Next Round of Budget Cuts

A return to half-day kindergarten, and of course, a parcel tax.  Sure if LAUSD schools looked like Oak Park schools, or performed as well, I could discuss a parcel tax, but are you kidding me?

I'll be honest, I have never been a fan of full-day kindergarten.  It's a convenience for working parents, and it's a way for the district to push the first grade curriculum down into kindergarten to increase test scores.  But I had to do it with my daughter, or else she would have read and done math for three hours and nothing else.  In order to get a balanced kindergarten with music, art, and games, I had to let her go full day.  Parents who want full day should pay for the privelege, and the schools can make money on the program.  Remember, California doesn't even require kindergarten, and the last thing I'd want to see is the district eliminate it completely.

 The proposal offered other "suggestions" as well.

Things like encouraging student attendance and teacher attendance are great, but I've known teachers who use their sick days as vacation to do anything from bowl in a tournament to go to Disneyland.  Ask your school site council what a substitute costs, and then multiply that cost by the thousands of "sick" days abused.  What about when talking about "shared sacrifice" if professional development was to be done in the summer, when teachers aren't in class.  Teachers have an option to take their pay in a 10-month installment or a 12-month installment, but they're always referred to as a yearly salary.  If we're all talking about shared sacrifice, then we need teachers to take some of that down time and put it back into their profession.  I know when I study, or do a conference, I'm not paid for it, and I use my personal time, so I'm not asking for anything I wouldn't do myself.  And on the other side of the attendance coin, as a parent, I'd be willing to pay for absences, not that I'm taking my kid to Hawaii for a week, but I know parents who do.  I've heard of some schools doing this, and I wonder if other parents would support it.  If not for student illnesses at the very least for family vacations.

Another part of the presentation that annoys me is the "volunteer at your child's school."  If you take the hours my husband and I both donate (along with my son, and even my mom), we're talking close to a full time job for one of us.  I don't mind.  I think truthfully, we should tap into the retired neighbors and grandparents and encourage them to help in the office, on the recess yard, or even to help read in the school libraries.  Often they had children attend the school decades ago, and the schools with strong API scores continue to help buoy home values in a tough real estate market.  I'd love to have that golden resource of retired folks helping on school since so many parents work.

 I'd be afraid to even consider LAUSD's non-profit foundation as a donation model, since earlier this year the district essentially stole funds from schools that had been holding on to as little as a couple thousand dollars of materials funds for next year.

And about that parcel tax.  Well, let's just see how fast the San Fernando Valley seeks to break away from downtown before that happens.  We already essentially have a "tax" in the form of a pledge drive for my daughter's school of a suggested $180 per family.  Other schools seek much more.  Parcel taxes are only paid for by property owners, but sadly renters will see increases as well.  And frankly I'd better trust my school's PTO and the school site council with the money than the district. 

Alright, I'm done ranting for now.  Anyone want to offer their take?