More on LAUSD- strike is barred, teacher performance based termination changes in law requested

A couple of stories on the LAUSD teacher issues are continuing in the news.

And L.A. Times story. "School board members acknowledge swifter firings are needed; Four L.A. Unified board members say state laws need to be changed to get rid of underperforming teachers. Support for such efforts has increased in the wake of a Times investigation." By Jason Song May 13, 2009.
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/05/la-schools-supt-reacts-to-teacher-dismissal-controversy-and-flu.html

There's the expected reaction coming from the recent series in the L.A. Times about the many teachers that can't be fired and that still get paid while housed at Beaudry headquarters. The LAUSD Board wants to have the state change laws but the Times items showed that the problems often came from mishandling of complaints and the processing by personnel that should be responsible for attending to hiring and continuing supervision. A lot of the problem is of LAUSD's own processes that you just don't see in the private sector, or if you do see it, the condition changes very soon upon discovery, and the people responsible have their own jobs to worry about.

There needs to be action to remedy situations like the one presented in the Times story, sounding similar in history to the various cases of sexual abuse in the Catholic church, including the Los Angeles Archdiocese under the "leadership" of Roger Mahoney. You may recall that there was the constant moving of priests and others accused or suspected of sexual abuse, instead of addressing the situation appropriately to end the conduct. Sometimes the people new location had some idea of the earlier problems and many times, nothing of the sort was mentioned, and the conduct was repeated upon other victims, usually children. The Archdiocese undeniably received favored treatment by law enforcement during investigations, and no one came in to clean out files and other records like what happens in other cases where it's not a church involved.

So let's not forget that. You had the D.A.'s office as another entity entangled with politics, not wanting to stir up a hornet's nest of controversy- but who suffers from that? It's justice that was shortchanged. It didn't help the victims. That entire scenario was not a good model to follow, but the impact on victims is no less serious when it's in the schools and not the church. In both cases, positions of respect and confidence allowed vulnerabilities of victims to be exploited.

The idea of easing restrictions on how a teacher can be terminated is one of the things that the Board voted for by a majority. President Monica Garcia is one of the persons usually in the union's corner, in the tradition of her benefactor, Mayor Villaraigosa.

Board President Monica Garcia, among others, cautioned that the solution would
be complicated and needed careful study.

Garcia seems to favor "studies" that are costly and that still leave you without any changes when much time has passed and much money has been spent. It seems that she is, in her own way, "running interference" for the union.

Look at her colleague, Board member Yolie Flores Aguilar, recently in the news when getting a big chunk of tax dollars as salary for consulting for state Sen. Gloria Romero, "Yolie Flores Aguilar, a longtime friend and political ally of some powerful California Democrats, last year supplemented her income as vice president of the Los Angeles school board with more than $32,000 as a consultant assigned to a state Senate committee that, during her tenure, did not meet or release any reports, " from the story, "California jobs go to those with connections; Lawmakers can hire anyone they choose. Sometimes that means friends and family." By Patrick McGreevy, March 27, 2009 http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-nepotism27-2009mar27,0,1567133.story

Flores Aguilar is in step with Garcia's view of this situation,

"We need a comprehensive strategy, we need to present a well-thought-out
legislation, and we [need] someone who will carry legislation. We have to do all
of our homework," said board member Yolie Flores Aguilar.

It all makes you wonder how anything will change when you have such an influence of politics overshadowing the need to act responsibly which is not always to stall things with a "study" but instead to move on making changes. Maybe one of the most significant changes you could ever see would be something done INTERNALLY to make the Headquarters and Sub-District offices do a better job to keep everything up to date. Some training in legal issues would help and some teacher and administrator training to avoid allowing the conditions that create lawsuits. And another improvement might be a novel one: using some common sense, often a scarce commodity in bureaucracies, as I have noticed over the years with many governmental agencies. When somebody asks for explanations for things, there should be prompt and good ones. There should not be cases where people have to construct lies or, maybe notice at that point, that what they have is not a completely responsible situation and they should not have let it get to that condition.

A lot can be done NOW to make the District act responsively instead of being a runaway train that will either crash or take miles and miles to slow down for control to be regained.

The other story is continuing from yesterday's L.A. Times story on the court order stopping a strike- updated for May 13, 2009- "Judge prohibits L.A. teachers strike; He grants a restraining order against the walkout planned for Friday, saying it defies the United Teachers union contract." By Howard Blume May 13, 2009 http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-lausd-strike13-2009may13,0,1958124.story

This strike is still something that many wanted to participate in but the law is what controls. If any complaints are to be made by UTLA members, complain to your negotiators who made up the contract. They could look into seniority as the controlling factor for layoff notices while they are at it.

You see in the story that there still was an impact from the threat of the strike, where cancellations of events and changes in schedules had to be made in anticipation of the strike happening, including a Lincoln High trip to Glendale Community College. While maybe not all people are going to college, the things like this trip being lost for that day is another waste of time in the planning and need for rescheduling. Exposure of even Community College facilities to many students is often enlightening. Many have not been exposed to what many of us now take for granted as know by all. Students don't necessarily "know all" about anything, and assuming so itself is a reason for a less-than-the-best learning environment to be presented. Such things like a strike that upset the school day have to be subordinate to what gets an educational experience accomplished for students at every opportunity.

Lots in this area- imparting personal knowledge and skill- can be helped along by persons with such personal knowledge showing many or even just a few students, those things that they otherwise would have to learn about from reading books, or from "field trips," and maybe not learning at all. There are so many people who are themselves potential resources for information that would be able to give students a richer learning experience, more easily getting students "engaged" in the process to perform better academically and at least be sure of what they do know from such mentors efforts.

The mentor approach is something that even I as a former teacher and alum of the school don't hear about as "happening." If I were a parent of an LHS student I might have that information, but even there, I am not sure that parents, in general, know much about what happens in school. I see numerous learning opportunities lost through the short-sightedness of people in administrative roles who remain confined in thought to ritualistic procedures. Some other approaches that seem to be "new" are often explored, including the "small learning academies" ("SLCs") that still don't make complete sense to me- if small is the only way to educate, then why do other districts with comparable populations have academic performance so much better without resorting to SLCs?

I will get into SLC discussions later and I don't think it's the panacea for the poor performance that many believe it to be.

Another development in LAUSD teacher layoffs

Here is an item from late yesterday on a development from the LAUSD Board in how they are handling of the layoff situation. "L.A. school board proposes plan to avoid layoffs,"10:41 PM PDT, April 28, 2009, by Howard Blume, LOS ANGELES TIMES - http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-briefs29-2009apr29,0,732323.story

The school board president unveiled a surprise plan Tuesday to avoid teacher
layoffs based on a compromise being pushed by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

Without advance notice, Monica Garcia proposed using more federal economic stimulus dollars right away to prevent the loss of teachers in the 2009-10 school year, which begins July 1. But in exchange, employee unions would have to match each dollar spent now with pay reductions that would apply to the next school year.

Because of a looming budget shortfall, as many as 3,500 non-tenured local teachers have received notice of possible layoffs, as have thousands of non-teaching employees. In addition, because of seniority rules, hundreds of more-senior employees who lose positions could bump out those at school sites in the Los Angeles Unified School District.

On that front, Supt. Ramon C. Cortines delivered a measure of good news. He predicted that no current principals would be let go because of adequate interest in an early retirement program."

No matter how Monica Garcia wants to look like the hero and save jobs by manipulating the stimulus money, there's a shortfall- and there's also a decline in the enrollment over the last decade, something more and more mentioned in news stories when covering this topic. There's still more money that's coming due and spreading stimulus dollars here stil might be something that will work. That causes some wonder, both as to why there are so many employees still in LAUSD in teaching and non-teaching positions, and why school construction is continuing so hurriedly. The District rep says that there is about one school a month completed, and this will go on for years.

To make this work, the cooperation of people NOT endangered by layoffs has to be obtained. That would mean two things: (1.) a membership vote that would take time that is in short supply, and (2.) the majority of the membership ACCEPTING the proposal and that means giving up pay that they otherwise would keep.

That follows the idea that Mayor Villaraigosa, the collaborator working to come up with this plan, and a "leader" of Garcia, politically speaking. The Villaraigosa plan needs union membership to work and if it doesn't, it leaves the proponent of the plan the virtuous "out" as simply, "I tried, but they didn't go along with it." That makes the Mayor look good if it fizzles and the union is left to blame each other for resulting layoffs. The same outcome could be expected with LAUSD employees. If the plan gets to the point of having a vote for it, the Board President, Garcia, is out of the woods, and the employess have their fate in their own hands when it comes to job losses.

I don't expect much, other that a lot of newer teachers looking for jobs elsewhere, maybe changing career, too. The interns working on credentials while they teach are the ones that I see as being in the most precarious position since the teaching job is an integral component to the credential program, and the time allowed to complete the credential work is NOT open-ended. There is where you will see a real waste of resources should the layoffs make the intern programs disintegrate for many participants.