At last week’s Davis School Board meeting, the district announced that a poll of Davis voters will take place as early as next week, aimed at the assessment of the public’s support for a parcel renewal.
Currently, Measures Q and W would expire next June. They currently generate $6.5 million annually for the district and levy a combination of $320 for single-family homes.
At a previous meeting, the school district laid out the consequences for the failure to renew that money, including increased class sizes, the loss of 78 full-time positions, including 51 teachers, and also counselors and librarians.
Traditionally, the voters in Davis have been extremely supportive of funding for schools. In 2007, Measure Q passed with over 70% of the vote. The following spring, volunteer efforts added a couple of million to the schools to prevent massive layoffs and school closure. In the fall of 2008, acting in an emergency capacity, the votes by a 3-1 margin approved Measure W.
However, since 2008, the economy has continued to decline. The state has balanced the budget through heavily cutting spending on K-12 and higher education. The result was another emergency measure passed by the voters in May of this year.
Despite a high profile and stormy election, Measure A passed. However, it received just a 67.2% vote in an election requiring more than two-thirds of voters supporting the measure.
If just 89 more voters had voted to oppose the parcel tax, it would not have passed. That measure added $200 to the parcel tax total.
While the new measure would represent a renewal rather than the new tax that Measure A represented, supporters of the school district and the parcel tax renewal have to be nervous.
Measure A saw a number of missteps, in part stemming from the fact that it was more scrutinized than past efforts. Chief amongst those errors included the controversy over a letter from the district to seniors who hold exemptions to previous parcel taxes.
Critics complained that the letter amounted to advocacy for the measure on the public’s dime. However, the Fair Political Practices Commission declined to find wrongdoing. The Vanguard at the time argued that, despite all appearances, the district maintained the legal line on what is generally considered advocacy versus permissible communications.
The Measure A campaign was also indirectly stung when the League of Women Voters declined to invite opponents of the measure to have a true debate.
The controversial decision to fire a popular girls’ basketball coach may have also factored into the close nature of the election.
Knowing the likelihood that this will be a close election will likely help the district avoid some of these problems in the upcoming parcel tax campaign.
However, the measure does face an uncertain, if not uphill, battle.
The economy continues to drag, meaning not only will state budgets be challenged in the future, but so too will the voters’ pocketbooks.
Furthermore, at the local level, it is likely that, within three months of the March election, will be another election that sees a battle over water rate hikes. The city itself will have a parcel tax – likely in June – over the renewal of the parks tax passed in 2006 by Davis Voters.
The water rate hikes figure to be a huge and divisive issue. While they are not on the same ballot, the uncertainty over the level of rate hikes could make passage of either parcel tax problematic.
While the schools parcel tax will generate $6.5 million, the city parcel tax will generate a million in general fund revenue that would go for the maintenance of the city’s parks and green belts.
The school has little choice but to put the parcel tax on the ballot, as the previous measures expire in June. However, the poll will be interesting in measuring the degree to which the Davis voters have simply had enough.
As we mentioned, the voters have traditionally strongly supported educational supplementary income, but the nature and duration of the current $520 commitment, combined with expected rate hikes that could double or triple the voters’ bimonthly water bill, could put that commitment to the ultimate test.
We have always been circumspect on the prospect of further parcel tax renewals, but this one figures to be, by far, the most challenging.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
We turned in over 5000 signatures to the City Clerk yesterday to support a referendum on the water rate hikes. Assuming the petitions qualify the referendum, the huge rate hikes will be immediately repealed by the CC, or legally stayed pending the general election in June 2012.
At least the voters will be able to decide the DJUSD parcel tax renewals in March 2012 without having to look at and pay hugely increased City water bills the same week.
Again, who is the calendaring rocket scientist who set that timing up?
This is not about the water rate hikes, it is about the school parcel tax, and I suspect that is how the voters will see it. IMO, the Vanguard has chosen to pit one against the other in its eagerness to kill/delay the surface water project, using the school and city taxes as a wedge issue to defeat the water rate increases…
You have yourself made the point that we have only one pot of money. Now that you have come out in favor of the water rates, you have changed your tune on that point.
Perhaps they should phase in the parcel tax, 5% this year, to reduce the impact on low-income families.
[quote]You have yourself made the point that we have only one pot of money. Now that you have come out in favor of the water rates, you have changed your tune on that point.[/quote]
There is no question that taxpayers have only one pot of money – their collective pocket books. I have come out in favor of the surface water project and the water rate increases BECAUSE I THINK IT WILL BE CHEAPER IN THE LONG RUN ON THE TAXPAYERS’ COLLECTIVE POCKET BOOKS. If cheaper in the long run, THERE WILL BE MORE MONEY FOR SCHOOL AND CITY TAXES. I have been consistent in that position, and have not veered from it one iota. The Vanguard on the other hand has used the school and city taxes as a wedge issue to delay/kill the surface water project, pitting one against the other, to the detriment of the community IMO…
[quote]ERM: “IMO, the Vanguard has chosen to pit one against the other in its eagerness to kill/delay the surface water project, using the school and city taxes as a wedge issue to defeat the water rate increases…”[/quote]Elaine: This is a huge issue and it’s important going forward to give credit where credit is due.
The parties publicly demagoguing the surface water issue and linking it to the school tax include David Greenwald, Sue Greenwald, and Michael Harrington. In the case of the two Greenwalds, this activity goes back years. There are a very large number of quotes in the record that demonstrate this fact.
I see that the thread has already been edited …
My point is that “The Vanguard” is an inaccurate over-generalization.
Elaine: It may in the long run save money, but there are short terms costs that must be considered.
Voter2012: Can you provide me with an example of my demagoguing the surface water project?
Is it really “demagoging” to argue that there is only pot of money and that Davis voters, especially in these times have only so much money to pay city fees, supplemental property taxes and so on? I really don’t think so. And keep in mind that regardless of the outcome of the parcel tax vote (Measure A) for schools came within less than 100 vote of not getting the 2/3 majority. Now, as David indeed argues, even without the water issue, as the recession persists (even deepens) for many it faces a much tougher battle.
I also have an ambivalence about supporting the parcel tax for schools in Davis though I have always voted for it. Is this really the progressive thing to do? It means that in better off communities, such as Davis, per pupil spending is much higher than in poorer district. Shouldn’t all children everywhere have roughly the same amount of money spent on them??? Long ago (1992), Jonathan Kozol published _Savage Inequalities_ that addressed the problems or massive inequities of the absurd way in which America funds its schools. Don’t we really need a state or federal solution, and doesn’t the present system, which allows well off districts (people) to levy more taxes to help their children, only postpone the day that this issue is addressed at the state and/or federal level?
Finally, I am a strong proponent of equal access to health care for all. During the “water wars” of the last few months I have found it troubling that quite a few people I know who are strong supporters of the school parcel tax strongly and the water project oppose a single payer or a truly universal system of health care for all. They have good health care through the public sector, or even sometimes the private sector, and they don’t give a damn about the rest. So why should someone on a modest income (much less than many of these people), with no children, pay a very significant supplement to educate many of the children of Davis’s elite?
Herman: [i]”Don’t we really need a state or federal solution, and doesn’t the present system, which allows well off districts (people) to levy more taxes to help their children, only postpone the day that this issue is addressed at the state and/or federal level?”[/i]
Forgetting for the moment that I absolutely disagree that more centralization of our education system will be the solution to the problems you point out, I think you raise a very good point. I was just thinking about the parcel tax renewal anxiety being perpetual and routine.
We tax ourselves extra locally to pay teachers’ salaries because the state has had to manipulate its budget due to overspending. By doing so we continue to enable the overspending. Now, in addition, we are going to accept a delay of necessary water infrastructure improvements that will result in higher costs… again, to pay teachers’ salaries and enable the overspending at the state level.
So, when does this stop?
Four years from now we will need another parcel tax renewal vote. Given our union-pal governor’s refusal to make necessary cuts in spending on long-term pension obligations for state workers, and the lack of voter support for state tax increases, the future for education spending appears very bleak. What new long-term fiscal choice be impacted by our anxiety in 2016 and beyond?
K-12 education, as designed, will go the way of the dinosaurs. It has too. We cannot afford this adult jobs program considering the woeful inadequacies cranking out students capable of pursuing their own happiness and prosperity.
The way I see it…
-We vote for the parcel tax renewal… we kick the can down the road.
-We delay paying for the surface water project… we kick the can down the road.
We keep looking back to see how fiscally irresponsible we have behaved. When we will learn to look forward?
JB: [i]…I absolutely disagree that more centralization of our education system will be the solution to the problems…[/i]
Then that implies solutions that are decentralized and local. That is what this parcel tax renewal discussion involves — a local say in what kind of schools we want.
JB: [i]K-12 education, as designed, will go the way of the dinosaurs. It has too.[/i]
I think what one has to conclude from your arguments are that Davis schools suck. In previous discussions you have qualified your arguments by saying that’s not what you believe, but your alternative vision for Davis is unclear. You want integrated technology and individualized instruction, and yet Davis schools already have programs that include that to various degrees, depending on what you want.
[i]The way I see it…
-We vote for the parcel tax renewal… we kick the can down the road.
-We delay paying for the surface water project… we kick the can down the road.[/i]
I am not aware of any situation in which families move into a community specifically because a new water/sewer treatment facility. Please let me know if there is an example I’ve missed. They will move to a community significantly because of good schools, however, and that’s what Davis has, because the community supports them.
A good K-12 education is one that has a varied and rigorous curriculum. That is what is being cut in most other school districts (because of cuts in state funding), but what Davis schools have and can continue to keep with this parcel tax renewal.
JB: [i]We keep looking back to see how fiscally irresponsible we have behaved. When we will learn to look forward?[/i]
Our local discussion about this measure is about fiscally responsible investment in human capital and it is forward looking. A good education is a ticket to a better future.
Herman: [i]So why should someone on a modest income (much less than many of these people), with no children, pay a very significant supplement to educate many of the children of Davis’s elite?[/i]
Because it improves the quality of education in the schools and attracts families specifically looking for good schools for their kids. Such families help improve the quality of the community and create more demographic stability in the long term.
I think it’s a mischaracterization to think that most families with kids in the Davis schools are elite with respect to income. If you get to know a lot of families in the community, you find a significant number who live in apartments and rented houses.
[i]”I think what one has to conclude from your arguments are that Davis schools suck.”[/i]
The cellular phone I used four years ago sucks compared to what I use today. What might I be using in 2016?
The Davis K-12 education model is the largely the same as it was in 1978 when I graduated high school. The only difference today is all the highly educated well-off parents spending many more hours helping supplement their kids’ education. These parents prop-up a system otherwise in need of reform while expanding the have and have-not gap.
wdf1: Do you really think that the Davis K-12 school system is better than Woodland’s school system if you where to level for parental education and wealth?
The decentralization that I desire is down to the individual choice level.
Herman says: I also have an ambivalence about supporting the parcel tax for schools in Davis though I have always voted for it. Is this really the progressive thing to do? It means that in better off communities….
My ambivalence is also growing. I noticed recently, while driving down 8th st., that the Valley Oak facility is now Da Vinci Charter Academy. The idea that Valley Oak would become an Elementary charter school that would service that special E. Davis community as well as out-of-city students and continue to support its first-class ESL program was enthusiastically supported by many “progressives”. The School Board shot this idea down even in the face of support by their school Superintentent. Now we have Da Vinci Charter Academy, whose student population would appear, from pix on its website, to be a far cry, in socio-ecomomic terms, from the majority of students who would have attended Valley Oak Charter School.
JB: [i]The cellular phone I used four years ago sucks compared to what I use today. What might I be using in 2016?[/i]
You operate out of the framework that raising kids is like making widgets. Does the way our parents’ generation raised us as kids suck compared to the way we raise our kids? By your analogy the answer would be categorically yes. Your logic is off. More later.
JB: [i]The only difference today is all the highly educated well-off parents spending many more hours helping supplement their kids’ education. These parents prop-up a system otherwise in need of reform while expanding the have and have-not gap.[/i]
I can only speak for my own experience and what I see around me. My parents provided for me at about the same level (time & money) as we have spent for our kids in grade school, for about the same result. (But that was a few decades ago for my parents, so their methods may have sucked by today’s standards) I don’t see anything that alarms me from my background in the way of parent involvement; perhaps it was different in your life?
[quote]Elaine: It may in the long run save money, but there are short terms costs that must be considered.[/quote]
So kill school taxes in the future because the surface water project will be that much more expensive in the long run? And what future would that be? And when would that be? When your children are out of the school system so you don’t have to worry about services for your children anymore? Furthermore, if the SWRCB does what it says it has threatened to do, make the fines steep enough so that a community will not gain economically for not coming into compliance, that is right around the corner in 2017…
I repeat:
[quote]The Vanguard on the other hand has used the school and city taxes as a wedge issue to delay/kill the surface water project, pitting one against the other, to the detriment of the community IMO…[/quote]
Elaine: “So kill school taxes in the future because the surface water project will be that much more expensive in the long run?”
Talk about pure speculation.
wdf1:
The education system is not analagous to parenting. Even so, I would say that parenting has come a long way since Dr. Benjamin Spock published “Baby and Child Care”. I think my wife and I are better parents than our parents and their parents before them. The topic of “good parenting” is widely published and debated these days. You might look at your work helping your kids succeed at school as an example of improved parenting. I don’t dispute that fact… I just dispute that it is so necessary.
Education is simply a service… a very important service… that has to work within a dynamic social and economic context. My cell phone example was only to make the point that most every other product or service we get today has been drastically upgraded in utility and value… public education has not. It has not because internally it is focused on protecting teacher jobs and not providing the best possible customer service at the least possible customer cost. The system has cooped people like you (well-meaning, well-educated and well-off) to help subsidize their deficiencies. You help your children and the system at the expense of those students lacking similar resources who are completely and wholly reliant on the education system.
You have raised the idea of volunteerism as a solution to help supplement what is lacking in education service quality and for other distributed social benefits. I think that is an interesting idea… and maybe part of a solution. However, it begs the question why is it necessary today?
See the following from the Cato Institute:
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/scrool.jpg[/img]
We have a very big problem. We are spending much, much more than we have in the past. We are spending more than many other industrialized countries. However, in terms of education outcomes we are far behind most industrialized countries spending less per student.
The public education model is unsustainable unless you support a widening wealth gap.
Part of me, unfortunately, thinks folks like you with a strong academic background protect the education system status quo because, conscientiously or unconscientiously, you see it as your ilk’s competitive advantage: raising the social and economic power of the intelligentsia over the enterprising class. However, regardless of your or other’s motives, raising the bar for required parental involvement while blocking education reform is a death sentence to many kids lacking the benefits of well-educated, well-off parents.
Poor education is a primary root cause of most socio-economic problems in this country. Another is the loss of a moral compass… which can also be blamed on poor education. The primary opportunity this country has for getting us back to the economic greatness we deserve is a drastically improved education system that, like for so many other products and services invented in the US, leads a global revolution in positive change.
Some interesting statistics about teacher pay over time:
[url]http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d10/tables/dt10_083.asp[/url]
There are lots of other interesting statistics at that site as well [url]http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/[/url]
Don, the NCES has a history of reporting bias in support of and protection of the education system. I suspect that teachers’ union employees and beneficiaries have corrupted much of that organization’s work.
Here is a good report on REAL high school graduation rates, not the inflated numbers reported on by NCES.
[url]http://ftp.iza.org/dp3216.pdf[/url]
Note the last two graphs:
[b]Figure XIV. Educational Attainment Decompositions, Males 1900-1980 Birth Cohorts[/b]
[b]Figure XIV. Educational Attainment Decompositions, Females 1900-1980 Birth Cohorts[/b]
JB: [i]We have a very big problem. We are spending much, much more than we have in the past. We are spending more than many other industrialized countries. However, in terms of education outcomes we are far behind most industrialized countries spending less per student.[/i]
Again, you look at education too much in a business/widget production framework. Over the time covered in your Cato institute studies, schools have narrowed their curriculum to focus on reading and math, without any significant improvement. If you want to focus on reading and math scores, then Davis schools have trended upward during that period of time.
But using reading and math standardized test scores to measure the quality of education is like using BMI (body mass index) and cholesterol levels alone to measure the health of an individual.
The Davis school parcel tax has supported an music education program that is one of the best in the nation at a lower cost than is usually required. Even your son benefited from that, according to you, participating in jazz band. If you choose to measure educational success mainly through reading and math scores, then the trend is to cut those programs that don’t directly help those standardized test scores. That’s how you get crappy schools and non-productive spending. A good grade school education is one that has a varied and rigorous curriculum, including music.
“Critics complained that the letter amounted to advocacy for the measure on the public’s dime. However, the Fair Political Practices Commission declined to find wrongdoing.”
would the vanguard please stop lying through its teeth? the fair political practices commission did not find no wrongdoing, quite the contrary, and anyone who actually read their findings knows they did find wrongdoing. they merely allowed the school district to get off with a warning provided they did not repeat their previous move.
“The Vanguard at the time argued that, despite all appearances, the district maintained the legal line on what is generally considered advocacy versus permissible communications.”
The fair political practices commission did not see it what the school board did as legal, and anyone who read their findings knows they did not.
91 Octane, thanks for reminding us of the FACTS…
JB: [i]Education is simply a service…[/i]
[i]The education system is not analagous to parenting.[/i]
[i]You help your children and the system at the expense of those students lacking similar resources who are completely and wholly reliant on the education system.[/i]
Your last statement actually seems incongruent with your own previously stated values. You actually think I shouldn’t be helping my kids because it is unfair to others whose parents can’t, won’t, or don’t help their kids???
If you look at websites for a number of private and charter schools, you will find that “parental involvement” is common to most and is touted as a plus. Geoffrey Canada, of Harlem Children Zone charter school fame, starts his families off with “baby college”, which mostly helps parents learn how to support their kids upbringing by doing things like reading to them regularly, engaging them in conversations as frequently as possible, spend time with them, take them to the library, take them to museums, keep screen time to a minimum, etc. When I think of parental involvement, it starts with this. I see it as just as much part of my kids’ education as the time they spend in school. When I have time, I volunteer at school, but that is a secondary to what I do at home.
[i]raising the bar for required parental involvement while blocking education reform is a death sentence to many kids lacking the benefits of well-educated, well-off parents.[/i]
What I list above are things that I believe that any parent really should, as a priority, find time to do. I don’t consider myself affluent or particularly well-off, especially by Davis standards. These are things I have done for my kids, my parents did for me, and my grandparents did for my parents. I happen to think these are strategies that hold up well through the decades.
I’m surprised and a little shocked at your scorn of these values in the context of the larger education system. It is something that anyone can do for their kids, regardless of what group you assign them to(“intelligentsia”, “enterprising”, “blue collar”, whatever…). To me education is a part of childrearing.
It seems that your ideal education system would place all the responsibility for education on the teacher/institution, relieve the parent of any worry of involvement in any way, and allow more time to work, play, or write comments on the Vanguard.
[i]…a primary root cause of most socio-economic problems in this country. Another is the loss of a moral compass… which can also be blamed on poor education.[/i]
You don’t think parents have a role in providing a stable moral compass? That, too, is also on the shoulders of education??
I’m not aware of any systemic issue in my kids’ lives in school that I can point to and say, “schools have lost their moral compass relative to when I was in grade school”.
wdf1:
[quote]Families have a natural nonnegotiable right/responsibility to guard/protect the right of their children to be perceived as human/educable, as being members of a community and to be involved in shaping the content/policy of their children’s educational programs. The failure of school systems to effectively provide educational justice to all children shifts the exercise of parental decision-making from a right/responsibility to an absolute necessity. (Davies, et al., 1979, p. 10)[/quote]
[quote]A noticeable shift over the years in the Title I parent involvement language has been from an emphasis on ensuring the delivery of equitable and effective programming across Title I districts and schools to an emphasis on a parent’s ability to oversee the program’s impact on their own child or children.[/quote]
Note that I am not talking about parent involvement for students’ attendance, committments, attitudes, behavior, graduation, and life goals; I am talking about parents tutoring their kids on academics. I am talking about parents editing papers and helping with research. I am talking about parents helping their kids with homework. I am also talking about parents that pay others to do these things too.
For example, my son had private saxaphone lessons from the time he was eight years old until he was 18. Without them he would not have been allowed into the Davis High jazz band. A high percentage of the kids given top spots in the music programs of Davis High were getting private lessons paid for by their parents. I still have a suspicion that my son’s original $2000 saxaphone also played a part in his challenge to be recognized… his new $6000 saxaphone did sound better, and maybe this gave him more confidence that help bring more attention from the band director/teacher. However, it still grates on me that kids with tutors and high-priced instruments are the ones able to participate.
You and others like me that do these things for our kids may not be mega wealthy, but we have more money that many, and you have the education background and flexible schedule that enable you to take on this extra tutoring/help workload. What about the working-class family headed by a parent or parents that do not have the cash, the education level or the luxury of flexible work schedules?
I would have zero problem with any level of parental involvement in their kid’s education (within reason) if our education system was performing well. Is is not performing well. It is a crappy system based on outcomes and based on trends. Far too many kids are left out and left behind. The reliance on parents has become a necessity to prop up a broken system and this prevents us from the political reality of needing to reform the system.
There are a lot of people having attended Davis schools that do not have many complementary things to say about their education experience. The commonality I see in these people are that they are mostly male and lacking parents with the money, education background and/or time to supplement the crappy education the public schools are providing. Yet, you and others still maintain that Davis schools are fantastic. I think Davis’s better outcomes are more the result of a brainy gene pool population and more Davis parents able to help supplement their kid’s education, and not evidence that our schools are better. My nephews live in Folsom and attend Folsom schools… I think their schools are generally better… especially for boys. They kicked our ass in jazz band competition too.
JB: [i]My nephews live in Folsom and attend Folsom schools… I think their schools are generally better… especially for boys. They kicked our ass in jazz band competition too.[/i]
Folsom schools are supported by a lot of more affluent employees of Intel. They also have an ed. foundation. So many of the criticisms you make of Davis schools would apply in similar ways to Folsom. Yes, I’m aware that they have a good band program and jazz choir program, but come up a little short in orchestra. On the basis of having an overall strong and well-rounded music program, I would still argue that DHS has the strongest in the Sacramento area.
They did win this national award recognition earlier in the year, one of only two CA high schools, and the only comprehensive high school (non-magnet school) from California so recognized:
[url]http://www.grammyintheschools.com/programs/grammy-signature-schools[/url]
Individual success in music, more than anything, depends on a student’s willingness to sustain focused practice over time. The most expensive instrument and private teacher aren’t worth anything if the student doesn’t practice. If a student is willing to practice and has the fire in the belly, then there is a future for him/her if he/she wants it. I have seen DHS students come from limited means (cheap instrument, barely any lessons) and have stellar success. It isn’t a perfect system, but I am confident that students of modest means have a chance to make it.
[i]There are a lot of people having attended Davis schools that do not have many complementary things to say about their education experience. [/i]
I don’t think my high school experience was especially thrilling, even with some successes I had. I would not have said much complimentary about my high school for at least the first 10-15 years after I graduated. But as I’ve compared it to others’ outcomes, I think it was actually quite good. With time I have recognized that some of my difficult teachers weren’t necessarily that way out of spite. I chalk up my challenges to adolescence and figuring out how to deal with the world. More than anything, I graduated and I found something productive to do afterward. I don’t think I was owed anything more than that — a chance to graduate and avail myself of something productive (college, trade school, military, or work).
And that’s why I support this renewal. It gives more students a chance to graduate and avail themselves of something productive, especially students of more limited means, as I describe above.
wdf1: Folsom and Davis have almost exactly the same population and median household income. What they are lacking is the same median education level. I think the Folsom school system is better managed for educating boys and low income students.
I can accept and appreciate your views on public schools in general, and I get the reasons you support the parcel tax renewal. I still believe we are failing to tap a much greater vision for education quality and value in this country.
I’m sure glad that my hospital didn’t take the same track failing to modernize their service model. Note that I am fine paying more for healthcare because it has improved in quality and options. What is education offering for their demand of more tax money besides hiring more public employees? DC schools are the prime evidence that spending more will not fix the problems… because the model is outdated and needs to drastically change, IMO.
Folsom HS is part of the Folsom-Cordova school district. The population of Folsom is different in many respects from Rancho Cordova; because of that, one Folsom resident I spoke to said there is ongoing sentiment for breaking into two districts.
I think the problem with Washington DC schools has something to do with past residual and ongoing effects of historical oversight by the U.S. Congress. D.C. got “home rule” in 1973, but Congress still has a certain amount of unusual oversight over Washington, D.C. For instance, Congress had to approve Mayor Fenty taking over the D.C. schools when he eventually appointed Michelle Rhee. When you are dealing with that kind of oversight and have no direct voting representation in Congress, then you deal with that kind of fallout.
Octane: the FPPC made no such finding of wrongdoing.
[quote]Octane: the FPPC made no such finding of wrongdoing.[/quote]
There may have been no “official finding” but there was most definitely an informal WARNING NOT TO DO IT AGAIN. Which means if they do it again, they very well may have an “official finding”.
Latest news on Michelle Rhee, D.C. schools, and whether there was improvement or not under her leadership:
3/28/11, “When standardized test scores soared in D.C., were the gains real?”, USA Today
[url]http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2011-03-28-1Aschooltesting28_CV_N.htm#[/url]
Rhee’s response:
[url]http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/class-struggle/post/rhee-says-her-remarks-on-test-erasures-were-stupid/2011/03/30/AFTaTl3B_blog.html[/url]
wdf1: Thanks for the information on the DC schools. I was not aware of this issue. After Rhee resigned following the national teachers’ union success at buying a union-friendly mayor, I stopped paying attention to the news. This gets to my point about teaching morality. What lessons do the students take away when their teachers cheat? How might a teacher with that type of moral compass even teach morality to students?
Regardless of the DC schools outcomes before, during and after Rhee, there is no question that higher spending does not correlate to better outcomes.
[url]http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2008/09/does-spending-more-on-education-improve-academic-achievement[/url]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/edspend4.jpg[/img]
[img]http://www.cscdc.org/miscjeff/edspend5.jpg[/img]
JB: I am no fan of using test scores that way that NCLB prescribes, especially with setting the proficient or higher benchmarks up by 11% each year until 2014. I don’t think student progress naturally happens at that rate, and I think it distorts what a good education is supposed to be. Even Michelle Rhee is a bit of a sucker for measuring the success of her policies by those test scores, and I think she needs to re-assess how she chooses to measure success.
That’s not the only case of tampering with standardized test scores.
I guess you haven’t read about the recent similar scandal in Atlanta?
[url]http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Education/2011/0705/America-s-biggest-teacher-and-principal-cheating-scandal-unfolds-in-Atlanta[/url]
and New York?
[url]http://www.sacbee.com/2011/10/15/3982189/ap-enterprise-rising-concern-over.html[/url]
I have a hunch that more of it is going on, and more of it will continue to occur until that aspect of NCLB is revised.
And this sort of thing goes on when so much rides on those two numbers — proficiency scores in reading and math — including the definition of teacher success, and whether Marguerite Montgomery Elementary is deemed a good school or not.
One of my kids could not tie a bow knot (and hence tie his shoes) until he was well past the age of 10. It wasn’t for lack of trying. Does that make me a bad parent?
There’s a quote making the rounds these days: “Everybody is a genius. But, if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life believing that it is stupid.”
I’ve seen the quote attributed to Einstein, but then as Abraham Lincoln once said, “You Can’t Believe Most of the Quotes You Read On the Internet.”
I made the point earlier in these comments about basing the health of an individual on BMI and cholesterol numbers. Those two numbers could be “acceptable” and yet other aspects of a person’s health could be out of whack. Likewise, there are cases in which those two numbers can be unacceptable and yet in the full context, a person can be deemed healthy.
I know you like to bash teachers’ unions and the people who stand with them, but I support the teachers’ union position on the current way that test scores are used to define educational success.
By the way, Jeff, I have to get on your case for not being consistently rigorous with your sources. You criticized Don Shor yesterday for referencing data from NCES, and then today you present Heritage Foundation material that references data from NCES to make its case (read the fine print carefully). So is NCES a generally acceptable authority on education statistics or not? If it’s okay for you to use their data, what’s wrong with Don using it to make his points?
[i]”So is NCES a generally acceptable authority on education statistics or not? If it’s okay for you to use their data, what’s wrong with Don using it to make his points?”[/i]
It goes to credibility. Understanding the general attributable bias of the source it is easier to accept facts and opinions counter to that bias.
The NCES is well connected with the existing education establishment and receives funding from the teachers unions. Most of the analysts have a stake in maintaining the status quo. I am more apt to trust findings from NCES data that run counter to the standard positions of the education establishment.
wdf1:[i]”There’s a quote making the rounds these days: “Everybody is a genius. But, if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will spend its whole life believing that it is stupid.”
I’ve seen the quote attributed to Einstein, but then as Abraham Lincoln once said, “You Can’t Believe Most of the Quotes You Read On the Internet.”[/i]
LOL. Great stuff!
Your first quote above hits a sweet spot with me. I think the education establishment has developed a culture that embeds the following thought in the mind of many school employees: “if it wasn’t for the idiot principle and all these needy and misbehaving kids and their dysfunctional parent(s) this would be an okay job.”
The solution to this problem is to first replace the idiot principle with a qualified leader, and then fire all the school employees that cannot quickly reframe their perspective to be that every student is their customer, and all customers have unique needs that must be satisfied… and if the school employee does not satisfy those needs, he/she will be terminated.
The ONLY common shared mission that the education system requires is the following:
To ensure every individual student is provided that absolutely best education possible for creating the stongest opportunity for his/her attainment of happiness and prosperity as an adult.
JB: [i] I am more apt to trust findings from NCES data that run counter to the standard positions of the education establishment.[/i]
If NCES is capable of presenting findings that don’t present the education establishment in a particularly favorable light, then I think you have to allow more crediblity (albeit with reasonably-tempered skepticism) for their findings that might present the education establishment in a more favorable light.
We all want credible data, even the NEA and AFT, in order to get a better idea for what’s really going on. I wouldn’t have a problem if Michelle Rhee’s educational organization gave money to NCES to run a particular study. They certainly have the knowledge and know-how to crunch numbers related to education.
JB: [i] “if it wasn’t for the idiot principle and all these needy and misbehaving kids and their dysfunctional parent(s) this would be an okay job.”[/i]
I can only respond to this as I see it in Davis. I hear comments similar to that among some teacher friends in social settings. I usually take it as a healthy venting and not as a blanket excuse for perceived incompetence or avoidance of responsibilities. It’s job stress; we all have it and we all overcome it and usually feel good about it.
In the few years that I have been following local school matters closely, I think I have seen a steady improvement among principals hired. Each has idiosyncrasies, and I have almost no knowledge about how they interact and oversee teachers. But I see better projection of leadership to the public. A willingness to interact with an inquiring or concerned public, an ability to articulate what philosophy or goal he or she is following, and some evidence that she or he is in the moment and engaged.
One good thing about the budget stresses of recent years is that I think it has encouraged a number of less passionate employees to retire or leave. From what I see of the district, it feels like a tighter, better-run ship.
I don’t really know what morale is like among teachers as a group, but I sense among individuals that there is appreciation of more stability and community support in Davis than exists other districts.
And to those ends, I think this district has improved meeting the goal you articulated.
[i]” I usually take it as a healthy venting and not as a blanket excuse for perceived incompetence or avoidance of responsibilities. It’s job stress; we all have it and we all overcome it and usually feel good about it.”[/i]
wdf1, I can bring you up to speed suggesting some reading on best practices for establishing a top-level customer-service-focused organization. These types of comments (stupid boss and irritating clients) are common and generally lead to a diagnosis of customer-service dysfunction and/or significant improvement opportunity.
I don’t know what your professional background is, but as an executive in competitive private-sector service industries you would have to eliminate the source of this type of “venting” because it is indicative of employee attitudes and perceptions that corrupt the work culture. If you hear it from more than a rare disgruntled employee in a social setting, then you can be sure that it leaks out in a professional setting in the actions or lack-of-actions of the employees.
Kids are hyper-sensitive to adults that give off vibes of irritation and dislike… or even apathy. In an excellent customer-service domain, the customer is made to feel like everyone in the organization is bending over backwards to make them feel cared for. This results in loyalty and engagement.
I used to get so frustrated having to train groups of people on customer-service practices because, for me, the concepts seemed so natural and logical. However, what I found over my career, is that people are generally narcissistic and don’t see the benefits in putting the welfare of customers before their own immediate desire to be cared for. However, what I also learned is that most people can be trained to perform in a best-practice customer service model. And, just like for happiness and other mindsets, people can become the role that they act.
JB: [i]it is indicative of employee attitudes and perceptions that corrupt the work culture.[/i]
The individuals involved I know to be completely professional. No one complained of dysfunctional parents or needy kids, but rather of conflicts of values and agendas. One person wants this, another person wants that, regulations mandate this or say nothing, gee, how do you make everyone happy. Well, you can’t, sometimes, now what do you do?
An open example is of the girls’ basketball coach being dismissed last winter.
[quote]One person wants this, another person wants that, regulations mandate this or say nothing, gee, how do you make everyone happy. Well, you can’t, sometimes, now what do you do? [/quote]
Fair point.
JB: [i]…attainment of happiness and prosperity as an adult.[/i]
Although I applaud this goal, and at some level buy it, at a practical implementation level, this is just a bit too warm and fuzzy to measure. Your perception maybe different, but happiness is a concept that I think is not always easy for a younger person to grasp (again, speaking for myself). With limited experiences, there is not much to compare against.
Something a bit more tangible, I would argue, is “does this person have a portfolio (or resume) to be viable in the marketplace?” Some obvious benchmarks of this would be a high school diploma and post high school education, perhaps including military service. For example, if you want to measure that way, DHS comes in at 93% from reported responses for the class of 2011 for going to the military, a 2-year or 4-year college. 3.3% did not respond. The remaining responses include work, foreign exchange program, and “other”. I would think anywhere in the mid-90% range would be pretty good in most cases.
If a person has some control him or her destiny in the marketplace, then likely they have an optimal shot happiness and prosperity from a life-long perspective, however one chooses to define happiness and prosperity.
JB: [i]I think Davis’s better outcomes are more the result of a brainy gene pool population and more Davis parents able to help supplement their kid’s education, and not evidence that our schools are better.[/i]
I’ve been thinking about this since you wrote it. I think genetics is the wrong concept. This is a values issue. Davis parents, on average, place a higher value on the local public school education than do parents in many other communities.
If you have a college degree, then you have more formal education than did Steve Jobs or Bill Gates (both dropped out of college). But I think we could both agree that it’s likely that Jobs and Gates were genetically or inately superior to you or me at doing what they do. (Maybe there was also some luck involved, on their part) But they didn’t value their formal education enough to finish their college degrees, and perhaps we’re all the better because of it. The human mind is malleable, and education is one means to take advantage of that malleability toward positive ends, especially if you may not have the genes to succeed otherwise.
JB: Possibly a better way to measure the robustness of the Davis school would be to see what percentage of teachers and district employees currently or previously had their kids enrolled in the Davis schools relative to that percentage in other districts.
Few people would be better qualified to evaluate the quality of education than individuals who are both teachers and parents. And often teachers who live in other cities get the courtesy privilege of enrolling their kids in the school district where they work. It answers the question, “would you prefer to consume your product, given all the alternatives?” or, a little more crudely, “would you prefer to eat your own sausage from among all the sausages available in the market”?
As far as I know, there isn’t much of any available quantitative data on that, but I am impressed, in my own contacts with the district, at how many employees currently have or have had their kids enrolled in the district through to graduation. A high measured percentage of such teachers would also be an indicator for potential motivation to do a good job.
wdf1: There is no question that Davis schools are recognized as higher performing. However, I still stand by my opinion that it has more to do with demographics of the student population than it does school quality. And when I say demographics, I am talking about income levels and education of parents. And I absolutely see a genetic correlation with academically-gifted families.
My opinion on this is not that the kids of highly-educated parents are more intelligent per se; or that ALL of them are wired like their parents… I think education system focuses on a specific type of intelligence that is more commonly owned by kids of parents that also succeeded academically. Remember, the system has not changed much in terms of methods for many decades. It has been, and still is, the template.
What is snubbed out in the education system, including K-12 and much of our system of higher-learning, is creative intelligence. Creative people are much more challenging to educate because they constantly challenge the status quo. They are absolutely bored out their gourd by methods of lecture and rote memorization. They tend to have a mind motivated by practical application and not the nebulous “trust me” theories handed out by those with credentials.
Jobs and Gates dropped out because they felt their creative energy being wasted in college. I am sure they felt the same way in grade school, but probably had the thumb of their parents on their head.
I think Davis schools are harder on non-template learners than other school systems because there is a higher percentage of them… kids with the type of academic intelligence favored by the system. I think this template has ALWAYS been too narrow, but the non-template kids would drop out and get a job and many would go on to create a happy and prosperous life. However, in a more complex information economy, the opportunities to “do it on your own” are much more limited. We need to completely reform the entire system so that the new template becomes “any child able to learn given all methods known and available”. We have a narrow-band standards system, but we need a completely dynamic, nimble system responsive to the needs of every single child. A unionized public sector system cannot change fast enough. We need a new system with significant privatization and choice.
JB: [i]Remember, the system has not changed much in terms of methods for many decades. It has been, and still is, the template.[/i]
Wow. Definitely wrong. It’s as if you hadn’t bothered to read some of Don Shor’s comments to you on this topic a few months ago.
I think you’ve decided, in spite of evidence to the contrary, that K-12 schools in Davis are pretty much the same as what you went through in your hometown high school when you graduated.
If a family is looking for curriculum that is less confining, more student initiated and project-based, and more technology-enhanced, there is the Da Vinci program. Year by year it has been expanding by a grade to the point where 7th graders can enter the program at Emerson Junior High. Some Montessori parents at Birch Lane express your very sentiments as the reason for having their kids in that program. If elementary Spanish language instruction is important to you, along with a bit more curriculum tied to cultural experiences, there is the Spanish Immersion program Chavez Elementary. There is Davis School for Independent Study that allows students to work individually more at their own pace. And do you know that if you take your kid out of school for at least five days, you can work out an independent study program through the district and not get hassled for truancy or excess absenses? And the district gets attendance credit from the state for your child.
Even while students participate in these alternative programs (Da Vinci or DSIS), they can also take advantage of many “conventional” programs offered at the secondary schools, such as music, drama, language, or dance. Did any of these options exist for you when you were in school? Did autistic and physically disabled kids attend your schools? They didn’t attend mine in the 70’s, but they do attend Davis schools. The options available to students in Davis in 2011 is so much greater than existed in past decades.
You speak to me as if I am unfamiliar with and unsympathetic to kids who don’t fit a standard mold. Yes, I was someone who did generally work fine in a traditional school model. My brother did not; he is someone who is a bit more of an independent creative thinker, as you might characterize. I’ve told him about these programs here in Davis, and we both agreed that such alternative programs would have been a better option for him in his day. One of my own kids also struggled in a similar way with a more conventional model of school. We took advantage of a combination of programs to get him through.
Your consistent template has been that nothing has changed in Davis, that it is a dinosaur, perhaps because of unimaginitive academic snobs and a teachers’ union, and that privatizing everything is the only answer. All of the programs described above have entered the district within the last 15-20 years, mostly at the demand of parents who did not a one-size-fits-all kind of education for their kids. Davis has been an early adopter in implementing these alternatives.
I think what probably bugs you is the template that an organized public effort (aka, local government) cannot possibly do something that can work, and actual viable and working alternatives under such a system cannot possibly exist.
Jeff, you are a taxpayer, voter, and resident of Davis. You have a right to ask questions, investigate, and get answers of the public school system if you really have the initiative to do so. I got involved with the schools on that basis (wanting answers to questions I had). The Da Vinci program periodically has public presentations in which their students present projects that they have been working on for a certain period. I suggest you call the Da Vinci front office during business hours and ask when the next public presentation is and arrange to attend it. Non-Da Vinci parents do so on occasion to get a sense for what the program is like. Then you can judge for yourself.
The reason we transferred our children into the Davis school district, and fought to keep them there when the district threw out interdistrict transfer students in the 1990s, was because DJUSD had programs and excellence that wasn’t available in nearby school districts, including our district of residence. Our kids made use of Special Ed (available everywhere), GATE (available everywhere, but Davis is outstanding), DSIS followed by DHS, DSIS split-site with DHS. There is nothing [i]anything[/i] like DSIS at any nearby school district, and it is the only thing that saved one child’s education. Many of my son’s friends did DaVinci and almost all of them liked it much better than the regular option.
Davis has many more options for students. The district is responsive to parent pressure for those choices: it is responsive to the consumers in its marketplace. The continued expansion of Spanish Immersion and the redistricting of schools to accommodate a full program of SI is a good example. What other district has anything like SI?
I frankly think Jeff hasn’t looked into what DJUSD has to offer. I think he has a bias that public schools cannot be offering the choices he thinks the private sector would somehow offer through vouchers. But DJUSD offers choices, has excellent outcomes, and certainly disproves his notion that the template hasn’t changed in decades.
Don,
DSIS is a home school support option. I know of many other school districts offering independent study options for home schooled students. What is Davis’s so outstanding and how did it “save” one child’s education? DSIS is another template, but much is the same as DSHS for kids in grades 7-12.
DiVinci does offer another option, but just read the “Is DiVinci Right For Me” FAQ on the website. This is still a template.
Spanish Immersion is a parents’-only option. The kids are too young at that point. We cannot brag about this being another way to help non-template learners. There is evidence that it makes later education more difficult for some kids. The jury is still out on the benefit or liability question.
Davis does not corner the market on options. Woodland just opened the Woodland Polytechnic Academy.
This from their website:
[quote]At Woodland Poly, our goal is to offer students (and their parents) an education that is both career technically oriented and college preparatory. We’ll meet the needs of all students, whether they are college bound or seeking technical training, while providing them a safe learning environment. We believe children are “thirsty” for knowledge and that fostering their natural curiosity of the world allows them to develop needed life-long learning skills.
Our focus on career technical education (“CTE”) courses is a result of watching years of CTE courses systematically stripped of equipment, course offerings, faculty and, ultimately, facilities due to both the reduction in Proposition 98 funding and a lack of understanding in how CTE course work is instrumental in student success. Additionally, Regional Occupational Program (“ROP”) participation has plummeted over the last several years. As so many will attest, it is these courses that kept many kids interested and coming back to school, and many will also say that these courses served as the groundwork for success in their adult lives.
Offering a unique educational experience centered around five CTE academies, Woodland Poly provides students an expansive, rigorous academic and career-oriented education in a safe, small-class-size environment. College and career preparation is not mutually exclusive at Woodland Poly, as both build upon each other and create viable options after graduation for students.
The charter school’s schedule will allow students to take courses at local community colleges and in an online setting. Students will engage in a course of study that blends career, high school and college academics, which will lead to multiple pathways after graduation. The culture of Woodland Poly is to promote 21st century workplace skills, civic responsibility and positive social behavior.
Woodland Poly was founded on the idea that the kids come first. Students, parents, teachers, staff and administrators are held accountable to the others in a system of checks and balances.[/quote]
The last paragraph incorporates the customer service concept that would make obsolete much of the need for us to create all these “special” public schools. If kids really did come first, there would be no template… or their would be so many education paths that we would successfully graduate 90% of the kids.
“or their” s/b “or there”
Don’t have much time for editing these days…
DSIS is a home school support option. I know of many other school districts offering independent study options for home schooled students.
That is not true. It is a fully accredited program that bears no resemblance to home schooling. Home schooling parents can use DSIS facilities and can make use of the program. But to suggest that it is “a home school support option” is not accurate. We looked into the independent-study options in nearby districts when we were facing the interdistrict eviction. At that time, Dixon had one (one!) teacher handling the whole thing, all grade levels. I can’t remember how many teachers DSIS has. There is nothing like DSIS at any local school district, or at least there wasn’t a few years ago.
I’m glad to see Woodland has allowed a charter school to open. It is unfortunate that DJUSD and the county board blocked the change of Valley Oak to a charter school. I think public charter schools have many benefits.
[i]If kids really did come first, there would be no template…[/i]
You seem to change your position from arguing for having lots of choices for what kind of school or education to pursue, to a position that an ideal school should be all things to all students. That there shouldn’t be a need for a student/family to have to shop around.
[i]…or their would be so many education paths that [b]we would successfully graduate 90% of the kids.[/b][/i]
Davis schools successfully graduate 90%+ of our kids. I guess that’s a good sign that things are working? What’s your point?
Jeff: [i]What is Davis’s so outstanding and how did it “save” one child’s education?[/i] [re:DSIS]
I realize I didn’t answer this question.
One of my kids was flunking out of 7th grade. It was clearly not working, in spite of frequent meetings and efforts by the SE counselors and staff. It was, as they say in ed jargon, clearly not the right placement. We arranged a transfer into DSIS.
That child continued split-site at the regular school for some classes, but took most of them at DSIS. Grades at the regular school were barely passing, some failures; grades at DSIS were straight A’s. The difference is the teachers, the flexibility, the ability to pursue individual interests fully. The same things that had made GATE successful for that child in elementary school were big factors in the success at DSIS in secondary grades.
When a child is not doing well in school, a parent needs to make sure first that the placement is appropriate. There may be a problem with a particular teacher, with the style of learning, or with disabilities. The school district will work with the parent to achieve the right placement. But sometimes you have to push for it.
The sibling did fine in both DSIS and DHS, making a smooth transition from the one to the other. DSIS in this case was more a matter of convenience and self-fulfillment.
wdf1: Ok, I can see I am getting sloppy with my responses.
Responding to your second point first…
Davis high school graduates 90+ of its students, so by that measure I would agree that Davis schools are doing a great job for this metric.
On your second point…
I have not changed my position that public schools in general, as designed, do a lousy job engaging, accommodating and educating a much too large population of kids.
I think you and Don are working and hard to get me to accept and admit that Davis schools are as great as you believe them to be. I’m sorry, but my kid’s experience and the experience of many of their friends – especially those lacking parents with significant traditional academic education and/or resources – was not very good. These kids may have all graduated, but any natural passion for learning was snuffed out around 7th grade.
I’m sure you and Don consider this the fault of these kid’s parents. Or would opine that maybe that the kids just didn’t do the work, or didn’t want to learn in the firt place. This is where we diverge 180 degrees. Because, I know that ALL kids have a passion for learning. They are born curious and with a natural desire to grow, create and accomplish things. The public education system sucks that natural energy out of them about the time they become no longer cute… pseudo adults with hormones and greater complications.
Davis has different programs. Folsom has different programs. These are “alternative” programs for kids that don’t do so well in the mainstream program, or who have different needs. However – and this is the point I was trying to make – these alternative programs are just another template. And although they may help engage a larger population of students than would otherwise be served… and this is certainly a good thing… I still think this falls wofully short of what we should be doing to engage many more of the kids. I think there are many Davis kids that would do better in a school system that it more used to teaching a more diverse group of non-template learners.
Here is a quote from Ken Robison in a Fast Company article that gets to this point:
[quote]” I’ve always believed that we all have these immense natural talents–we don’t all know what they are and we have to discover them. Very often organizations are inflexible because there is too little communication between functions; they are too segregated. A lot of people in organizations are disengaged–there’s a lot of research to show that. They turn part of themselves off when they get to work.”[/quote]
[url]http://www.fastcompany.com/1764044/ken-robinson-on-the-principles-of-creative-leadership[/url]
This is related to organizational work culture, but it applies to public education also, IMO.
JB: [i] There is evidence that it makes later education more difficult for some kids. The jury is still out on the benefit or liability question.[/i]
re: Spanish Immsersion
What is that evidence? We have made use of Spanish Immersion with no negative effects and have been happy with the outcomes.
If standardized scores are any kind of test on this, one way or another, then Chavez Elementary scores are equivalent to the rest of their peers in the district by grades 5 & 6. They warn parents that SI students will underperform slightly vs. the rest of the district in English in earlier grades (2 & 3), but catch up later.
wdf1: Thanks for that explanation. I can see why you are supportive of DSIS. My kids got mostly As and Bs through 8th grade accept for higher math where they got Cs and Ds. They both had to take algebra twice. The teachers sucked. We paid for private tutors, and these helped the kids pass their classes the second time… but both learned to hate math because of their crappy teachers. I didn’t remember enough to help them except for rudimentary things.
Similarly for writing; I read and edited many of the English papers both boys submitted. They did fine until about the ninth grade and then both started to struggle. The teachers were crappy. Both kids got turned off on writing and English classes.
I do have some regrets about not intervening in their education choices at the point we started noting the struggles, and forcing them to attend either DSIS or DiVinci. We talked to the kids about it; however, neither wanted it, and it was not clear for, us nor the teachers we talked to, that alternative programs were needed or beneficial. Both of my boys are extremely bright and would do just enough work to get good enough grades in most of their classes… except for math and English. The bigger problem was that they went from actually liking school and excelling at it prior to attending Emerson… to disliking it. After 7th grade they skated and we didn’t know about it except for their struggles with math and their complete distaste for writing.
In your case it seemed like it was much clearer as your son was flunking classes.
JB: [i]wdf1: Thanks for that explanation. I can see why you are supportive of DSIS.[/i]
You’re addressing Don Shor’s comments, not mine.
JB: [i]I read and edited many of the English papers both boys submitted[/i]
Why is that an undo intervention? Having someone else edit your writing is sensible in most cases. Even professional writers have editors.
[i]”You’re addressing Don Shor’s comments, not mine”[/i]
[i]”Having someone else edit your writing is sensible in most cases. Even professional writers have editors.”[/i]
Apparently, I need an editor!
[i]”Why is that an undo intervention?”[/i]
It depends on the level and type of editing. I know parents that practically write the paper for their kids.
wdf1: On Spanish Immersion: are there any measurable or notable benefits derived from this? My oldest son’s same-age childhood friend did both Spanish Immersion and DiVinci. According to my son, this boy wasn’t fluent in Spanish. In fact, this kid had problems with school throughout his public school education. I always suspected that some of his struggles were due to his delayed English education.
JB: [i]It depends on the level and type of editing. I know parents that practically write the paper for their kids.[/i]
I can agree that writing a paper for one’s kid is not appropriate. If a kid cannot write a first draft for an assignment, then there are problems.
I think a big challenge in transitioning from elementary to JH in Davis is that a student goes from having 1-2 teachers in elementary school to having 6-7 different teachers in junior high. A teacher goes from having 25-60 students (depending on the configuration of block scheduling, if it exists) in elementary school to having 150-165 different students in JH, for an optimized full-time schedule. So a parent goes from needing 1-2 teacher contacts to 6-7 teacher contacts to get a sense for how things are going. When you have 1-2 teacher contacts, then you will also get a more comprehensive assessment of your student, because that teacher(s) is often teaching more than one subject and has more contact with that student throughout the day. There is greater potential for communication breakdown going into JH. It also happens at a time of life when a student is in early adolescence and is less inclined to display reliance on parents.
One tool that the district has introduced to improve communication is ParentConnection. It is an online gradebook system that allows parents to see the same gradebook that the teacher sees:
[url]http://www.djusd.net/family/zangpc/zangpchome[/url]
It is something that has been phased in over the past several years. At first I found that it was mainly Da Vinci teachers using it, but over time, more non-Da Vinci teachers have transitioned to using it. It is most useful, I think, for parents of secondary students to follow progress. I followed it about once/week for a situation in which my kid had a responsible track record, about 2-3 times/week when my kid was showing evidence of being unreliable.
“[i]Why is that an undo intervention?”
It depends on the level and type of editing. I know parents that practically write the paper for their kids.[/i]
I still edit papers for my daughter, and she’s a graduate student!
JB, re Spanish Immersion: If you would like to see your kid learn Spanish or a second language, then I think it’s a good program. It’s probably a good idea for parents to evaluate the situation carefully, though. If it looks like the student isn’t on a trajectory to use Spanish once leaving SI, then he/she is likely to forget it.
Fluency in a language depends on whether you use it regularly or not. If you don’t speak it regularly, then you lose your fluency. I guess it’s like you and algebra (from what you mentioned in an earlier comment). You don’t use algebra calculations much, so you forget how to do it, or it comes more slowly to you. But if you took a refresher course on algebra, it’s likely you’d find it coming back surprisingly quickly.
In the case of Spanish, a student with fluency in a second language has access to many more job opportunities, so to me this is a marketable skill relevant to the 21st century. I say this without commenting on whether our society ought to cater to Spanish speakers or not; it’s simply a fact that businesses seek whatever markets are out there, Spanish-speaking or not.
But again, if you want to rely on standardized test data, then the scores as presented in public databases (STAR tests) don’t show any difference in performance from non-SI students, if you track them through to 5th & 6th grade and beyond. If you see contrary conclusions, then I would be interested in checking it out.
[quote]Study Finds Every Style Of Parenting Produces Disturbed, Miserable Adults
October 26, 2011 | ISSUE 47•43
SANTA ROSA, CA—A study released by the California Parenting Institute Tuesday shows that every style of parenting inevitably causes children to grow into profoundly unhappy adults. “Our research suggests that while overprotective parenting ultimately produces adults unprepared to contend with life’s difficulties, highly permissive parenting leads to feelings of bitterness and isolation throughout adulthood,” lead researcher Daniel Porter said. “And, interestingly, we found that anything between those two extremes is equally damaging, always resulting in an adult who suffers from some debilitating combination of unpreparedness and isolation. Despite great variance in parenting styles across populations, the end product is always the same: a profoundly flawed and joyless human being.” The study did find, however, that adults often achieve temporary happiness when they have children of their own to perpetuate the cycle of human misery.
From The Onion
[url]http://www.theonion.com/articles/study-finds-every-style-of-parenting-produces-dist,26452/[/url]
[/quote]
wdf1: I would crack up laughing except that I am too flawed and joyless.
They can’t be serious about this, can they?
JB: [i]They can’t be serious about this, can they?[/i]
Note the source. Just in case:
[url]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_onion[/url]
[i]”Note the source.”[/i]
Got it. I guess I was thinking there might be some real evidence that this is true.