Elephant in the Room
This was found so correct I didn't change a thing...
Elite Media Hoax on California Education
Patrick Mallon, Friday, Jan. 7, 2005
As an persistent surveyor of California education policies and attendant inclination of the state's legislature and teacher's union to emphasize self-esteem, leftist indoctrination and sexual ambiguity into the classroom at the expense of basic academics, it was with low expectations that I read an eruption of stories on our "failing schools" delivered by the politically routine press on January 4.
The writers were reacting to a just-issued Rand report titled: California's K-12 Schools: How Are They Doing?
One story defined the report's intent: "The nonpartisan Rand Corporation examined every measurable aspect of California schools, from student achievement to teacher qualifications and facilities. The report was commissioned by the William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation, which supports educational, environmental and social issues."
A sampling of the headlines:
· "Study offers Grim Look at Schools" (LA Times)
· "Bleak Report on State's Schools" (Orange County Register)
· "California School 3rd-worst in nation" (Long Beach Press Telegram)
· "California's Flunking" (Contra Costa Times)
· "Study shows schools in crisis" (Ventura County Star)
The unswerving reasons spread throughout these pieces were as predictable as hard cheese: insufficient funding, class-sizes, teacher salaries and qualifications, and the adverse impact of 1978's Proposition 13.
While offering valid points about the crumbling education system, the causes were almost identical to the incomplete explanations offered in the 1990s, and as moldy as those offered in the 1980s.
A systemic challenge far more culturally explosive than that of 20 years ago certainly deserves a more inventive, honest, and unafraid examination than what is offered by the elite education professionals whose expertise has led a generation of students down the brave path of the unprepared.
The Contra Costa Times scored high points for coming close to the core problem stating, "When family conditions like poverty and English language deficiencies were factored into the national results, California scored dead last in reading, 46th in math."
The LA Times dodged a deeper examination with: "A growing portion of these students come from low-income families or are immigrants who are still learning English." One might expect a paper like the Times, with its vast research resources, to quantify for their readers what number this "growing percentage" is.
No dice.
The Orange County Register, interminably writing about Latino education issues, rarely if ever discusses the critical association of a student's lack of legal status on underperformance on tests and grade-level learning.
Meanwhile businesses continue to employ millions of illegal immigrants on a cash-only basis; employees who will never file a state or federal tax return. Entire work descriptions are now dominated by Latino immigrants: child care, landscaping, pool and home construction, dry walling, roofing, food service, and many other work categories. And these people do a damn good job too. But there are consequences to the taxpayer, consequences that no politician wants to touch.
According to the California Department of Education, 46 percent of the state's 6.4 million K-12 students are Latino or Hispanic. This classification is defined as: A person of Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South American, or other Spanish culture or origin - regardless of race.
Who is the William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation?
Follow the money. The William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation funded the Rand report that everyone is reacting to. Who are they and what is their agenda?
According to the foundation's website (http://www.hewlett.org/Default.htm) charter statement:
"The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation makes grants to address the most serious social and environmental problems facing society, where risk capital, responsibly invested, may make a difference over time. The Foundation places a high value on sustaining and improving institutions that make positive contributions to society."
The site describes an important television documentary soon to receive wide national visibility: "First to Worst" is Hewlett grantee John Merrow’s in-depth look at the dire state of California’s public schools. It is scheduled to air on PBS stations nationwide beginning in February.
"First to Worst" illustrates how the passage of Proposition 13 combined with other factors to seriously weaken California’s public schools.
Prop 13 is the 1978 tax reform amendment that capped property taxes and transferred school funding from local control to state control. Instead of a reliably stable funding source, property taxes, schools are now funded by state revenues, which rise and fall based on the economy, but more importantly, by taxable income.
Herein lays a key issue: 30 percent of the state's workers get paid in cash and many don't file tax returns. What percentage of the three to five million undocumented workers fit into this category in unknown, but there are number crunchers in government qualified to make an intelligent guess.
Nor do we know the actual number of struggling immigrant children who attend California K-12, because no one will tell us, because no one in government wants you, or I, to know.
If the governor, an honorable man to be sure, wants credibility, he would address this issue with courage. The education budget in this state constitutes the biggest piece of California's fiscal pie.
A huge number of the state's school kids could care less about old staple subjects like citizenship, civics, history, geography and government. It's not easy to perform well in subjects like these when upwards of 30 percent of these kids have no legal status other than that the law that requires the state to educate them.
Many of these kids are bitter, cannot legally share in the American dream, and a good SAT score or grades are the last thing on their mind. Many female students would just as soon have a kid and qualify for benefits as soon as their baby is born – an American citizen with a ticket, a mom without.
According to the governor in his state of the state speech:
"In every meeting I attend in Sacramento, there's an elephant in the room. In public, we often act like it's not there. But, in private, you come up to me … Republicans and Democrats alike … and you tell me the same thing, 'Arnold, if only we could change the budget system. But the politics are just too dangerous."
The elephant's in your court governor. The issue isn't about inept teachers. Though the state has their share, the majority of teachers are dedicated professionals committed to a quality education for kids, no matter what the obstacles or frustrations.
The facts are these: 6.4 million kids now collectively rank 48th out of the 50 states in scholastic achievement. 50 percent of Latino students drop out before graduating from high school. Almost entire school populations in Los Angeles, Monterey, and Santa Barbara are comprised of students whose parents are, and many themselves are, migrant workers who are here in the United States on a transitional, under-the-table employment basis. This unstable condition makes a productive classroom experience for affected students a farce by all definitions.
After the governor's speech, Sarah Shaw, a high school English teacher in Costa Mesa responded to the implication that education problems are the fault of teachers alone. "It felt like a slap in the face. Schwarzenegger made it sound like teachers were responsible for all the state's shortcomings in education. It's an insult."
The greater insult would be for the governor to ignore the state's "elephant in the room" and the extraordinary impact illegal immigration has on the composition of the classroom, the overall performance of the students, and the continuously declining quality of education in a state that once boasted award winning schools.
Patrick Mallon is a freelance investigative reporter
Elite Media Hoax on California Education
Patrick Mallon, Friday, Jan. 7, 2005
As an persistent surveyor of California education policies and attendant inclination of the state's legislature and teacher's union to emphasize self-esteem, leftist indoctrination and sexual ambiguity into the classroom at the expense of basic academics, it was with low expectations that I read an eruption of stories on our "failing schools" delivered by the politically routine press on January 4.
The writers were reacting to a just-issued Rand report titled: California's K-12 Schools: How Are They Doing?
One story defined the report's intent: "The nonpartisan Rand Corporation examined every measurable aspect of California schools, from student achievement to teacher qualifications and facilities. The report was commissioned by the William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation, which supports educational, environmental and social issues."
A sampling of the headlines:
· "Study offers Grim Look at Schools" (LA Times)
· "Bleak Report on State's Schools" (Orange County Register)
· "California School 3rd-worst in nation" (Long Beach Press Telegram)
· "California's Flunking" (Contra Costa Times)
· "Study shows schools in crisis" (Ventura County Star)
The unswerving reasons spread throughout these pieces were as predictable as hard cheese: insufficient funding, class-sizes, teacher salaries and qualifications, and the adverse impact of 1978's Proposition 13.
While offering valid points about the crumbling education system, the causes were almost identical to the incomplete explanations offered in the 1990s, and as moldy as those offered in the 1980s.
A systemic challenge far more culturally explosive than that of 20 years ago certainly deserves a more inventive, honest, and unafraid examination than what is offered by the elite education professionals whose expertise has led a generation of students down the brave path of the unprepared.
The Contra Costa Times scored high points for coming close to the core problem stating, "When family conditions like poverty and English language deficiencies were factored into the national results, California scored dead last in reading, 46th in math."
The LA Times dodged a deeper examination with: "A growing portion of these students come from low-income families or are immigrants who are still learning English." One might expect a paper like the Times, with its vast research resources, to quantify for their readers what number this "growing percentage" is.
No dice.
The Orange County Register, interminably writing about Latino education issues, rarely if ever discusses the critical association of a student's lack of legal status on underperformance on tests and grade-level learning.
Meanwhile businesses continue to employ millions of illegal immigrants on a cash-only basis; employees who will never file a state or federal tax return. Entire work descriptions are now dominated by Latino immigrants: child care, landscaping, pool and home construction, dry walling, roofing, food service, and many other work categories. And these people do a damn good job too. But there are consequences to the taxpayer, consequences that no politician wants to touch.
According to the California Department of Education, 46 percent of the state's 6.4 million K-12 students are Latino or Hispanic. This classification is defined as: A person of Mexican, Puerto Rican, Cuban, Central or South American, or other Spanish culture or origin - regardless of race.
Who is the William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation?
Follow the money. The William and Flora Hewlitt Foundation funded the Rand report that everyone is reacting to. Who are they and what is their agenda?
According to the foundation's website (http://www.hewlett.org/Default.htm) charter statement:
"The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation makes grants to address the most serious social and environmental problems facing society, where risk capital, responsibly invested, may make a difference over time. The Foundation places a high value on sustaining and improving institutions that make positive contributions to society."
The site describes an important television documentary soon to receive wide national visibility: "First to Worst" is Hewlett grantee John Merrow’s in-depth look at the dire state of California’s public schools. It is scheduled to air on PBS stations nationwide beginning in February.
"First to Worst" illustrates how the passage of Proposition 13 combined with other factors to seriously weaken California’s public schools.
Prop 13 is the 1978 tax reform amendment that capped property taxes and transferred school funding from local control to state control. Instead of a reliably stable funding source, property taxes, schools are now funded by state revenues, which rise and fall based on the economy, but more importantly, by taxable income.
Herein lays a key issue: 30 percent of the state's workers get paid in cash and many don't file tax returns. What percentage of the three to five million undocumented workers fit into this category in unknown, but there are number crunchers in government qualified to make an intelligent guess.
Nor do we know the actual number of struggling immigrant children who attend California K-12, because no one will tell us, because no one in government wants you, or I, to know.
If the governor, an honorable man to be sure, wants credibility, he would address this issue with courage. The education budget in this state constitutes the biggest piece of California's fiscal pie.
A huge number of the state's school kids could care less about old staple subjects like citizenship, civics, history, geography and government. It's not easy to perform well in subjects like these when upwards of 30 percent of these kids have no legal status other than that the law that requires the state to educate them.
Many of these kids are bitter, cannot legally share in the American dream, and a good SAT score or grades are the last thing on their mind. Many female students would just as soon have a kid and qualify for benefits as soon as their baby is born – an American citizen with a ticket, a mom without.
According to the governor in his state of the state speech:
"In every meeting I attend in Sacramento, there's an elephant in the room. In public, we often act like it's not there. But, in private, you come up to me … Republicans and Democrats alike … and you tell me the same thing, 'Arnold, if only we could change the budget system. But the politics are just too dangerous."
The elephant's in your court governor. The issue isn't about inept teachers. Though the state has their share, the majority of teachers are dedicated professionals committed to a quality education for kids, no matter what the obstacles or frustrations.
The facts are these: 6.4 million kids now collectively rank 48th out of the 50 states in scholastic achievement. 50 percent of Latino students drop out before graduating from high school. Almost entire school populations in Los Angeles, Monterey, and Santa Barbara are comprised of students whose parents are, and many themselves are, migrant workers who are here in the United States on a transitional, under-the-table employment basis. This unstable condition makes a productive classroom experience for affected students a farce by all definitions.
After the governor's speech, Sarah Shaw, a high school English teacher in Costa Mesa responded to the implication that education problems are the fault of teachers alone. "It felt like a slap in the face. Schwarzenegger made it sound like teachers were responsible for all the state's shortcomings in education. It's an insult."
The greater insult would be for the governor to ignore the state's "elephant in the room" and the extraordinary impact illegal immigration has on the composition of the classroom, the overall performance of the students, and the continuously declining quality of education in a state that once boasted award winning schools.
Patrick Mallon is a freelance investigative reporter
posted by Jim at
9:56 AM
