One of the many things I’ve learned from teaching in an urban public school is that adults in the school and district rarely pay attention unless parents get involved.
That, of course, is a generalization–there are admins who care, and teachers who care–but that characterizes the majority.
Quick anecdote to substantiate: a few years back at my school, the administration decided to give a dress code for prom. No deep cleavage showing, no midriffs exposing belly buttons, etc, etc. In other words, be tasteful. Great idea! Finally, some cajones from the powers that be!
Well, the parents got upset. Yes! That’s right. Amazing, because you’d figure that they’d be happy about such a standard, but they stormed the castle with complaints. What’s even more amazing, the administration backed down and dropped the dress code as a result of the pressure.
Compare that with a parent meeting held this year. The subject: how to improve our struggling school. Out of a student body of around 2,600, about 15-20 parents showed up. YYYYEEPPP. Clearly there are some misplaced priorities going on there.
I have had a similar experience with contacting parents. Whenever I schedule a parent-teacher conference, the parent shows up about a third of the time. When I tried to curb rampant tardiness in my class by calling parents during class, I got a hold of about 15% of the parents. Of that 15%, more than a few simply muttered a few things about trying to help get the student to class on time, then, once the student was on the phone, the parent would quickly veer off subject and start talking about groceries or something like that.
If the parents put even half the effort into that that they spent getting the dress code for prom dropped, there’d be a revolution at the school. District bureaucrats would be held accountable for finances; principals would snap to attention (nothing gives a principal more of a headache than having a gaggle of irate parents bum rushing the front office); teachers would dot their I’s and cross their T’s.
This is where The Parent Revolution comes in. TPR is the brainchild of Ben Austin and Green Dot Charter School entrepreneur Steve Barr. They are both parents who are sick of seeing Los Angeles Unified School District fail kids. They realize parents have the power to revolutionize schools in their neighborhoods.
Everyone shares the burden of improving a school, but the parents are in a unique position to get things moving. What is clear is that LAUSD and many districts like it are hopelessly broken. They are in the grips of bureaucrats, unions, and other adults. It is for the adults, not the kids. A dismal percentage of students from LAUSD graduate, and an even more dismal percentage go to college. The same is true of students in my district.
Parents, in sufficient numbers, can wrest power away from the gatekeepers. If you are a parent of a child in LAUSD, click on the link above to see how. Heck, even if you aren’t a parent of a child in LAUSD, still click on the link. Get informed, then pass on the word.
This won’t solve all the problems inherent in our system (the links don’t get into all, but some of the problems I see)…but it will solve much of it.
“Accountability?” “Because parents are the only people without a conflict of interest when it comes to the future of our kids.”
Wait a minute, highly paid executive Ben Austin doesn’t have a conflict of interest in the hostile takeovers of public schools? Really? The Beverly Hills Barrister, Ben Austin, isn’t a community volunteer, and his parent corporation Green Dot (non-profit status notwithstanding, they’re a corporation nonetheless) stands to gain financially from taking over more schools. In fact, the more schools Ben Austin can coerce to privatized charters, the more money he makes! By definition that is a conflict of interest.
Who writes the trash above… wait a minute, we know: the paid staff of the astroturf organizations like the woefully misnamed “Parent Revolution” née Los Angeles Parent Union, front groups for the private corporation Green Dot. Really think these rich white guys are going to be more accountable than the status quo? Try the following: call Green Dot or any of their phony front groups and ask them how much Steve Barr, Marco Petruzzi, or Ben Austin makes a year. Wont tell you? Yet Ben Austin claims there is total accountability and transparency! What gives?
No conflict of interest? Try this, using a paid for chartered busses to pick up parents, give them free t-shirts and lunches on the way to pack a Green Dot Public Schools Board of Directors meeting the way Ben Austin arranges his “grass roots cum astroturf” parent organization to pack LAUSD meetings. Would Steve Barr and his band of elite board members welcome them like the subservient kowtowing Monica Garcia does when Petruzzi, Barr, and Austin’s “volunteers” show up.
Ben Austin’s career reads as a seedy list of working for and with the most unsavory characters in Los Angeles politics. His latest pay for gig as a parent advocate is more of the same. While real activists are actually struggling to change things in our school district, Ben Austin and his astrotuf wrecking crew are insuring the mortgage notes on his Beverly Hills bungalow, and Steve Barr’s lavish Silver Lake estate are being paid by their charter cash cow.
While Ben Austin is endorsing fat checks from William Gates and Eli Broad, we are out in the communities working with parents and teachers to effect real change from below. A “parent advocate” and “revolutionary” indeed. If there is a more disingenuous person in Los Angeles than Mr. Austin, I’d love to know. To all the anonymous (read LAPU staffers), my name is Robert D. Skeels and I live in District 2. We will be working to recall your crony the LAUSD Board President from office soon. You’re no Parent Revolution, just a reactionary corporate money grab, and given your funders listed above you are more a “Billionaires Revolution.”
Geez Robert.
Your whole comment was one big ad hominem, and did not address a single point I made in my post. I’m going to approve your comment, but your future comments must be ad hominem free and on point.