Angeles resident whose two daughters attend school in Beverly Hills. "It's incredibly unfair." The plan, which is expected to get final board approval next month, comes as Beverly Hills Unified School District switches to a budget plan financed directly by the city's well-to-do tax base instead of with state money based on enrollment. (more...)

 

Living the education gap as a San Jose teacher

Commentary by Iliana Perez/New America Media

01-04-2010 --  In Washington, D.C., as politicians discussed health care and the economy, a group of students, educators and organizers convened at the Opportunity to Learn Conference to talk about what was most urgent to us – education. We gathered at the Marriot Hotel in Arlington to talk specifically about the education opportunity gap - the gap that divides students based on their access to education. Rather than focusing on comparing school achievement, the conference focused on schools’ accessibility to resources, quality teachers and effective curriculum. We stepped away from measuring achievement and asked the more fundamental question: “How can all students be assessed at the same standard of achievement if they are not receiving the same level of education?” As causes and solutions were discussed, we collectively surfaced ideas that ranged from national legislation to changing neighborhood bus schedules. (more...)

The California Education News Roundup is a daily publication that highlights news and commentary about California educational policy, educational reform, and related items of interest to California's educational justice community. Included are brief summaries and links to full articles from mainstream media, ethnic media, and select blogs. The News Roundup also features local education stories related to statewide education issues or to local advocacy campaigns. Finally, the Roundup includes selected national stories that may affect California educational policy and reform.

LAUSD MEETING WILL DISCUSS FEDERAL GRANT MONEY

 

from Daily Breeze School Briefs

Posted: 01/03/2010 09:41:02 PM PST

The board of the Los Angeles Unified School District will hold a special meeting Tuesday to consider an agreement with the state to apply for major federal grants.

The deal would make LAUSD eligible for Race to the Top funds, $4.35 billion in stimulus funding that the Obama administration plans to make available through a national competition meant to encourage education innovation and reform.

Up to $700 million may be available to California schools, the state Department of Education estimates.

The voluntary agreement would tie pay to test scores, change state standards, require a new system of data tracking, and allow more charter schools.

School districts must opt in to the agreement with the state by Friday.

California must apply to the federal government by Jan. 19, but before that the Legislature needs to approve changes to education law that would make the state eligible for the funds.

The meeting begins at 2:30 p.m. at the district's downtown headquarters, 333 S. Beaudry Ave., Los Angeles.

The view in the rear-view-mirror from the other side of the pond/the other side of the road: EDUCATIONAL REVIEW OF THE DECADE + RECESSION ‘THREAT’ TO EDUCATION

 

smf: Naming the decade past the ‘noughties’ is reason enough to forward this retrospective.  “Why Must the Children Pay?” is question enough to demand an answer.

But the issues: Transparency, Student Fees, Accountability, the Recession, Political Meddling, Parent Input,Testing, E-Whiteboards, Funding, Food Quality, Local v. National Control , Administrative Bloat, iTunes and e-learning – etc., are eerily similar.

Education Review of the Decade

By Mike Baker | BBC NEWS | Radio 4

So education is leaving the "noughties" behind - but which of the many changes of the past decade are durable enough to last the next 10 years?

30 Dec, 2009 -- Educational change now comes so fast that it is hard to distinguish the significant from the ephemeral.

For each year of this decade my review of the previous 12 months has appeared here. Looking back over these annual reviews has been a salutary experience.

With the benefit of a longer view, some of the events that seemed worth noting at the time now seem transitory and unimportant. Yet others have stood the test of time.

And some smaller, incremental changes that seemed unimportant year by year have steadily transformed educational practice.

In my review of the year 2000, one of the big events was the parental ballot on whether Ripon Grammar School should remain selective.

Legendary Laura

This was the first - and, as it turned out, the last - of the grammar school ballots promised for England by the newly elected Labour government. Parents voted for the status quo.

It soon became clear that, perhaps by deliberate design, the whole machinery of the ballots was designed to make them hard to organise and made the prospects of change very slight. Since then, the ballot machinery has gathered dust.

By contrast, another of the highlights of 2000 has proved more durable.

Gordon Brown, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, made one of his first forays into education policy when he criticised an Oxford college for rejecting an application from a well-qualified comprehensive school pupil, Laura Spence.

Since then the issues of widening participation and fair admissions have remained high profile and controversial. After the Schwarz Review in 2004, there has been progress on making the university admissions process more transparent.

However, relatively little has happened to bring about another of Schwarz's recommendations, namely the move to a post-qualifications admissions system, with admissions decisions based on actual rather than predicted grades.

So what change has the decade brought to Oxford's admissions?

In 2001 the proportion of undergraduates admitted from state schools and colleges was 53.2%. In 2008 (the most recent available) it was 55.4%. So a big fuss, not a lot of change.

In my review of 2000 I briefly highlighted the launch of a new type of school: the City Academy. At that stage, these new state-funded independent schools were no more than a proposal.

However, the first three Academies opened in 2002. There are now 200 with a further 100 due to open in 2010.

“ The usual game of political musical chairs has kept up its pace ”

Back in March 2000, I wrote that Labour had stolen the idea from the Tories' City Technology Colleges.

Now it seems things are going full circle, with David Cameron's Conservatives keen to expand the programme through their "New Academies" proposals.

Looking across the decade, the usual game of political musical chairs has kept up its pace, with no fewer than eight Cabinet ministers taking the helm at education.

In the schools sector we started out with David Blunkett and ended with Ed Balls, with Estelle Morris, Charles Clarke, Ruth Kelly and Alan Johnson along the way.

Meanwhile, after higher and further education (FE) were split from schools in 2007 to form the short-lived Department for Innovation Universities and Skills, we have had John Denham and Lord Mandelson running the other parts of education.

'Student fees'

But as ministers have come and gone, some changes have left an indelible mark.

Perhaps the most notable has been the growing acceptance that undergraduates should pay towards the cost of the university courses.

Although the methods and costs vary across the UK, the principle of students making a contribution is now well established.

The big step was taken just before the decade began, when Labour introduced fees and abolished grants, but the so-called "top up" fees were introduced in England in 2006, after the government narrowly avoided defeat in the House of Commons over the issue in 2004.

The decade began with the then Prime Minister Tony Blair calling for a review of student finance at his 2001 party conference, following the tough time Labour candidates had received on the doorstep during the general election that year.

At the time, the idea of a graduate tax was being floated by government sources. But, in the end, ministers fought shy of anything with the word "tax" in it and opted for the misnamed "variable fees" scheme.

Now we end the decade with another review under way in England.

Yet, in a sign of the shift in attitudes, the National Union of Students is now campaigning for a graduate tax to replace the current system.

'Benevolent decade'

But what about the big changes that failed to happen?

One of the biggest must be the government's failure to accept the Tomlinson Review, which in 2005 proposed an overarching qualification to cover all existing 14-19 qualifications, including GCSEs and A-levels.

But Downing Street, fearful of reforming the "gold standard" A-levels, diluted the plans.

So, Tomlinson's plan was reduced to the introduction of a new applied learning qualification, the Diploma, whose long-term future still looks uncertain as we enter a new decade.

But there have been quieter, stealthier changes that have transformed the educational landscape.

One of the most significant has been the huge growth in the number of teaching assistants employed in schools.

There are now around 120,000 more classroom assistants than a decade ago and the number of other administrative staff in schools has doubled.

For teachers this has coincided with one significant change: guaranteed non-teaching time during the school day for preparation and planning.

“ Electronic whiteboards are now commonplace in schools ”

For education as a whole, the "noughties" have been benevolent in funding terms.

According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), total spending increased by 120% between 1996 and 2008.

However, after taking account of increased prices, the ONS puts the increase in staff, resources and capital (what it calls the "volume of education inputs") at a more modest, but still significant, 33%.

But not all areas of education have shared equally in this.

Adult education has been particularly badly hit by the policy, introduced after the Leitch Report on skills in 2006, of shifting FE resources towards economically valuable skills for 16 to 19-year-olds.

Universities, too, have seen their funding per student fall in real terms.

Technological change attracts fewer headlines, but has steadily transformed aspects of teaching and learning.

'Turkey Twizzlers'

Electronic whiteboards are now commonplace in schools, replacing the chalk and blackboard.

And in the university sector, the Open University has just marked the ten millionth download of its educational content by students using iTunes, a technology that did not exist at the start of the decade.

The decade has brought numerous other changes: the decline in pupils taking foreign languages after 14, the Every Child Matters agenda that has broadened the responsibility of schools, and the new emphasis on "safeguarding", following the murder of two girls by school caretaker Ian Huntley at Soham in 2001.

Some things are still with us, though: Sats are still here (just) and Ofsted [national oversight] continues to cause controversy, although Chris Woodhead, its most famous head, left in 2000.

But Turkey Twizzlers are no longer on the school dinner menu and for that, at least, we should be truly thankful.

Mike Baker is an education writer and broadcaster. BBC Radio 4 recently broadcast his three-part history of primary schools.

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RECESSION “THREAT” TO EDUCATION: Teachers' leaders have claimed education funding is under a "very real" threat amid the recession.

01:20 GMT, Friday, 1 January 2010 - The Educational Institute of Scotland (EIS) said students should not have to see the teaching they receive suffer because of the mistakes of others.

The union has launched its "Why Must Our Children Pay campaign".

A government spokesman said local authorities have been given funding levels to allow them to increase education budgets.

EIS general secretary Ronnie Smith said the "bleak financial position was not caused by our schools or colleges or by our young people".

The union said it was organising a protest in Glasgow in March to defend funding for education.

“ It is absolutely vital the frontline public services, in particular education, are protected during these difficult economic times ”
Ronnie Smith EIS general secretary

Mr Smith said: "We want to send a strong message to government at every level that our children and young people must not be forced to pay the price for the cavalier behaviour of others that led to this recession.

"The threat to education funding is very real.

He added: "Already over the past year we have seen very significant cuts in education budgets and classroom resources right across the country.

"It is absolutely vital the frontline public services, in particular education, are protected during these difficult economic times."

A Government spokesman said local authorities are given "significant levels of funding allowing them to continue to increase education budgets despite a difficult economic climate".

He said: "Total spending on education has increased over the last two years. However the funding available to the Scottish Government, and therefore to local government, is under severe pressure.

"Difficult local and national decisions have to be made about spending priorities."