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Parents prepare to take over failing school
http://triblive.com/usworld/nation/2265530-74/parents-trigger-law-desert-district-california-charter-parent-state-trails ^ | 7-24-2012 | not listed

Posted on 07/25/2012 4:00:12 AM PDT by quimby

A group of California parents has cleared a legal hurdle to become the first in the nation to take over a failing elementary school under a “parent trigger law,” a legal tool gaining popularity around the country.

San Bernardino County Superior Court Judge Steve Malone has ruled that parents in Adelanto, a desert town 90 miles northeast of Los Angeles, should be allowed to implement the state’s trigger law, which says that a majority of families at a struggling school can force major changes, from firing the principal to closing the school and reopening it as an independent charter. All they need to do to wrest control is sign a petition.

At a Los Angeles gathering to celebrate the decision, the parents said they hoped to set an example for the nation. “Our children will now get the education they deserve,” said Doreen Diaz, whose daughter attends Desert Trails Elementary in Adelanto. “We are on the way to making a quality school for them, and there’s no way we will back down.”

At Desert Trails last year, two-thirds of the children failed the state reading exam, more than half were not proficient in math, and nearly 80 percent failed the science exam. The school has not met state standards for six years, and scores place it in the bottom 10 percent of schools statewide.

(Excerpt) Read more at triblive.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: education; parents; schools; sourcetitlenoturl
Cheers to the families who chose to take responsibility and initiative.
1 posted on 07/25/2012 4:00:19 AM PDT by quimby
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To: quimby

mark


2 posted on 07/25/2012 4:14:39 AM PDT by Ladysmith (The evil that's happening in this country is the cancer of socialism...It kills the human spirit.)
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To: quimby; All

Send a link to your State Assemblyman/Senator. No free society and no child should be held hostage to teachers unions.


3 posted on 07/25/2012 4:17:23 AM PDT by Jacquerie (I want my America back.)
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To: Ladysmith

Just caught this after Jim was talking about it. Glad it was posted!


4 posted on 07/25/2012 4:18:48 AM PDT by prisoner6 (Right Wing Nuts bolt the Constitution together as the loose screws of the Left fall out!)
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To: Jacquerie

YES!


5 posted on 07/25/2012 4:21:18 AM PDT by prisoner6 (Right Wing Nuts bolt the Constitution together as the loose screws of the Left fall out!)
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To: wintertime

Thank God for parents that are actually willing to do something, rather than sitting around whining.


6 posted on 07/25/2012 4:35:56 AM PDT by verga (Every single cult leader has believed in Home schooling, think about it.)
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To: quimby
The idea behind the 2010 law — placing ultimate power in parents’ hands — resonates with any parent who has felt frustrated by school bureaucracy.

But others see the law as dangerous, handing the complex challenge of education to people who may be unprepared to meet it. Critics also say the law circumvents elected school boards and invites abuse by charter operators bent on taking over public schools. A group of Desert Trails parents is opposed to the trigger, and they have received help from the California Teachers Association, the state’s largest teachers union.

On the "But others see" line; As if the current administrators are doing such a bang up job! This is truly incredible. How this law ever passed in Kalifornja is stunning. I will be sending this article to my state representatives (Florida)

7 posted on 07/25/2012 4:36:47 AM PDT by mazda77 ("Defeating the Totalitarian Lie" By: Hilmar von Campe. Everybody should read it.)
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To: quimby
can force major changes, from firing the principal...

To.... fire teachers? I'd presume not; but, if yes, that would show POWERFUL teeth in this trigger law!

8 posted on 07/25/2012 4:39:37 AM PDT by C210N ("ask not what the candidate can do for you, ask what you can do for the candidate" (Breitbart, 2012))
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To: quimby

I saw this in yesterday’s WSJ.
It’s a victory for parents vs. the “educators.”


9 posted on 07/25/2012 5:06:40 AM PDT by Eric in the Ozarks (I didn't post this. Someone else did.)
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To: quimby
The fundamental problem with this school is that it is:

1) A socialist entitlement. It will still be a socialist entitlement even if the parents do manage to gain some minimal control. The children will still risk learning that any voting mob powerful enough to give them tuition-free schooling is powerful enough to give them **lots** of “free” stuff.

2) It will remain godless. Even if the parents do manage to introduce some God-centered principles into the curriculum and school policies, this government's school could never be more than generically lukewarm in its religiosity. ( What does Christ do with the lukewarm? He spits them out of His mouth!)

Questions:

Even if these parents do manage to take over the school, what will be the constraints on them due to socialist-entitlement and godless schooling laws? That is a terrific amount of work giving minimal results for a school that will still remain a socialist-entitlement and godless school. In the meantime, their precious children languished and continue to languish in an intellectually wilderness.

These parents have spent a lot of time and likely money to get this far with attempting to take over this school while their children sat in this pit. Although it is impossible to do a double blind study on children, would these children have been better off if the parents had used that time and money to have **immediately** removed their children and to have educated them at home or in private cooperatives?

Finally, ...It would be an interesting study to see how many of the parents who oppose the take over of the school either work for the school district, have a spouse or relative as an employee for the school, or are a subcontractor for or vendor to the school. This is a rural community. In counties like this the school district, as in mine, is usually the largest single employer with the largest single payroll. No other business comes close.

10 posted on 07/25/2012 5:51:16 AM PDT by wintertime (:-))
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To: quimby

Hate to put any kind of a damper on this, but let’s hope the parents aren’t products of the California (ever-experimenting) school system.


11 posted on 07/25/2012 6:00:21 AM PDT by Mach9
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Comment #12 Removed by Moderator

To: wintertime

YES to all. (I wouldn’t have posted if I’d seen yours first.) Excellent job.


13 posted on 07/25/2012 6:02:19 AM PDT by Mach9
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To: verga
Thank God for parents that are actually willing to do something, rather than sitting around whining.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

It is impossible to reform a socialist-entitlement and godless school. There are only two options:

1) It will remain a socialist and godless entitlement with no, or very minimal, academic improvement. Since no education is politically, culturally, or religiously neutral, it will continue to crush the First Amendment Rights of the parents, children, and taxpayers.

**or**

2) It will be privatized and then it is no longer a government school.

There is only **one** solution that will both improve the academic achievement of the children and end the relentless education wars: Begin the process of privatization.

I am sorry for these parents. For all their work and effort they will see no, or very minimal, academic improvement, and when they are exhausted and worn out, the socialists running the system will laugh and continue on as always. The **first** and most important responsibility of these parents is to their **own** children. It would have been far better to have directed this time and energy into educating their **own** children.

Remember, verga, socialists think globally, and think of children like herds....but...children are saved one at a time in the same way that we are redeemed by the atonement of Jesus one soul at a time.

By the way....Did you know that George Washington only had an eighth grade education? I learned this interesting factoid this week while reading, “The American Creation “, by Joseph Ellis. I recommend the book.

14 posted on 07/25/2012 6:10:02 AM PDT by wintertime (:-))
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To: wintertime
Thank you for proving once again that you would complain if you were hung with a new rope.
How many times have you whined about “parental control” of education, these people get it and once again you want to go to the extreme.
15 posted on 07/25/2012 6:50:07 AM PDT by verga (Every single cult leader has believed in Home schooling, think about it.)
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To: wintertime

The largeest single employer in Adelanto used to be George Air Force Base. Now it is the prisons.


16 posted on 07/25/2012 7:37:07 AM PDT by Excellence (9/11 was an act of faith.)
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To: prisoner6

Same here. Just caught a bit of it and was hoping for more info...


17 posted on 07/25/2012 1:34:49 PM PDT by Ladysmith (The evil that's happening in this country is the cancer of socialism...It kills the human spirit.)
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To: Clintonfatigued; BillyBoy; fieldmarshaldj; GeronL; GOPsterinMA

Interesting.


18 posted on 07/25/2012 11:18:34 PM PDT by Impy (Don't call me red.)
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