Now that we have the nation’s number one Rose Garden we must seek to have the nation’s number one schools. Many of San Jose/Silicon Valley’s children began a new school year yesterday to acquire the skills and knowledge that will lead them to productive, fulfilling lives. Yet, there are many thorny issues that will prevent all the children from reaching the successes they deserve and which we need for our economic survival.
We have an education system mired in practices of yesteryear: a school calendar built around our agrarian past, an antiquated and broken tenure system, a compensation system plagued with built-in inequities, increasing dropouts, the racial achievement gap that threatens our collective future, school districts that make little sense with boundaries and grade levels, and nutrition programs that do not nourish the brain. We have a CA school system spending $2,400 less per child than the national average (according to Education Week 2009). This is a recipe for disaster.
We need a new consensus plan similar to the volunteer plan that led the San Jose Rose Garden to be picked as the number one rose garden in the country. All of us must come together to discuss solutions to these aforementioned impediments and agree where we can. I think most of us agree that the system is not working well enough for enough of our children.
Sunday’s This Week program with Christiane Amanpour led off with an Economic Panel. Laura Tyson, Obama economic advisor, echoes much of what I have been writing about these last several years. Tyson said, “Unemployment for those with college education is now 4.5 percent. We have a problem of education in this country, and we have to educate more of our young people fully through college…Let me turn to investment in education. It is the case—we used to be number one in the world in college graduation rates. We are now 14th…We’re leading the world in high school dropout rates…the unemployment problem is most severe in dropouts.”
On Sunday I attended the annual jazz mass at St. Joseph’s Cathedral. The 75 minute high energy mass was an uplifting spiritual experience, though the sermon by Father Pat Brown was quite difficult to hear from where I was seated. This is analogous to the feeling I get each week when I read the responses to my writings. Even though I write loudly about the criticality of the quality of public education and its outcomes relative to our economic health, my sermonizing is not heard from where many of SJI readers are seated.
Five years ago when I began writing a monthly education column in the Silicon Valley Community Newspapers I had hoped that my experiences and knowledge would lead to a comprehensive discussion on solution sets to the enormous problems the system of public education in our city is facing. I obviously was naive, for the comprehensive discussion has never really begun. I ran for school board to put my beliefs and values front and center to further the goal of thoughtful discussions leading to a new plan, but as we take one step forward we take two steps back. I fear the results of this march 30-50 years from today.
Perhaps we can learn from the volunteer effort of the San Jose Rose Garden. What if we trained thousands of volunteers to help teach certain reading skills to struggling students in 1st and 2nd grade in all Silicon Valley schools. What if we had a goal to realize on-grade level readers for 95% of all Silicon Valley’s 3rd graders by the time they leave 3rd grade? What if we did the same thing for struggling math students by 5th grade?
Concurrently we can work on the school calendar, tenure, compensation, nutrition, and school district consolidation issues at policy and collective bargaining tables. If the children win we all win. Our future is inextricably tied to the education of our children, there is little time for us to waste in forging comprehensive solutions to the myriad of problems we have in public education. We must end the partisan bickering, at least when it comes to our children, and come up with a bipartisan plan before it is all too late.
Good article… let’s add one more “what-if.” What if thousands of parents would take responsibility for their children, instead of expecting “the system” to do it for them? In my mind, the value of that one effort transcends all others.
Greg,
For once we agree 100%. My parents sure did!
Government’s solution is always more taxes and more volunteers rather than do more with what you have by
1) consolidating school districts to save overhead and improve efficiency – Why should we pay for waste and inefficency
2) reduce administrative jobs
3) change school administrators and teachers attitudes to treat public and community as education partners that participate in education decisions not just source of more taxes and free volunteer labor
4) much of partisan bickering is from teachers side resisting change and standardization of education and student achievement testing and local School Boards resisting change and community suggestions
5) many taxpayers feel they are not getting their money worth for taxes and see continuing school scandals and wasted taxes so will not vote in more taxes to be wasted
Many voters will be saying School ( Government ) Reform before any More taxes Vote No – until they get message since nothing else has worked
Rose Garden Volunteers were treated as equal partners were listen to, had say in decisions, and could see improvements for their efforts
There is little to No public participation in public decisions in California’s special interest schools and governments run for benefit of teachers, administrators, government employees, unions and special interests who are ripping off taxpayers and ignoring public comments and protests
They are not fooling public or taxpayers with their fake public participation 1-2 minute public meeting comments which are ignored because special interest spending deals were decided before meeting started
While I appreciate Mr. DiSalvo’s call to find a “solution” for the educational issues that befall us, I fear that there will be no solution forthcoming without some measure of “partisan bickering,” because the public educational system has arrived at its current low ebb primarily because of the lack of that bickering.
Simply put, in the current political climate in San Jose, no one is willing to stand up to the Educrat lobby.
Until that changes – or until the Educrats fall from power by their own collective incompetence – there will be no substantial change in the public educational system.
In a way, change is being forced upon the public system through the ability of (some) parents to move into areas where educational results are “better”, such as Cupertino and Sunnyvale and Palo Alto. Those who are unable to move to the West Valley but still have the financial means and a matching desire to improve their childrens’ education will very frequently put their kids in the Parochial system, and after that into BCP or AMHS or VCHS – thus moving themselves and their kids out of the San Jose public system.
(I should note for the record that I am a graduate of BCP, but I went to public schools from K to 8).
It’s not necessarily a chicken-and-egg proposition. Make public schools in SJ educationally equivalent (but preferably superior) than those in the West Valley, or the Parochial system, or the private high schools, and you will have people moving into those areas in order to put their kids into those schools.
This is easily done. How?
1) Reward educational success. Let successful teachers and school administrators share in the benefit of success in the classroom.
2) Punish educational failure. Make unsuccessful teachers and indifferent administrators share in the costs of the inappropriate use of federal and state educational dollars.
3) Reinforce to the parents that THEY, not the schools, are the primary caretakers of the kids, and as a result they bear the main responsibility for the daily preparedness of the child in the school, as well as the conduct of the child during the school day. Make it clear to the parents that any disruptive children will be removed from the school, with the rights of return severely restricted.
4) Demand excellence, then take measures that will ensure you get it in all phases of the educational experience.
All things being equal, the garden-variety Educrat will outright reject the first two measures above, and will only pay lip-service to the latter two.
As long as that indifference on the part of the Educrat community continues, public education will remain in San Jose will remain in its current sorry state.
Do schools still have volunteer TA’s? (teachers aids). It used to be a student from an upper class could be a TA on a lower class for extra credit. I saw a lot of it in Los Altos schools growing up, but not a lot in San Jose schools. I also remember seeing less TA’s as the years went by and near 0 TA’s by the time I got to High School.
Joe, you may be happy to learn that I decided last week to file for the Berryessa school board to work to close education gaps for all students by 2014 as required by a 2002 federal law.
Educators in San Jose do know how to teach to close the gaps, and raise unsuccessful students to proficiency. Those educators don’t seem to be invited to the table to discuss this problem.
If by some chance I am elected this November, my commitment will be to address closing educational gaps at every meeting of the school board so that Berryessa, at least, will meet the federal law’s goal of proficiency for every student by 2014.
An anonymous person in Berryessa has put up a web site to support my campaign. I do not know who did it. You may see it at:
http://dalewarnerforberryessa.com/
“What if we trained thousands of volunteers to help teach certain reading skills to struggling students in 1st and 2nd grade in all Silicon Valley schools.”
The Rose Garden serves as an excellent example of private citizens stepping in to do a job the government cannot, or will not, do.
But understand the history: Councilman Oliverio had to fight the unions tooth and nail to allow volunteers to perform the work that was not getting done by unionized city workers. If, as you propose, unpaid volunteers were recruited to serve in classrooms to do, or even supplement, the work of teachers would we expect anything less from the American Federation of Teachers, the California Teachers Association, etc.?
The problem is not with community support or lack of involvement, as educators like to pretend. We all want our schools to succeed, and we pay through the nose in tax dollars to support our schools.
The problem clearly lies within the non-performing educational infrastructure and the chronic propensity of educators to blame everyone but themselves for the poor performance of California’s schools.
And Joe, regarding your complaint about “…a school calendar built around our agrarian past…” just remember California’s schools functioned much better, and with fewer tax dollars, during that agrarian past!
Joseph,
I a bit confused. When I went to college in the 90’s, and in 2008, and during high school, I never saw minority students treated differently in the classroom. As a matter of fact, I had instructors of all races. What do you mean by inequality, and racial preferences mattering in the classroom? I see this mentioned all the time when education is discussed and I just don’t buy it. Paying attention in class and doing the work is up to you as an individual.
Also, for the past few decades’ students who don’t speak English are slowing down classes and dropping the learning and grading curve. Is that something that will change in the near future?
And finally, I am very concerned about children with disabilities, both learning, and physical, not getting the attention they need in the classroom. I served on the County’s Advisory Commission For Persons With Disabilities for many years. When we held our annual event that brought persons with disabilities to spend a day at work with us, I heard horror stories regarding the unemployment rate of persons with disabilities, and saw some incredibly educated, and skilled people with disabilities looking for work. I was also told how badly they were treated in and by your educational system. Some were passed through high school and couldn’t even read!
I think it is an outrage that these great minds and talented people who want to work are pushed off on to Welfare, SSI or SSA, just so we as a society don’t have to deal with them! Will this issue ever be addressed? I think this topic might be a great one for your next blog.
Partisan democrat apparatchik DiSalvo writes thusly:
“Even though I write loudly about the criticality of the quality of public education and its outcomes relative to our economic health, my sermonizing is not heard from where many of SJI readers are seated.”
It starts and ends with education.
We get that.
The sun rises in the east. We get that too.
The comedic silver lining to be found in DiSalvo’s ‘sermons’ is that never never ever ever is there a mention of the 800lb-teachers-union-gorilla-from-hell that is standing between our kids and a good education.
Priorities.
“The problem clearly lies within the non-performing educational infrastructure and the chronic propensity of educators to blame everyone but themselves for the poor performance of California’s schools.” add asking for more taxes while wasting taxes that get
“But understand the history: Councilman Oliverio had to fight the unions tooth and nail to allow volunteers to perform the work that was not getting done by unionized city workers. If, as you propose, unpaid volunteers were recruited to serve in classrooms to do, or even supplement, the work of teachers would we expect anything less from the American Federation of Teachers, the California Teachers Association, etc.? “
” There is little to No public participation in public decisions in California’s special interest schools and governments run for benefit of teachers, administrators, government employees, unions and special interests who are ripping off taxpayers and ignoring public comments and protests ”
Until voters demand school reform and back it up with rewards for good schools and teachers and penalize bad schools and teachers no school reform will happen
Dale how many times have you run unsuccessfully for political office ?
Here is your ” An anonymous person in Berryessa has put up a web site to support my campaign. I do not know who did it. ” who registered dalewarnerforberryessa :
Unless John Dewey is a false name and email
kn*****@ao*.com
is also false
Registrant Name:John Dewey
Registrant Organization:
Registrant Street1:1970 Morrill Ave
Registrant Street2:
Registrant Street3:
Registrant City:San Jose
Registrant State/Province:California
Registrant Postal Code:95132
Registrant Country:US
Registrant Phone:+1.4089231930
Registrant Phone Ext.:
Registrant FAX:
Registrant FAX Ext.:
Registrant Email:
kn*****@ao*.com
http://www.whois.net/whois/dalewarnerforberryessa.info
Phone listed as
Morrill Middle School
1970 Morrill Ave
San Jose, CA 95132-1637
(408) 923-1930
Are people at school supposed to use schools addresses and phone numbers to support school board political candidates ?
Sounds like a political campaign No, No
I’m a teacher in Berryessa and I’m all for Dale Warner being elected to the board.
The above post is replete with fallacies and nitpicking.
The important issues are the ones that he’s been talking about.
Witnessing the impact that Dale has had on district in the past, I’m sure, if elected, he’ll get things done.
If you have an argument against his candidacy, that’s fine, and I hope you share it, but please also show a higher level of critical thinking.
Are you kidding? Dale Warner has more skeletons in his closet than Disney’s Haunted House!
But he never likes to bring those up.
Pathetic.
…is a teacher AT Morrill Middle School.
http://www.berryessa.k12.ca.us/15742098182125133/site/default.asp
Are you the creator of the website endorsing Dale Warner?
Partisan democrat apparatchik DiSalvo writes thusly:
“We have a CA school system spending $2,400 less per child than the national average (according to Education Week 2009).”
Fraud? Outright lie? Accounting three card monte?
You make the call!
“The research by Adam Schaeffer of the Cato Institute’s Center for Education Freedom seemed shocking: The Los Angeles Unified School District spent $29,780 per student in fiscal year 2007-08. That’s way above the $10,000 as advertised by the school district, and as used in most studies.”
…
Basically, what Schaeffer found was that the LAUSD doesn’t count capital spending, such as from local and state bond measures passed by voters. For example, $1.18 billion was spent in 2007-08 from Measure R, which 64 percent of voters passed in March 2004. And the district spent $668 million from state Proposition 55, also on the March 2004 ballot.”
“Most school districts don’t count capital funding in budget reports.”
http://www.calwatchdog.com/2010/08/20/lausd-spends-30k-per-student/
http://www.ocregister.com/articles/school-259767-education-district.html
> Basically, what Schaeffer found was that the LAUSD doesn’t count capital spending, such as from local and state bond measures passed by voters.
Which is entirely understandable.
After all, everyone knows that LAUSD doesn’t have any school buildings.
I’m told that they hold their classes outdoors in pristine meadows in all the greenbelt open space they have in LA.
No, actually, I’m the author of Primary Colors, I live at 301 Lang Rd. in Cornish, NH, and I used to live at the Intercontinental Hotel in Managua before the earthquake.
aka J.D. Salinger
Robert Wright, a teacher at Morrill Middle School or some using his name
created and registered
dalewarnerforberryessa.com
dalewarnerforberryessa.info
web sites using Morrill Middle School address and phone number
Robert Wright’s name is on web site as recently posting information to Dale Warner for Berryessa home page
Is Robert Wright a member of Dale Warner’s campaign ?
Isn’t there some school, Santa Clara County election, or California prohibition of using school property for political purposes