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Monday, July 18, 2016

Parent Power: Community Organizing as a Parent Engagement Strategy | Schott Foundation for Public Education

Parent Power: Community Organizing as a Parent Engagement Strategy | Schott Foundation for Public Education:

Parent Power: Community Organizing as a Parent Engagement Strategy



 Edgar Villanueva, Vice President of Programs & Advocacy

Parent engagement can take on many forms within schools. Helping a child with homework, attending after school activities, cooking for a bake sale, and volunteering in the school’s office all fall under our general understanding of typical expectations for parent involvement in schools.Parent engagement, however, is often not defined by parents, which sometimes leads to negative narratives about a “lack of engagement” of parents of color or low-income parents. Parents and communities are critical to catalyzing and sustaining improvement in schools, but one of the biggest challenges can be finding ways to engage and support the powerful involvement of parents.

Edgar Villanueva, Schott Foundation; Leticia Barrera, Logan Square Neighborhood Organization; and Roberto Bustillo, InnerCity Struggle
But in some schools, community organizing has creatively transformed parent engagement into something much deeper: parent power. For over 25 years, the Schott Foundation for Public Education has supported parent organizing with the understanding that parents, especially those from marginalized communities, should be central to improving public education. Schott’s core belief is that a grassroots movement - including parents, students and teachers - is critical to systemic change in the disparities that poor children and children of color face in our nation’s schools.
As an advocate for community organizing in building power for change, Schott’s Vice President of Programs & Advocacy Edgar Villanueva facilitated a workshop on “Strategies for Building Parent Power” at the National Family and Community Engagement Conference from June 20 - 22 in Pittsburgh. This workshop profiledInnerCity Struggle (ICS) in Los Angeles and Logan Square Neighborhood Association (LSNA) in Chicago — both are models that communities and organizers could replicate across the country.
InnerCity Struggle, Los Angeles
InnerCity Struggle Parent Organizer Roberto Bustillo highlighted how his organization in Los Angeles uses community organizing to build parent power as a catalyst for positive change in public education. ICS was founded in 1994 by parents, youth, and residents with the goal of promoting safe, healthy, and non-violent communities in the Eastside of LA. ICS’s campaigns identify parent voice as a crucial component of their strategy to reform discipline policies and practices and to provide equitable opportunities for all youth. With the critical support of parents, ICS and its partners recently won a campaign to ensure that the schools with the highest needs in the L.A. school district are first in line to receive the district-allocated funding.
Watch a Schott-sponsored video about how ICS and others community groups organized to win this campaign here:
Logan Square Neighborhood Association, Chicago
In 1995, the Logan Square Neighborhood Association (LSNA) in Chicago developed a program in conjunction with principals and teachers to engage parents in the low-income, immigrant community of Logan Square on the northwest side of Chicago — beyond just the handful of parents who regularly volunteered at the schools.
Beginning in four schools in 1995, within a few years the program quickly doubled to eight schools in the Logan Square neighborhood. LSNA’s full service community school model, with the Parent Mentor Program as a central component, gained attention and interest throughout the city, with community organizations like the Southwest Organizing Project (SWOP) beginning the Parenting Mentoring Program and then CEO of Chicago Public Schools Arne Duncan spreading the LSNA model to 100 schools throughout the district.
In 2010, LSNA and SWOP began the Parent Engagement Instituteto provide training, coaching, and mentoring to spread the Parent Mentor Program model throughout the state with other community partners. The Parent Engagement Institute continues its work within the state, while also offering community organizations and school districts throughout the country to learn about and implement the model. The program now operates in at least 65 schools throughout Illinois with some financial support from the Illinois State Board of Education.
Since the creation of the program, 1,300 parents (mostly mothers) have graduated from the Parent Mentor Program, and today 130 parents work in eight schools. Through this program, parents are assigned to a classroom where they work one-on-one with small groups of children for two hours a day, Monday through Thursday. Every Friday the parent mentors receive extra training around academic instruction, professional development, community engagement, and leadership skills, and receive a modest stipend after completing 100 hours.
The results are clear: engaging parents, especially through community organizing, improves student outcomes. In Chicago, after having a parent mentor in the classroom, schools experienced the following results:
  • Improved Test Scores (increase of 35% of students that meet or exceed on the ISAT in 10 years)
  • Increased Long Term Graduation Rates (between 1990 and 2009, the dropout rate for youth age 16-19 decreased 61% in classes with parent mentor in their early grades)
  • Strengthened Social Capital (Parent mentors more than doubled the network of teachers and parents with whom they communicate regularly).
Also, the parents themselves have been positively impacted — some are now full-time employees of the school system or have gone to college to become teachers.
Watch this NBC Education Nation video "Putting Parents to work in the Classroom" Video on the success of parent organizing in Chicago:
These amazing parents in Los Angeles and Chicago have been able to utilize community organizing to harness parent power to generate concrete change within public schools - and leadership by two exemplary organizations, ICS and LSNA, has transformed schools and scaled reforms, contributing to a national movement for community-centered education justice.
To learn more about the power of parent engagement through community organizing, check out these resources:
Book: Match on Dry Grass: Community Organizing for School Reform (Oxford University Press, 2011) - LSNA chapter available for download. Parent Power: Community Organizing as a Parent Engagement Strategy | Schott Foundation for Public Education:
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8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City's School Closures - AACRE

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City's School Closures - AACRE:

8 Interesting Facts about the Aftermath of Sac City’s School Closures 

 

1.  4 out of the 7 closed schools have re-opened.

In January 2013, Sacramento City Unified School District and former Superintendent Jonathan Raymond proposed the closure of twelve (12) neighborhood elementary schools. Of those twelve, five (5) were quietly taken off the closure list prior to the final vote on the ‘wrong-sizing’ proposal. In February 2013, only a month after announcing the proposal, the Board voted to close seven(7) neighborhood schools in a controversial 4-3 decision.
In the two years since the school closures, 4 out of the 7 campuses have re-opened either as a charter school or a community center.

2.  Joseph Bonnheim re-opened as a Community Charter School.

The first school site to re-open was Joseph Bonnheim Elementary. Immediately following the closures, parents, teachers and community members came together to save their neighborhood school. To keep their school open, the community needed to come together to establish a community charter school. A small but incredibly passionate coalition of community leaders and parents raised money, passed around petitions and developed an organic proposal to re-open the school as a dependent charter. Finally, in 2014, the New Joseph Bonnheim (NJB) Community Charter opened its doors to a new cohort of students. NJB remains the only public school in Northern California with a special emphasis on agriculture. A week ago, NJB celebrated its second year and we’re thrilled to see students back at Bonnheim.

For over 40 years, La Familia Counseling Center has been a fixture in the South Sacramento community and a hub for Sacramento’s Latino community. In recent years, the expanding number of staff and the growing need for services among Sacramento’s diverse populations made LFCC’s location on Fruitridge Road feel a bit cramped. In July 2015, LFCC confirmed a lease for Maple Elementary School to convert it into their new headquarters. By moving their main office to Maple Elementary, LFCC is better situated to expand its world-class services to the Maple and South Sacramento community.

4.  Washington Elementary re-opens in Midtown.

The only closed school outside of South Sacramento was Midtown’s Washington Elementary. During public testimony to oppose the school closures, one Washington Elementary parent remarked, “it doesn’t make sense to close a school in a community that is growing tremendously. More and more families are moving into the area and we will need a neighborhood school to call our own.” As it turns, she was right. With the population in Midtown exploding and new developments being built throughout the Downtown area, the need to re-open Washington became apparent when neighboring schools became overcrowded. With the help
- See more at: http://aacre.org/8-interesting-facts-about-the-aftermath-of-sac-citys-school-closures/#sthash.Qcjoat7H.dpuf




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Deborah Meier’s Stand on Central Park East I: A Crucible for Progressive Education | ECE PolicyWorks

Deborah Meier’s Stand on Central Park East I: A Crucible for Progressive Education | ECE PolicyWorks:

DEBORAH MEIER’S STAND ON CENTRAL PARK EAST I: A CRUCIBLE FOR PROGRESSIVE EDUCATION

Deborah-Meier650x400


In 1974, a small elementary school blossomed in East Harlem. The seeds were planted by Deborah Meier, renowned thinker, teacher, principal, education activist, and recipient of a McArthur “genius” award. Blessed by Anthony Alvarado, a forward-thinking superintendent in New York City, Central Park East I became a beacon of progressive, child-centered practice.



The school embodies Meier’s vision. “Democracy demands we acknowledge everyone’s inalienable capacity to be an inventor, dreamer, and theorist—to count in the larger scheme of things,” she wrote in The Power of Their Ideas.  She warned us long ago about the dire consequences of ignoring this dictate. Play, described by Meier as “self-initiated cognitive activity,” is at the heart of Central Park East I’s form of progressivism.
Over the decades, CPE I, as the school is known, became a haven for early childhood educators, a number of whom have gone on to found their own progressive public schools.  But with the enactment of No Child Left Behind, the school entered turbulent waters, its leadership faltering.
Today, under standards-based accountability and assessment, the kind of public education that Meier championed in New York City and Boston’s Mission Hill School, is under siege.  CPE I has morphed into a battleground for democracy, pitting parents and teachers against Monika Garg, a principal whose curriculum vitae does not include early childhood education, much less pedagogy driven by progressive philosophy.
Garg assumed her position last summer as interim acting principal. The CPE I School Leadership Team, accustomed to collaborative decision making, had no input in this decision. She had previously worked at Pan American International High School in Corona, Queens, under Minerva Zanca, the subject of a federal suit against the New York City Department of Education. Among the complaints was race-based harassment of black teachers.
Upon her arrival, Garg promptly hired four teachers—a sizable number for the school’s small staff—all of whom had limited experience with progressive practice. Professional development to get them up the learning curve was not forthcoming. By last fall, anxiety among CPE I’s parents and teachers was mounting. A request for a town hall meeting with Garg and Estrella went unheeded.
Garg rejected parents’ request to consider a diversity initiative program Deborah Meier’s Stand on Central Park East I: A Crucible for Progressive Education | ECE PolicyWorks:
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Choosing Democracy: Chicano History Will be in the California Text Books in 2017

Choosing Democracy: Chicano History Will be in the California Text Books in 2017:

Chicano History Will be in the California Text Books in 2017


History and social science textbooks in public schools in California and most of the nation are racist, class-biased, and ignore LGBT history. This condition will change in California in 2017 when new textbooks are adopted.



It is over. We won !

 At 2:45 PM July 14, 2016,  the California State Board of Education unanimously endorsed a new History /Social Science Framework for California’s public schools that includes a substantial addition of Chicano/Latino history, improved history of LGBT people, and improvements in several other histories.
This completes a 6 year effort against substantial opposition to revise the Framework.  As a result textbooks in California in 2017 will be the most inclusive ever required, and all students will be taught an inclusive history. This has been the major campaign of this blog and the Mexican American Digital History project since 2009. 

Under this decision California students will finally be encouraged to know the history of Latino civil rights leaders like Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta and Filipino labor leaders like Larry Itliong, as well as an accurate and inclusive history of LGBT activists  as a part of the history of California and the nation. These topics are currently substantially absent from public school textbooks and curricula in California.
The Quality Instructional Materials Committee of the  California State Board of Education decided to include these long- ignored histories in their re-writing of the History/Social Science Framework for the state.  The Framework  document sets the parameters and the minimums required of textbooks used  in the schools.  Because of California’s large size and market, what goes into California textbooks  frequently also gets written into textbooks around the nation.

In the current books, when the 51%  of students who are Latino, the 11.5% who are Asian, and the estimated 11% of students who are LGBT, do not see themselves as part of history, for many their sense of self is  marginalized.   As I argued in a prior book, marginalization negatively impacts their connections with school and their success at school. This has resulted in a nearly 50% dropout rate for Latinos and some Asian groups  and LGBT  students.. School marginalization also contributes directly to low-level civic engagement.  An accurate history would provide some of these  students with a  a sense of self, of direction, of purpose. History and social science classes  should help young people acquire and learn to use the skills, knowledge, and attitudes that will prepare them to be competent and responsible citizens throughout their lives.   

 As a consequence of the current  outdated history texts for California public schools, most schools, most teachers,  fail to teach an accurate, complete, complex  history of the Chicano- Latino people, of Asian Americans and of LGBT youth, among others.   This essentially means that the writers are choosing not to recognize reality. – not to tell the full story.  
And, while California and the nation have a general problem with low civic engagement among young people,  it is also true that the state  has  a very specific problem with the rate of Latino and Asian voter participation in  civic life.
Rates of voting and voter registration provide a window into civic engagement.  The proportion of state voter registration that is Latino and Asian has remained far below the proportions of these groups in the state’s overall population. In 2010, Latinos in the state made up 37.6% of the general population while they were only 21.2 % of the registered voters. The Asian population was 13.1 % of the state population but only 8.1 % of the registered voters.
We know that we can do better.   California has the largest school population of any state, with more than 6,226,000 students in school in 2015, more than 11% of the United States total. California, along with some 16 other states, adopts textbooks for use by the entire state instead of purchasing books district by district. This makes the California textbook adoption the largest single textbook sale in the nation. Many publishers write and edit their books in a targeted attempt to win a piece of the large and lucrative California and Texas markets.  In recent years, as Republicans gained control of state governments, Texas, Arizona and  several other  southern states have moved their textbook histories sharply to the right.
The 1980’s were the age of Ronald Reagan.  As Governor of California he appointed members of the State Board of Education.  His influence continued long after he became president of the U.S. The view of history that won the textbook battles in California in 1987  was crafted by  (then) neoconservative historian Diane Ravitch  and former California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Bill Honig.

The 1987 Framework for History and the Social Sciences  is  still in use today, with minimal modifications.  It   expanded African American, Native American and white women’s history coverage but remained  totally inadequate in the coverage of Latinos and Asians. The only significant change Choosing Democracy: Chicano History Will be in the California Text Books in 2017:


Big Education Ape: antiracismdsa: We Won ! Chicano History Will be in the California Textbooks in 2017 - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/07/antiracismdsa-we-won-chicano-history.html

Big Education Ape: History Social Science Framework - Year 2016 (CA Dept of Education) - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/07/history-social-science-framework-year.html

Big Education Ape: After hours of testimony, state board adopts history guidelines | EdSource - http://bigeducationape.blogspot.com/2016/07/after-hours-of-testimony-state-board.html
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Randi Weingarten: Working for a fair economy, fair deal - #AFT100

Working for a fair economy, fair deal - Pensions & Investments:

Working for a fair economy, fair deal



As nearly every American will tell you, retirement starts with a living wage and a stable pension. Eighty-two percent of Americans say a pension in general is worth having, according to the National Institute on Retirement Security. Pensions, along with Social Security, are the keys to a healthy, safe and productive retirement.

RELATED CONTENT

The American Federation of Teachers, through the AFT Trustee Council, works with trustees of public teacher retirement systems who oversee $630 billion in assets. By providing transparent information for pension trustees, ranking asset managers in our powerful “Ranking Asset Managers” report, and gauging hedge fund performance in our “All That Glitters Is Not Gold” report, we’re holding hedge funds accountable for their performance, helping pension trustees fulfill their fiduciary duty and ensuring retirement security.
We take the obligation to protect pensions seriously, and that includes stopping bad actors who, without safeguards, would extract billions in fees, leaving taxpayers and workers on the hook. We counsel trustees to carefully define what they want from hedge funds, and evaluate whether other asset classes provide a more cost-effective and transparent means of achieving risk-adjusted returns. If trustees choose to invest in hedge funds, they must find an effective means to control costs and measure performance.
Last year, the AFT found that 11 public pension funds would have been $8 billion better off if they never invested with hedge funds. The average pension fund we examined paid 57 cents in fees to hedge fund managers for every dollar of net gain. And in June, a report released by CEM Benchmarking Inc., which provides benchmarking services to asset owners, showed hedge funds provided lower average net annual returns to U.S. pension funds than any asset class besides cash.
Big public pension funds like the New York City Employees’ Retirement System are pulling out of hedge funds because they generate huge financial gains for their principals but a poor return for pension funds.
Accountability is one thing. But a comprehensive pension strategy is about more than just saying no. By investing our members’ deferred wages in prudent and responsible ways, we can stoke America’s economic engine by creating good jobs and sustainable returns for investors — a virtuous circle of growth.
Our investment work stretches right across the economy to crucial pension fund and divestment decisions, to hedge fund regulations, and to infrastructure projects like rebuilding New York’s LaGuardia Airport. Since 2011, in partnership with the Clinton Global Initiative, the AFL-CIO, North America’s Building Trades Unions and others, $16 billion of teacher pension assets have been allocated for fiducially sound investments in infrastructure.
The National Institute on Retirement Security has found that every dollar paid out in public employee benefits generates $2.36 in economic activity; any additional investments in local communities, like rebuilding bridges and repairing the energy grid, helps boost that margin. These investments in the real economy create long-term value.
And as part of Take On Wall Street, a campaign launched by 20 national organizations, including the AFT, we’re working to reform financial markets by, among other things, closing the carried interest loophole that means some Wall Street moguls pay a lower tax rate than firefighters, nurses and teachers. We’ve been demonized and scapegoated for our efforts.
At the AFT, we’re showing what can happen when innovative thinking is applied to America’s most pressing economic challenges. We’re guided by the core belief that we must take practical steps to reinvest in the promise of America: If you work hard and play by the rules, you should be able to build a secure life for yourself and your family; if you can’t, the rules should be rewritten.
We’re expecting more pushback from hedge funds. But our work to ensure a fair economy will continue, and we’ll see more success as it does. We’ll continue to use every method at our disposal — from the street to the C-suite — to make sure Wall Street works for all Americans, not just hedge fund managers and the wealthy few.
Randi Weingarten is president of the American Federation of Teachers, AFL-CIO, Washington.Working for a fair economy, fair deal - Pensions & Investments:


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Republican Platform: Dept. of Education, nuclear capability, infrastructure, Social Security, minimum wa… No. It’s all a sham. | Reclaim Reform

Republican Platform: Dept. of Education, nuclear capability, infrastructure, Social Security, minimum wa… No. It’s all a sham. | Reclaim Reform:

Republican Platform: Dept. of Education, nuclear capability, infrastructure, Social Security, minimum wa… No. It’s all a sham.

The 2016 Republican National Convention will begin with Melania Trump introducing the Republican Platform regarding major issues such as the Department of Education’s future, the nuclear capability issue, the infrastructure, Social Security, minimum wage, women’s rights…
No, it won’t. She will not mention these real issues in any meaningful manner.
The entire event is a multimillion dollar sham taking place in one of America’s poorest cities with its history of corporate abandonment, poverty, unemployment, closed schools, privatization, minority suppression and worse. This is Theater of the Absurd complete with celebrity bling and sexy-lady attention grabbing – “all full of sound and fury Signifying nothing.”
We are, yet again, being forced into selecting the lesser of two evils thereby assuring the actual choice of evil. Trump and Company are less than evil; they are incompetence, arrogance, xenophobia, misogyny, racism, corporatism, and the destructive influence of Republican Platform: Dept. of Education, nuclear capability, infrastructure, Social Security, minimum wa… No. It’s all a sham. | Reclaim Reform:
Melania Trump's platform.001
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