Sunday, August 23, 2015
Friday, August 21, 2015
Peoples College of Law Representing at UCLA Pre-Law Society’s Twenty-Third Annual Law Forum
UCLA Pre-Law Society’s Twenty-Third Annual Law Forum
I will be one of the representatives from Peoples College of Law (PCL) at The UCLA Pre-Law Society’s Twenty-Third Annual...
Posted by Robert D. Skeels on Friday, August 21, 2015
Peoples College of Law: Is Social Justice Law School for you?
"The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress."—Frederick Douglass
If you’re a social justice minded person in Los Angeles, with at least two years of college credit, consider Peoples College of Law (PCL). PCL offers a four-year evening Juris Doctor program to accommodate working students. Successful completion of the Juris Doctor (J.D.) program provides qualification to sit for the California State Bar exam. From their site:
Our recruitment and admissions policies are strongly directed toward socio-politically conscious Native American, Asian Pacific Islander, African-American/Black and Latina/o students. Our goal is to have a student body that is at least half women and two/thirds Third World People. Peoples College of Law affirmatively recruits LGBT applicants.
Thursday, August 20, 2015
AALA: Eli Broad and Charter Expansion
From the August 24, 2015 issue of Update
The Los Angeles Times reported earlier this month that the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation is leading an effort to expand the number of charter schools in LAUSD. The Broads are being joined by the Walton Family and the Keck Foundations, among others. The expansion of charter schools is supposed to decrease the number of children attending what the charter industry calls failing schools or those with lower test scores. The aim is to get at least 50% of these children in the privately-run charter schools which could potentially be located on District sites. LAUSD already has about 100,000 students attending charter schools, more than any other school district in the country. In an email to LA School Report, the officials from the Broad Foundation wrote, “Too many of our school children still aren’t getting the quality of education they deserve, which is why tens of thousands of students are currently on public charter school waiting lists. We are in the early stages of exploring a variety of ideas about how to help give all families—especially in low-income communities of color—access to high- quality public schools and what we and others in the philanthropic community can do to increase access to a great public school for every child in Los Angeles.”
Officials from charter organizations, such as ICEF and Green Dot, are, understandably ecstatic about the proposal as it will generate more dollars for their programs. The foundations could provide funding for early administrative costs of new charters and for teacher training. Board Member Mónica Garcia said she is open to the foundations’ plans and says that her district could benefit from additional charter schools. However, not everyone is happy about this expansion. Because charter school teachers are not unionized, UTLA is not supportive of these independent schools and feels that input of teachers is disregarded. In a call to members, Alex Caputo-Pearl, UTLA President, vowed to fight the plans of the foundations, saying they are “out to destroy collective bargaining.” Board President Steve Zimmer is concerned that the charter schools will continue to be selective about who they enroll, leaving those students who require more specialized services and resources at the District schools. A mass exodus of students to charters will also severely decrease state and federal funding for the traditional schools.
As has been noted before, Eli Broad, the Waltons and other billionaires have been active in LAUSD politics for many years and have supported controversial efforts for reform. Financial resources have been provided candidates for the Board of Education that AALA has not supported and who have been strongly procharter. It should also be noted that Dr. John Deasy, former LAUSD Superintendent, was a graduate of the Broad Superintendent Academy and is now the Superintendent-in-Residence for the Broad Center. In fact, it has been reported that Eli Broad said that John Deasy was the best Los Angeles superintendent in memory. That, in and of itself, should give us all a reason to pause and look at this expansion plan with a critical eye.
Monday, August 17, 2015
Friday, August 14, 2015
Stoner Elementary community to hold protest against charter school co-location that has taken resources from home school
Press release – Stoner Elementary community to hold protest against charter school co-location that has taken resources from home school.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
On Monday, August 17, 2015, the first day of school, from 7:30-8:30AM, the Stoner Elementary School Community and local Del Rey neighborhood will be holding a protest against the co-location of ICEF Vista Charter School on the Stoner ES campus. Stoners parents are upset that the co-location has taken resource rooms including: music, special education, and language therapy among others. Local residents are upset because the co-location will bring traffic and safety issues to their neighborhood.
WHAT: Stoner Elementary Community is holding a:
RALLY TO SUPPORT STONER ELEMENTARY AND OPPOSE THE CO-LOCATION
WHEN: Monday, August 17, 2015 at 7:30 – 8:30 AM
WHERE: on the corner of Stoner Avenue and Lindblade Street, 90230.
[map]
Media is invited to attend.
There will be speakers. There will be signs. There will be chanting and drums.
Most importantly, there will be calls for better schools, a safer neighborhood, and unity in the community.
ICEF Vista Elementary, a neighboring school that is located two blocks from Stoner on the campus of the defunct St. Gerard Majella Elementary School, has taken classroom space at Stoner. To many people in the neighborhood, ICEF is seen as ‘the school at the church’ and many ICEF families take pride that their school provides benefit to the local parish. However, ICEF wants to expand and that means leaving the church grounds. Part of ICEF’s expansion plan includes co-locating at another campus to open up space at the St. Gerard campus.
ICEF is “stealing from Peter to Give to Paul”
Stoner ES parents are outraged that ICEF Vista’s will be co-locating this year and has taken set aside rooms that are used for music, art, parents center, and computer lab at Stoner so that ICEF can open up space on the St. Gerard campus to have room for an art room, parents center and computer lab. ICEF is literally taking away resources from Stoner ES to give those same resources to the ‘school at the church.’
The Stoner parents and local residents are mad about the colocation and are fighting back
In February 2014 when the proposed co-location was announced, Stoner community leaders addressed the ICEF board and asked them to reconsider their co-location plans. In March 2014, Stoner families and local residents sent over a hundred letters and emails to ICEF and LAUSD Boards urging them to not have the co-location at Stoner. In April 2014, when a final offer was made for the co-location, the Stoner and local community held a protest in front of the ICEF Vista campus urging them to not co-locate.
The Stoner and local community will be holding a protest on the morning of the first day of school Monday August 17 to let ICEF families know about our concerns with the co-location. More protests are planned for later in this school year.
WHAT DO WE WANT:
We want to let the ICEF community know the damage this co-location is causing and the harm it is bring to our community children. The Stoner parents are asking family of ICEF Vista to not support the co-location by selecting another educational option. We are encouraging the families of the 20 ICEF students who pertain to Stoner to consider sending their children to their local community school. We are asking parents from outside the area to consider their local schools or choose a non-colocated charter.
Adam C. Benitez
President, Friends of Stoner Avenue Elementary School
www.friendsofstoner.org
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Protest against Eli Broad's charter putsch by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education
The activists comprising Voices Against Privatizing Public Education, whose efforts were recently highlighted on Professor Diane Ravitch's blog, are holding a rally/protest in front of the Broad Foundation's headquarters. This is in response to Broad and his fellow reactionaries' announcement of plans to privatize more than half the Los Angeles Unified School District within the next few years. Given the money these plutocrats have dumped into their profitable privatization projects, the Broad/Walton threat to eliminate public education is a clear and present danger. Join the rally/protest, sign the petition, and get involved with turning back the tide of school privatization by helping overturn avaricious billionaire Reed Hasting's 1992 California Charter School Act. For more on Eli Broad and school privatization, see the section entitled "The Neoliberal Emperor of Los Angeles" in this essay. — rds
ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!
Join us in showing your support for public education. Public schools are OUR schools, not Eli Broad's
SAVE OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS RALLY
Sponsored by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education
PROTEST LOCATION: Broad Foundation Headquarters (in front of building only) Avenue of The Stars Los Angeles, CA
MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 2015 AT NOON
The LA Times announced that the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, along with the Walton Family Foundation and the Keck Foundation met to discuss plans to have half of Los Angeles students attending charter schools over the next eight years. http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-me-lausd-charters-20150808-story.html
We say no more billionaire and corporate takeover of our public schools!
Charter schools cherry pick students, falsify records, commit enrollment fraud, close down public schools in predominantly low income areas, destroy jobs, bust up unions, appoint private school boards unaccountable to the taxpayers, and segregate student populations based on income and race.
Separate but equal has no place!!
A recent report entitled “Fraud, Waste and Lies: Charter Schools Cheating Communities out of Millions of Dollars” cited hundreds of millions of public education dollars being wasted due to fraud and other abuses in the charter school sector. Read here: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2015/04/29/fraud-waste-and-lies-charter-schools-cheating-communities-out-millions-dollars
The charter school industry is a cancer on our public education system. The only solution is to repeal the charter school laws in California once and for all.
Come to the rally - defend our public schools against the attack by greedy profiteers.
Please show your support for placing a statewide ballot initiative to repeal charter school laws in California by signing petition here: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/repeal-charter-school-act-of-1992-in-ca-ballot
Please read more at: https://notocharterschools.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/defend-public-ed-statement.pdf For more information about this rally call us at: (415) 282-1908
Make your voices heard and be part of the solution to save our public schools!
Protest against Eli Broad's charter putsch by Voices Against Privatizing Public Education by Robert D. Skeels
Saturday, August 08, 2015
Professor Wayne Au: The Opt Out Movement
Antioch University Friends of Education Speaker Series - Wayne Au will talk about various issues with high-stakes testing and organizing against the tests. Au is an Associate Professor in the Education Program at the University of Washington, Bothell, and he is an editor for the social justice magazine, Rethinking Schools. Most recently, he co-authored the article, "Rethinking schools: Enacting a vision for social justice within US education" for Critical Studies in Education and co-edited Pencils Down: Rethinking High-Stakes Testing and Accountability in Public Schools.
Join Voices Against Privatizing Public Education's efforts to repeal the California charter school law
There is a small grass-roots group that has been working diligently to create a ballot proposition to repeal the charter school laws. While a seemingly daunting task, there might not ever be another chance to do this before the privatizers eliminate public schools altogether (Eli Broad just announced his plans to cut LAUSD's public schools in in half). The group has an online petition that now has over 600 signatures. They also have a facebook group. Both of which are linked here:
Ballot Initiative to REPEAL the CA Charter School Act of 1992
Voices Against Privatizing Public Education
Most importantly, they have picked up a handfull of key labor leaders and organizations:
- AFT Local 6161 (Palomar Faculty Federation)
- North County Labor Alliance
- Escondido Public School Advocates
- Bill Freeman- NEA Board member for California
- Alita Blanc- United Educators of San Francisco
The coalition is working hard to get several more organizations on board, including local Democratic party clubs in several large cities. Please consider getting involved, and perhaps even endorsing the efforts of the group.
Tuesday, July 21, 2015
Friday, July 17, 2015
Wayne Au: Mapping Corporate Education Reform in the Neoliberal State
Wayne Au: ”Mapping Corporate Education Reform in the Neoliberal State" from Fairhaven College, WWU on Vimeo.
Wayne Au, Associate Professor in the School of Educational Studies at the University of Washington Bothell; an editor for Rethinking Schools.
Public education is currently seen as one of the last great “prizes” for proponents of neoliberalism as a large market for potential profit. In this talk Professor Wayne Au analyzes how the neoliberal restructuring of the state relative to public education has resulted in a shift from democratic government to an increase in non-democratic network governance by corporations, non-profit organizations, and philanthropies. Drawing from his upcoming co-edited collection, this talk offers a framing for the rise of neoliberal network governance in education and share different examples of social network analyses illustrating such governance in the U.S. Chile, and elsewhere.
Thursday, July 16, 2015
MiSiS: The [John Deasy] Gift That Keeps On Giving
From the July 20, 2015 issue of Update
Just when we thought there could possibly be a light at the end of the dark and winding MiSiS road, the LAUSD community now faces another hurdle—faulty transcripts. Superintendent Cortines confirmed that there have been reporting issues with graduation requirements for students in the Class of 2015 resulting in potential errors on as many as 7,500 transcripts. For some reason, several transcripts show that students had met graduation requirements when they didn't and vice versa for other students. In other cases, summer school grades just disappeared from the system, affecting credits earned and matriculation to the next grade level. While it was announced that these most recent problems have been resolved, those in the field claim there are still inaccuracies. Several additional steps for school site and local district office staff have been put in place, most of them entailing checks and balances to ensure the accuracy of the information in MiSiS.
The issue with transcripts is not new. The same problems were occurring last October as seniors were preparing their college admissions applications. The District at that time hired retired educators to come in and verify by hand that the transcripts were correct and students were asked to compare their new transcripts with their old report cards. Several more millions of dollars were allocated to fix the problem then, so it is unsettling to see that the same thing is reoccurring now.
Superintendent Cortines had hoped that the system would be operating correctly by now, but recently admitted that it may take all of 2015-16 to get it fully functional. Last week, the MiSiS log of unresolved problems still exceeded 350. School staff members report that as soon as one problem is resolved another pops up. And now as we are less than a month away from the start of the new school year, administrators, counselors and teachers are holding their breaths that students will have accurate class schedules, that attendance reporting will be correct and enrollment counts can be taken.
Workshop: let the community drive LCFF/LCAP for Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve
Instituto de Padres / Parent Institute
Saturday, July 18, 2015
12:00 to 4:00PM
3303 Wilshire Blvd., 8th Floor
Los Angeles, CA 90010
Instituto de Padres / Parent Institute by Robert D. Skeels
[The Education Trust-West] and many of the cited sources in the [20]14-15 ETW/LAUSD Case Study are noted School [R]eformers aligned with Secretary Duncan, the Broad/Gates/Waltons — and the then superintendent John Deasy — whose [Local Control Accountability Plan] LCAP this was. The Walton Foundation is thanked for their support. — Scott M. Folsom (4LAKids)
The Nonprofit Industrial Complex (NPIC) and their billionaire backers saw Governor Brown's wrongheaded Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) and Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP) proposals as a "double-play" against public education. On the one hand elimination of categorical funding would further expose the most vulnerable (e.g. Students With Disabilities—(SWD)) to inequitable funding at the whim of those controlling the LCFF/LCAP process, on the other it would further the designs of those wanting to destroy the public commons as per the Andy Smarick roadmap.
The NPIC drove the entire Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) LCFF/LCAP process. Authentic community, family, and educator voices were drowned out by a cacophony of corporate voices in the guise of "engagement" that only the well-funded NPIC can wield. The United Way of Greater Los Angeles (UWGLA), and its smaller NPIC allies like Community Coalition, and their man in LAUSD—Eli Broad trained Superintendent John Deasy, controlled the LAUSD LCFF/LCAP process from start to finish, with a blitzkrieg series of forums, surveys, public relations, and more. However, no one should be surprised that Community Coalition is now the front group suing the district on behalf of their funders. That's how to create a crisis part of neoliberalism, so well described by Naomi Klein, works.
A chance for community to drive the process
The activists behind the Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve (SLASD) movement have organized an Instituto de Padres / Parent Institute forum to train authentic parent and community leaders to advocate for students in their communities. Here's an excerpt from a note sent to me by a parent leader discussing the event:
I urge you to encourage adult student leaders in the community to learn about the new Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) and Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP). We are having a Parent Institute on Saturday, July 18th. Please see attached flyers in English and Spanish. Khallid Al-Alim, LAUSD parent activist, will explain this budget process. It is crucial that we understand this, if we are to effectively push back against the NPIC that you so clearly describe.
Monday, July 13, 2015
SKrashen: The ELL "Problem" and the Common Core "Solution"*
SKrashen: The ELL "Problem" and the Common Core "Solution"*: Stephen Krashen There is a problem with ELLs/Emergent Bilinguals (henceforth ELLs), but it is not the problem that is typically stated i... [READ ALL]
Sunday, July 12, 2015
Schools Matter: 2015 Week 28 Education Odds and Ends
First published on Schools Matter on July 11, 2015
“Our rulers don’t just want exclusive control over the governance and finances of our schools, they want to control both what is taught and by whom.” — Robert D. Skeels
Deasy not given his due
An EdSource piece by the respected Carl Cohn makes the tired old case for "breaking up" Los Angeles Unified School District. Cohn lists multiple recent missteps in his case — MiSiS cRiSiS and Pearson/iPad scandal among them — but never once mentions the common denominator of all the missteps, perhaps because of EdSource's sources of funding. I addressed Cohn's lack of attribution thusly:
Mr. Cohn, how coy of you not to provide full credit to John Deasy for nearly all of the woes you enumerate above? The Broad Superintendents Academy "graduate" oversaw (read masterminded) MiSiS, iPads, and many more projects that left the district in disarray, nearly bankrupt, with little more than the ability to manage damage control rather than implement any of the forward looking projects you allude to. While some say that Deasy, and all of the Nonprofit Industrial Complex (NPIC) organizations that supported his abject tenure, were following the Andy Smarick roadmap for scuttling school districts (outlined in his "Wave of the Future" essay in the fringe-right EdNext journal), I would posit it sounds more like Broad's meddling.
Dr. Mitchell Robinson's response to Peter Cunningham
Duncan given his due, for the most part
Arguably the doltish Arne Duncan is either the worst Secretary of Education in all of U.S. History, or the best corporate bagman to ever occupy the post. Honestly, he's both. The distinguished Professor Diane Ravitch excoriates the inept education chief in her response to Lyndsey Layton's ham-handed paean to Duncan.
Confronting a corporate reform neckbeard's mansplainin'
I was on Twitter the other day and noticed someone mansplainin' a teacher acquaintance of mine. The offender was none other than former Michelle Rhee minion Eric Lerum. When the teacher made the correct assertion that privately managed charter schools engage in selective enrollment, Lerum made the following bizarre statement:
.@cjnkira A frequently repeated talking pt not supported by evidence + unified enrollment system would actually help protect against that.
— Eric Lerum (@ericlerum) July 5, 2015Incredulous at the neoliberal corporate reformer's statement I provided hard evidence from the Office of Independent Monitor (OIM):
@ericlerum @Rae_Shih @cjnkira Come again on the "not supported by evidence" thing? https://t.co/9j4FLjNZRw #LAUSD
— Robert D. Skeels (@rdsathene) July 10, 2015Lerum did not respond to that tweet, presumably because his entire argument rests on ignoring facts. Neither he, nor any other corporate reformer, are able to address the issue. Instead, he kept berating my teacher friend by citing policy papers (as opposed to legitimate research) by the Center on Reinventing Public Education (CRPE), a fringe-right think-tank funded by reactionary ideologues including: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Fund for Educational Excellence, The Joyce Foundation, Laura and John Arnold Foundation, Michael and Susan Dell Foundation, National Alliance for Public [sic] Charter Schools, Walton Family Foundation, and The Broad Foundation.
At one point Lerum stated in regards to the significant under enrollment of Students with Disabilities (SWD), particularly low incident ones, "not enough to look at #s - must also examine cause of #s." Lerum holds a Juris Doctor, and I'm working on mine, so let me make this as simple as possible for him to understand in legal terms. The ostensible reasons why the lucrative charter school industry refuses to educate SWD are not important as this is a strict liability offense. Lack of specific intent, mistake of fact, or mistake of law are no defense here. Charters do not educate every child, and as such, must be held strictly liable for their crimes. Sorry to threaten the charter sector's profits, but that's the reality, and no amount of un-juried policy papers masquerading as "research" will change that.
The teacher then cited the illustrious Professor Antonia Darder's Racism and the Charter School Movement: Unveiling the Myths.
.@cjnkira This piece is all opinion & assertion, weak on facts & evidence. Does include good rhetoric for weighted student funding though.
— Eric Lerum (@ericlerum) July 5, 2015Lerum's maladroit response speaks volumes to his limited understanding of education, and research in general. It is no exaggeration to say that Darder is an intellectual giant in the field of education. Years ago I remember one of my mentors, Dr. John Fernandez, saying "sure you've read McClaren, Macedo, and Giroux, but you need to read Darder, she's the closest thing to Freire." Professor Darder can write a piece like she did in Truthout precisely because she's written dozens of books, and peer reviewed articles. What does Lerum have to his credit? A few poorly composed and fact-free Huffington Post pieces? Yet leave it to the corporately sponsored Lerum to question the veracity of one of the preeminent scholars of our age.
It shouldn't surprise me that a neoliberal corporate education reformer like Lerum doesn't know the difference between peer reviewed works and policy papers. Nor should I be surprised that he didn't have the good sense to avoid insulting a luminary in the field of critical pedagogy. Moreover, while he had tons of mansplainin' on hand for my female teacher friend, as soon as I confronted him with the OIM report, he went silent. His only response to me was to assert that my questioning of CRPE's funders wasn't "substantive". I would posit that his staunch defense of his corporate funders and allies speaks for itself.
Ref Rodriguez watch
Corporate charter sector mogul Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez is under investigation by a number of authorities including the LAUSD Office of Inspector General and the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. Keeping up with all of Rodriguez's financial scandals and possible felonies is difficult, but the following articles and resources should help:
- LAUSD School Board Member-Elect Ref Rodriguez’s Financial Disclosures (And Possible Conflicts of Interest)
- Ref Rodriguez OIG Investigation Disclosure Neighborhood Council Resolution
- Was Refugio “Ref” Rodriguez self-dealing and running front groups?
- The Ref Rodriguez papers: Various documentation of Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez's alleged criminal acts and other sundry ethical lapses.
- Admitting no wrongdoing, Ref Rodriguez and Jacqueline Elliot resigned from all PUC Corporate Charter Boards
Admitting no wrongdoing, Ref Rodriguez and Jacqueline Elliot resigned from all PUC Corporate Charter Boards #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/xGZ5PQpmxz
— RD Skeels LAUSD 2013 (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) July 7, 2015The NPIC further undermining LAUSD
The usual Nonprofit Industrial Complex (NPIC) suspects are hard at work in their never ending quest to bankrupt public education in Los Angeles. News that they were dissatisfied with the district's implementation of Local Control Funding Formula/Local Control Accountability Plan (LCFF) would be surprising given how they drove the entire process, except when viewed from the perspective that they never intended for LCFF to do anything but break the district. I had the following to say:
This is somewhat surprising given that UWGLA and their anti-public education CLASS "coalition" (read Eli Broad proxy groups) held so much sway over the entire LCFF process in LAUSD. For a while it looked like all the decisions for LCFF were being coined by John Deasy under the direct supervision of Elise Buik and Maria Brenes.
With more current news that a leading Broad Foundation funded group is suing the district, there's a need to create a community based opposition to the NPIC driving the entire process. Fortunately the folks at Schools Los Angeles Students Deserve are doing just that with their Instituto de Padres / Parent Institute next weekend.
The Non-Profit Industrial Complex’s role in imposing neoliberalism on public education
Friday, July 10, 2015
Jan Resseger's critique of the privatization of the G.E.D. makes excellent use of Professor Mike Rose's work
.@JanResseger's critique of the privatization of the G.E.D. makes excellent use of Professor @MikeRose7971's work. https://t.co/ZGlCJYIcaE
— RD Skeels LAUSD 2013 (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) July 10, 2015The New GED: Making A Second Chance So Much Harder
Tuesday, July 07, 2015
Admitting no wrongdoing, Ref Rodriguez and Jacqueline Elliot resigned from all PUC Corporate Charter Boards
Admitting no wrongdoing, Ref Rodriguez and Jacqueline Elliot resigned from all PUC Corporate Charter Boards #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/xGZ5PQpmxz
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) July 7, 2015Admitting no wrongdoing, Ref Rodriguez and Jacqueline Elliot resigned from all PUC Corporate Charter Boards... by Robert D. Skeels
Friday, June 19, 2015
SKrashen: Stop the Summer Slide by Investing in Libraries
SKrashen: Stop the Summer Slide by Investing in Libraries
Sent to US News and World Report, June 18, 2015 There is an obvious, inexpensive and very effective way to deal with summer learning loss not mentioned in "Stop the Summer Slide" (June 16, Knowledge Bank): Provide more access to interesting reading material.
Research tells us that those living in poverty have the least access to books and also show the most summer loss, and that those who read more over the summer make better gains in reading achievement.
Let's invest in libraries filled with books and other kinds of material that students will read, as well as librarians who will help children find what is right for them. We are living in a golden age of literature for young people; let's take advantage of it.
Stephen Krashen
Professor Emeritus
University of Southern California
Original article: http://www.usnews.com/opinion/knowledge-bank/2015/06/16/summer-slide-is-bad-for-students
Sources:
Poverty and access to books:
- Neuman, S. and Celino, D. 2001. Access to print in low-income and middle-income communities. Reading Research Quarterly 36(1): 8-26.
Summer loss and poverty, more reading and gains:
- Allington, R. and McGill-Franzen, Anne. 2012. Summer Reading: Closing the Rich/Poor Reading Achievement Gap. New York: Teachers College Press.
- Heyns, Barbara. 1975. Summer Learning and the Effect of School. New York: Academic Press.
- Kim, Jimmy. 2003. Summer reading and the ethnic achievement gap, Journal of Education for Students Placed at Risk 9, no. 2:169-188.
- Shin, Fay. and Krashen, Stephen. 2007. Summer Reading: Program and Evidence. New York: Allyn and Bacon. (Available for free download at http://www.sdkrashen.com).
Monday, June 15, 2015
Is Social Justice Law School for you?
Is Social Justice Law School for you?
Ever consider wielding our oppressors’ weapons against them?
If you’re a social justice minded person in Los Angeles, with at least two years of college credit, consider Peoples College of Law (PCL). PCL offers a four-year evening Juris Doctor program to accommodate working students. Successful completion of the Juris Doctor (J.D.) program provides qualification to sit for the California State Bar exam. From their site:
Our recruitment and admissions policies are strongly directed toward socio-politically conscious Native American, Asian Pacific Islander, African-American/Black and Latina/o students. Our goal is to have a student body that is at least half women and two/thirds Third World People. Peoples College of Law affirmatively recruits LGBT applicants.
Tuesday, June 09, 2015
K-12NN Wire: Was Refugio “Ref” Rodriguez self-dealing and running front groups?
First published June 4, 2015 on K-12 News Network
Currently under investigation by a number of authorities, including the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Office of Inspector General and the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office, Charter industry mogul Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez's innumerable front groups are hard to keep track of. The following articles should help contextualize the situation, and the tweets and documents following are from various parent and community activist sources.
- LAUSD CHARTER GROUP GAVE FOOD CONTRACT TO AN EMPLOYEE’S FIRM: School Board candidate Ref Rodriguez’ PUC Schools partnered with Better 4 You Meals, a company partially owned by one of its employees
- L.A. UNIFIED WILL INVESTIGATE FOOD-SERVICE CONTRACTS AT PUC CHARTERS
Any surprise that Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez's Better 4 You Fundraising and Meals companies share an address? #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/CeYGvJNsBm
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 4, 2015Reported Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez's Partners for Developing Futures front group to IRS. #LAUSD https://t.co/Vo1Kcbri8c pic.twitter.com/ZtuluD6p9X
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 4, 2015Stopped by Ref Rodriguez's Partners for Developing Futures for 990s. Occupants-PUC Schools say PDF is defunct. #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/AfBrK5LbZP
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 4, 2015No doubt about Ref Rodriguez's companies. Compare logos, websites, prose, and clients! https://t.co/NKxSOQs95n #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/de3Sqtn10r
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 2, 2015PUC employee Jason Roberts ran Ref Rodriguez's B4UF "side business" just like Jacqueline Duvivier Castillo. #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/9WNpuhrdaH
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 5, 2015Just called the #LAUSD OIG regarding Ref Rodriguez's Better 4 U business investments! https://t.co/NKxSOQs95n pic.twitter.com/pDAZs2xKpy
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 1, 2015Ref Rodriguez under investigation for Better 4 U Meals, Form 700 reveals stake in Better 4 U Fundraising! #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/OyDzFNOkh4
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) June 1, 2015Bad news for Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez and his PUC accomplices. They can be held liable! http://t.co/bAal9BunG6 #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/u4mT3MqOUF
— RDSkeels4Schoolboard (@RDSkeels4LAUSD) May 27, 2015Ref Rodriguez's Partners for Developing Futures and PUC shared an office, but no commingling of funds? #NPIC #LAUSD pic.twitter.com/olTpSoRqU0
— PESJA Los Angeles (@PESJA_LA) June 4, 2015Charter mogul Ref Rodriguez's money laundering scheme should be called Better 4 U Profits! #LAUSD @CALcharters pic.twitter.com/BQX5Lst7eL
— PESJA Los Angeles (@PESJA_LA) June 2, 2015Ref Rodriguez's Partners for Developing Futures, Inc. front group reported to IRS by Robert D. Skeels
Ref Rodriguez, under investigation for Better 4 U Meals scandal, Form 700 reveals stake in Better 4 U Fundr... by Robert D. Skeels
PARTNERS FOR DEVELOPING FUTURES, INC. WARNING OF ASSESSMENT OF PENALTIES AND LATE FEES, AND SUSPENSION OR... by Robert D. Skeels
More Ref Rodriguez self-dealing PDF/PUC Contract by Robert D. Skeels
CCSA's Ref Rodriguez's PUC Lakeview Charter Academy Audit by Robert D. Skeels
Sunday, May 24, 2015
Schools Matter: 2015 Week 21 Education Odds and Ends
First published on Schools Matter on May 22, 2015
“We believe that this recognition has come about because of the “blatant” move by corporations to take over public education and the creation of these charter schools who are limiting the rights of teachers and the type of education that our children are receiving.” — Juan Orozco
Professor Antonia Darder this weekend in Los Angeles
Dr. John Fernandez writes:
Roosevelt High School and the Boyle Heights community have a long and proud history of fighting for social justice, from the election of Ed Roybal to the Los Angeles City Council in 1949, to the fight against Prop.187, and to the current struggle against the scheduled layoffs of 23 RHS teachers and the struggle to dump PLAS. This video was taken when the Great Recession began and when PLAS came in. In June of 2008, when this video was produced, there were about 240 RHS teachers, now there are only 110 and dozens of classes have been cut. This Saturday, May 23, 2015 at 8:30 a.m., RHS will be having a youth conference. Dr. Antonia Darder will be presenting. Antonia is a world renowned writer on critical education theory, Latino education, and Paulo Freire. I am sure that Antonia will connect theory and practice to the situation at RHS. Please attend this important event. La Lucha Sigue
Charter billionaires buy L.A. school board election
Professor Mike Klonsky's post Charter billionaires buy L.A. school board election is worth the read. I left the following comments:
Thank you for this Professor Klonsky. Poverty pimp Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez has spent his entire career viewing and utilizing school children as ATM cards. Now that the billionaires have installed him at #LAUSD, he has the combination to the entire bank vault.
Karen Wolfe on LAUSD election fallout
Public school parent and member of the Venice Neighborhood Council Education Committee Karen Wolfe wrote an excellent piece looking at the May 19, 2015 Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Board elections entitled LA Election Lessons: Anatomy of a Shakeup … in the LAUSD Board Races. I made the following comments:
Thank you for this excellent analysis Ms. Wolfe. Charter profiteer and poverty pimp Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez has spent his entire career viewing and utilizing school children as ATM cards. California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) boasted that they "generated 30% profit margins in subsequent years–with 20-30% lead generation and 20-50% close ratios" when Rodriguez was a CCSA board member. Meanwhile he ran Lakeview Charter in the red for the better part of decade, and oversaw Jacqueline Duvivier Castillo's self-dealing with the now breaking Better 4 You Meals scandal. Now that these right-wing billionaires have installed him at #LAUSD, he has the combination to the entire bank vault. We can only hope that the LAUSD OIG and LA District Attorney's office will indict Rodriguez, but a cover-up is more than likely since José Cole Gutiérrez was one of Rodriguez's employees when Rodriguez sat on the CCSA board.
Professor Julian Vasquez Heilig testifies on Parent Trigger
Professor Julian Vasquez Heilig traveled to Texas to speak truth to Walton Family Foundation funded Parent Revolution's attempts to place a loaded "Parent Trigger" gun in corporate charter hands. Best quote from his testimony: "SB14 is parent empowerment without the empowerment. Parental involvement without the involvement."
Keeping up with Ref Rodriguez's possible crimes
Charter industry mogul Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez is under investigation by a number of authorities including the LAUSD Office of Inspector General and the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office. Keeping up with all of the financial scandals and possible felonies by this Rodriguez charter is difficult, the following articles should help.
- LAUSD CHARTER GROUP GAVE FOOD CONTRACT TO AN EMPLOYEE’S FIRM: School Board candidate Ref Rodriguez’ PUC Schools partnered with Better 4 You Meals, a company partially owned by one of its employees
- L.A. UNIFIED WILL INVESTIGATE FOOD-SERVICE CONTRACTS AT PUC CHARTERS
Whitney Tilson does rape culture!
Right-wing hedge fund manager and school privatization pusher Whitney Tilson was quick to jump on the blame-the-victim bandwagon. An email to his cult of fellow neoliberals said "I question her story" of Emma Sulkowicz.
Scott M. Folsom on student mental healthcare
Suing a school district for failing to provide mental healthcare may seem, at first blush, to be a stretch. What part of the 3Rs is mental healthcare? But this is a stretch that is needed – like those stretches people who exercise do before they exercise.
Education is about stretching our little grey cells. It’s about being safe and well and healthy. Maslows’s Hierarchy of Needs: Food, Comfort, Safety.
- You can’t learn if you are hungry.
- You don’t learn if you don’t have a place to live.
- You won’t learn if you don’t feel safe.
Then and only then can we get down to the Rs.
In Compton and in most of the brink o’ th’ apocalypse they inhabit the school nurse is most students’ primary-and maybe-only healthcare professional and medical provider. The school nurses’ office has become the Health Office has become the School Wellness Center – even as the School Nurse has become a vanishing species, repurposed to paperwork shuffling and IEP Compliance Officer – often traveling from school-to-school on a one-day-a-week rotation.
This has all worked out because school health crises: The flu outbreak, the second grader who falls out of a tree, the incident of diabetic or anaphylactic shock – these only occur on the days the nurse is at the school and is otherwise available. I have spent some of the last month reading essays by middle-schoolers about the impact of violence and trauma on their lives. Most need additional instruction on narrative storytelling (and grammar+punctuation) …but the far more pressing need is for mental health professionals to begin to have the conversation with them about their lives.
LAUSD in planning to eliminate some psychiatric social workers in next year’s budget. The bad-news masquerading otherwise is that the District is not going to eliminate as many as first proposed. Nobody in their right mind is proposing to rehire mental health workers previously laid off. But I am.
Post Traumatic Shock Disorder is not just for returning warriors anymore. This is not John Boy’s America. This is not the Bobsey Twins’ America. Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm graduated decades ago and doesn’t come back for the alumni meetings ‘cause she’s scared of the neighborhood. Today’s narrative was written back in 1969: “Oh, a storm is threat'ning / My very life today / If I don't get some shelter / Oh yeah, I'm gonna fade away.”
By ‘75 Bob was feeling better about it than Mick+Keith in ‘69:
“Come in,” she said, “I’ll give you shelter from the storm”
It’s an apt metaphor to duck in under.
Alliance Charter's Judy Burton still union busting
Right-wing extremists Antony Ressler, Richard "Dick" Riordan, and Judy Ivie Burton are still turning children into profit centers, and union busting at the Alliance Corporate Charter Chain. The ongoing struggle for their beleaguered educators to organize themselves continues. Community activists are taking the struggle to the streets, and posted this and other photos on facebook with the following caption:
Attending the Lincoln Heights Neighborhood council asking them to adopt our resolution calling on Alliance to let teachers form their union without harassment ([i]t passed unanimously!)
I left the following thoughts on the photo:
I document Judy Burton's mind-boggling salary in this piece about her fellow charter school profiteer Refugio "Ref" Rodriguez. https://www.laprogressive.com/charter-school-profits/ That obscene $330,400.00 doesn't include the additional six-figure income she gets from CalSTRS+CalPERS. She will go to any length to prevent educators from exercising their lawful right to organize. Any movement to put students and educators ahead of executive salaries and board member sweetheart deals at Alliance Charter Corporation will be resisted with extreme prejudice, as you are already experiencing.
Refugio just dumped gallons of toxins on Santa Barbara for profit. Another Refugio (Rodriguez) is about to do the same to #LAUSD
— Robert D. Skeels (@rdsathene) May 22, 2015
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