The Green Dot charter chain took over Locke High School in 2008.
It received $15 million of mostly private funding to overhaul the school and completely change its culture.
But the one challenge that Green Dot has been unable to overcome is to provide a safe, clean place for boys to go to the bathroom.
After the stalls were vandalized, the school ripped them out, leaving no privacy.
When you read the article, you will note that teachers were afraid to express their concerns. Wonder why?
Many boys go home to use the toilet.
Test scores are up, though still disappointingly low.
On state subject matter tests, more than half the Locke students tested “below basic.”
But the students don’t have the most basic of amenities, even with a grant of $15 million.
Still waiting for that Green Dot magic.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
I urge readers of this blog to click on the link Diane provides to the LATimes article.
Here is a experienced charter operator [18 schools in LA!], Green Dot. Look at what’s humdrum everyday normal at the school in question. Clueless principal. Fearful teachers. Frustrated students. Bathrooms that will prepare the male students for what they will face in prison [literally school-to-prison pipeline???], not to mention bathroom safety and hygiene issues that this charter has simply continued [if not worsened] from the worst of the LAUSD’s schools. Vandalism. Management that won’t move—until prompted by an LATimes reporter. Last but not least, “achievement overall remains low.”
If this is what $15 million buys…
Maybe, just maybe, the charterites/privatizers could learn a thing or two from the public schools.
But don’t hold your breath waiting…
Was the floor in the bathroom vandalized as well? THIS is what a bathroom looks like in a school that received $15 million for an overhaul? It looks like the inside of a shed, with some toilets stuck in there. I wonder what the rest of the school looks like.
And, yeah, “to overhaul the school and completely change its culture.”
It looks like the culture was changed from that of a school to a warehouse.
Or–worse still–what Krazy TA said about the bathrooms.
Green Dot and the founder Steve Barr are a joke. Barr tried to get $60,000 for free and someone found it in the tax records of Green Dot which are public, The school financial records are not except, depending on the MOU, information required to go to the district files and that is supposed to be public, however, the Head of the General Counsel’s Office, Holmquist, regularily breaks the law in every sector you can imagine. It would take too long here to lay it out. Just let me say that they regularly do not provide the legally required information with legal proper public information requests (6250 et seq.). The principal did not know. The same today at Santee High School where the principal who gave a power point to the parents did not know the revenue/student even when his power point had the enrollment and revenue on the screen. That is how I figured it out. They did not know the districts income/student, about $11,000 or the revenue/student at Roosevelt High School which is also a PLAS school very close by. Roosevelt got the year they took over $9,000/student and LAUSD paid for the buildings maintainence and special ed. However, I have a budget for one of the 7 schools with 8 principals and that school only received about $4,400/student. Where did the rest go? Santee had $3,475/student. How is this possible and they do not know. I can tell you this after Dr. John Fernandez and myself got done today PLAS and the principal have no more believers and they now know the parents know. Next Monday there is another meeting and PLAS et al will have a real bad day which they deserve. We are now going to educate the parents as to the law and what can be done so that they can run the school and take care of their own business. Why should they trust LAUSD and PLAS who have done nothing but ruin their lives? Green Dot has the same ethical problems. What else is new with the corporatist privatizers.
I have been to plenty of schools all over the world where the bathrooms do not disrespect the children.
A former principal of mine once explained his immaculate school by saying that the cleanliness of the school was a reflection of the principal and that folks take pride in a beautiful space.
Really, atmosphere is everything. You can make a school into a friendly, caring place, even in a high school with very little effort. One thing administrators always said about my classroom was that it was “warm”. It was not always neat and clean but the atmosphere was one that cared about the children, even big children. It is more important that the school show respect for the children than that the teachers get respect from the children, because if you show respect, you get respect.
twinkie1cat: and why aren’t you featured on TED and Education Nation and the rest, but instead we get Bill Gates with 98% of teachers get feedback consisting of the single word “Satisfactory” and Geoffrey Canada denying he disappeared an entire class to make himself look good?
“We cannot all do great things, but we can do small things with great love.” [Mother Teresa]
I was fortunate enough to have worked with teachers like you.
Krazy props.
🙂
So the magic was in how they made all that money disappear?
They need an UNO audit!
They’ll certainly need the magic at one of the toughest high schools to turn around, The problem with Locke unfortunately is endemic to the neighborhood and therefore the operation of the school under private control is no different than under public. Yes they can get real security and tighten up parents basic concern of better security but does that translate into a better, more productive school, I think not.
To Green Dot CEO Marco Petruzzi, (if you’re reading this)
A mere 30-second google search yielded the following:
http://www.allpartitions.com/panels.html
That’s right. $90 for a bathroom stall partition.
Since you and Green Dot get $15 million / year of extra private funding,
you think that you can afford it?
This is nuts! Glad that all the millions of Walton/Walmart dollars given to Green Dot are making real improvements in our kids’ lives…
Really, what do you expect in a school run by amateurs instead of professional teachers. They only care about their bottom line at Green Dot. Especially you know this if the teachers are afraid to speak up. Students absolutely should not be leaving campus to go home and use the bathroom. That is dangerous. Why didn’t they just put up some disposable paper curtains between the toilets? It would take a few minutes to duct tape them to the ceiling and if they tore, just put up another one. Can you imagine what students who have neurogenic bladders or are just pee-shy are going through? Also those who are “underdeveloped”. Boys are very sensitive about their penises.
Toilets without stalls is not at all uncommon in inner-city school bathrooms. It’s a security concern, not just a response to vandalism. Think about it, if you have to make a deal and there are cops on every floor of your school, where would you go for some privacy? Just sayin’
Okay, we get that. In fact, I worked in a middle school where there was bathroom vandalism, but it was dealt with accordingly, and the bathrooms remained intact after being cleaned. Also, the very clever principal removed all the mirrors, so that neither the boys nor the girls would use said rooms for primping time!
But, come on Dave, I reiterate–that bathroom looks like a shed, warehouse, or some prison facility. THIS is what $15 million buys?
Also, I wouldn’t even want to be the teacher who is keeping watch over the bathroom. Yuck!
This is so sickening, I have no words. I just… I wonder… How about… Nope, no words. This is just so wrong, I’m more worried about civilization than ever.
What civilization?! This is further proof of us becoming a third world country!
(See my earlier diatribe on the post regarding the Bangladesh factory collapse.)
I will, retired’.
To look at that picture, one would think one is looking at a prison cell wall.
I’m beginning to not know my own country anymore. This is how we treat children in America?
I’ve seen bathrooms like that in urban school districts where there have been problems with kids putting fire in trash cans. soap bars in the toilet so they overflow (soap dispensers anyone?) and stalls without doors are common. Staff gets weary of fixing the bathrooms. They just give up . These are schools that have fighting and other problems too.
But, lellingw, this is a CHARTER school that was given $15 million to “overhaul the school and completely change its culture”…in 2008! On the whole, it looks like this Green Dot School isn’t looking so great–and it’s been 4 years.
Aren’t charter schools supposed to be the “fixers?”
I think Green Dot is unionized….one of the few charters with unionized teachers. I wonder why the teachers didn’t speak up.
Green Dot has a different kind of union, a “thin” contract. Apparently too thin.