Editorial: Forget the lawyers, focus on the students
Published: Wednesday, Jul. 24, 2013 - 12:00 am | Page 14A
Sacramento attorney Mark Merin alleged in closing remarks to a lawsuit, filed on behalf of a dozen students and their parents, that in the transition caused by seven elementary school closures in Sacramento City Unified, such students become "interlopers" at their new schools.
This is an insult to the staff at these schools, which has a duty to provide education for all students, including the newest students.
And the resort to the courts first – before trying to work with the schools to assure a successful transition or before considering that students might actually have access to more opportunities and more learning supports at their newly assigned schools – is counterproductive. These students deserve better.
Fortunately, a federal judge dismissed the case on Monday.
This should be a time for educating the larger public about difficult choices that the Sacramento City Unified School District has faced. Its elementary schools lost 4,000 K-6 students in the last
