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Public School Student in Los Angeles Gets Perfect Score in AP Calculus Exam

By dianeravitch
January 29, 2016 //
25

Call Davis Guggenheim! Time for a new movie about a remarkable public school in Los Angeles!

 

Cedrick Argueta, the son of immigrant parents, received a perfect score on the AP Calculus exam, one of only 12 students in the world to do so. Some 302,000 students took the exam.

 

Cedrick is a student at Lincoln High School, which has 1200 students. His teacher is Anthony Yom. Lincoln is a regular neighborhood public school, not a magnet or a charter.

 

“As far as math whizzes go, Cedrick is unassuming. He likes to play basketball with his buddies, and his favorite reading of late was the Harry Potter series. Knowing he was going to do television interviews this week, he donned a blue LHS hoodie and sneakers.

 

“Math has always just made sense to him, he said. He appreciates the creativity of it, the different methods you can take to solve a problem.

 

“There’s also some beauty in it being absolute,” Cedrick said. “There’s always a right answer.”

 

“When asked about his perfect exam score, Cedrick just thanked everybody else in his life.

 

“It just sort of blew up,” he said. “It feels kind of good to be in the spotlight for a little bit, but I want to give credit to everybody else that helped me along the way.”
“Cedrick is the son of Lilian and Marcos Argueta, both of whom came to the United States as young adults – she from the Philippines, he from El Salvador. Lilian, a licensed vocational nurse, works two jobs at nursing homes. Marcos is a maintenance worker at one of those nursing homes. He never went to high school.

 

“Lilian Argueta, pausing during one of her shifts this week, said her son’s accomplishment is still sinking in. He texted her when he found out, and she told him it was great but, she said, she didn’t understand the magnitude until reporters started calling.

 

“Argueta said that she always told Cedrick and his younger sister to finish their homework and to “read, read, read,” but that they knew she’d be proud of them whether or not they got straight A’s.

 

Cedrick’s teacher was very proud too, although he is accustomed to good results.

 

“All 21 of Yom’s AP Calculus students who took the exam last year passed; 17 got the highest score of 5. It was the third year in a row that all of Yom’s kids passed the test.

 

“Yom, 35, said he treats his students like a sports team. They’d stay after school, practicing problem solving for three or four extra hours, and they’d come on weekends. On test day, they wore matching blue T-shirts sporting their names, “like they’re wearing jerseys to the game,” Yom said.”

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Education Reform, Los Angeles, Students

Feds Give More $$ to L.A. Charters than to Higher-Performing Magnets

By dianeravitch
January 28, 2016 //
35

The U.S. Education Department, which was once a defender and supporter of public education, has now become a major investor in privately managed charters.

 

The lobbyist for the board of the Los Angeles Unified School District reported that larger amounts of federal funding was directed to the city’s charter schools than to the city’s magnet schools. The city’s magnet schools are far more successful than the charters.

 

As the LA School Report says:

 

“For all the successful magnet schools in LA Unified and elsewhere, they are not attracting as much federal support as charter schools.
That was a stark message from the district’s federal lobbyist, who told a district board committee this week that Washington is increasing national support for charter schools by nearly 32 percent but by only 6 percent for magnet schools, a difference that surprised some of the school board members.

 
“We never imagined this would ever be this much of a discrepancy,” board president Steve Zimmer said at a meeting of the board’s Committee of the Whole.

 
“The money for charters rose to $350 million from $270 million while the magnet school support increased to $96 million from $91 million, according to Joel Packer, of the Raben Group, which lobbies for the district in Washington.

 
“Charter schools have big bipartisan support in Congress,” Packer said. “They got a big increase. Magnet schools don’t have the same political clout.”

 

Who lobbies for magnet schools? No one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Charter Schools, Education Reform, Los Angeles

“Schools Aren’t Start-Ups and Kids Aren’t Consumers”

By dianeravitch
January 26, 2016 //
18

Karen Quartz wrote a powerful article explaining why Eli Broad’s plan to grab control of half the students in Los Angeles is a huge mistake. Quartz is the director of research at the UCLA Community School, a K-12 university-supported neighborhood public school in Pico Union/Koreatown.

She wrote:

“In September, a proposal from Great Public Schools Now, an initiative led by billionaire Eli Broad, unleashed ferocious debate. Rife with business-speak, it suggested LAUSD could be fixed by attracting edupreneurs to launch 260 new charter schools that would capture 50% of the district’s “market share” by 2023. Within weeks, battle lines were drawn. Rallying anti-charter-school activists, former school board president Jackie Goldberg declared “This is war!” On its website, the teacher’s union posted “Hit the Road, Broad.”

“Another coalition of local foundation leaders then weighed in with its own open letter in November and offered to mediate. Without taking sides, they cautioned that “intended reforms often fall short if they are done to communities rather than with communities.”

“Then, in an abrupt turn, Great Public Schools Now announced in December that it would channel its resources not just into adding more charter schools, but into replicating models of success at traditional schools as well. It released a list of 49 schools that were models of success, 42 of them magnets and charter schools. Both types of schools rely on competitive admissions policies that are based on lotteries or criteria such as giftedness.

“The list’s near-exclusive focus on charters and magnets rather than neighborhood schools sends a powerful message about how these private reformers want Angelenos to think about education — as savvy consumers competing for scarce resources needed to help their children get ahead.

“What does this process of edupreneurship and innovation look like on the ground? Magnets and charters use aggressive recruitment campaigns to draw families with more social capital away from their neighborhood public schools. The most vulnerable children, then, are left behind in quickly emptying buildings, which sit waiting for a Proposition 39 takeover bid, which allows new charter schools to open in the unused classroom space.”

Quartz explains why Broad’s proposal is harmful to the democratic concept of public education.

“My point is not that one method of reform trumps all others. Rather, it’s that to ensure high-quality schools for all children requires recognizing that public education is both an individual good that helps people get ahead — “the great equalizer,” as Horace Mann put it in 1848 — and a collective good that defines how we together determine our shared fate.

“Edupreneurship is designed to unleash creative energy into conservative school systems and disrupt longstanding patterns of underachievement. But if that comes at the expense of our common good, it threatens the very foundation of public schooling.”

Of course, there is no guarantee that the edupreneuers will succeed. Based on their spotty record, they are likely to fail and move on, leaving communities in shambles. For the Broad team, the little people are pawns on their chess board.

Categories Corporate Reform, Education Industry, Los Angeles

Ethics Expert: LA Times Has a “Massive Conflict of Interest”

By dianeravitch
January 19, 2016 //
25

Peter Sussman is an expert in the ethics of journalism. He literally wrote the book. A concerned citizen contacted him to ask him about whether it was proper for the Los Angeles Times to accept money for education coverage from Eli Broad, since his activities in education are covered by the newspaper. The editorials in the Times have been very enthusiastic about Eli’s plan to open 260 new charters for half the students in the Los Angeles public schools. The Times is careful to note that its education coverage is subsidized by a gaggle of wealthy people, including Eli Broad’s foundation.

 

This is not a small question. How can we have freedom of the press if billionaires buy the media and/or subsidize the coverage that directly affects their interests?

 

Peter Sussman responded:

 

Was I tagged because this is such a tough ethical issue to parse? It is not. With this kind of entanglement with the subject of its news stories, the Times has given up the right to expect any trust or credibility for its journalism on education. They are trapped in a massive conflict of interest, and no amount of pro forma disclosure will fix that. It’s so sad to see what has happened to that once-great publication.

 

You can add to the comment that trust and credibility are the life’s blood of journalism, and without it, a “news” organization is no different than any other partisan in public disputes, with the added problem that there is no major paper to hold it accountable, although in this case a blogger has apparently stepped into the breach. People have jeopardized and lost their jobs for defending their editorial independence and standing up to such conflicts of interest. I haven’t read the background on the issue you’ve highlighted, but if all your information is accurate, the Times’ problem extends beyond opinions to reporting, however well-intentioned their education reporters are.

 

–Peter Sussman, a retired longtime San Francisco Chronicle editor who is a past co-author of the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics. (He was co-author of the 1996 version.)

Categories Education Reform, Los Angeles, Media

LA Times Outdoes Its Broad Worship

By dianeravitch
January 17, 2016 //
37

The Los Angeles Times has a love affair with the privatization of public schools; it is wild about the idea of outsourcing control of students and funding to private management. Just a few days ago, the LAUSD surprised everyone by voting 7-0 to reject billionaire Eli Broad’s plan to take control of half the students in the district by putting them in charters. It sounded a little fishy because even the board’s charter faction voted against Eli’s power grab.

 

Now we see the game is still on. Eli’s front-group called Great Schools Now is staffing up.

 

Today the Los Angeles Times published an editorial in support of the Broad plan that was breathtaking for its audacity. It echoed the charter lobby’s contention that any resistance to their drive for power was divisive. The editorial proposed that the district’s new superintendent should ask for a place at the charter lobby’s table so she could help shape their plans for a takeover. Say what?

 

What arrogance! What happened to the democratic process? Has Eli already purchased the district? Is Superintendent Michelle King his employee?

 

Here are some good comments by public school activists in LA.

 

Karen Wolfe warns King to stay away and reminds Eli that he is a citizen with one vote only. He should go to board meetings like everyone else with an idea.

 

She writes:

 

“In its ongoing effort to convince the city that a huge public entity should be handed over to a private group of titans, the LA Times now suggests inviting the public official to the table to give the effort some credibility. This is the superintendent, who was appointed by the democratically elected board, to lead the public entity the titans seek to control.

 

“As Chicago Teachers Union president Karen Lewis has said, “You can’t have a seat at the table when you’re on the menu.”

 

Ellen Lubic wrote the following article:
Another Coffin Nail in Public Education…if Eli Broad Can Get Away With It

 

As we continue to see, the highly biased LA Times is under the thrall of Eli Broad and his cohorts to take over public education in Los Angeles and convert it to free market profiteering. Almost daily, the Times runs what is loosely called journalism, lauding charter schools, and defaming public schools, They add a disclosure announcement at the end of these articles admitting they are paid for by Broad and the non profits like United Way where he calls all the shots.
Here is the operant paragraph of Sunday’s editorial from the LA Times, which is paid for by Eli Broad and his claque of pretenders (see their full disclosure which appears repeatedly with most of the education issues on which they report). It is all about the new Broad-concieved 501c3 Great Public Schools Now, a permutation of Eli’s leaked plan to take over all of LAUSD.
“A better move would be to call on Great Public Schools Now to provide a place at the table for the district’s new superintendent, Michelle King, to participate in the planning process. If the new nonprofit organization hopes to overcome resistance in the community, it needs to be more open about its planning and it needs to open the process to public discussion — after all, whether charter schools or not, these are all public schools.”
“The Times receives funding for its digital initiative, Education Matters, from the California Endowment, the Wasserman Foundation and the Baxter Family Foundation. The California Community Foundation and United Way of Greater Los Angeles administer grants from the Broad Foundation to support this effort. Under terms of the grants, The Times retains complete control over editorial content.”
What a pile of manure…the only way these charter schools are public, is that We the People, we the public, we the taxpayers, are forced to pay for them…with NO oversight by the public, the government, or the school system. This is an amazing scam concocted by the Bonfire of the Vanities guys to use public funding for public schools while transferring students to privatized charter schools, all for their own profit. Rupert Murdoch and Eli Broad have openly written about this, and they and their billionaire buddies are gathered in their kingdoms, cackling at their success in fooling the public.
Now we read in their controlled corporate media, the LA Times, that Broad and Company wants the new Superintendent of LAUSD, Michelle King, to sit at their golden table as a participant with his hit squad, to charterize and privatize the rest of LAUSD…or at least for now, up to 50% more charters which take away from public education. Their fantasy seems to be that Michelle King will now work for them and be a subject to Myrna Castrejon…and of course Eli Broad.
It is shocking to see that Broad lawyers and PR firms now use as their mouthpiece, this hard core, non educator, lobbyist for CCSA who spent her time twisting arms in Sacramento who now thinks she is on the same level as the new Superintendent of LAUSD.
As to Myrna Castrejon, a political hit woman who works for charter schools, here is her Times dossier.
“The organization driving a controversial effort to vastly expand charter schools in Los Angeles has selected one of the state’s most visible charter school advocates as its first executive director.
Myrna Castrejon, 50, is leaving her position as a lobbyist and strategist for the California Charter Schools Association to lead Great Public Schools Now, a nonprofit organization established to carry out the charter expansion strategy, which was first developed by billionaire philanthropist Eli Broad and his foundation.
In her new position, Castrejon will become the face of an initiative that is stoking tumult among educators and push-back from the Los Angeles Unified School District. An early proposal called for raising $490 million to enroll half of the district’s students in charter schools over the next eight years.
Castrejon, senior vice president of government affairs for the charter association, begins her new role Feb. 22. She said a key priority will be reaching out to leaders of the nation’s second largest school district who, just two days ago, publicly opposed the plan developed by the Broad Foundation.
L.A. Unified Supt. Michelle King on Thursday echoed concerns raised by the school board, saying she does not support any initiatives that propose to “take over” the district by encouraging students to enroll in charters.”
How many of the California legislators are under the influence of Broad and his endless cash? We know for a fact that the former mayor of LA, Anthony Villaraigosa, who is now preparing to run for Governor, is prime among these sellouts to the big money. He is so close to Eli and John Deasy, he can taste them.
Have we lost all control of American society and democracy to Broad his band of oligarchs? How can they form a new 501c3 and think it will be the vehicle to infiltrate the school district and usurp it totally, from Superintendent to BoE to every classroom and every piece of LAUSD real estate?
The arrogance and sheer chutzpah of this power grab is mind boggling.
The real public living in the community better wake up to this irreversible loss of public schools and must take to the streets to preserve what is left. California already has more charter schools than any other state in the Union, and Los Angeles has the most of any city in the nation. Yet university reports show that the preponderance of these charters do no better than public schools in educating students, and a large group does far worse…all the while making big bucks using ill prepared teachers who flee their charges quickly.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Broad Foundation, Charter Schools, Education Reform, Los Angeles

Shocker: Los Angeles School Board Votes 7-0 for Resolution Opposing Eli Broad Takeover

By dianeravitch
January 14, 2016 //
24

Will wonders never cease!

 

The LAUSD school board voted 7-0 for a resolution that rebuffs Eli Broad’s plan to take control of half the students in the district and enroll them in privately managed charter schools. After a lively discussion, the board passed a resolution that made clear it would oppose any effort to weaken the LAUSD public schools. This is a startling development, since some of the members were elected with Eli Broad campaign funds.

 

The focus of the discussion was a resolution put forward by Scott Schmerelson, strongly in opposition to a corporate takeover of the public schools. Some of the members openly acknowledged that the expansion of charter schools put the public schools at risk by diminishing their resources and programs. The Los Angeles Times noted with surprise that the board had selected its new superintendent by unanimous vote, and now voted to support the public schools by unanimous vote. The resolution directed Superintendent Michelle King “to analyze how the outside plan, which was developed by the Broad Foundation, will “affect the district’s enrollment, fiscal viability and ability to provide an outstanding public education.”

 

The Times writes:

 

Board member Scott Schmerelson, who authored the resolution, agreed to make changes proposed by other board members to soften some of the language describing charter schools, such as removing the word strangulation from a sentence describing the plan.

 

Schmerelson said he struggled to understand why Eli Broad and others did not work to improve traditional public schools by investing in successful programs.

 

“The point is that we have thrown the glove down to big business and they know they’d better be very careful how they work with LAUSD,” he said. “We’ll accept their help in limited forms, but they will not take over our district.”

 

Sarah Angel, managing director of regional advocacy with the California Charter School Assn., told board members that the resolution was polarizing. But board discussion settled some of her concerns. (I had to laugh when I saw that she called the resolution “polarizing,” because that was the same comment that the CCSA wrote in response to an opinion piece I wrote for the Los Angeles Times in support of public schools. According to CCSA, if you support charter schools, you are “for the children.” But if you support public schools, you are “polarizing.”)

 

Board president Steve Zimmer deserves credit and high praise for uniting the board behind a resolution in support of the public schools. Member Scott Schmerelson deserves credit and high praise for boldly and clearly opposing privatization and for laying out the disastrous consequences if the Broad plan were allowed to move forward.

 

My observer in Los Angeles watched the school board meeting and reported:

 

There was some pontificating, but basically, not one board member would say they were against the resolution. Just before the vote, Steve Zimmer spoke eloquently and signaled what I hope is the dawn of a new day at LAUSD. I want to send you his statement. When it was declared to have passed unanimously, the audience went crazy. In fact, a rhythmic chant of extreme support for Schmerelson and the resolution followed. While the camera was focused on the whole board and not specifically on Schmerelson, you could see his reaction. His body language was unmistakable. It was as if an extreme burden had been lifted from him. There is little doubt that he must have suffered greatly from attacks by the charter industry. In fact, you will hear Zimmer complain bitterly about nasty public comment from charter advocates made during the morning session and apparently before the resolution came up for a vote in the afternoon (I wasn’t watching at that time).

 

I would say that Schmerelson provided the board with a jump start to take the battle against privatizing education to a higher level.

 

When the video is available, I will post it.

Categories Broad Foundation, Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Industry, Los Angeles, Privatization

LAUSD: Michelle King is the Right Leader for Our Kids

By dianeravitch
January 13, 2016 //
22

The blogger known as the Red Queen in LA breathed a sign of relief and expressed joy: The LAUSD board chose a knowledgeable insider instead of a flashy outsider. Michelle King was the right choice to lead the district and to take care of the children, not the billionaires. The board conducted a national search and then chose the educator who knew the system. They learned that there are no miracle-workers out there.

 

She writes:

 

I’ve heard it remarked this is LA’s Hope moment, but I do not think so. King’s promise is not of suppressed anticipatory excitement, but of commonplace relief. None of us actively engaged in public education actually wants the drama of ideology, we want schools that work, institutions anchored to our communities, giving and taking in equal measure, part and parcel of our society’s bedrock. We don’t want to be utilized as part of neoliberal capitalism where education is a sector exploited for its privatization potential. Our kid’s education is not a commodity, it’s just part of their ontogeny. We want a village that will raise our children. Correctly, adequately, properly and in exactly the same way as are Walton or Gates or Obama children.

 
Traveling through public spaces in town yesterday everywhere could be witnessed folks high-fiving. I stuck my hand out and high-fived innumerable strangers. I knew what they were talking about without overhearing their words: everyone’s just plain relieved. She’s come home, the board’s recovered its senses. The tempering of jittery nerves regarding LAUSD and its future was palpable.

 
LAUSD’s school board made a very courageous decision in opting for the quietly competent administrative “tortoise” who has not been swinging from educational lianas, leveraging criminal racketeering into higher education diplomas. Michelle King is politically savvy perforce, and the board has satisfied its members through private conversations that her political ideology is sound enough. The prerequisites for this job are ultimately not complex, and the in-house candidate has an advantage in this politically charged climate: she is a known, knowing and competent candidate, and she demonstrably will in fact work for “the children” and not just pretend as much.

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Education Reform, Los Angeles

Los Angeles Picks Michelle King as New Superintendent

By dianeravitch
January 11, 2016 //
11

The LAUSD board voted unanimously to select a veteran educator in the system as its new superintendent.

 

Michelle King, a 30-year veteran, will succeed Ramon Cortines. She will be the first woman and the first African-American to lead the school district. She was previously a respected high school principal, and served as deputy superintendent under both John Deasy and Cortines.

 

Board members said that she impressed them in their long interviews behind closed doors. They said they appreciated her knowledge of L.A. Unified, which, they concluded, would allow her to tackle the school system’s problems without delay.

 

The board will eventually have to confront Eli Broad’s effort to take control of half the children in the district by opening 260 charter schools.

 

The big showdown will come in the school board elections in 2017, when the billionaires can be counted on to pour millions into school board races in an effort to gain control of the board.

 

In the meanwhile, Michelle King will have her hands full trying to steady the district after years of disruption, budget crises, and declining enrollments.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Categories Administrators, superintendents, Los Angeles

Scott Schmerelson: A Hero of Public Education in Los Angeles

By dianeravitch
January 9, 2016 //
19

Billionaire Eli Broad aims to privatize the schools of half the children in the Los Angeles Unified School District; he has even funded a phony, astroturf organization called “Great Public Schools Now” to push his plan. He has no intention of submitting his proposal to the vote of the people of Los Angeles. He forgets that their tax dollars built the facilities; he thinks that because he is a billionaire, he should have the right or at least the power to privatize what rightfully belongs to the people of Los Angeles, without asking permission from them.

 

State law, adopted during the aggressively pro-charter Schwarzenegger era, clears the path for rapid expansion of charter schools. If LAUSD rejects a charter, it will be approved by the Los Angeles County Board of Education. In the rare instance that the county board does not approve, the charter can appeal to the state board of education. Los Angeles currently has the largest number of students in charters of any school district in the nation. The charters are deregulated and unsupervised. Neither the state nor the district has the personnel to oversee their financial or academic operations.

 

One member of the Los Angeles school board has had the courage to stand up and boldly say NO to billionaire Broad. He is Scott Schmerelson, the most recently elected board member and a retired educator in the LAUSD schools.

 

An article in LA School Report says:

 

 

“As a retired, life-long LAUSD educator, I believe that I have a moral obligation to raise awareness and understanding of externally driven strategies that support the uncontrolled proliferation of charter schools at the expense of the District’s ability to adequately provide for the needs of all students, especially the most disadvantaged students who rely on public education,” Schmerelson told LA School Report.

 

As impassioned as the resolution may be, it’s effectively toothless in terms of changing how the district deals with charter applications and renewal requests that come before the board. State law creates the rules for charters, and it only provides for denials in the cases of questionable finances or managerial weakness.

 

In his review of the resolution, LA Unified’s chief legal counsel, David Holmquist, said as much: “It should be noted that any analysis done by the district on any charter school proposal needs to be in accordance with the provisions of the Education Code.” He added, “The Board should be cautioned against using any fiscal impact to the district and potential decrease in revenues as bases for denying a charter.”

 

That’s part of the problem, Schmerelson said, pointing to state regulations that restrict how the school board monitors, controls and approves charter schools. “We need to change state law and clarify ambiguous state and district guidelines that hamper our ability to act as responsible charter authorizers and exercise diligent oversight of existing charter schools,” he said.

 

Understand this state law: school boards cannot deny a charter application simply because it will impoverish the district and rob the children of necessary resources. So Broad wants to create a system that is separate and unequal. The students in his privately run charters will have the resources they need, while the children who remain in LAUSD will be stripped of courses, programs, teachers, nurses, staff, and maintenance. Broad promises to create his little empire by robbing those children not lucky enough to gain admission. Eli Broad does not believe in equality of educational opportunity. He believes in the free market, so long as he is in control.

 

His proposal is a disgrace. He wants “great schools now” for some children, and “rotten schools now” for others. This can’t be America.

 

Scott Schmerelson most certainly is a hero of American education and of this blog.

 

This is Board Member Schmerelson’s resolution (Item 25 at this link):

 

 

Mr. Schmerelson – Excellent Public Education for Every Student (Res-019-15/16) (Noticed November 10, 2015 and Postponed from a Previous Meeting)

 

Whereas, The recently released report from the Los Angeles Unified School District Independent Financial Review Panel indicates that declining enrollment is one of the critical issues that the District needs to proactively address in order to remain fiscally viable and to be able to provide a high quality, full service public education for every child who enters public schools in Los Angeles;

 

Whereas, The recently released “Plan for Great Public Schools” from the Eli Broad Foundation seeks to aggressively move over 250,000 students from LAUSD public schools to privately operated, under-regulated charter schools;

 

Whereas, The Broad Foundation plan does not address the impact, implications and potential for collateral damage to the approximately 300,000 students who would be left in a LAUSD system precariously drained of resources, programs and support systems;

 

Whereas, The Governing Board of the Los Angeles Unified School District passed the “Believing in our Schools Again” resolution in May 2015 directing the Superintendent to identify successful programs within the District including but not limited to magnets,

 
  

 

 

International Baccalaureate programs, Dual Language Immersion programs, STEM/STEAM programs, and Pilot schools and develop a comprehensive strategy to grow these programs and strengthen instruction and support at neighborhood schools;

 

Whereas, The Independent Financial Review Panel made similar recommendations for investment in successful District programs;

 

Whereas, The Board serves as both the authorizer of the largest number of charter schools in the nation and is responsible for ensuring an excellent educational program for over 540,000 students in LAUSD schools and programs;

 

Whereas, Rather than incubating ideas and sharing best practices between robust LAUSD programs and innovative charter schools as originally envisioned, recent tactics of saturation and strangulation threaten to create unnecessary competition for precious resources and to divides students and communities; and

 

Whereas, The Board is committed to the most important and comprehensive education equity mission in the nation and must have the needed resources to implement the A-G for All resolution, the School Climate Bill of Rights, the Equity Index and other essential initiatives to ensure 100% graduation of all students who are college and career ready; now, therefore, be it

 

Resolved, That the Governing Board of the Los Angeles Unified School District, while diligently seeking new District leadership, affirms and publicly commits to making every possible effort to attract and retain students and parents by engaging with all stakeholders to develop a framework for excellent public schools, and improved outcomes, for every student by relying on tested strategies and forward thinking new models that include:

 

  • Research based curriculum and instruction designed to provide all students with equitable and rigorous learning opportunities to equip our graduates with the skills and knowledge necessary for college readiness, career training and preparation for successful lives after high school;
  • Fostering Community Schools intentionally directed at improving student achievement, through a holistic approach to teaching and learning, by implementing policies and programs that recognize and support the social, emotional, physical and academic needs of all students;
  • Demanding, supporting and cultivating accountable school leadership and teaching staff who understand and project a clear vision and high expectations of academic excellence for all students;
  • Leveling the playing field for our youngest students, who daily endure the disadvantages of poverty, by providing access to high quality early learning opportunities that are aligned with first-rate early literacy programs;
  • Equitably funded, sequential arts and music education curricula that advance creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication skills for all students regardless of their socioeconomic status;
  • Acknowledging that student safety is our highest priority and that parents expect their children in our care to be vigilantly protected and educated in secure, well maintained facilities; 
 
  • A meticulous and urgent review of our parent engagement efforts that recognizes that we are not always successful in creating welcoming and resource rich environments and policies that support and encourage critical family involvement in student achievement;
  • Developing aggressive and definitive plans for improving student and staff attendance and reducing our unacceptable dropout rate;
  • Bold and consistent advocacy for adequate and equitable local, state and federal funding while improving responsible, transparent and accountable management of public revenues; and be it finally

     

  • Resolved, That the Board directs the Superintendent to analyze all external proposals targeting

    the District for their impact in terms of enrollment, fiscal viability and the District’s ability to

    provide an outstanding public education with comprehensive student and family supports before

    that proposal is considered by the Board.

 

Categories Broad Foundation, Education Industry, Los Angeles

Howard Blume: A Balanced Account of the Berkeley Study of L.A. Charters

By dianeravitch
January 1, 2016 //
119

Howard Blume has written a very informative and fair account of the study of charters in Los Angeles conducted by Bruce Fuller and other researchers at Berkeley.

 

The study, which is linked in the article, says that students in charters begin with higher test scores and improve faster than their peers in district public schools.

 

The implications, I believe, are that those who enroll in charters start off ahead academically, and their academic gains are increased by peer effects. If a student is enrolled in a school with other higher-performing students–and if the students with behavioral problems and the unmotivated students are not present–the students learn faster.

 

What are the lessons for public schools? Remove the students with behavioral problems; remove the students who are unmotivated; remove the students with severe disabilities; remove the students with low test scores; limit the number of English language learners to those who are nearly fluent. That’s a formula for success. In a school where everyone is motivated, well-behaved, and ready to learn, students get higher test scores.

 

But what should we do with all those kids who were removed and excluded? If Eli Broad has his way, half the children in Los Angeles will be in charter schools with strong peer cultures, and the rest will be left behind in squalid public schools. Are they his problem too? Why not just give the entire enrollment of Los Angeles Unified School District to Eli, and let him take responsibility for all the children, not just the likeliest to succeed?

 

Take the challenge, Eli. Think big. Can you do it? Take responsibility for all the children, not just the ones you want. If you aren’t willing to do that, stick to funding art and medical research. You don’t tell artists how to paint or doctors how to perform surgery, do  you? Stick to what you know.

Categories Charter Schools, Corporate Reformers, Education Reform, Los Angeles, Privatization
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