Patch Letter: Don't Vote for the Status Quo

This weekend, as I was reading the most recent Blumenfeld campaign flyer, I learned something about our current school board. What I learned is that the School Board has voted consistently against proven methods for evaluating teacher effectiveness. I was disheartened about this, because I imagined that our school board would be at the forefront of the research, implementing the proven methods from other districts, to make our own district even better.

In March of 2009, they voted against setting the Superintendent's Goals in Public. We, as a community, have a stake in those very goals. If the goals were about teacher and administrator accountability, then they should have been public.

In both 2009 and 2010, they voted against "Seeing Education Metrics for Teachers." Again, they allowed a barrier between our administrators and themselves, and thus any sense of accountability.

I want our teachers and our administrators accountable. They need to tell the Board how the individual teachers are performing. The Board will then have the data they need to make important decisions. The Board needs to demand this type of data, as without accountability, the same issues remain issues, year after year.

And just last Spring, the Board voted against "Seeing Student Performance Data by Teacher & Course." While this information should not be available directly to students and parents, it should be available to our representatives. How can the Board set goals for the district or the Superintendent, without having the fundamental data needed to know where the priorities should be placed?

Four years in a row, the board voted against Collecting Customer Satisfaction Surveys by Teacher & Course. We will never know why the board voted no, because they chose to have this discussion during "Closed Session." What we do know is that it took four years of consulting with their lawyer, and one parent-driven survey on the subject of to realize that they need to consult parents and students, their stakeholders, from time to time.

So, this fall, they finally voted for the creation of a Survey "by teacher & course."

As a parent stakeholder in LCUSD, I care about these issues. I want our Board to vote in ways that they will have the data to make important decisions from this point forward. Honestly, the same teachers that "needed improvement" when Andrew Blumenfeld was a student, are still employed and still "need improvement" now.

This means, that my sons, half Andrew's age, will be subjected to the same ineffective teachers.

The status quo will not work. For these reasons, I am voting for Andrew Blumenfeld on Tuesday. Please join me in voting for Blumenfeld.

Sincerely,
Belinda Randolph