Leave a comment Posted on schools, students, teachers

A 2016 Student Superstar

Too often educators get caught up in negativity.  Like a peace officer who mainly interacts with the worst citizens in society and forms an overall suspicious attitude towards anyone he encounters, teachers often generalize about all students especially when they have several who misbehave or don’t do their work.

When a teacher, however, gets the opportunity to know brilliant students, it more than makes up for others who aren’t.  With high school graduations on the horizon, I’d like to devote this column to one such remarkable senior.

I have had the privilege of working with Kamilah Zadi for the past three years.  In addition to having her in the 10th grade honors English class, Kamilah has spent nearly all of her high school career in journalism working on Hoover High School’s newspaper The Tornado Times.

In the 23 years I have been teaching journalism, she may be the most passionate editor-in-chief (EIC) I have ever met.   She cares so deeply about social issues that she continued as opinion editor this year despite her EIC duties.

In addition to her column, Kamilah writes the staff editorials for the newspaper, often writing about national issues that she thinks teens should have an awareness of.  If she had her way, the opinion section would appear on page one.

The qualities she exhibits resemble those of a seasoned professional in the field.   Commitment to excellence may be the Raiders’ motto but it’s one that Kamilah adheres to, and it bothers her when she does not see it in her peers.

I asked her why more students aren’t involved in school beyond the classes they take and she matter-of-factly responded, “They don’t care.”

“They don’t seek something to be passionate about and people don’t encourage them to get involved,” she said.

Kamilah’s parents, food historian and writer Susan Park and chef Farid Zadi who has appeared on Cutthroat Kitchen, encouraged her to get involved beyond her own world, to experience other cultures at an early age.

Before she attended Hoover, she was homeschooled—by herself.

“My mom stayed at home with my brother and I and put a lot of energy into talking to us about the world and requiring us to know three languages,” she said.

After her mother laid down the foundation, she attended weekly meetings at Verdugo Academy, but did “everything on my own.”

She decided to attend a public high school “to explore my passions and figure out what I wanted to do.”

Even though she felt ready for college last year, she finished her senior year because she wanted to be EIC and lead her peers in the endeavor of producing an outstanding publication.

In terms of how schools could be improved, she thinks that “teachers are too lenient, coddling the students.”

“When the bar is raised higher, you’ll get higher.”

To prove that Kamilah follows her own advice, look at what this 17-year-old has accomplished and plans on doing:

  • created the SAGE club (Students Advocating Gender Equality).
  • member of the Gender Spectrum National Youth Advisory Council.
  • started a feminist newsletter/club, From Margin to Center, named after feminist Bell Hooks.
  • has an internship with political activist and CNN commentator Van Jones this summer.
  • works at her parents’ taco restaurant Revolutionario in Los Angeles.
  • plans on starting an online vintage clothing store with her mother called BAMN (By Any Means Necessary). Its purpose:  to provide clothes and funding for women in prison so that when they get released they have what they need for successful job interviews.

Such an industrious individual is the type of student that inspires even teachers.  Energetic, ready to take on the world, Kamilah enters UCLA this fall majoring in Pre-Political Science, feeling “pretty confident” about her future.  So should we all.

Leave a comment Posted on advanced classes, Public Education, public schools, teachers, valedictorian

Have Separate Classes for Kids of Different Abilities

“I find rowdy kids intolerable and just plain annoying.”

This is not a teacher talking, but a student describing what it is like for a smart kid to be in a class with kids of lower ability.

About 15 years ago, a shift began in high schools instituting an open door policy that allows any student access to an advanced class regardless of prior achievement.  No more prerequisites.

This experiment has not worked.  In fact, little evidence exists proving that lower ability students succeed at a higher level when sitting next to their higher ability counterparts.

Gone are the days when all my “honors” students earned A’s and B’s.   Now I have students all over the grading scale.

In following an “all classes for all students” policy, all students are harmed by a system where competition is de-emphasized.

When I began teaching, there were English courses tailored for each ability level:  high, middle, and low.   That makes sense.

A teacher can do a more effective job tailoring lessons for homogenous groups rather than having to differentiate for all levels within the same class period.

Students who struggle need a properly trained teacher for their needs just as special ed kids need specially trained personnel.  Many low ability learners feel inadequate so having them sit next to geniuses is not to going to raise their self-confidence.  And gifted kids gamely sit through redundant lessons that their peers can’t handle.

More than 80 percent of advanced students believe strongly in having separate classes for high ability learners and low ability learners, according to a survey of my students.

The reasons they oppose grouping all abilities together include the harm it does to the advanced student due to the slower pacing and the disruptive environment.

“They frustrate you because they aren’t understanding what everyone else is talking about or they won’t do any work,” says one.

“The smarter people who understand the lesson have to wait for the others to understand the topic before moving forward which is wasting their time and keeping them from having harder and more challenging problems,” says another.

“I dread coming to class.  The concepts are dumbed down, the students are less mature, and they make a lot of noise and interrupt the lesson.”

Several students don’t feel their needs are being met.

“It is unfair to treat us as a collective body rather than teach each students’ personal needs.”

One exasperated student wondered, what’s wrong with “rewarding those who work for” high achievement?

How ironic that the higher achieving kids which school administrators love to spotlight as evidence of a school’s excellence actually are short-changed in their learning.

A long-running belief among education officials is that they don’t have to worry about the smart kids, and because of that view, they do nothing for them.  Funding for gifted students barely registers a sliver on the education budget pie chart.  In other words, the children who become  contributors to society are held back from even greater achievement.

In a way, public school is the antithesis of the American economy where competition does not exist.  Some schools have done away with ranking students which means there no longer is a valedictorian for graduation.  For an institution that is supposed to educate young people about the real world, this anti-competitive approach fails kids.

The one area in school where competition is allowed to thrive is athletics.  The coach is not forced to provide equal playing time for each athlete.  The same philosophy should be applied to academic classes.

If it weren’t for the College Board’s Advanced Placement courses, schools would not even offer any of those classes.

Probably the most help higher-achieving students provide for lower-achieving ones is by supplying free paper and pens.

 

Leave a comment Posted on children, Common Core, parents, Public Education, public schools, schools, students, teachers, teaching

Tenure remains one of the few benefits of teaching

Teachers and their unions collectively exhaled last week when a California appeals court overturned the Vergara ruling in 2014 which struck down teacher tenure in the state.

As a teacher who has struggled with the virtue of tenure, this was the right call to make at this time.

I, too, am frustrated that ineffective instructors remain on the job in classrooms, negatively impacting young people’s education.

Barring heinous criminal behavior, you can’t easily fire a teacher. The amount of energy and paperwork required to remove a bad one is monumental.  However, if teachers had no job protection, it would cause harm to the entire profession.

The history of tenure in public schools dates back nearly a century when women could be fired if they got pregnant or married.

Without tenure, a personality clash between a principal and a teacher might mean dismissal.

With pressure from dissatisfied parents and students, a decent teacher might lose her job.

Teaching is not that financially rewarding to justify removing the safety net of tenure.

Teachers remain the lowest paid group of professionals despite half of them holding master’s degrees.  Tenure is a kind of substitute for the lack of financial benefits other professions offer.  That is the main reason it needs to remain in place.

California educators recently received a solicitation from the Educational Testing Service (ETS) to score the new Common Core assessments.  Pay?  $20 an hour—only $5 more than the proposed $15 minimum wage.   For ETS to think that such a low sum would entice teachers is quite insulting.

Think of workers who you can hire for $20 an hour.  And if you can think of any, please email me.

Actually, if administrators did their job properly, there would be fewer incompetent instructors. After two years of formal and informal observations, enough evidence exists to determine is a teacher is good enough to stay employed.

If an administrator overlooks deficiencies, then that person now has a job for life, possibly marring children’s learning for years to come.

No, tenure is not the real problem; it’s that the teaching profession looks the other way when it comes to the one thing that truly distinguishes one teacher from another, and that is quality.

If teachers are required to work without job security, then they should be compensated significantly more money.

In most other careers, people risk losing their jobs if they don’t perform well; however, with that risk, comes rewards if they do.   Such an environment does not exist in the teaching field.

The system pays everyone the same, adjustments in salary solely based on units in college and years on the job.

For those educators who provide a minimum effort, teaching is a cushy job.  But for those who work hard and tirelessly push themselves, teaching is quite frustrating.

No matter the “I’m here for the kids” slogan, an excellent teacher feels slighted.  No bonuses, no promotions, no recognition.

Whether or not a teacher designs effective lessons, communicates well with students, properly evaluates student work and returns it in a timely manner, arrives to the workplace on time, has no bearing on the employability of that individual.

So while I am all for making it easier to fire bad teachers, what has to happen at the same time at the other end of the spectrum is that teachers should earn more money for performing at outstanding levels.

Until that day arrives (which I have been waiting for since 1989), teacher tenure must stay.

If teachers are not going to be rewarded monetarily for a job well done, then they should feel secure that their career will not be in jeopardy.

 

Leave a comment Posted on parents, schools, students

Less Writing–Now a Requirement for College Entrance

Young people who attend school today may be the least read of any previous generation.

Well, life is about to get even easier.

In a sign of the attention-deficient times, the University of California (UC) has announced a change in the personal statements previously required in applications.

No longer will high school seniors need to write up to 1,000 words responding to the following two prompts:

  • Describe the world you come from — for example, your family,

community or school — and tell us how your world has shaped your

dreams and aspirations.

  • Tell us about a personal quality, talent, accomplishment, contribution

or experience that is important to you. What about this quality or

accomplishment makes you proud and how does it relate to the person

you are?

This fall, the two personal statements transforms into eight “personal insight questions” whereby applicants respond to four of the eight prompts of their choosing, with no response longer than 350 words, and the total word count not to exceed 1,400 words:

  1. Describe an example of your leadership experience in which you have positively influenced others, helped resolve disputes, or contributed to group efforts over time.
  1. Every person has a creative side, and it can be expressed in many ways: problem solving, original and innovative thinking, and artistically, to name a few. Describe how you express your creative side.
  1. What would you say is your greatest talent or skill? How have you developed and demonstrated that talent over time?
  1. Describe how you have taken advantage of a significant educational opportunity or worked to overcome an educational barrier you have faced.
  1. Describe the most significant challenge you have faced and the steps you have taken to overcome this challenge. How has this challenge affected your academic achievement?
  1. Describe your favorite academic subject and explain how it has influenced you.
  1. What have you done to make your school or your community a better place?
  1. What is the one thing that you think sets you apart from other candidates applying to the University of California?

(At this point, I have just written the UC maximum of 350 words.)

The impetus to change the prompts came out of a desire to “better reflect [student] voices and personalities,” according to UC spokesperson Claire Doan.

Gary A. Clark, Jr., UCLA director of admission, told me that “far too often, students would respond to the personal statement prompts with information that did not provide the kind of personal insights” that was helpful.

“An applicant might have written about an inspiring family member and would share more about the family member than themselves,” Clark said.

With the maximum word count jumping from 1,000 to 1,400, how will this impact the workload of those reviewing applications?

Clark does not believe this will be a problem, stating that admission officers are committed to reading “everything a student shares with us.”

I asked my current sophomores, who will be the second class to write to the new prompts, what they thought about the change.

While more than a quarter preferred the older personal statements, the majority liked the new questions, one calling them “more precise and to the point.”

Overall, I applaud the University of California in developing more focused questions that cover a wider range of topics to pique a student’s interest. I lament, however, the demise of a longer piece of writing, a skill that needs mastering at the college level.

Here’s hoping that in 2020 the University of California does not further downsize the four 350-word questions into 12 140-character tweets.

 

Leave a comment Posted on amusement parks, Disney, Disneyland

Disneyland: The Costliest Place on Earth

Many families cherish the memories of taking their children to Disneyland for the first time.   I just experienced what in all likelihood will be my last.

This week my wife and I treated our youngest son to an overnight trip at the Disneyland Hotel. A stay in a small 364 sq. ft. room is $595 with tax. This luxurious cost should be reserved for four-star hotel in Midtown Manhattan.

But I was just warming up my credit card.

This month Disney introduced tier pricing, three different prices contingent on attendance figures. Instead of the old $99 any day price, now Disneyland charges $95 for “value” days, $105 for “regular” days, and $119 for “peak” days.

The rationale is that by charging more during busier periods, fewer people will go, thus lessening the crowds.

So far it’s not working.

Just our luck we happened to go on a “peak” day paying 20 percent more than if we had visited a couple of days earlier.   And the whole area from Downtown Disney to lines for rides and food was clogged with people.

A family of four will have to budget a one-day trip to the Magic Kingdom on a peak day as it were a three-day excursion elsewhere.

First, just to walk through the gates is $476. Each meal with drink costs around $20 meaning for four people, one meal is $80; multiplied by three, the total food tab soars to $240. Add $80 for souvenirs and snacks and $18 for parking and the whole day at Disneyland costs a family of four $814.

That nearly matches the gross median weekly earnings of an American, “$825 in the fourth quarter of 2015” as reported by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

And with the ubiquitous crowds, lines lasting up to two hours for a ride, it is doubtful that they will get to experience one-quarter of the 58 attractions.

I would not mind paying an extra $20 if the Disney company would guarantee fewer people. But they do not.

The “you get what you pay for” adage does not apply here. Except for the rides, nothing at Disneyland is of high quality.

The souvenirs ranks slightly higher than those found at a carnival midway, and the food whether bought at a stand or a sit-down restaurant is the same caliber—average—at an exorbitant price.

It’s like buying Target-like clothes at Nordstrom’s prices among Black Friday-level crowds.

It is not just the $4.25 for a churro that ruins the experience; it is the line of 10 people waiting to buy one.

There is only one way to improve the Disneyland experience and that is to limit the number of people coming into the park.   Only on rare occasions does Disney do this when attendance reaches around 65,000 people.

Here’s a marketing suggestion: limit capacity to 30,000 but charge $300. I bet there would not be a shortage of people going for that promotion. Of course, by limiting attendance you are also limiting sales in food and souvenirs.

When my brother worked for Disney, he revealed an internal acronym widely circulated: GTG—Gouge the Guest.

According to Disney, its theme park division earned $2.2 billion in profits in 2013.

Ultimately, my son had a wonderful time. But at $1,200 for this 24-hour excursion (that’s $50 an hour), I’ve had my last “yo-ho-yo-ho.”

Disneyland employees are trained to tell customers, “Have a magical day!” Magic has its price.

 

 

1 Comment Posted on Angry Birds Movie, Bernie Sanders, CNN, Donald Trump, Keeping Up with the Kardashians, Marco Rubio, Zootopia

Trump Trash-talking Coarsens Society

Last week I took my son to see the animated film “Zootopia” and saw a trailer for “The Angry Birds Movie” which included a 15-second scene of an American Bald Eagle character urinating in front of other birds. While the action was not shown, the sound of it was in full Dolby sound. This is what passes as family entertainment these days.

Of course, this pales in comparison to presidential hopefuls Donald Trump and U.S. Senator Marco Rubio mocking the size of one’s manhood.

The incredulous campaign of Trump that has captured America’s attention this election season has done more than bring out new voters to the polls and new viewers to Fox News. It has lowered the bar in campaign protocol and human discourse.

How many of us would extol a person who uses profanity in a public speech, mocks a female journalist’s menstruation, insults people who are not white or Christian, and interrupts others who try to question him?   Trump is not trying out material in a comedy club—he’s running for President of the United States.

Just so you know, I am not registered with any political party. Over the years I have voted for both Democrats and Republicans.

I get the anti-establishment appeal of a Trump or a Bernie Sanders.   We should not ignore the concerns of those who vote for these candidates.

However, we want leaders to inspire people. Instead, we have someone whose no-filter, impromptu remarks is bringing out the ugliness in Americans.

Two weeks ago a disturbing event took place at a high school basketball game in Indiana.   Students from Andrean High taunted Bishop Noll students, a school with a significant Latino population, holding up giant Donald Trump heads and chanting “build that wall.” A similar incident occurred earlier in Iowa.

Impressionable young people are picking up on how Trump’s vitriolic language is garnering loud ovations. If it is okay for grown-ups to mock immigrants, it’s okay for them to do it as well.

Trump is tapping the anti-politically correct core that has remained dormant. He is not pushing people’s buttons, he is unleashing demons like a bad horror movie.

In the world of 2016, we don’t need someone antagonizing world leaders.

Part of the reason for Trump’s rise is the amount of media attention he has received. Have you noticed how the debates seem to occur once a week? It’s as if they are a regularly scheduled show.

Here we are in mid-March and the GOP has already held 12 debates. The Democrats have had eight, including two this week within four days of one another. And this does not include the phony baloney town hall meetings that CNN televises.

At the very least, stop inviting audiences to debates. It wasn’t that long ago when people attended debates respectfully, reserving applause until the end. Today audiences chant “USA, USA” as if watching a UFC match. Such a mob reaction encourages Trump to say even more outlandish things.

Also, why do the news networks insist on covering Trump’s complete speech on election nights since it lengthens into a pseudo-press conference ensuring extended free TV time for him to pontificate and proliferate his views?

Electing the most powerful person in the free world should not be an entertainment alternative to “Keeping Up with the Kardashians.”

A colleague told me long ago that teachers need to be careful of what they say in front of students since one never knows how certain words will affect young people.   Too bad our political leaders don’t follow that same advice. To borrow from Cole Porter, today anything goes.

 

 

Leave a comment Posted on Back to School Night, Open House

Bring Back Parent Conversations to Open House

Get ready for a new kind of Open House experience, where having a quick conversation with your child’s teacher is discouraged, replaced with exhibits of student work.

Hopefully schools are getting this message out to parents in order to dampen their disappointment when they approach a teacher to discuss their child’s progress and are informed to make an appointment at another day and time.

Traditionally public schools have invited parents to two evening events: Back to School Night during the first half of the year, and Open House during the second half.   Since Back to School occurs about a month after the start of school, its purpose is to introduce parents to their children’s teachers and the curriculum.

At the secondary level, parents follow a bell schedule marching from one room to another for 10-minute sessions.   It is deliberately controlled, allowing little time for parents to ask questions.

That’s where the role of Open House comes in (or used to be).   With the majority of the school year past the midway point, and progress reports sent home, this is the perfect time for a check-in on how a child is doing so that modifications can be employed to improve performance.

For schools to deny parents that opportunity is unfortunate.

Of course, school officials will tell you that all a parent has to do is arrange for a private conference with a teacher.

While that would be feasible for an elementary school teacher with 35 students, how about the high school teacher with 175? Arranging private meetings of that size would be daunting.

That’s the beauty of the traditional Open House. I have found that most parents just want to say a quick “hi” and ask how their child is doing. No need for a 30-minute conversation.

I am able to meet dozens of parents efficiently and thereby eliminate many time-consuming conferences and emails, making the event productive for all.

When I asked administrators in both Glendale and Burbank about the shift towards student exhibits and demonstrations, they privately told me that it is in the best interest of the teachers to avoid ambushes by parents.

To prevent that, schools are rebranding Open House as a showcase of student work, more of a public relations event. The concept of “selling” a school is sound, but it should occur at another time. For example, the Block Party hosted by Keppel Elementary, Toll Middle, and Hoover High Schools on a Saturday afternoon in April serves that function.

Parents attending Open House are already invested in that institution—no sales ploy needed.

Here is what I propose. Take those two pupil-free days when students stay home and teachers attend meetings and put it to good use by scheduling conferences with parents arriving at appointed times to pick up their child’s report cards and chat with one of their child’s teachers.

Elementary schools already do this. They take a whole week of shortened days and meet with parents in the afternoon hours to discuss grades. Usually the meetings last 15 minutes.

Since secondary teachers have a much larger workload, the meetings would have to be shorter but could still be meaningful. And it would provide parents with a sense that their concerns were heard.

So, parents, please don’t blame the teachers if they are hesitant to say a few words about your child, for while it is still called Open House, conversations are closed.

 

Leave a comment Posted on Presidents' Day

Do You Know the Year Washington was Born?

Today is the 207th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s birth. If you already knew that, congratulations, you are in a select minority who do.

See, while schools close for two days in February, the reason for these closures remain vague for most.   All it means is a three-day weekend.

If you are as old as I am, you remember schools used to have two holidays in February for the most revered U.S. Presidents: Abraham Lincoln, Feb. 12, and George Washington, Feb. 22.

It used to make sense. Have a day off to recognize America’s first president and another for the man who held this country together through its only civil war.

What is curious is that schools that close for Lincoln’s birthday do so independently for there is no federal holiday for Honest Abe.

And while a day off in honor of George Washington has been a federal holiday since1885, it has been decades since it was celebrated on his actual birthday.

Signed into law by President Johnson in 1968 but not enacted until 1971, the Uniform Monday Holiday Act mandated that Washington’s Birthday, Memorial Day, and Veterans Day move to Mondays.

Why? To provide Americans additional three-day weekend opportunities to help the economies of the tourism and retail industries.

This meant that the real Armistice Day of Nov. 11 was pushed back to the fourth Monday in October. Due to the outcry of Veterans groups, the day was relocated to its proper month. In recent years, schools have attempted to observe it on the real day unless the 11th comes on a weekend.

Meanwhile, once Washington’s Birthday was altered, the holiday became mistakenly known as Presidents’ Day. The federal government still refers to the third Monday in February as Washington’ Birthday even though on nearly all calendars and advertisements “Presidents’ Day” is used.

I don’t know about you, but should we really honor every past president, even the 32-day tenure of William Henry Harrison?

Even more baffling is that the third Monday in February never falls on Feb. 22. In other words, the U.S. law guarantees that no one will know the year when the father of this country was born.

Look, few of us put forth an effort to recognize the holidays we are given days off from work. How many attend a Martin Luther King parade or visit a veterans cemetery on Memorial Day?

The one constant that unites us on all holidays is the freedom to do whatever we want to do. Stores no longer close on Thanksgiving or Christmas. People can now exercise their normal spending habits any day, go to a movie, eat a meal, buy some clothes.

And in having 24/7 access, we are depriving ourselves of slowing down a few days a year, and honoring people who have sacrificed for our privilege to eat a Big Mac and drink a zebra Frappuccino anytime we desire.

As long as we aren’t the ones flipping the burgers or stirring the drinks, working on holidays has no impact on our lives.

Even Daylight Savings Time was devised so that people would have more light to buy more stuff.   And by the way, how about renaming it Standard Time since we are on non-standard time 66% of the year, from March 12 to Nov. 7 in 2016.

President Obama should issue an executive order moving Washington’s Birthday to the fourth Monday of February; a week later would make no difference in retail sales.

Since Feb. 22 falls on five Mondays over the next 33 years, we can least get it right a few times.

Now, who wants to join me in starting the petition to make this happen? I’ll bring the cherry pie.

 

 

Leave a comment Posted on CAHSEE, college ready, NCLB, parents, Public Education, public schools, reading, schools, students, teachers

CAHSEE: RIP

This year’s 10th graders have reason to celebrate since they no longer have to take the California High School Exit Exam (CAHSEE).

Last October Gov. Brown signed into law SB 172 suspending the test for three years through the 2017-18 school year.

Since 2004, the CAHSEE was administered to the state’s sophomores to test their ability in math, English, and writing.

Former Glendale superintendent Jim Brown served on the original committee whose intent was to develop a rigorous enough test to certify that a high school diploma meant something. If a student did not pass either portion of the test, he did not graduate.

However, when the test was piloted, it was discovered that half of all students could not pass the test.

Since schools could not have survived the public relations nightmare of a 50% graduation rate, CAHSEE was redesigned, or dummied-down, testing 8th grade level math and 10th grade level English to represent 12th grade competency.   The original two essays were downsized to a single piece of writing.

The writing prompts demanded little on the part of students, asking them to discuss a place they would like to visit or a toy from their childhood. And with such competency they are ready for college?

Even with a passing threshold of 55 percent in math and 60 percent in English, plus a host of free intervention classes and one-on-one tutoring, along with multiple chances to pass the darn thing, one out of every ten California seniors still did not pass it.

For those reasons, I never knew a single student who proudly proclaimed, “I passed the CAHSEE!”

State Sen. Carol Liu of La Canada Flintridge who sponsored SB 172 told me that she agrees “passing the exit exam in and of itself [did] not ensure students [had] mastered grade 12 standards.”

Think about the tens of millions of dollars and dozens of school days wasted on this endeavor. The biggest impact CAHSEE made in the past decade was enriching testing companies.

Besides suspending the test, the measure that went into effect the first of this year allows the 32,000 students who never passed the CAHSEE to now receive their diplomas. In other words, all the students who ever took the exit exam have officially “passed it” making the rationale behind it in the first place a very expensive joke, a high-priced feel good award akin to all kids on a sports team earning trophies regardless of merit.

Unfortunately, CAHSEE may return in a different form in the future.

One foreboding element of the law stipulates that “the Superintendent of Public Instruction convene an advisory panel to provide recommendations . . . on the continuation of the high school exit examination and on alternative pathways to satisfy the high school graduation requirements” as worded on the California Department of Education website.

Sen. Liu believes that future students could be looking at “multiple measures, such as an exit exam, coursework, and a project-based assignment” to prove they have earned a diploma.

Um, whatever happened to using a student’s course grades in determining achievement as colleges do? No college was ever interested if a student passed the CAHSEE or not.

The costly lesson of politician-produced initiatives such as CAHSEE and NCLB (which officially ended last month) is that elected officials need to stop thinking of themselves as experts on how to improve education.

 

Leave a comment Posted on parents, public schools, school calendar, teachers

GUSD Should Copy BUSD Calendar

January will be a busy time for Glendale Unified school board members as they tackle two of the most significant issues left over from 2015: the search for a new superintendent and a new starting date for school.

While the public has a minor say in choosing a superintendent, parents can have a major impact voicing their views on when schools should open their doors by attending one of the upcoming meetings: Jan. 11 at Glendale High, Jan. 13 at Hoover High, and Jan. 14 at Crescenta Valley High.

As reported before in this space, opening schools in early August makes no sense. The desire to finish the fall semester before winter break pertains only to 7-12th graders who have final exams.

And the idea that high school students need more time to prepare for Advanced Placement tests before the May testing period is just that—an idea. There is no proof that students have performed better on AP tests ever since school was moved up several weeks to early August.

In fact, AP test results have suffered in recent years ever since pre-requisites to taking AP classes were eliminated. Plus, this affects only a small portion of high school students. The majority of the K-12 student population does not need to follow a college calendar.

Thumbs up to parent Sarah Rush for spearheading an online petition to start school later that garnered 2,000 plus signatures. It definitely got the attention of GUSD more than this writer’s musings.

Thumbs down to GUSD for shelving this discussion even though parents expressed themselves back in August allowing plenty of time to alter next year’s calendar.   One school board member rationalized that they could not change the calendar because people already have made plans based on the Aug. 8th start date. Really?

Number one, how many parents cement August 2016 vacation plans in August 2015. And, number two, if they did, so what. School would not be starting earlier, it would be starting later.

Unfortunately, GUSD was not interested in renegotiating the already approved 2016-2017 calendar. Understandably Glendale’s school board members had their hands full with myriad issues this year including labor negotiations with employee groups, a proposed charter school (recently denied), future realignment of the district, as well as the continuing Sagebrush saga.

On the plus side, GUSD finally followed what Burbank Unified has done for years by posting an online survey for parents between Jan. 8 and 22 on this issue. And the district has formed a 27-member Superintendent’s Committee on Calendar Development that will meet five times (do we really need 27 people to devise calendar options?).

I find Burbank’s school calendar the most efficient. School opens Aug. 15 and ends on May 25. The 11-week summer allows more time not just for travel but for kids to enroll in enrichment classes or to get jobs. Conversely, Glendale schools start Aug. 8 and end June 1 with a 9-week summer.

I’m not sure why GUSD’s 27-member committee needs five meetings to devise a new calendar when their municipal neighbor already has one that they can adopt. Not having the Friday off before Labor Day, limiting the Thanksgiving holidays to three, and keeping Winter Break to two full weeks is how they do it, fitting the state-mandated 180 days of school within 284 calendar days instead of 298.

There, you can cancel four of the meetings right there.

Both cities share similar demographics and the same delicious bakery, Porto’s. So, to start the New Year right, hold a joint meeting of BUSD and GUSD and come to a consensus on the same school calendar. Potato balls, anyone?