If you can envision being allowed to use just one hand to pinch a pregnant elephant all the way into a tin cup brimming with gooey mud, that was the other-worldly task assigned last night to two intrepid young women planning to open a charter school in Culver City – where every previous charter bid has been turned away with a teeth-shaking thud.
The next virtually automatic no by the School Board is due in a month, Tuesday, Dec. 11, after which the petitioners are expected to seek an overruling from the County Office of Education. The ambitious women with the Sisyphean task would hope that the County agency would decide that since their voluminous paperwork (300 pages) was in order, that Culver City would be told to green-light their project, ISPY, the Innovatory School for Professional Youth, serving both at-risk and professional children, sixth through the 12th grade.
Immediately afterward, Teachers Union President David Mielke probably spoke for between 99 and 101 percent of the District decision-makers when he made several pivotal points paraphrased below:
• This is our backyard where outsiders (non-public schools) are not welcome, and you are an outsider. Public money needs to go to public schools. We would lose students, and therefore desperately needed state funding, to you.
• Our public schools already practice what you are promising to do, rescuing and educating at-risk students. This would be duplication.
Meanwhile, it was curious espying the five members of the School Board while the educators Jessica Jacobs and Florina Rodov were making their latest in a series of vivid video/power point presentations.
Observing the Deciders
Two and sometimes three members, bored or distracted, were drawn elsewhere, mentally. They performed any errant task that would blur what they were hearing for 15 minutes, aiming their focus elsewhere in the District Board Room.
The energetic, always-enthused Ms. Jacobs declared frustration over perceived roadblocks she indicated had been placed by the District to impede or discourage the women from broadly marketing their plan for a virtual school to teachers and other influential school-type persons.
Starting with the Superintendent, she said:
Hello Mr. LaRose, hello Board members, mostly, hello members of the audience.
As you know, this public hearing is for the CCUSD Board to consider the level of support for the petition by District teachers, employees and parents.
Because Mr. LaRose received counsel advising against an interactive review process (as he and I initially had discussed), and because we were denied access to District teachers in our efforts to educate them about ISPY, and because the District Petition Review Committee that we understand exists decided they didn't need to meet with us, we will share ISPY with you now.
Last time we were here, we brought our Chief Financial Officer (whom the District also doesn't feel it needs to meet with), members of our advisory council and local operating board, supportive parents, and letters from community members, today we are allotting the extra time to answer your questions.
Board members, please know that the support we have received from community leaders, business professionals, important parent groups, and local educators remains overwhelming.
Additionally, our new petition (which addresses every one of the District staff's concerns outlined in the denial recommendation findings from last time), now 300 pages, meets the legal requirements for approval.
More than that, our program, which is now more clearly described, is one of quality, a unique approach to alternative education that has been proven successful, a school that will make Culver City proud.
Supt. Dave LaRose took strong exception to the assertion that a thorough vetting has been a casualty of this lengthy process.
He told the audience:
I feel compelled to address, for the Board and the public, the implications made relative to the manner in which we are considering the ISPY petition. The comments imply the lack of a thoughtful, thorough and intentional approach to this petition review.
This could not be further from the truth. Not only are we committed to a process that adheres to the rules and regulations associated with Charter Petitions, we have invested time, energy and resources to a collaborative, student-centered assessment of the petition. Our responsibility is to review the merits of the petition as it was submitted and we take this responsibility very seriously. Comments to the contrary are unfortunate and inaccurate.
For the School District, the cherry topping was applied when Mr. Mielke became the only audience member to step out and speak.
Nearly Every Part Is Wrong
The proposition is a money-loser for the School District, he charged. “We have been squeezed terribly (financially). Every kid we lose to ISPY is money we don’t get.
“If charter schools do something that we don’t or can’t do, I will say okay.”
But that is not so, Mr. Mielke said. “We are good with at-risk students. I worked at Culver Park High School 19 years. Culver Park was recognized as a model continuation school in the state of California, accredited by the Western Assn. of Schools and Colleges.
“We know what we are doing.
“In terms of serving professional youths, we have an independent study program, where I also worked.
“So we do what this school wants to do.
“Finally,” Mr. Mielke said, diverging in a different direction, “I am concerned about how much of their program is online. The longer I teach, the more I am convinced that it is the (face-to-face) relationship between teacher and student that is really important.
“I might be great. But watching me on TV is not the same as you getting to know me and me getting to know you.”
