STORIES FORM THE BILLIONAIRE'S PLAYBOOK: THE PLANS TO DESTROY PUBLIC EDUCATION
L.A. Schools’ Superintendent Attempts a Coup – Carl J. Petersen – Medium - https://medium.com/@ChangeTheLAUSD/l-a-schools-superintendent-attempts-a-coup-7ab023e5b9d by @ChangeTheLAUSD on @Medium
“The secrecy has got to stop.”- LAUSD Board Member Scott Schmerelson
In a clear case of insubordination, Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) Superintendent Austin Beutner has ignored a request for copies of contracts that the District had signed for four months. On at least one occasion, Beutner publicly promised to turn over these “confidential contracts” to Board Member Scott Schmerelson but did not do so until last week. “The consultants’ work was not disclosed”.
To make matters worse, it appears that information about the contracts, which “total $3 million so far”, was selectively released to other Board Members. Schmerelson noted at yesterday’s Board meeting that he is “sure that certain offices receive more information than others”, which eliminates any notion that the information was somehow unavailable. The lack of disclosure was willful and a clear attempt to keep information away from an elected Board Member who is, by definition, Beutner’s boss. In the private sector, this would be a fireable offense. It should be no different in the public sector.
In discussing Schmerelson’s “Reimagining Open Government Based on Transparency, Accountability, and Oversight” resolution, no direct reason was given for lack of candor by the Superintendent. However, Board President CONTINUE READING: L.A. Schools’ Superintendent Attempts a Coup
Read the recommendations of consultants hired to re-imagine L.A. schools by @matt_barnum
Consultants hired by the country’s second-largest school district recommended a dramatic restructuring of Los Angeles Unified, documents show.
The 300-plus pages of memos, presentations, and plan drafts offer a revealing look at options district leaders were weighing in 2018 before the district was consumed by a weeklong teachers strike. Created by the consulting firm Kitamba, the documents lay out an aggressive timeline for assigning schools to 32 support networks, giving principals more power, and cutting the central office by fall 2019.
The January strike appears to have derailed the plans. A spokesperson for Los Angeles Unified declined to comment.
After this story was published, the Los Angeles Times published an interview with Los Angeles Unified Superintendent Austin Beutner, who said a substantial restructuring is no longer planned.
“We went through an exhaustive exercise. We listened to suggestions and ideas and we dismissed many of them that might have been tried elsewhere in the country,” he told the Times.
The Times has previously reported aspects of the ideas being proposed, many of which were confirmed by the documents obtained by Chalkbeat through a public records request. Still, the documents offer more detail about what was being considered by Beutner — and the key decisions leaders faced about how a new system should work.
The documents recommend that schools be given more control in exchange for CONTINUE READING: Read the recommendations of consultants hired to re-imagine L.A. schools
