A candidate who wants to unseat Katherine Nakamura on the San Diego Unified school board is taking aim at her decision to support the schoobrary, a charter school located in the planned downtown library.
Business owner and school board candidate Steve Rosen sent out a press release last night calling the move "foolish" and arguing that it wasn't what voters had in mind when they approved $2.1 billion in bond funding to renovate schools:
This is a classic case of "bait and switch" and is unfair to students, teachers and taxpayers. ... We need to fix the roofs, repair classrooms and attend to the needs of students, not waste scarce funding on unrealistic plans for a white elephant wanted by a few select interests.
Nakamura, who represents the northeastern areas of San Diego Unified, has been one of the strongest backers of the idea of placing a charter school in the library. She voted last night to approve leasing two floors of the library for the school, praising it as a valuable partnership with the city and a new resource for kids.
If you want to get the gory details on what happened at the school board meeting last night, you can always check out my Twitter feed. Now for the newsblitz:
- We blogged about the latest news from the San Diego Unified school board: Studentswon't have to take an Advanced Placement test to get a higher grade in AP classes. And the schoobrary took another key step forward when the school board approved a lease with the city.
- Marsha Sutton at SDNN writes that the AP decision puts San Diego Unified in line with other districts.
- Two Escondido school districts are weighing whether to unify, the North County Times reports.
- California lost out on the first round of Race to the Top, a competition between states for more school money. Now it has a new strategy for the second round, the Los Angeles Times reports: Only having three large districts apply. San Diego Unified, which has sat out on Race to the Top, isn't one of them.
- Educated Guess blogs about how a radio show, This American Life, challenged the way that California gubernatorial candidate Steve Poizner portrayed a San Jose high school. I just listened to the show last night and it is fascinating stuff.
- The new No Child Left Behind could focus more on student health and other needs outside the classroom, Education Week writes.
