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.

As a former LAUSD employee, I can honestly say that the best ways to fix the problems are:
TRIM THE BUREAUCRACY or break up LAUSD into smaller districts! We don't need so many 'mini-superintendents' with their offices, staff, etc. that eats up so much money.

First thing that must be done to secrue the future of LAUSD is make sure you DO NOT vote for Mayoral backed candidates. Compared to what will happen to the schools if Villaraigosa takes over is FAR MORE DANGEROUS OF A RISK AND A MUCH BIGGER THREAT than the mediocratiy we have now. Now regarding that mediocraty -- WE HAVE JUST INSTALLED THE NO-NONSENSE DAVID BREWER AS LAUSD SUPERINTENDANT.

So now, mediocraty is not an issue, because he is on the case, and I trust the school board in HIS hands much more than shady Villargrosa's hands.

All Antonio wants, is control of the school construction budget, so he can have the contracts go to his short list of preferred contractors.

SO ZUMA DOGG SAYS YOU MUST VOTE FOR JON LAURETZEN. Because if you say, that means status quo and we need reform, REMEMBER, we just hired Brewer who everyone seems to agree is taking the bull by the horns.

Do we really need to slam on the brakes and hand the keys over to someone else..when that someone else is Antonio Villaraigosa? Common, the guy hasn't done one thing for the City, so now he wants to take on the challenge of fixing the schools? Tell him to stick to doing his job as mayor, and fix the city, then he will be doing his part to fix the schools. So, you gotta vote for Jon Lauretzen, because the mayor doesn't want you to.

How to "fix" LAUSD

First of all, keep in mind LAUSD just hired David Brewer to transform the school system, so using past performance results to predict what will happen now, may do more harm than good. Because we may be making suggestions, based on processes that are now null and void -- then you make the change, and make things even worse. (When a sailor turns the wheel of the ship, there is delay time before you change course/see results.) So if you turn the wheel, right as you were about to see the shift/results, you are undermining the whole plan.

So I don't buy the mayor's premise that HE needs to take over the school board, at this point, now that Brewer has taken charge. (And I'd put LAUSD'S future in Brewer's hand over Villaraigos'a any day.)

So, let’s look at some bigger picture solutions not affected by these factors.

First, you gotta break it up into smaller systems. It’s way to big and way to beuracratic to operate efficiently. Besides being too big geographically, it’s too wide socio-economically. The higher performing schools in the more affluent areas seem to get the “house advantage” over the lower performers in lower economic areas. (Different needs and attentions.) But even socio-economic inequalities aside, it’s just too big a system to operate as an efficient system.

The first thing that can be done to fix 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. (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. But you must rise to the challenge and be the leaders and role models in your kids’ lives.

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.

So ONE thing we can do to fix the schools (besides reducing classroom size, paying teachers more so we can recruit new ones, after school programs, safer streets and other things that are out of your control), is 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 and teaching them responisibity and values needed to keep them in school, graduating and productive members of society we need them to be to a 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.

There IS much for LAUSD to do as well, especially in the areas of management of quality and productivity as it related to operations and the administrative system itself.

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
Public Advocate of the Community

I completely agree with the Daily News and will go on to say that all of public education needs a top to bottom (or bottom to top) overhaul. It's completely clear that public education is, and has been, failing our children and society.

No critical assessment of public education is complete unless it takes an objective look at the great harm caused by labor unions on public education and state and local government in general. A system in which it's difficult to discipline problem employees, nearly impossible to have regular layoffs for budget streamlining (as done by the private sector), pays automatic salary increases no matter the budget reality, pays far too many generous benefits and vacation hours, allows teachers to retire as early as 50 (DN recently reported that public safety employees can retire at 50 and other at 55 -- it's actually 45 and 50, simply at a slightly lower percentage of salary) gives employees far too much power to call their own destinies, faces little competition, and which corrupts elected officials with the union money and volunteerism is a COMPLETE FAILURE TO OUR CHILDREN AND TO TAXPAYERS.

The Board needs to use it's influence to purchase the needed items the district needs for all schools. The local schools through it's principal together with the parent groups and teachers decide what happens inside the school. The Learn model was an excellent model in that it allowed local schools handle the money based on what they needed instead of what the board wanted. We need music, art and physical education to go along with academics in all our schools. We need to control the high cost of textbooks. If one publisher doesn't want our business, I'm sure that others will.

If the Stanford Report is correct, this new infusion of money to targeted schools under the current structure will also be wasted. How much of that $1,000/student will actually make it into the classroom? How about allowing each teacher $1,000/year to spend on whatever resources they need in the classroom?

Welcome to the LAUSD blogosphere!

The Daily News has historically been an important and vital voice about public education and LAUSD. Not always right - none of us are - but there and engaged.

Onward - smf

I was cleaning up some stuff on my computer the other night and ran across this...

I was asked to deliver the keynote to the LAUSD Parent Summit FOUR years ago.

Re-reading this reminds me of why I am doing this work - and of just how far we have to go...

Maybe this will get the blog started....

Regards,

Bill

Bill Ring
Chair Ex-Officio, Parent Collaborative
moderator, LAUSDParents Yahoogroup
www.guerrillaguidetolaunified.com
========

Good morning....let me add my own welcome to all of you to the 7th annual
parent summit. I have to say...when the summit planning committee was organizing
and we were looking for a keynote speaker, I never expected to be the one
standing here in front of all of you. I guess that's what a budget crisis will do:
everyone else wanted to get paid to come and speak to you. I said I'd do it
for free... but I'm going to tell you what I think you need to hear.

I'd like to begin by sharing a story with you.

I have been wrestling for some time with how to have a more meaningful impact
upon our schools.

One of the extraordinary things Merle Price did while he was our local
superintendent was to hold a retreat for his administrators, a retreat to which he
invited me. It was the first time I got to see - from the inside - just how
little trust there was among administrators and between the Local District and
Central District folks and just how political and dysfunctional our school
system was.

For two years, my understanding deepened until I was able to see how the
business of schooling children in Los Angeles is, to a great extent, decided by
the central district administration and the Board of Education and those who
have influence with these groups, including the various unions.

I was then serving on a local district parent council which had determined
that it would not spend time hearing complaints from schools around the Local
District so parents were left with the challenge of resolving any issues with
their school principals. In those schools that did not welcome parents, I
wondered how was this going to be accomplished? In a system that may put teachers
and administrators to work when they may have already shown that they don't
belong in a school or don't want help in making it work, this can be, for a
parent, the equivalent of an educational life sentence.

But let me return for a minute to the retreat I mentioned. I left the Local
District retreat feeling as though I had finally made a connection with some
administrators, that we had shared an experience which allowed each of us to
better understand one another. I was also reminded about the value in working in
earnest with teachers and administrators as partners and saw that it could be
a reality. Some of the wonderful relationships I developed then continue to
this day.

There were some goals and key intentions that came out of that retreat:

• To Make processes more public.
• To Develop the trust among ourselves to build
• To Work to eliminate the vestiges of the "old system" as quickly as
possible.

and how about this one:

• We may need to look at 'cleaning house' of people who don't want to move in
our common direction.

There was much promise but I'm sorry to say the wonderful conversations,
insights and intentions voiced at that retreat proved short lived.

Last year, I began to search for a model for parent engagement - one to adopt
or, perhaps, to create, where I could, working with other parents around the
district, begin to get parents to talk with one another about their concerns,
to share what's working and to shine a light on what isn't... perhaps to build
a network, an association of parents, district-wide.

I admit, I sometimes wonder if we as a community of parents have the will to
make the required changes in our schools. If you are like most parents, you'll
move through the system with a child in elementary school and it may be
second or third grade - or later - before you realize what is really going on in
your child's school. Then again, perhaps you are one of the fortunate ones with
a child who attends a school with a principal and staff that welcome you as a
parent, a principal who is passionate about creating the best possible
learning environment for all children, a principal who is connected to his or her
community. On the other hand, perhaps you have a child in a low performing school
with a principal who appears not to care or with a teacher who was
force-placed into your school or your child's classroom. Before you know it, you've left
that school and begin to adjust to the challenges of middle or high school,
perhaps leaving the condition at the old school unresolved for other, incoming
parents to discover.

In an article that appeared in Steve Lopez's column in the LA Times almost
exactly one year ago today, Mr. Lopez says, "If there is a greater collective
failure in American society than the state of public education, it has not been
brought to my attention. The economy, the quality of life, flight from cities,
segregation, the crime rate in your neighborhood--all these things are tied
to the quality of public education in the richest country on Earth. And yet
despite the stakes, we can't get it right. Can't even get close. "

I dug out that article recently. It was about a conversation that Mr. Lopez
was having with LAUSD Board member Mike Lansing and near the end of the
article, Mr. Lansing was quoted as saying, "if more parents were involved in
meaningful ways, public education would be transformed overnight."

You're absolutely right, Mike. This is something for which I have been
advocating as an active parent for the last six years.

While parent involvement certainly means different things to different
people, it begins at home with parents taking an active role in the education of
their children including asking them about their school day, making sure they
have a quiet, well-lighted place to study at home, reading to them and with them,
assisting with and reviewing their homework and other assignments and
insisting upon meeting with their teachers and school administrators regularly. Many
parents already do such things but historically, a significant percentage of
parents do not, for any variety of reasons. Some may not take the
responsibility seriously and those need our help. A growing number of our parents are
single parents like me. Many struggle just to cope with life everyday...so for many
of them, just being able to do the things I outlined above is an achievement.
Still, others make choices to put themselves before their children. I don't
know what else to say about that.

Some parents have more time and some have more experience than others.
Perhaps they are more familiar with their school, with the teachers and staff,
perhaps they've been more involved in their school or perhaps they serve on a
committee or otherwise have a leadership position. I think that those of us who can
should help other parents, help them to become oriented at a new school, let
them know about community resources which may be available to them, mentor and
share what we know and what we do with other parents...

To me, then, parent involvement necessitates being involved in some way at
your child's school. Yet it's important to understand that parent participation
and the voices of school communities are not genuinely honored at many school
sites. Many schools do not welcome parents. From the unfriendly signs that
are posted on the gates to the attitude that may permeate a school, some don't
welcome parents on campus at all and some are only happy to see us if we're
helping to raise money or participating as field trip chaperones or if we'll sign
off on something requiring a parent signature. Also, schools don't always
educate parents to become equal partners in shared school-site decision-making
councils and I'm sorry to have to break the news to you but they may just not
want us involved. What Boardmember David Tokovsky once said about himself is
often true of parents at schools across the district: we're sometimes treated
like mushrooms... kept in the dark and fed cow manure.

Don't you think parent voices should be considered when it comes to deciding
who will replace a principal or a local superintendent? Shouldn't parents be
heard in determining how their child's school actually budgets its funds and
how it spends the money, in how it aligns the budget to meet the needs of the
school's student population? What is the phrase "community school" all about?
What does it really mean when the community is not involved?

Even at the central district, parents are not generally welcomed as partners
in policy making and decision making. I offer you this example: Are we
considered when it comes time to talk about wages and benefits and working
conditions for the teachers who are teaching our children and administrators who are
running our schools? When union representatives sit down with the district to
talk about such things, are the parents included in the dialogue? No. Are we and
our children not the clients? Parents, we need to be included in these
discussions. They are directly connected to the District's budget crisis and the
last I checked, the sunshining (that is, the making public) of the contract
negotiations with unions is a requirement of state law. Parents are completely
left out of such discussions and it has to change. WE have to organize to change
it.

Each year, we choose a theme for our Parent Summit. The theme of this year's
Parent Summit addresses our role as parents in ensuring that no child is left
behind. As I've begun to outline, we have a huge role in ensuring that our
kids are not left behind...and we also have a role in ensuring that our
neighbor's kids are not left behind and that our community's children are not left
behind. In fact, I would suggest to you that we have THE primary role...each of us
is our child's first teacher and we owe it to our children to make sure that
they get a quality education. What parent doesn't want his or her child to
succeed?

No Child Left Behind. If you are unfamiliar with this phrase, it is a
reference to federal legislation passed in 2001, the No Child Left Behind Act. One of
the seminars at 9:30 will help you to understand the key provisions of the
NCLB Act.

Let me tell you...it will take more than federal legislation to ensure that
no child is left behind...and it will take more than money to ensure that no
child is left behind.

I've said it before: The original Elementary and Secondary Education Act of
1965 was introduced nearly 40 years ago. This was federal law which was
supposed to help the poor, the underserved and culturally deprived kids learn to read
through Title One programs. Thirty-seven years and $100 billion later, ask
yourselves: are the kids really better off? Have we closed the achievement gap?
You want to know the worst part. It's this:

The kids are still taking the blame.

But let me say something about the state of California and it's fiscal
crisis. California is hurting to the tune of $35 Billion..a $35 Billion budget
deficit....and LA Unified and the Board of Education are struggling under the
weight of having to cut hundreds of millions of dollars from this year's budget and
hundreds of millions more next year...and we don't really yet know what the
state education budget for next year will look like. As parents, we have
several responsibilities to our children in this regard: we must educate and inform
ourselves as to what we feel is most important to our children's education -
smaller class sizes, school safety, teacher quality and stability, nutrition,
student needs...maybe you want smaller school districts. We must prioritize
our concerns. We must make our voices heard. We must also make sure that the
boardmembers remember the mantra: put children first! We must make sure our
elected representatives in Sacramento hear us loud and clear: less money for jails
and more money for schools; less money for prisoners and more money for
students and teachers. Now!

Parents must also recognize that we needn't leave our children in schools
that are failing them. We can have even more choices in our public schools than
we have now.

Parents could choose to take advantage of open enrollment periods, a specific
time period set aside by the District when parents have an opportunity to
have a child attend other than a neighborhood school. In a district as
overcrowded as LAUSD, this seems hardly worth mentioning as most parents will not be
able to take advantage of it for their children.

Another choice for parents: magnet schools. For those of you who would like
to learn more about magnet schools, there's a session at 11:15 this morning.
They are among the District's gems but over 35,000 kids district-wide are on
the waiting list for magnet schools.
An administrator told me recently that some schools actually have not
informed parents of their choices for other schools because the current school
doesn't want to lose the student to another school. And PARENTS want to know why a
local school for their children doesn't always mean that their child will be
able to get a quality education; parents want to know why can't EVERY school be
a magnet school?

There are other choices. The District's Schools for Advanced Studies (SAS)
program was created several years ago to take some of the pressure off the
magnet schools by introducing advanced mathematics and other curricula at select
school sites yet many parents don't know about the programs. Some have been
unable to get their children into such schools and in some cases, funding for such
programs has been provided to school sites yet those schools are not
incorporating such programs into their school plans.

Among the other choices available to parents today are public charter
schools. There are many of us who embrace charter schools and more who are learning
about them every day. Nonetheless, there is a lot of misinformation and
disinformation about charters - AND other school choices - out there.

So....

WHY DON'T WE CONTINUE TO THINK ABOUT OTHER CHOICES? Remember those Apple
Computer billboards. What did they say? Think different.

Maybe, just maybe we're ready to try something new instead of banging our
heads against the wall year after frustrating year.

Parents...are you getting the idea? We have the power to choose, we have the
power to tell our representatives what we want...now we need to step up. Us.
You and I and the thousands of other parents with kids in schools in this
district. We need to organize, we need to communicate, we need to hear from you
about what you want and what you don't and we must all make our voices heard.

Will you voluntarily continue to send your children to schools that may not
teach or protect them? Will you continue to send your children to schools that
may not welcome you as a partner? If you could, would you choose schools as
different and unique as your children’s personalities and abilities?

Of course you would. If we parents do not take our responsibility for our
children's education seriously, do you think that any amount of “reform” is ever
going to change things? No amount of money is ever going to be enough. By the
way, would someone please show me the studies proving a connection between
increased spending and increased learning?

There's been a lot of talk about increasing the number of days our kids go to
school. Here's something to think about: I read recently that Hong Kong,
with a short school year, beats Japan in math and science contests and that
Israel, with a long school year, can’t keep up with Belgium...and Belgium has the
shortest school year in the world!

And standards. Who, exactly, is setting these standards? Think about what you
want for your kids. Of course we want them to read and to write. Of course we
want them to understand mathematics and to appreciate art and music. Don't we
also want to teach our kids to think critically for themselves, to make
better decisions? Don't we want our kids going to schools that encourage and
foster the different ways to make learning happen? If so, it is up to us to insist
that it happen.

Administrators and teachers are talking about having high expectations of our
children. We need to let them know that as parents, WE have high expectations
of teachers and administrators but that we also have high expectations of
ourselves.

Parents, if we can only take the challenge, the real challenge to ensure that
no child is left behind, then as Mike Lansing says we could transform public
education overnight.

We parents have a right— and the primary responsibility— to determine the
education of our children, arguably a family’s most important responsibility.
This issue may be, as Martin Luther King III has pointed out, the last great
civil rights issue. Do we have a right to have a say in where our kids go to
school, in who teaches them, and what they learn? If you’ve got money, you can buy
this right, but if you don't, you can't.

Think about it.

The future of parent involvement in LAUSD can be bright. So much of that
resides in our imagination. We need to learn to use more of that, don't you think?
We don't utilize what we have...and you know what they say, if you don't use
it, you lose it.

Don't lose yours....imagine. Imagine what we can do when we all work together.

It's been an honor to address you today. Let me leave you with this:

As he left LAUSD as interim superintendent in 2000, Ramon Cortines told
parents to raise hell with the system. It's time to take up the challenge.

Thank you.

Get rid of the LAUSD TV station, KLCS. It produces very little original programming and the few programs it does produce are mediocre and self serving vanity shows. The District could sell the license for well over 40 million dollars and save millions each year in operating costs.

The board meetings could still be broadcast over Los Angeles City’s cable channels.

Most of the other programs it airs are recycled PBS and instructional programs that are easily available elsewhere. In addition, in this era of so many other technologies, TV is rarely used in the classroom. Many other sources, including the Internet and instructional DVD’s are readily available.

Thirty years ago, a TV station to deliver instructional programming made sense. Today it is a multi-million dollar drain on the District and needs to go!

The priorities of schools need to change. They need to focus on the core components of education and stop wasting time with all of the programs that supplement the basics. There are too many extracurricular activities’ going on in schools which take away from the fundamentals of education. Everyone wants to try new stuff and implement whatever is the newest fad in education. This approach just distracts from what really needs to be taught.
Also, watering down the educational system to accommodate everyone under the sun also weakens what the strong learners need to succeed. Teachers are not gods and they cannot teach a classroom filled with students of many languages, mental and physical disabilities and give extra attention to those that want to excel beyond what is giving to them. Let's be realistic about this, not idealistic. And why is it that an English teacher without any knowledge of Japanese can go over to Japan and teach their children English, while we need to pay extra for so many bilingual teachers to teach Spanish speaking children English? Gee, and who scores higher in academic tests, American children or Japanese children?
When my children start elementary school I will work hard to make sure they are spending a majority of their time learning the basics like math, grammar, reading, and science and not spending a great deal of time in some lame presentation in the auditorium with guys dressed in animal costumes singing and dancing around preaching how to eat right and brush your teeth.

Any fiscally responsible business person knows, money is not the answer here. California is the most populous state in the union, so it seems we should be getting more mileage for our $$$. Just like members of Costco or a credit union where the more members you have, the cheaper the goods. Why isn't our broken school system the same way?

By getting rid of it?

Seriously, what function does the LAUSD perform that schools couldn't perform for themselves, more efficiently, at lower cost to the public and without having a soul-sucking bureaucracy to support?

No discussion or analysis of public education is complete until an objective look at the problem of union teachers is addressed. Decades of experience should have made it clear that unions have no place in government. To work in public service should be an honor.

Teachers being allowed to call their own shots in spite of budget realities and management concerns has been a complete disaster. Taxes are continually raised and new taxes created to feed the greed of civil service bureaucrats. Half of the CA budget goes to schools (with salaries being the largest pie share by far) and we have little to show for it. Test scores are dismal and teacher quality is questionable at best.

The union propaganda that teachers are underpaid is a lie. Take the annual compensation of the average CA teacher (about $60K?) and divide that by actual number of hours actually worked in a year and the result is a very high effective hourly rate. Plus, they have many other nice benefits not enjoyed by private sector employees. How would you like a defined benefit retirement plan that pays you for life with eligibility to retire as early as the ripe old age of 55 (50 at a lower percentage of income)?

The union civil service system has corrupted government. Politicians are beholden to the financial contributions, campaign volunteerism and votes of union bureaucrats and basically give them everything they want. This comes at the expense of high taxes and poor services.

I know most journalists are union members themselves, but this problem must not be ignored if the severe problem of unacceptable public education quality is going to finally be solved. Children must come before teachers and other bureaucrats!

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.

Sorry about the accidental repost, I hit the wrong button.

Responding to Truth mustbeTold.

What people usually fail to understand is that the teachers are the union and the union is the teachers.

To say that teachers are overpaid and enjoy all the trappings of power is to ignore the real truth. If the teacher’s gig was so desirable then why aren’t we having to beat off people in their pursuit to gain employment?

I sit on the hiring committee of my school, Lawrence Middle School in Chatsworth. We are one of the most desirable schools to work at in the district. Our test scores are good, we have a supportive community, and the campus is well maintained.

We are lucky to have one qualified applicant for each job opening. Under the federal no child left behind legislation, we sometimes have a much better candidate interviewing with us, but have to choose the qualified one. Is President Bush in bed with the Unions? Really?

You will never find anyone more committed to seeing resources put into the classroom than a teacher. We are on the front lines everyday trying the best we can to educate today’s youth.

It’s hard though. All too often we are subjected to derision by in the media and by the public. We feed at the public trough, we are greedy, we don’t care about the kids, these and many many more sap at our resolve.

And so, we leave the profession. One out of two teachers walks away in the first five years. In the next 10 years, 1/3 of all teachers will retire. CSUN, the teacher factory for Los Angeles, is running at 50% of it’s education enrollment compared to five years ago.

I ask you Truth, who is it you expect to walk into the classroom and teach? It is an honor to serve society as a teacher. I wish that more people shared that sense of duty, but they don’t. It’s your wonderful market economy based on supply and demand at work.

We are importing math teachers from India and Pakistan. There is talk of expanding the program to include Science teachers. What’s next, American History teachers from Bankok?

Who is being idealistic and Pollyannaish now? The teachers are the one group of people who really do have a sense of what should be done.

Responding to Smiley.

First, do you Bush Bashers ever fail to find any silly opportunity to bash Bush? Get over it. He's your president and he has nothing to do with this debate.

On to the subject at hand. Nice try, but I've heard all the standard teachers' union propaganda many times before and my opinion is completely unchanged after you repeat it. You teachers can pat yourselves on the back all day long, but the fact is that we keep throwing more and more tax dollars at public education and results and quality continue to decline. Why do you think we're having this discussion? Because you're doing such an outstanding job? Want to answer why that is? Is HALF the California state budget still not enough for you? What taxes would you like to increase and raise again? Is 5 months of vacation/holiday time off not enough for you?

I didn't criticize the teaching profession. What I am critical of are the public employee unions, and certainly the teachers union. I've already explained the reasons for my criticism, which you conveniently ignored -- a typical tactic by union people.

Here are some reasons why you are likely having problems finding qualified teachers as you submitted: 1) You aren't graduating students well educated enough to pursue careers in teaching, 2) Some may not want to join your union and put up with your nonsense, and 3) Your union has created standards for your profession that too narrowly disqualify many people who are interested in teaching and who would make fine teachers.

But here's the most relevant question ... if you're really having so many problems hiring new teachers and if you're all doing such a fine job of educating our children -- why do you insist on having union protection at the expense of our kids??? If skilled teachers are so scarce, why not compete on the open market without a lot of bureaucratic union restrictions??? Do you fear that many school districts might unload a lot of the dead weight teachers who hate their jobs and the children they're supposed to be educating? I personally think that would be good for education. Do you disagree?

Who do I think should walk into a classroom and teach? Well, I'll tell you. I think that anyone that is skilled in a subject that we want to teach our kids (fancy certificates or not); who loves the idea of sharing his or her knowledge with kids; and who is willing to live up to the standards of the school district or accept dismisal (just like any private sector profession) should be teaching our kids. And I suspect that such a person would do a much better job. I'm not saying that there aren't already many such teachers in the system ... but the union doesn't reward excellence and motivation so much as it promotes resistance and mediocrity.

No, extolling the virtues of the teaching profession is not an argument that should convince any reasonable person that your union should continue to be allowed to do its damage. You haven't convinced me and putting your union bosses on the radio begging for politicians to raise taxes isn't going to convince me either. Enough is enough.

As far as I'm concerned, an Education Revolution requires an end to the union. Either that or we must finally give up on public education and let the private sector take over.

Oh Truth, if it were only so simple. The teacher shortage I speak of is not a LAUSD problem, it is a national problem. The U.S. Department of Education predicts a shortage of over two million K-12 teachers in the next 10 years. There are only five million K-12 teachers nationwide. C’mon, do the math. A shortage of 40%! That’s the fault of the unions? How?

I guess now would be a good time to point out that you failed to comment on our outsourcing of Math teaching positions from the far East.

Trust me, the vast majority of teachers would like to see the really poor teachers run from the profession. Lincoln, one night, was listening to his wife complain about General McClellan. He asked her whom he should replace McClellan with. Replace him with anyone, Mary Todd replied. Lincoln told her “that’s the problem, I can’t replace him with anyone, I must replace him with someone.” And so it is with our poor teachers.

There is one thing that good and bad teachers have in common. We are willing to walk into the classroom. I agree with you on one thing, until there is real competition for the jobs there will be no improvement in the quality of the teaching force.

You want us to fire the bad teachers. Great, help us create an environment where there are more applicants than positions. Until then, it’s a moot point. With the shortage of teachers growing exponentially we need every able body in the classroom.

One more thing on this topic, it is not that hard to fire a teacher when there is cause. Chronic absences, insubordination, or a spectacular event are all grounds for termination, and many teachers lose their jobs each year because of it.

Let’s both dial down the propaganda. I won’t use any more union rhetoric if you stop using phrases like “The union civil service system has corrupted government. Politicians are beholden to the financial contributions, campaign volunteerism and votes of union bureaucrats and basically give them everything they want.”

Do you honestly believe that the elimination of the teacher’s union will solve the problems plaguing our schools today? It is the teachers, through their union, that just got the district to cut class size for the first time in over six years. It is the, through their union,that is pushing the district to return 2,400 out of classroom teachers to the classroom where they belong. It is the, through their union, who are pushing the district to put the classroom first.

I am sure that we both agree of the immediate need to slash the numbers of people downtown and at the mini-districts. Those out of classroom teachers and administrators need to be returned to the school sites. We also agree that money alone is not the answer.

Class size, working conditions, and support rank equally high. Hey, we’re not asking for much. Perhaps a phone in the classroom so we can call parents. Access to a photocopier rather than having to wait 24 hours for turn-around. Maybe, if it wouldn’t be too much some furniture that wasn’t built before I was. My desk has a stamp on it from 1962, my chair, 1955.
You spoke in your post of the great benefits package that we have. How no one in the private sector enjoys this kind of package. Tell you what, my brother and I both have the same educational levels. He earned ten times what I did last year as a lawyer. Pay me what he makes, and you can keep the benefits.

Your analogy doesn’t work. You are only counting the work we do in front of the kids. Every teacher, every day spends 2-3 hours grading, planning, making phone calls, etc... My brother works about 60 hours a week. I am usually right behind him on hours.

So, in exchange for working for 10% of what he makes, I will get health care until I die. I will receive a pension running about 60% of my final salary. I can’t be fired on a whim, or by a principal with whom I have a disagreement.

I go back to my original point. Truth, you can take those things away from me, heck, next time we strike, go air-traffic controller on us. But until there is an over-supply of quality teachers waiting to get into the classroom, you’ll get what you pay for.

Simple economics 101

By the way, my reference to President Bush was only referring to the fact that his signature law, designed to boost the quality in the teaching ranks, has had the opposite effect. Frequently we have to pass over a worthy applicant because they do not possess the proper paperwork mandated by No Child Left Behind. If that’s Bush Bashing, then so be it. It’s his law. It’s working about as well as his other stuff is.

Well, Smiley, congratulations on taking another opportunity to bash Bush. I knew you wouldn't be able to resist. I don't know enough about his No Child Left Behind policy to comment on it. But I'm sure his intention was good and for the children.

I would suggest a new plan to President Bush: the Put Children & America First plan. In it, I would propose that we eliminate all civil service unions for the reasons I've already detailed.

Gee, Smiley, I don't earn as much as your attorney brother either ... but I'm not whining and standing on a table calling for union representation. See, I believe in the free market. In this system, the market determines what your brother gets paid and what I get paid based on supply and demand. Your union system in which you hold the public and administrators hostage to your demands is a failure. There's no guarantees in a free market system, Smiley. You're asking for security. That's a union pipedream that only results in failure. You'll have to compete in the fair market and accept what your chosen profession deserves and commands.

I personally believe that good teachers will be paid better in an open market system. No, taxpayers can't afford to pay you lifetime health insurance and large percentages of your salaries from the ripe old age of 45-55 forward. Heck, most taxpayers are just hoping to get some of what they paid into Social Security back in their 60s. I guess I should mention that you government civil service bureaucrats don't pay into the Social Security system. You can factor that into your salaries, as well. So you think we'll lose teachers if we kick out the unions and the fat contracts? That's a chance I'm more than willing to take to undo the damage of government civil service unionism. I am confident that the market will quickly find replacements for dead beat teachers who work primarily for union protection of the lowest common denominators rather than for other rewards of the job.

In re-hashing your argument that there is a severe scarcity of teachers, you completely ignored my points as to why that scarcity exists. Look, your labor union isn't doing anything to improve that situation and, in fact, is adding to the problem. The fact that the false scarcity of teachers is national rather than isolated to California is irrelevant.

You're complaining about school infrastructure. I would argue that the infrastructure has suffered because teachers have commanded such a high percentage of the tax dollars devoted to education to pay for their generous salaries and benefits.

I want to add one more important point to this discussion. In addition to my contention that government unions are a major problem in education, I would add that illegal immigration is also a major contributing factor. I would also suggest that government labor unions have been actively in support of ignoring the problems of illegal immigration. Why would they do that? Well, government jobs exist based on maximized population for which to provide services and the tax revenues derived from that population. There are many examples in which unions have come out in support of ILLEGAL immigration. Nobody can tell me that adding millions of unexpected children to the schools of California hasn't been a disaster on our infrastructure. I would also argue that your contention that there is a teacher shortage is also due to the problem of adding millions of additional population in large part (as well as my other points).

No, I don't buy your union's arguement that citizens aren't paying enough taxes, nor that we haven't dedicated enough of our taxes to education, nor that continuing to give teachers more is a solution to the problem. Your union rhetoric that the problem in education is that we don't compensate and treat teachers well enough is propaganda. That's been your arguement for decades and we've squandered multi-billions in response as the problem continues to get worse.

Get off your union high horse, Smiley, there's no more bargaining. This is about the welfare of our kids, our future, and the success of our nation. As stated, it's time to put our kids and our nation first.

I have, as a parent, been involved with LAUSD for 2 years now. A new comer I know. (My daughter goes to what we believe is a great school, Micheltorena Street Elementary). From my two years, here is what I believe we need to make LAUSD work:

Smaller classes (but not smaller schools). K-3 should be 15 students per class, 4-6 18 students per class. With the exception of performing music classes, all Jr. High and High classes should be 25 students or less.

Traditional calendar schools

Elementary schools should be k-6th grade, Jr. High 7-9 and High 10-12.

If possible, primary centers

More magnet schools for jr. high and high school

Strong principles, assistant principles and support staff. For all of you who gripe about top heavy schools, I have seen how important the non teaching staff is to a school and how much support they give to the teachers, parents and students.

More exercise (informal like jump ropes and sports equipment available to kids before and after school and formal like more and smaller PE classes), more fresh fruit and veggies in food services and less crap (fried, dripping in fat and salt- were all the food looks beige)

Were there is wasted money (and I have seen it) get ride of the program and/or staff that is causing the waste. Just because a program has been around for years does not mean it needs to stay around if it is no longer needed. And letting people keep their jobs is not a reason to keep unneeded departments.

Parents need to organize themselves out side of the LAUSD sponsored parent groups. These may be very informal; maybe they will have a yahoo group email list of an official name or they may be non profits buster club type groups. Don’t fall for the non LAUSD groups that are using parents as pones in their own game against LAUSD. Because I don’t want to get sued, I will not use the names of these groups, but think charter schools and other who profit when the public thinks all LAUSD schools are “failing”

Well, only a few days into this message board and it's already turned into a us-versus-them fight where virtually anyone can be deemed a "them." Is it any wonder that LA public schools for the most part stink? Everyone has a stake and a responsibility to the outcomes of local schools.

First off, CHOICE starts at home--having families of a size that one can afford and making the time to instill values and discipline. Whether it means giving up a weekly manicure or a cell phone bill, or having a family of a sustainable size, why do people spend so much time finding a school only to abandon the kids in the parking lot of the school for up to ten hours a day? Why are people so willing to let strangers completely raise their children?

Secondly, the district has to allow parents to choose where they send their kids. Schools that allow parental involvement and have happier teachers and staff not surprisingly have better test scores. Why penalize people who want a better experience for their children--even if they live a little further? While I support the smaller local districts, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to realize that with fewer students enrolled each year in the entire district there should not be MORE people on the LAUSD payroll.

Teachers have to take the responsibility that they can't have it both ways. Increases in test scores come from all components (students, families, district support, AND teachers working together) and poor test scores come from a lack of the same. Everyone knows of strong teachers and very poor teachers, and the sad thing is that while great teachers are heralded, poor teachers survive for years and years at the same or different schools ruining the experience for too many children.

Finally, the community. Unfortunately, this year it seems that the school board is more political than ever before. I won't support arrogant, press hungry people whether they come from the Mayor's office or the UTLA. It's really a shame that so many people fell for the "same old, same old" philosophy or the "anything is better than what we have" mentality instead of really looking at the issues. Can't an independent candidate run without being railroaded by special interests? And can the candidates actually address the issues rather than just trash each other?

The answers are in working together, but with so many agendas at work, I'm not holding my breath. Will the last LAUSD family please turn out the lights?

To Truth, I accept that you feel the teacher’s union is the cause of all that ills society. By now, I’m sure you accept I don’t see it that way. It’s time to move the agenda to other topics.

How do we reform education. Not just LAUSD, but education itself. I agree with Truth on one thing at least, illegal aliens have had a tremendous effect on the education system. It’s the ostrich syndrome. “What is the last thing a ostrich sees before being eaten by a lion? Sand!”

Our approach to illegal immigration has been like a ostrich’s response to danger. Bury your head in the sand and hope the problem goes away. It hasn’t yet. As a teacher, even as a member of the mighty and powerful teacher’s union, I have absolutely no say in which students are put into my classes. By law I am required to treat them all equally and provide a quality education regardless of my personal beliefs.

At the core of education’s problems is 200 years of education law. It is time to start a comprehensive review of the education code, both on a state and national level. Every law dealing with education should be examined and stripped from the books if it is not working.

Many of the programs that Dorit speaks of are there by court order. Many of the limitations on who can stay and who can go among teachers are dictated by the courts. The Rodriguez decree, Chanda Smith, and many other decisions severely limit what a school may or may not do.

It is wrong that a student who brings a weapon onto campus remains on that or any other campus. It is wrong that a student who sells drugs is allowed back in our schools. It is wrong that a student who is constantly disruptive, who has little parental support, who makes a mockery of the entire process to the student body, cannot be disciplined if the behavior is written into an IEP.

All of these things are dictated to the schools by judges and lawmakers. Schools are a political entity. We have to find a way to depoliticize the educational process. From lawmakers who write laws to further political careers to parents who sue when the school tries to discipline students to teachers filing lawsuits to protect their jobs, things need to change.

It is amazing to me how many bulletins and memorandum are issued by LAUSD on a yearly basis. Many of these are driven by legal decisions and make little sense to anyone not trained in law. But follow them we must.

The time has come to strip outmoded laws, craft newer and effective ones, and re-examine what the central role of education is supposed to be.

To Smiley, of course I didn't say the teachers union is the cause of "all society's ills" but it certainly is a major cause in the majority of the ills in education. You simply can't accept it as a recipient of the corrupted system. By the way, Smiley, the negative impacts of the teachers' union powers aren't "propaganda," they're provable facts. Teachers whining that they're underpaid IS propaganda and rhetoric.

Now, in addition to my suggestion that it's vital to stop the union power and put it back in the hands of citizens, and the enormous negative effects of illegal immigration on education, here is one more suggestion:

** Extend the school day until about 5 p.m. Most households have two working parents. Most people work between the hours of 8-5. It doesn't make sense to release kids at 2-3 and then send them home with armloads of homework expecting parents to do the educating teachers fail to do. Keep the kids and teachers in school longer. Keep the work in school supervised by teachers. After school, kids need time to do athletic activities, family activities and simply unwind.

Wow! We agree Truth! I'm not sure where parental responsibility for the education of their child begins or ends, I just know that if I get 50% of the homework back from an average class, it was a good day.

I think we do need to extend the school day. It all depends on what is done with that additional time in school.

If it is going to be used for more academic instruction, then it will be wasted.

If however, it is used as a time for teachers to interact with students on homework, or to counsel, or to enrich what is being done during the academic day, then it has great value.

Not until 5pm though. Doing that would cut off any ability for the kids to participate in any kind of extra-curricular activity.

My daughter plays soccer. After the time change in October, it gets dark by 4:30-5:00. Kids need exercise too.

Lengthing the school day, if used properly, will not fix the problems, but would help.

As a teacher with a Ph.D. in English, working at Valley high schools since 2000, I have researched the reason for low CST test scores and poor graduation rates.

There are a lot of theories out there, but one statistical fact explains by itself the low test scores, poor academic performance, and discipline challenges. The problem is functional illiteracy. I Star tested nearly all of my 10th and 11th graders, and the results reflect the poor performance on the CST test scores. In short, over 80% of students tested cannot read at grade level.

When I bring this up in meetings with administrators and teachers, they largely ignore it. All of LAUSD ignores this problem, including UTLA. (By the way, UTLA is just another department of LAUSD.)

I refer you to a website, childrenofthecode.org, for expert opinions on this problem nationwide.

Extend the day and my kids will be homeschooled. Kindergarten is now full day and my daughter all but falls asleep in the car every day on the way home. Yet I send her to a full-day campus because the kids getting 1/2 day aren't getting any of the extras. Make the day any longer, and I couldn't accept that trade-off any longer.

Frankly, the high school I chose for my son more closely resembles a college schedule with three classes a day for each semester--and they get out at 1:12 every day (Ask me about their CAHSEE pass rate, too). Students with parents who work (and therefore worry about idle hands) can take a fourth class and theoretically graduate early yet still get out of school at 3:00.
Sports are also taught during that fourth period. Athletes are actually home before dark and can even swing a part-time job during their sport season.

Some kids need jobs. Kids in sports need to remain academically eligible. The bright kids who want to take college classes have to have time to do their homework from both schools. If the school day is any longer, you take away from these groups.

You extend the day to take care of a social problem (parents refusing to parent and pushing their kids off on schools) and you'll lose the families that actually best support in-class endeavors.