Seceding from the LAUSD; LAUSD counters charter takeover bid; LAUSD's opportunity
What's going on in LA with Green Dot's apparent takeover of a miserably chronically failing public school is revolutionary. Here are three articles/editorials on it from the LA Times:
A) Kudos to the LA Times's editorial page for being so forceful -- and so right. The contrast with the NY Times couldn't be greater...
The events at Locke give clarity to the real struggle for Los Angeles public schools. On one side are devoted teachers, brave administrators and long-suffering students and parents. On the other are narrow and defensive interests, dedicated to protecting a failed system. There should be no doubt about who deserves to win.
B) What an awesome sight to see the entrenched bureaucrats and union make a futile, pathetic counter-offer, "years too little, too late."
Faced with the prospect of losing wholesale control of a campus to Green Dot — a group that has clashed frequently with the district throughout its aggressive push to expand — district officials were still scrambling Monday evening to pull together the details of what they would present to Locke teachers.
Kathi Littmann, a senior district official, said the proposal focuses on giving Locke teachers and administrators charter-like autonomy from the mammoth district's central bureaucracy.
But Zeus Cubias, a math teacher at Locke, chafed at word of the district's attempt to assuage the faculty. "It's too little, too late," he said. "And not just now, but years too little, too late."
C) Randi Weingarten showing up in LA to maybe endorse a charter school?!?!
So, for the first time in decades, UTLA might be ripe for an overhaul.
And an overhaul it needs. The leadership of the union is out of sync with the realities of modern education and the priorities of many of its members. The post-World War II system of tenure, rigid work rules and budget-breaking pensions have stultified schools. Today's young teachers are more interested in good wages, upward mobility and affordable housing than in lifetime sinecures and fat retirement packages.
Unions don't have to be dinosaurs, and not all are. The New York City teachers union supported mayoral control of the schools there, and it is calling for new ways to draw good teachers to troubled schools. On Friday, the New York union's president, Randi Weingarten, will be visiting Green Dot charter schools with an eye to possible partnerships. There can be no more important job for the new L.A. board and the mayor than to push UTLA in the same direction.
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Seceding from the LAUSD
Teachers, parents and a principal have sacrificed much to demand that their Watts-area high school become a charter school rather than accept the status quo.
THREE CHEERS for Locke High School.
Three cheers for its courageous teachers and stalwart principal, who have chosen to break with the dithering Los Angeles Unified School District and a hidebound teachers union to become a Green Dot charter school.
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Three cheers for its courageous teachers and stalwart principal, who have chosen to break with the dithering Los Angeles Unified School District and a hidebound teachers union to become a Green Dot charter school.
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LAUSD counters charter takeover bid
District and union officials scramble to pull together reform plans to appeal to Locke High teachers.
In response to a surprise plan launched by a leading charter school organization to take control of one of Los Angeles' most troubled high schools, school district and teacher union officials are hurriedly trying to counter with reform plans of their own.
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LAUSD's opportunity
With contract talks coming up, the new school board has a chance to take on the teachers union.
LOS ANGELES schools have a few things going for them today that they didn't have a couple of years ago: a new superintendent with a fresh eye. A new school board majority eager to make changes, aligned with a (relatively) new mayor who vows to renovate the halls of education.
posted by Whitney Tilson at 3:55 PM
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