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[plaasjaapie]

Arnie and the Democratic legislature have signed a new law that precludes schools from giving preferential treatment to teachers wanting to transfer either within a district or across district lines.

What has happened previously is that principal could talk a teacher who was facing a poor performance evaluation into transferring in exchange for a good evaluation on parting. Now, schools do not have to give preference to teachers coming either with a district or outside who have seniority.

http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=20100

Sounds like the teachers' union here got on the outs with the Democrats big time.

Wahoo!

Oh yeah, little factoid. In the LA Unified School District there is one administrator for every classroom teacher. Forty years ago it was 1 to 7.
_________________
Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
— Sir John Harrington

[CharlesWT]

For the first time, the state has ranked nearly 100 of California's most academically troubled school districts.

The Ravenswood City School District, serving East Palo Alto and eastern Menlo Park, was ranked the fourth-worst district in the state. Pajaro Valley Unified in Santa Cruz County was rated the 15th-worst. East Side Union High School District in San Jose was 65th-worst and the Hollister School District the 67th-worst.

Those are the only districts in the South Bay, on the Peninsula and in Santa Cruz and San Benito counties on the state Education Department's list of 96 poor-performing districts.

The list is compiled as part of an effort to improve education for the nation's poorest children. The 7-year-old No Child Left Behind Act has forced state education officials to impose sanctions on districts not making enough progress toward meeting academic standards.
Worst-performing districts in state ranked for 1st time

[CharlesWT]

Vikki Reyes has had it with Locke High, the school her daughters attend in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles. She walked in on class one day and recalls “the place was just like a zoo!” Students had taken control, while the teacher sat quietly with a book.

Frank Wells has also had it with Locke High. When he became principal he says gangs ruled the campus. He tried to turn things around but ran into a “brick wall” of resistance from the school district and teachers union.

Locke seemed destined to languish in high crime and low test scores until Wells, Reyes, and many reform-minded teachers joined with a maverick named Steve Barr in an attempt to break free from the status quo. Their battle is just one example of the charter school education revolt that’s erupting across the nation.
The Drew Carey Project: Episode 8 - Unlocked: Education Revolt in Watts (video)

[plaasjaapie]

Occasionally, something nice happens.
_________________
Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
— Sir John Harrington

[CharlesWT]

[plaasjaapie]

As usual, some pus-dripping judge has his head up the asrse of the teachers' unions.
_________________
Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
— Sir John Harrington

[Larry_Home]

It fits, though. Expect a wave of this stuff if a Democrat enters the White House next year, and has a Democrat Congress.

Both Obama and Clinton believe totally that the state should educate your children, not you, and should determine WHAT they learn as well. Given that, obviously you cannot allow parents to do it themselves unless they have been previously indoctrinated, licensed and then overseen by the state. Truthfully, here I mean "central government" rather than state, but the rhetoric will be couched as if it were up to the states.
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The future ain't what it used to be. (Yogi Berra)

[plaasjaapie]

Interestingly, Schwarzenegger has moved to set aside the ruling and is coming to the aid of home schooling parents.

One thing that came out today that wasn't clear in the early reports was that the ruling ALSO ruled that credentialed teachers could not supervise parents in the education of their own children. California has, in every school district, a state programme in which school district teachers oversee the home schooling of children whose parents do not want them in regular schools.

The court ruling basically outlawed these programmes as well. That doesn't sit well with the districts because these home school programmes that they administer are cash cows for the district in that they cost very little to administer, unlike ordinary classes.

Both the teachers' unions and the judge friendly to them clearly overreached. Depend on this "ruling" going away really fast. Another case which leaves out the districts' home schooling activity might be fought in court later, but for now, at least, the nonsense is going to stop.

One not clearly understood aspect of the district home schooling programmes is that schools have been using home schooling as an alternative to sending kids with discipline records off to expensive "schools for troubled children." Districts HATE doing that because such placements cost them $40-50K annually per student, 4-5 times the rate for the average student. Home schooling costs about about $3-3.5K annually to administer.

As H. Ross Perot famously said, "Follow the money."
_________________
Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
— Sir John Harrington

[CharlesWT]

Columnist Ron Hart looks at the way in which teachers unions are responding to Teach for America, a program that puts new college graduates in failing classrooms:

[plaasjaapie]

Unions are unions. They're worried about pay, bennies and job security. Anything else can just go hang.
_________________
Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
— Sir John Harrington

[CharlesWT]

[plaasjaapie]

Arnie went over to the dark side after he lost that big referendum aimed at trimming public servants unions grip on state gov't november before last. Now that the real estate bubble popped the revenues that were fueling the Democrats' spending binge that he was aiding and abetting in the spirit of "bipartisanship" have dried up. Mind, the Democrats this legislative session want $9.2 billion in new spending in spite of the fact that the economy here is in the toilet. Typical politicians.

He still has enough integrity that he has tried to stave that particular madness off.
_________________
Treason doth never prosper: what's the reason? Why if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
— Sir John Harrington

[CharlesWT]

A family of German homeschoolers have been living in Tennessee for a couple of years now. They came seeking refuge from the government in their native land, where teaching your kids at home is effectively illegal. While most countries have some kind of education mandate, there are loopholes, exceptions, and limited enforcement. In Germany, the only exceptions are in cases of ill health—and a November 2007 ruling reinforced the state's right to take custody of kids who are not attending school.
[...]
German Homeschoolers Granted Asylum in U.S.