It's baaaack! Descriptor Code: JBCC - Student Assignment

So, at the last board meeting, Ramona Tyson quietly pulled the new board policy on student assignment (transfers) from the agenda. Now, we see the new policy (we're interested in Part F) has emerged on the eBoard website, still allowing for a range of interpretation. Still clear as mud.

Here we go:

Instances in which students may attend school outside their attendance area are outlined below. The District will publish written and/or electronic materials further explaining each of these options.

Students who do not reside in the District are not eligible for enrollment in a District school, except as required by state law or as provided below.

A. ESEA/NCLB Public School Choice
Pursuant to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act/No Child Left Behind Act (“ESEA/NCLB”), students attending a school designated as Needs Improvement may be eligible to transfer to another school that is on the District’s list of receiving schools. Each year, the District provides notice to parents or guardians of students who are eligible for ESEA/NCLB transfer.

B. Special Needs Students
In certain circumstances, special needs students requiring special education student services will be placed in a school other than the school serving their attendance area, in accordance with special education procedures.

C. Georgia Special Needs Scholarship Program (Senate Bill 10)
Qualifying special needs students may attend another public school within the District that has available capacity and that has a program with the services agreed to in the student’s existing individualized education program.

D. Limited School Choice (House Bill 251)
Students may enroll in certain schools outside of their attendance area where space is available. The House Bill 251 receiving schools to which a student may transfer are publicized each year after seat availability has been determined.

E. Other School Choice Programs
The District offers a number of academic options for students, including, for example, charter schools, magnet programs, and theme schools; these options are referred to as School Choice Programs. The available School Choice Programs and the relevant admissions criteria are published yearly. Every eligible student, regardless of circumstance, must follow the published criteria and process.

The Board, upon recommendation by the Superintendent, and as allowed by applicable laws and regulations, may move a School Choice Program to a different facility or cease the operation of a School Choice Program.

F. Children of Full-Time District Employees
Subject to review by the Office of Student Assignment, a student whose custodial parent or legal guardian is a full-time school-based employee of the District may enroll in the school in which the parent or legal guardian is employed, regardless of whether the employee and student reside in this or another school district. Transportation will not be provided by the District. Children of employees who do not reside in the District will not be required to pay tuition.

A student whose custodial parent or legal guardian is a full-time school-based employee at a theme school may enter the lottery to attend the respective theme school, regardless of the student’s residence. The student must comply with the school’s published admissions procedures.

Because of the unique nature of magnet programs, which have special admission criteria and competitive selection processes, children of magnet program employees will be given no special preference in the application or lottery process for admission to the respective magnet program. Students wishing to enroll in the program must follow the published admission procedures and meet the admission criteria for the program. Moreover, because of the special cost to the District in providing magnet programs, these programs are limited to students who reside in the District.

This provision does not apply to pre-K programs.

Employees’ children who, at the time this Policy is enacted, are attending a school at which they would not be entitled to enroll under this Policy shall be allowed to remain in their current school until they have completed the highest grade at that school.

G. Hardship Transfers
In exceptional circumstances, and on a case-by-case basis, hardship transfer requests will be considered. Upon receiving documentation of an extenuating situation, the Superintendent or designee may approve a recommendation by the Office of Student Assignment that a student be allowed to attend a school other than the school serving the student’s attendance area. State law allows for transfer requests in certain circumstances based on placement in a nonpermanent classroom or excessive travel time or distance, as specifically defined by state law and the rules of the Georgia Department of Education, and such requests may be considered by the District. For all hardship transfer requests, available capacity in the requested school at the time of the request will be considered. If capacity is not available, the Superintendent may approve transfer to another school in the District. Transportation will not be provided by the District.

H. Unsafe School Choice Option
1. A student who is the victim of a violent criminal offense, as defined by state law, while in or on the grounds of a public elementary school or secondary school that the student attends, may transfer to another school within ten days of the offense.

2. Federal law also provides for transfers out of a school that is designated as a “persistently unsafe school.” If a District school is designated as “persistently unsafe,” the District will provide procedures for students wishing to transfer from the school.

I. Seniors Moving out of the District
A current or rising senior at a District school who moves out of the District may complete his or her senior year at the District school if the student furnishes transportation, maintains regular attendance, and pays tuition as set forth in Policy JBCBA.



School-based employees. Does that include teachers as well as all other employees, such as cafeteria workers, janitors, bus drivers, security, etc? That could mean several thousand more employees, and several thousand more transfer students. If this "perk" is meant to attract the best and brightest teachers, should it not apply strictly to teachers? If this "perk" is meant to allow teachers the flexibility to stay late and help or tutor students, shouldn't this perk apply to teachers only? Can we afford to offer this perk to say, 10,000 employees rather than the 6,500 who are teachers?

One more thing, please take note of the admission that magnet programs cost more per student to operate.

AYP transfer invasion breaking the back of CCHS

This week's Dunwoody Crier informs us that Chamblee has been pushed over capacity by NCLB transfers.

Already over capacity, Chamblee Charter High School may receive several hundred more students before August 30 under the No Child Left Behind initiative for schools who fail repeatedly to achieve federal benchmarks.

But parents are firing back and have asked DeKalb School officials to rethink their decision to make CCHS a receiving school for 2010-11.

According to school officials, parents and other sources, about 200 ninth graders are scheduled to start school at Chamblee sometime before August 30. The school already has 198 students from previous admissions through NCLB. The students, according to sources, would stay through their high school careers at Chamblee, if the transfers are approved.

Last week, the county delivered four trailers to the school’s property and is in the process of refurbishing them, supposedly in anticipation of the extra students.

Lakeside and Druid HIlls are also seriously over-capacity largely due to transfers of all kinds. With a current enrollment topping 1,800 students in a building with a capacity for 1,350, Lakeside has over 20 trailers on-site to accommodate the overflow.

However, Arabia, which is not yet even at capacity and also must serve as a "receiving school" for transfers, has been allowed to set up an "annex" facility - housing their transfer students at the Lithonia High School Campus.

In response, there will be a Community Meeting at Chamblee Charter High School TOMORROW night, Tuesday, August 24, at 6:00 pm to discuss the situation regarding student transfers.

We have been told that Bob Moseley, the Deputy Chief Superintendant, and other DCSS officials will be there.

Apparently CCHS was just notified of this meeting this morning and are relying on parents to get the word out.

Please come and show your support for Chamblee Charter High School!

===


UPDATE: In the words of Emily Latella, "Nevermind!" 
The meeting has been cancelled.

Just how much Title 1 money are we spending?

That fabulous DeKalb Parent has once again crunched some interesting numbers. We have all been wondering if perhaps we have not been utilizing the over $31 million in annual Title 1 funds in the best way for student success. Our discussion revealed that we seem to have literally thrown everything but the kitchen sink at the problem of 'making AYP', yet we continue to miss the mark. Mull over the following report from DeKalb Parent --

I agree that DCSS is spending "tons of Title 1 dollars". Click here to read the parent letter sent home by Cross Keys, one of the many Title 1 schools that did not make AYP. Similar letters went home from all of these schools. The letter is very illuminating as to how Title 1 dollars ARE NOT being spent on direct and intensive math and Language Arts instruction for students.

According to the letter, below is where the Title 1 money for struggling Language Arts and Math students is going:

• Implement school wide tutorials in the areas of Language Arts and math
• Provide transportation for all students that attend tutorial sessions
• Provide targeted remediation academic sessions that take place before or after school
• Execute focused staff development training for teachers in order to address the needs of all students
• Implement collaborative planning opportunities for teachers to strategically plan research based lesson plans
• Implement the America’s Choice framework that is proven to increase academic achievement in the areas of Language Arts and Math
• Provide the placement of a fulltime Language Arts Coach at Cross Keys
• Provide the placement of a fulltime Math Coach at Cross Keys
• Provide the placement of a fulltime Graduation Coach at Cross Keys who works intensely with students, parents and faculty members
• Provide the placement of a Re-design Coach that places a special emphasis on the academic, social, and emotional needs of all freshmen

The emphasis is on expensive, non-teaching personnel - Language Arts, Math, Graduation, and Re-design Coaches, as well as transportation and staff development training. BTW the average salary and benefits cost for each Instructional Coach is around $100,000 (source: Georgia Salary and Travel audit) so four of these non-teaching coaches cost about $400,000 a year. America’s Choice for our Title 1 schools is around $90,000 per school. How much direct instruction tutoring would $500,000 buy for Cross Keys students?

What is a Re-design coach? I've never heard of this one. The Re-design coach "places a special emphasis on the academic, social, and emotional needs of all freshmen". Well, I thought that's what Cross Key’s four counselors (average salary and benefits for each DCSS counselor is $84,000), one Intervention and Prevention specialist, one social worker, one school psychologist, and one Parent Resource Center Facilitator do ($75,000 in salary and benefits for a Parent Resource "Facilitator" - Zepora Roberts' daughter is one).

DCSS spent $8,000,000 for America's Choice, and the renewal is going to be funded by the BOE for the 90 Title 1 schools bringing the average to $90,000 for each America’s Choice school. Please show me valid and reliable studies (not done by America's Choice) that show significant improvement in Language Arts and Math for schools using America's Choice. DCSS has absolutely no proof that America's Choice or these Instructional Coaches have increased student achievement for DeKalb County students.

Cross Keys ONLY HAD forty students who were in the “Did Not Meet” category. Considering the $500,000 cost of Cross Keys Instructional Coaches and America's Choice, we spend $12,500 a year for each student who “Did Not Meet Expectations" at Cross Keys on the GHSGT. Thirty seven of those were Economically Disadvantaged. Maybe the parents of these students are better off getting the $12,500 for intensive tutoring than spending it on non-teaching personnel.

Don't believe me? Go to the Georgia DOE site for Cross Keys and see that only 40 students out of “All Students” are in the “Basic/Does Not Meet” category (and 37 are in the Economically Disadvantaged category) – click on Academic Performance

Before you protest that these numbers are an underestimation of the problem, I recognize that it's really more accurate to view 40 students per grade level (9th, 10th and 11th grades) as needing academic help since only the 11th graders taking the GHSGT are considered by NCLB. I also understand that these at risk students need intervention from when they enter high school. But even dividing that $500,000 a year among 120 students will fund hundreds of hours a year per student to receive one on one instruction by SES (Supplemental Education Services - aka tutorial services) . Tell me that won't make more of a difference than four Instructional Coaches and America's Choice.

What is Audria Berry ($145,000 in salary and benefits) who runs the Office of School Improvement and makes the Title 1 decisions thinking? Where is the cost /benefits analysis that needs to occur for Cross Keys (or each school in DCSS)? Why are we not using Title 1 funds for intensive one on one tutoring for the students who have fallen behind?

Again, I ask, "Choice for whom?"

Mrs. Ramona Tyson
Interim Superintendent
DeKalb County [GA] School System

Mrs. Tyson:

It is unacceptable to further overcrowd Chamblee Charter High School with AYP transfers. Chamblee Charter High School (CCHS) already has more students than it was built to accommodate.

Overcrowding has a proven negative effect on our students’ education. For more than 25 years, we have known, “Probably the greatest single discouragement to better instruction is the overcrowded classroom.”[1] (Karp) Further, this overcrowding at CCHS is a long-term educational problem since the AYP transfers being sent to CCHS are 9th graders and they may stay at CCHS until they graduate.

Overcrowding puts more stress on CCHS’s already-stressed building that is way overdue to be re-built. Portable classrooms create capacity problems inside the bricks-and-mortar school building. CCHS is already approximately 200 students over its original as-built capacity of 1,347. These unnecessary AYP transfers will put more than 1700 students in CCHS, thus being significantly out of compliance with the Georgia Department of Education’s square footage requirements for school library media centers, school cafeterias and toilet facilities.[2] The Georgia Accrediting Commission requires, “a minimum of 20 square feet of floor space per student in each instructional area.”[3] Overcrowding is also unsafe and puts our students at a physical and health risk.

To paraphrase Walter Karp, quoted above, “What makes these conditions [at CCHS and elsewhere in DCSS] appalling is that they are quite unnecessary. The [DeKalb County School System is] top-heavy with administrators and rife with sinecures. Large numbers of teachers scarcely ever set foot in a classroom, being occupied instead as grade advisers, career counselors, coordinators, [coaches] and supervisors.”[4]

You have other choices allowed by No Child Left Behind besides overcrowding and dumbing-down successful schools like Chamblee Charter High School. For example:
1) “A virtual school may be among the schools to which an eligible student may transfer, so long as that school is a public elementary or secondary school (as defined by the SEA) and has not been identified for school improvement, corrective action, or restructuring. If the “virtual school” is not operated by the LEA, the LEA could enter into a cooperative agreement with the school so that its students can enroll.”[5]
It’s time to get our money’s worth out of the DeKalb Online Academy (DOLA). If that doesn’t suit you, then there is always the Georgia Virtual School – also paid for by our tax dollars.

Further:

2) “The NCLB statute does not address whether non-Title I schools that miss AYP for two or more years may be offered as transfer options. Accordingly, an SEA may adopt a policy governing the use of non-Title I schools that have missed AYP for two or more years as choice options. In doing so, the SEA should bear in mind that the public school choice provisions are designed to offer high-quality options for parents. If an SEA adopts a policy permitting the use of non-Title I schools that have not made AYP for two or more years as transfer options, LEAs offering such schools as transfer options should provide parents with detailed information on the academic achievement of those schools, including information on why they did not make AYP, so that parents can make informed choices.”[6]

What is the Georgia Department of Education’s policy on this? Because Georgia is a mostly rural state with limited school choices in rural school systems, I am betting that Georgia permits the use of non-Title I schools that have not made AYP for two or more years as transfer options,

Finally:

3) Chamblee Charter High School is, in fact, a real charter school – the result of a grassroots community effort. CCHS is a charter school that always has more students wanting to enroll than there are seats. There is always a lottery for available seats at CCHS. This lottery is required by the U.S. Department of Education. “SEAs or LEAs may not require a charter school to alter its admissions process for [the purpose of admitting AYP transfer students]”.[7],[8]

Students who wish to transfer to CCHS should have participated in the lottery for charter school seats. Or they could have applied to the lottery for the CCHS Magnet Program. However, it is too late for either one of those options for the 2010-2011 school year.

In addition to the choices listed above, here are some other U. S. Department of Education-approved options:
4) "Creating new, distinct schools with separate faculty within the physical sites of schools identified for school improvement, corrective action, or restructuring;
5) "Encouraging the creation of new charter schools within the LEA;
6) "Reshaping long-range capital construction and renovation plans in order to ensure that schools that are likely to receive new students have additional space; and/or
7) "Easing capacity by initiating inter-district choice programs with neighboring LEAs or by establishing programs through which local private schools can absorb some of the LEA’s students."[9]

Have you seriously considered the above options? If so, please explain in detail why they are not being used in DCSS. I will publish your response to this e-mail, word-for-word.

What you are doing may meet the letter of the NCLB law, but it does not meet the intent of NCLB. You are overcrowding and taking down successful schools while, at the same time – because you will not address the challenges and correct the problems in schools not making AYP – you are consigning DeKalb County’s students (especially its substantial Title I student population) to a bleak future.

What you are doing with regard to AYP transfers and Chamblee Charter High School may not be legally criminal, but it is morally indefensible.

Sincerely,

Sandy Spruill

http://www.sourcetext.com/grammarian/johnny.html
http://www.doe.k12.ga.us/_documents/schools/facilities/squareft.pdf
http://www.coe.uga.edu/gac/standards/highschool.html
http://www.sourcetext.com/grammarian/johnny.html
http://www2.ed.gov/policy/elsec/guid/schoolchoiceguid.pdf

Fallout from the massive cuts

Ok, lets hear it.  The first week of school is complete and we're hearing that the massive cuts to support staff are having quite an effect in the schoolhouse and on our already over-stressed teachers. (For a good post on the subject, click here.) Here's a quote from one of our bloggers:

Please do a blog on the opening of school from the persective of parents, students and staff. Today was the 5th day of the year that rooms went without air. There were large trash cans in the halls to catch the leaks. The men from plant services are spread out all over the county. Every time I see them they are really working. But we have old buildings that are in need of repair.

Someone took their eyes off of the school house. We are on the front line. If you are a principal, an AP a teacher, etc and work in the school you have a special trust.

I know that there is more accountability for everyone, but we seem to get blamed for everything.
We should be held to a high moral and ethical standard, but the people above us should be required to also have high standards.

What has happened to us?

Additionally, this email was released today:

From Mr. Bob Moseley, DCSS Deputy Chief Superintendent for School Operations........ Mrs. Ramona Tyson, Interim Superintendent, has received numerous emails about the ESEA School Choice Option at Chamblee Charter High School. Approximately 200 ninth grade students have selected Chamblee Charter High School as an option. Mrs. Tyson appreciates the input from parents. She is reviewing options with staff to determine if better options are available. Once final decisions have been made we will communicate with all parents. Please look for communication from the school district on this matter next week.

I can't explain just how distressing it is to be a 'receiving school' for AYP transfers. Really, is it fair to expect an already over-capacity, old, crumbling school building with one field and no auditorium to squeeze 200 new students into the schedule three weeks into the school year? Worse, these students are all taking classes on the block schedule and the receiving schools have the 7 period day. Students will add three new classes to their schedule, three weeks into the school year. Oddly, Arabia - our brand new, shiny, gleaming, gorgeous high school facility in south DeKalb is slated to receive transfers, however, these transfers will not see the inside of that gorgeous multi-million dollar facility. No - Arabia's AYP transfer students will be sent to an Arabia "annex" located at Lithonia High School.

Ain't that some stuff???