41 Years of School Reform and Nothing to Show for It?
The Daily News - supporters of the Mayoral backed LAUSD takeover candidates - has started up it's own blog about the LAUSD, The Education Revolution. A far better blog is the LA Times' School Me, but I must admit they've had a much longer head start as the Daily News' effort only started last week.The first and only post calls for the usual digital fish-fluff: challenging the Mayor to reveal his plan, calling for a top to bottom overhaul, bla, bla, bla.
However a far more reasoned, simple and intelligent take on the LAUSD comes from the first comment on the blog by Brent Smiley:
Education reform in LAUSD has been around longer than I have been alive (41 years). Literally hundreds of programs have been rolled out with great fanfare as the cure to LAUSD’s ills. Some have worked, many have not. Tamar Galatzan, who by her own admission was not even interested in those problems until a year and a half ago, even knows what the real issues are is ridiculous. I am so tired of political hacks using our school children to serve their own interests. If the Mayor was really interested in educational reform, he would have nominated a truly respected educational reformer, not some rank amateur.In other LAUSD related matters, Earl Ofari Hutchinson, writing in the Daily News calls for Mayor Villaraigosa to take his hands off the schools.
Posted by Mayor Sam @ 3/21/2007 12:05:00 AM
28 Comments:
the Mayor...lol
twilight zone
that's where you live Matt
One word: vouchers.
Earl just schooled Tone-Loc.
C'mon Higby, lose the picture of Hugzberg and the long rants of Elliott and you can bring this blog back to quality.
Exactly, Vouchers!
The Mayor has experienced decrease in popularity.
thanks for your support 8.01 and 11.50pm? ...I'm on a lawsuit fighting FOR the constitution, unlike your precious Mayor. he's pushing us all into the twilight zone.
my A380 video is up to 16,000 hits on only the 2nd day. Boeing and other companies should really look at the comments, the hits, and the power of a Matt Dowd video statement.
click the honors button under the video, theres a ton of awards already. lol. don't you just love a good manipulation of the public?
its like the YouTube oscars....
801=ALger
Other than the vouchers comment, what does any of this have to do with LAUSD?
Vouchers my ass.
That "one word" is a case-in-point for demonstrating how out-to-lunch Walter is. And how stuck he is in 1984.
Does anyone answer or even ask the question of WHY LAUSD has deteriorated so much over the past several decades?
With all due respect to Walter, it's actually two words:
private school
Good morning Ladies and Gentlemen (removes hat and bows low):
So, you want Villabarbosa to take his hands off the schools? And what, if you will, is he going to put his hands on, savvy?
Most black people want vouchers
thirty black ministers and educators from Detroit traveled to a Queens church early last month for a conversion ceremony of sorts. They had come to learn from the Rev. Floyd Flake how he had built the Allen African Methodist Episcopal Church into a congregation of 9,000 that brought housing, businesses and quality education to a blighted neighborhood. Most of all, they had come to hear how the pastor -- a liberal, black, six-term Democratic New York congressman -- had embraced the cause of school vouchers.
Some in the delegation had been similarly persuaded on visits to Cleveland and Milwaukee, the only cities now using public funds to underwrite private-school tuition for poor children. The uncommitted still wondered why Flake would break with his party and the Congressional Black Caucus to cosponsor a voucher bill in Congress and champion a voucher program using private moneys in New York City.
"When a white person kills a black person, we all go out in the street to protest," Flake told his listeners, explaining his heresy. "But our children are being educationally killed everyday in public schools and nobody says a thing."
Those words, more than any Flake uttered, won over the skeptics. A day that began with one-third of the visitors favoring vouchers ended with three-quarters doing so. "It's hearing an African-American, nationally recognized Democrat speak for it in a way that made sense," recalled Anita Nelam, the chief development officer for an overwhelmingly black Quaker school in Detroit. "Nobody can doubt the reality of what he said. It was the truth. And anybody who's being honest has to admit that."
But at the same time Flake was seeking black hearts and minds on behalf of vouchers, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was campaigning against them. Working with the liberal lobbying group People for the American Way, the NAACP has been building a coalition of labor, education and ministerial groups dubbed Partners for Public Education. Vouchers, NAACP president Kweisi Mfume has contended, are "a concept of exclusion and selective opportunity" propounded by "the far right wing."
Today (Sept. 30), Partners for Public Education is holding a day of rallies and workshops in Philadelphia, one of its biggest anti-voucher events yet. In two weeks, Floyd Flake leaves his seat in Congress, a move that he says will "liberate" him to advocate even more strongly for vouchers.
The most important education debate of the fall, then, has been joined. And this time, it is taking place almost exclusively within the black community. Like the furor surrounding the Clarence Thomas nomination to the Supreme Court, the issue of vouchers promises to show just how diverse and divided black America is.
"There's a big debate that has to take place," says Diane Ravitch, author of numerous books on American education. "Black and Hispanic parents are desperate to save their children. And their patience for reforming public schools has run out. If you ask them if they'd want to send their kids to private school, you get an overwhelming yes. But not if you make it a choice between a liberal position versus a conservative position. There is still a tremendous suspicion of anything that's called vouchers, because it's associated with Republicans."
Black support for vouchers has risen nearly 10 points, to 57.3 percent, in the past year, according to a poll by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a Washington-based think tank devoted to black issues. Yet the poll also shows stark fissures within the black community. For instance, while 86.5 percent of blacks between the ages of 26 and 35 supported vouchers, only 19 percent of those older than 65 did so.
"For older blacks, there's a belief in the role of government, the federal government in particular, and an attachment to the Democratic Party," says David Bositis, who conducted the Joint Center's poll. "They believe the civil rights movement was a success. For younger people, it's not a question of whether the movement was a success or a failure. It's just not part of their consciousness. They weren't on the Edmund Pettus Bridge."
In 20 years as a pollster, Bositis says, no survey of his has generated more interest than the one on blacks and vouchers. He has been invited to address groups from the Rainbow Coalition to the Republican National Committee to the National School Boards Association. Julian Bond, a major figure in the civil rights movement now serving on the NAACP board, personally called for a briefing.
The issue has also given rise to some unprecedented political alliances. In Wisconsin in 1990, a black Democratic legislator from Milwaukee's North Side ghetto, Polly Williams, allied with the Republican governor, Tommy Thompson, to push through a pilot voucher program that provided about $3,000 a year for children from low-income households. In Cleveland several years later, Christian Coalition organizers worked in tandem with black parent-activists in the East Side slums to create a similar program. A pro-voucher group called TEACH-Michigan, typical of grass-roots organizations in other urban areas, assembled the delegation that visited Floyd Flake's church. And for the past three years, Republicans in Congress, with a small but increasing number of black allies like Flake, have tried to bring vouchers to the District of Columbia.
In each case, the class factor that liberals usually wield to keep blacks on their side was turned against them. "It's about giving poor people choices, the choices that people with money can make everyday," says Howard Fuller, a black man who served as superintendent of Milwaukee's public schools before becoming an education professor at Marquette University. "Bill Clinton can decide to send Chelsea to private school because he has the money. And then he says to poor parents in Washington -- who are stuck with the same schools he wouldn't send his daughter to -- that they have no way out."
A bill largely drafted by House Republicans, but influenced and cosponsored by Flake, would use federal funds for vouchers in 100 impoverished neighborhoods across the country. The provision is part of a broad array of tax cuts and regulatory reforms, under the rubric of the American Community Renewal Act, that together form a conservative agenda for reviving the inner city. The Clinton administration and the Congressional Black Caucus oppose the bill, but five of Flakes' black colleagues in Congress have endorsed it.
Meanwhile, privately funded voucher programs have sprung up in cities from Oakland, Calif., to Indianapolis to Albany, N.Y., each targeted to low-income children. Last spring, when New York's program was announced, 23,000 pupils applied for 1,300 grants. Each grant paid $1,400 annually, within $300 of the usual tuition at a Catholic elementary school.
These programs are more than isolated examples of philanthropy. They are the opening wedge of a political push to shift tax dollars from public schools to private, often parochial schools. For precisely that reason, teachers' unions and civil libertarians have already challenged the Milwaukee and Cleveland programs in court.
The arguments against vouchers go well beyond those of constitutional law. Opponents say the grants will skim the best students, and their share of state and local education money, from public schools that are already starved for resources. And, they maintain, once a voucher system is enacted, even if only for the poor, conservatives will seek to extend it to home schooling and sectarian academies favored by the Christian right.
"It's exploitative of the black community," says Mary Jean Collins, the national field director of People for the American Way. "The philosophy of the right is always, 'Give my kid what he wants and to hell with the rest.' For that attitude to get into the black community would be shameful."
Vouchers also threaten the economic stake that blacks hold in the public school system as a source of stable employment and a proven route into the middle class. The percentage of non-whites among America's public school teachers rose from 8 percent in 1990 to 11 percent in 1996, according to the National Center for Education Information, and 17 percent of college students expressing an interest in teaching are minorities. In the large cities most likely to be affected by vouchers, the numbers are even higher. Blacks and Hispanics constitute about one-quarter of New York's teaching and supervisory force.
Tuesday's event in Philadelphia, though, inadvertently underscores the difficulty of the NAACP's position. In a public school system that is 80 percent nonwhite, only six percent of high school students are reading competently, according to the New York Times. Three-quarters of blacks in Philadelphia already favor vouchers.
"The status quo is unacceptable, totally unacceptable," acknowledges Collins. "No matter who you think is responsible for it, it's got to be fixed. I would tell parents to mobilize and demand more resources and fix the system as it is. The only way out is a good public school system. Public education is still the last, best hope for these kids."
SALON | Sept. 30, 1997
Samuel G. Freedman is a regular contributor to Salon. He is the author of three books, most recently "The Inheritance: How Three Families and America Moved from Roosevelt to Reagan and Beyond."
I'd like him to put his hands on a golden ticket to Washington D.C. before he does any more damage.
Does anyone answer or even ask the question of WHY LAUSD has deteriorated so much over the past several decades?
Prop. 13
"Prop. 13"
Oh STOP it! That excuse is BEYOND tired.
lesson to kids : learn and understand the constitution and bill of rights, AND how it applies. that's how mine is related to this thread.
Q: Does anyone answer or even ask the question of WHY LAUSD has deteriorated so much over the past several decades?
A: LAUSD (Ans other City agencies) are failing us; not because of lack of spending, but, because of lack of leadership (upper management) failing to constantly innovate; failing to continuously improve the system, itself; failing to make the constant improvements needed to stay competitive.
Now we are fighting for reform, out of a crisis situation.
As a result of this neglect of leadership, we are faced with unacceptable drop-out rates; we are losing generations to the streets; and are not producing enough productive citizens to replace outgoing teachers, police and high value jobs that prevent business from being able to set-up shop Los Angeles.
Zuma Dogg would like The Mayor and City Council to notify all LAUSD parents in thier districts, to let them know one leader, Admiral David Brewer is in charge of the transformation, and is seeking community input from parents, students and teachers and that transformation is on the way.
The voters voted for the school board members, and they voted for Admiral David Brewer to lead this transformation. He just started, and people feel good about him. So let Brewer (who everyone trusts more than Villaraigosa anyway, in this department) do his job, see how he does.
In other words, if you care about the school system, it would be ludicrous to take power out of the highly respected Brewer's hands and turn things overt to Tamar Galatzan and her muppet Masters, Eli Broad, Richard Riorend and Shady Villagrossa. So don't hijack the system, just cause you want your share of the construction money.
In the meantime, Zuma Dogg would like to empower ALL employees, throughout the City, to pick up the ball -- and use common sense and all thier years worth of experience to do their best job and help fix the City in your own way, everyday, on the jobe.
Don’t wait for the City to wave the starting flag to start doing what you know is best. (The fudge factor/flexibility that comes with smart people, putting their experience/knowledge to good use. So upper management doesn't have to get involved in every micro management decision.
And staffers, let management know what THEY can do, to help make YOUR job easier/less beuracratic, so you can do a better job/increase efficiency/reduce waste.
For example, maybe a principal that tells the teachers, "Hey no mid-term exams the day after American Idol finals. Kids won't study the night before, and overall test scores will drop." (Based on what learned last year.) And before you know it Simon Cowell isn’t just foiling the careers of bad singers, but state school dollars, as well, based on underper
Let common sense prevail, wherever legally possible. Knowledge comes from everyone within the system (it is called a school “system”), and if your ship is sinking, don’t ask what kind of life jacket they are throwing you.
For example, maybe the janitor can tell the cafeteria’s meal planner not to serve a certain item anymore, because most of it is ending up in the trash. (The meal planner would never know, cause all of it was served.]
Or the parking lot attend who notifies the principal that the lights need to be replaced in the staff parking lot because kids shot them with a BB gun. (And the principal would never know because he leaves work before dark.)
Kids know the problems; parents know the problems; teachers know the problems. Many of them have the solutions. Embrace your biggest assett, community input. (And I see Brewer doing that.)
And Council, here are some things I would like you to remind your constitunets:
Fixing the school system starts at home. Parents need to accept responsibility and become active participants in their children’s lives. You can judge what a young kid says, and how they behave by the standards imposed on them by the parents. It’s tough to say “no” to your kids, when other parents say, “yes”, or don’t say anything at all, because the kids are left un-attended.
Too many parents think it is the schools and teachers job to instill dignity, respect and discilpine into their kids. BUT IT IS NOT. That is the parents’ job. The schools job is to educate kids. Help fix LAUSD by fixing your kids, so the school can do it's job. (Teach them how to read, write, add, etc.) Asking your kid, “How was school today? Did you do your homework?”, is not taking responsibility for your child’s eductation.
I know it’s tough to be a parent to your kid, these days. The high cost of housing, taxes and gas makes it hard to make ends meet, and both parents (if there are even both parents at home) have to work long hours, and travel through long traffic-jammed commutes, for not enough pay, at the end of the day.
And at the end of that day, It’s much easier to say, “yes”, than argue a long protracted battle over how late a kid can stay out, or how many hours they can use myspace, youtube, ipod, xbox, or even regular old TV. And it doesn’t help when other parents refuse to do a thing to help instill disipline, morals or standards in thier kids.
But you must rise to the challenge and be the leaders and role models in your kids’ lives. Parents, don't rely on the City to be your kids babysitters after school. Rely on each other. Spend more time talking to each other about after school activities. Do more for each other. Talk about what your kids are and are not allowed to say and do. Try and convince other parents to go along with the higher standard, so all the kids that play together lift each other up, instead of drag each other down.
Take on more responsibility to do the job you asked for when you had a kid. Be a mentor -- to your own kids. You cannot leave the job of raising your kids; teaching them responisibity and values needed to keep them in school; to graduate and become the productive members of society we need them to be -- to the school system. That’s not THEIR job, it’s YOURS. Take on the challenge. It will be almost as enriching and rewarding of an experience as myspace or YouTube.
I have detailed a plan based on Dr. Deming's 14 points for methods of management of quality and productivity that should be applied at LAUSD to help eliminate the beuracrtatic waste that is costing this City billions of dollars and hindering student achievement. You can read the 14 point plan at www.zumadogg.blogspot.com (See "Interpreting Deming's 14 Points.")
Zuma Dogg
International Consultant, Methods for Management of Quality and Productivity
ADDITIONAL APPLICATIONS AT LAUSD: (Part 2 - early draft) :
Are the teachers themselves staying up to speed on cultural and technological phenomenons? Are the teachers and staff being kept up to date and informed by various City departments. Do the teachers know more than the students at the street level? Technological level? Cultural level? Teachers must be good psychologists, too. Does LAUSD make sure IT’S trainers are well trained?
The school system needs to move away from using tests and grades as a way of motivation. Tests can be used as way to measure progress. Not only of the students, but of the school systems. However, it should not be used as a fear based motivating tactic, or used to rank students (grades).
Then you have the teachers that only teach students how to pass the test, and kids who only memorize what the are expected to recall for the test. Rather than teaching the students to have a profound knowledge and understanding of the topic.
Tests and grades rob the student of intrinsic motivation to learn. Give a kid a bad grade, early on, and you are labeling them for life. Stigmatizing them. Maybe the teacher was having a bad day, and didn’t do their jobs, that day.
Or a student who’s reading comprehension scores are declining. The teacher demands a better job. The parents are called into the office. Priviliges are taken away from the child. They are stigmatized by others. Only to discover the childs vision was in decline, not behavior. So they get the kid a pair of glasses and the scores go back up.
Ranking students will never eliminate the bottom. You will always have a top, bottom and middle of any ranker. Ranking students, only demoralizes the majority of them.
The transformation must start with top management, for they have the most leverage and influence. They are the leaders. Once the decision has been made, middle management, supervisors and workers must come on board. It takes training and removal of inhibitions (fear, competition, barriers and divisions). We must fully cooperate with each other to constantly improve the system. THINK HOLISTICALLY (systematically).
More on Deming: www.ZumaDogg.Blogspot.com
Sam,
How come you didn't mention your own homeboy, BIG ZD has two sweet comments published right underneath Smiley's. (What up, Smiley!) We ran a tag team bamboozle-attack on those fools, y'all.
So look for ZD's two comments under Smiley. I pummpled 'em with words, y'all.
Anyone who can afford to send his children to private school in this town does so. Equal opportunity means we should enable all citizens to do so, not just the well-to-do.
Sadly, the Daily News' attempt at an education blog is turning into a free-for-all. The LA Times School Me! has actual content and does more than allow trolling. I'll check the DN on occasion, but I'm not very confident it could possibly shape policy as there's too much crap to sort through.
both papers are crap. get the news here on Mayor Sam.
Zuma ---
You did a GREAT job of answering a question...too bad it wasn't the question that was asked...
The question pertained to why LAUSD has deteriorated, not civilization.
The public school system in CA has been sliding downhill because of Proposition 13 (and yes, I do know more about Prop. 13 and public school education than you do ZD).
2:43,
Prove you know more that I, regarding public school education with a post of YOUR solutions. Because I DID answer the question. And it doesn't matter what you KNOW, what are you doing?
And yeah, tell me about Prop 13, cause i've only heard one side of that one. And it usually isn't your side.
You can say you know more about public schools than ZD, and I'm sure you do...but we'll see who the voters think knows more when you holla your tamar galatzan for school reform noise, versus what Zuma Dogg is saying.
Anyone who blames LAUSD's problems on Prop 13 knows NOTHING about Prop 13. My guess is that this person benefits handsomely from defending the real problems.
Zuma Dogg, you asked
Does anyone answer or even ask the question of WHY LAUSD has deteriorated so much over the past several decades?
and your answer to that question was off the mark. It's not due to lack of leadership - at least not primarily. It's about demographics. I can tell that you prefer to steer well clear of non-PC issues, like those regarding race and culture, but that's where the answer to your question lies.
You need to ask WHO within the LAUSD is bringing down the numbers for the whole population. If the problem was "leadership," then you'd expect uniform distribution of academic problems across racial and ethnic lines within the district, since the LAUSD has but one leadership. But the distribution isn't uniform at all. White, Asian and black students are performing at levels consistent with their historic averages. Latinos, however, are not. I suppose this is due in part to a combination of illegal immigration (ie, increases in the percentage of parents who are uneducated and/or English illiterate) and part due to white/Asian/black flight from the LAUSD or at least from schools that are predominantly Latino, which has changed the very culture of many LAUSD schools and L.A. neighborhoods and perhaps the entire district. The LAUSD student body, and parent body, is qualitatively different from what it was 30 years ago. That is your answer. It's simple and maybe painful to talk about, but that's it.
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