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LA lack of transfer opportunities - with comment by MN
- To: ca-resisters@interversity.org
- Subject: LA lack of transfer opportunities - with comment by MN
- From: Peter Farruggio <pfarr@cal.berkeley.edu>
- Date: Fri, 07 Jul 2006 16:17:50 -0700
From: "Monty Neill" <monty@fairtest.org>
This is on NPR - got to
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5538536>http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5538536
and you can listen to it.
A few comments: it reveals again the pincer
movement (old military strategy) against public
schools: install a law that says students must
move be able to move, but a law that says they
must be able to move only to schools that are
not 'failing'; meanwhile ensure that most
schools in urban areas are soon labeled failing.
The proposed lawsuit, if successful (and there
may be no standing to sue as the law allows no
private right of action), intensifies the
pressure - which apparently the feds are already applying.
Yes, this also reveals the disgraceful and
disgusting unwillingness to provide decent
schooling in CA for poor kids. Prop 13 is a
primary culprit, but the state could have raised
state $. It did not. But the failure of the feds
for many years to provide $ for building
schools, and that NCLB is a law essentially
silent on the issue of making better schools
rather than creating inadequate transfer
options, both contribute to intensifying the
mess being exploited by Clint Bolick.
Two results could occur: of course even more
pressure to do noting except teach the test,
hence blighting educational opportunity for
millions of kids; and more push for
privatization since it is a virtual given that
LA cannot meet the demand placed on it anytime
soon (a decade, as they say). Yes, no kid should
have to wait a decade - but privatization and test prep are not answers.
Monty
Education
California Schools Could Lose Aid over 'No Child' Law
by
<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=2101122>Claudio Sanchez
David McNew
California is under pressure to provide students
at low-performing schools in its largest school
districts with more options for transferring
out. Above, a new school under construction in
Maywood, Calif., part of the L.A. school district. Getty News Images
DEADLINE LOOMS FOR CALIFORNIA
California has until Aug. 15 to come up with a
plan to allow more students to transfer out of
low-performing schools in its largest school
districts. If the state fails to meet that
deadline, the U.S. Education Department has
threatened to withhold part of the $700 million
it provides California for high-poverty schools.
Read the U.S. Education Department's letter to California:
*
<http://www.npr.org/programs/atc/features/2006/jul/nochild/letter.pdf>Letter
from the Education Department to California
<http://www.npr.org/templates/rundowns/rundown.php?prgId=2>All
Things Considered, July 6, 2006 · This week, the
U.S. Department of Education threatened to
withhold millions of dollars in federal school
aid from California because the state has failed
to help students transfer out of low-performing schools.
The No Child Left Behind Law requires that
students in such schools be given the option of
transferring elsewhere. But nationwide, some 4
million students eligible for such transfers did
not do so, in many cases because there was no place for them to go.
Getting the School District's Attention
In Los Angeles, some 250,000 students were
eligible for transfers, but only a small
percentage actually switched schools. Among
those who didn't is Yolanda Decatur's 8-year-old son, Cameron.
Like many children in Los Angeles, Yolanda
Decatur's three sons attend year-round schools
-- a byproduct of crowding in the
800,000-student district. By 6:30 a.m. on a
typical school day, Decatur has three bowls of
milk and a box of Cap'n Crunch waiting on the kitchen table of her home.
Kyron, 5, is still in pajamas, watching Sesame
Street. Cameron and Sexton Jr., 14, are dressed.
Both boys have struggled academically, Decatur
says, but it's 8-year-old Cameron who's having
the most trouble at West Athens Elementary School.
"He goes through his tantrums," she says, adding
that the school is too crowded to give her son
the one-on-one attention he needs. "There's too many kids."
But it's not just the crowding. Decatur says
that Cameron's teachers seem to have given up on him.
Last fall, she had nearly lost all hope of
getting the school district to pay attention to
Cameron's case. Then, John Mancino walked into
the fast-food restaurant in south central Los
Angeles where Decatur works full time.
Mancino, a management consultant by profession,
with children of his own, says he became an
activist because he hates the way the Los
Angeles Unified School District bureaucracy
deals with parents who request transfers.
"A lot of them have given up," he says. "They
don't think they can beat the system. They've basically thrown the towel in."
Few Transfer Options for Students
Mancino's organization -- the Coalition on Urban
Renewal and Education -- has filed a complaint
with the district and the state. It accuses
school officials of withholding information from
parents about the district's transfer policies
and discouraging them from even applying.
"According to the law, NCLB [No Child Left
Behind], they're supposed to make it very clear
and explain it in simple, easy-to-understand
terms, and they're not doing that," Mancino
says. The district, he says, is "burying" the
information about transfers "to get around the
requirements of No Child Left Behind."
Mancino says about one-third of the district's
students were eligible for transfers this past
school year, but only 527 students actually did so.
The school district has dismissed Mancino's complaint.
"We have a massive program of transfer of
students throughout this district," says L.A.
school district superintendent Roy Romer.
Urging Parents to Be Patient
The L.A. school district has done everything
possible to give parents options, Romer says,
but it simply doesn't have the room for all of those students to transfer.
"We're 160,000 seats short. Where do you
transfer to?" he says. "Give us some time. We'll
have new buildings built. We're building them now."
Romer says the district is building 160 new
schools at a cost of $19 billion to deal with
the crowding. But, he adds, parents like Decatur have to be patient.
"I've got to say to that parent, 'We are making
more change in the right direction than any
other urban school district in California,'"
Romer says. "You can't turn one of these things
around in a month, a year or five years. It takes 10 to 12 years to do it."
That's not good enough for Yolanda Decatur.
"Tell my son, you look in his face and tell him
he that he has to wait for a better school," she says.
She says parents like her feel that suing the
school district will force it to act faster. "We
have these rights to demand better schools for our children," she says.
Federal Funds at Stake
There is no lawsuit yet, but there will be soon,
says Clint Bolick, of the Phoenix-based Alliance for School Choice.
Bolick, a longtime advocate of vouchers and
school choice, is working with Mancino and his
organization to help parents in Los Angeles. He
says he's convinced that the threat of a lawsuit
will force U.S. Education Secretary Margaret
Spellings to deal with the problem.
"If she wants school districts to comply with
the law, she has got to make an example out of a
school district that is in blatant
non-compliance, and she could not find a better
example than the Los Angeles Unified School
District," Bolick says. "She's offered an awful
lot of waivers to school districts to get out of
from the requirements of the law, and she's
threatened a great deal. But so far, she has not made good on a single threat."
Chris Doherty of the U.S. Education Department strongly disagrees.
"This secretary has made clear that she's
unsatisfied with what we're seeing across the
country, and she's taking strong steps to bring
those numbers up to where we want them to be," Doherty says.
Doherty has been monitoring parents' complaints
in Los Angeles and across the country.
Spellings "has made California aware that she's
following this extremely closely," he says.
"She's made every state superintendent aware
that she's poised to take action, including
withholding funds from noncompliant districts and states, if need be."
In an unprecedented move, Spellings has given
California six weeks to come up with a plan that
would allow students in failing schools
throughout the state to transfer to a better school this fall.
If the state does not submit a plan that
Spellings deems adequate, Doherty says the
education secretary will withhold part of the
$700 million California is due to receive this
fall in federal Title I funds, which are
earmarked for high-poverty schools. And that,
department officials say, is no empty threat.
California officials told NPR that what the U.S.
Department of Education is asking for is going
to be a logistical nightmare: Every failing
school -- and every school district -- where
parents have tried, unsuccessfully, to transfer
their children out now faces a six-week deadline
to make sure those students find a new school.
California officials said lawyers for the state
will likely examine the letter from Washington
to see whether they can challenge the Aug. 15
deadline, because under No Child Left Behind,
there is supposed to be a process in place that
gives states time to review and appeal any
complaint or lawsuit. This process now appears to be out the window.
Monty Neill, Ed.D.
Executive Director
FairTest
342 Broadway
Cambridge, MA 02139
617-864-4810 fax 617-497-2224
<mailto:monty@fairtest.org>monty@fairtest.org
http://www.fairtest.org
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