THE FLEMING FOUR SHOULD RESIGN OR BE RECALLED NOW!

Last Fall the voters in the Capistrano Unified School District spoke loud and clear that they wanted change: a school district that built facilities for students and teachers rather than administrators, accountability and true open government in their local public school district. They overwhelmingly voted for the Reform Candidates Anna Bryson, Ellen Addonizio and Larry Christensen and rejected the two incumbents who were running for re-election.

The remaining four Trustees from the era of former Superintendent James Fleming, Marlene Draper, Sheila Benecke, Mike Darnold and Duane Stiff, also known as "The Fleming Four," apparently did not get the message the voters were sending them. At their last meeting of May 7, 2007 Board President Sheila Benecke simply skipped several items on the Board's publicized agenda. The other members of the Fleming Four (Draper, Darnold and Stiff) apparently did not object to Benecke's action, (although Ms. Bryson did object vigorously).

What was on the agenda Ms. Benecke skipped and did not cover? Five important proposed revisions to the Board's policies on Conflicts of Interest, Hiring and Placement of Relatives, Purchasing Procedures, Bids and the Use of District Vehicles. All of these reforms being proposed by Reform Trustee Ellen Addonizio (with support from Ms. Bryson and Mr. Christensen) in response to the various misuse of District property and the awarding of contracts to relatives, such as Ms. Draper's daughter, that have caused public scandals and investigations by both the District itself and the Orange County District Attorney's office. It is apparent from this action that The Fleming Four have not learned the lesson of last year's recall attempt or the November 2006 election results.

To add insult to injury, the Broad very recently settled a lawsuit brought against them by Mr. Ron Lackey (who was represented by Brown Act expert James Lacy) regarding the old Board's prior violations of the Brown Act open meeting laws. Part of the settlement was that the Board members attend seminars on the Brown Act.

Apparently The Fleming Four were asleep during the seminar because the skipping of these publicized agenda items may be a violation of the Brown Act! In addition, Government Code section 54954.2, subdivision (b)(3) "...mandates that action on continued agenda items must occur within five calendar days of the meeting at which the continuance is called." Chaffee v. San Francisco Library Commission (2004) 115 Cal. App. 4th 461, 469. To this writer's knowledge, the Board did not reconvene another board meeting within five days of May 7th to consider the items on the agenda they did not consider on May 7th despite what would appear to be a clear legal mandate that they do so!

Of course this is all now in the backdrop of yesterday's indictment of former Superintendent James Fleming for misuse of public funds and other alleged criminal activity. All actions he committed while the former board (including these four holdovers) where allegedly overseeing Mr. Fleming's activities.

In this writer's opinion, these four holdovers have failed in their duty by:

1. Not properly overseeing Mr. Fleming and the Senior Administration Staff;

2. Not focusing on the needs of the children and teachers by building a very expensive and over sized Administration building while children and teachers remain in old, sometimes unhealthy, portable classrooms;

3. Diverting funds from redevelopment funds from San Juan Capistrano that were intended to contribute to the upkeep and construction of school facilities and using those monies to build the Administration building;

4. Entering into professional services contracts with companies who employed the adult daughter of one of the trustees (Ms. Draper);

5. Refusing to listen to the concerns of the voters and citizens when they came to Board meetings to express their concerns about these issues;

6. Condoning disgraced former Superintendent James Fleming's compilation of an "enemies list" and used District facilities to disseminate and expand on it; and

7. Even now stonewalling needed reforms in the District put forth by Trustee Addonizio, perhaps in violation of the Brown Act (which appears to be their pattern and practice).

This list of violations of the public trust is definitely NOT exhaustive and I am sure there are many more!


The Fleming Four must resign now or they should be recalled at once!

Craig P. Alexander, Esq.
Education Alliance Member

No More Excuses!

Our public schools are failing our children. I am not saying that all children are failing, some are doing very well. Rather, overall, public education has some major problems. Consider that 30% of our children drop out and international tests prove that the United States seriously trails other developed nations in education.

Recently, Jack O'Connell, State Superintendent of Education, wrote in San Diego's North County Times, "I have begun an intensive effort to find ways to close the gap that exists between successful students who are often white or Asian and financially well off, and struggling students who are too often poor, Hispanic, African-American, English learner or with a disability." Rather than concern himself with ethnic or economic differences, perhaps the State Superintendent of Public Schools should begin by holding public education employees accountable!

Mr. O'Connell is looking for an excuse rather than a solution. I have heard this excuse many times before in various forms from educators. One was so bold as to say "those children (referring to English learners and poor children) just can't learn, this is the best we can do." This is what is known as the "soft prejudice of low expectation." What a sad state for our children if their teachers feel this way about them.

Public education's poor results over the years are not because of poor families. It is because public education is an organization that does not hold employees accountable for results. Jack Welch is one of our nation's foremost CEO's and the former leader of General Electric, an extremely successful large corporation. GE holds the philosophy that each employee needs to be evaluated on a regular basis. The top 20% of employees in an organization need to be rewarded, the bottom 10% need to be let go. This may sound harsh but this is the philosophy used in most successful businesses and corporations today. Those individuals who do not produce are encouraged to find work where they can be productive and successful. The basic problem with O'Connell and the education establishment's philosophy is that they blame children for the shortcomings of adults. They need to look at their own public education structure and the way it encourages mediocre performance.

When you do not reward high performing employees and at the same time treat them the same as the poor performers, you discourage excellence and professionalism. Human nature also plays into this. When those who produce results are treated the same as their non producing colleagues, they often lose their motivation.

Mr. O'Connell and those who agree with his philosophy are the problem in public education. Teachers' unions refuse to allow school boards to reward the top performing teachers financially. Then they make it difficult and sometimes impossible to let poor performing teachers go. When an employee is never rewarded for results but is only rewarded for time in the job, excellence is not the result.

I once heard a teacher claim she was an excellent teacher but her students were not capable of learning. My definition of an excellent teacher is one whose students learn.

When administrators are not accountable, they do not hold teachers accountable. When teachers are not held accountable, we get unprofessional and sometimes quirky programs that are foisted on children as creative teaching. One quirky idea was the "environmental cheeseburger." A teacher once spent a whole year in math class talking about the environmental impact of a cheeseburger. Test results at the end of the year proved that all the students in that math class went backwards rather than progress in that year. And yes, some administrators in that district praised this as creative teaching.

Our job in education should be preparing students for real life and to be successful as adults. This requires teaching the core subjects of math, science, history and English by teachers and administrators who are held accountable for the results.

Colonel Marshall, an Army evaluator, made several recommendations that were loudly criticized but later proved to be highly valuable to the military. His response to the criticism was insightful, "It is time to despair of an institution when those who serve it and profess to love it no longer challenge their own system, or become less critical than those who speak with the valor of ignorance." Mr. O'Connell, it is not the children who are not learning, it is you and the adults who profess to love public education who do not learn. Public education is not a jobs program for adults; it is an organization that should be educating our children.

The solution does not require spending money; it requires those paid to lead to hold the employees within our education system accountable for results with no more excuses - including you, Mr. O'Connell.


Jim Gibson
President Board of Trustees,
Vista Unified School District
JG@eNova.us

Law signed by Schwarzenegger responsible for female homecoming King.

According to the Associated Press, a few weeks ago, Cinthia Covarrubias, who is described as a "girl who sometimes goes by the name of Tony" and who "dresses as a man and acts like a man most of the time" was allowed by Fresno high school to run for homecoming King.

Cinthia, or Tony from time-to-time, was granted the right to demand that she (he?) be allowed to run for homecoming king. Governor Schwarzenegger signed legislation giving her (him?) that right.

This legislation (SB 1234) made it illegal to discriminate against a person based on that person's "gender identity and gender related appearance and behavior whether or not stereotypically associated with the person's assigned sex at birth." In other words, it is discrimination if you do not treat a woman who claims to be a man like a man. Unless of course the woman is feeling like a woman that day, in which case you have to treat her like a woman. I guess in Cinthia's case (or Tony depending on what date it is) you need to check each day to determine what name to call her.

The legislation that Governor Schwarzenegger signed was a result of Westminster School District refusing to give into demands by State Schools Superintendent Jack O'Connell that WSD's discrimination policy include perceived gender. Mr. O'Connell claimed that state law mandated such a policy. The School District said it didn't, and O'Connell backed off, apparently after realizing that there was no law requiring Westminster to redefine gender. A few months later, however, legislation was passed that clearly defines discrimination as the failure to treat someone in conformity with their perceived gender.

I was WSD's attorney while they were challenging O'Connell on this issue. I was soundly criticized when I wrote an opinion article for the Orange County Register explaining that it would be illegal to prevent a male teacher from teaching in high heals and a dress if it is illegal to discriminate against a person based on their perception of their gender. The trustees at the time were pummeled in the media for asking simple questions such as what bathroom a person who gets to choose their own gender would use, or whether a boy who claims to be a girl could demand to play on a girl's sports team.

Unfortunately, a girl who likes to dress like a boy, but not always, demanding the right to run for homecoming king pretty much proves that these concerns were well founded.

Mark W. Bucher, Esq.

TEACHER APPRECIATION WEEK & CLASSIFIED EMPLOYEE WEEK

John Briscoe, elected Trustee to the Ocean View School Board, provided a written statement of his enthusiastic support of Teacher Appreciation Week and Classified Employee Week at the specially scheduled meeting held on May 4, 2007. When the original motion was considered, Trustee Briscoe requested the Board recognize ALL teachers including private and home school instructors. He reminded the Board that recent demographic data suggested only 75% of children attend OVSD public schools. One in four children have a teacher that is not a government employee. The Board refused to expand the resolution forcing a negative vote. Classified employee recognition was a separate resolution rolled into a single agenda item, but was never in contention.

There are astounding trends afoot in public education. A measure of how well schools serve their constituents can be measured by the percent of children that actually enroll in the public schools. While the Ocean View School District participation rate of 75% is surprising, Trustee Briscoe was shocked to discover the Huntington Beach City School District only enrolls 63% of total children aged 5 to 14. And the HBCSD is projecting this to decrease further to only 59% in 2011! Yes, over FORTY PERCENT of children in the HBSCD are projected to be schooled elsewhere. If these trends continue there will be mass school closings and long drives to the remaining few open public schools.

We can do better! Trustee Briscoe has proposed school districts take an immediate look at what their parents really want and deliver those services. The objective is simple: provide curriculum so compelling that parents wait in line to enroll their children! Lessons can be gleaned from nearby public and private schools. These actions might include total campus security with staff and child ID badges and controlled campus access. Most private schools require standard clothing and provide a rigorous physical education that monitors improvement over multiple years. Private schools publish Internet lesson plans, semester syllabi, and grades for parents to track student progress; and children are taught how to take class lecture notes. These are just a few of the many aspects missing from public schools that drive parents to private and home schools. There is much to be done to bring back the increasing tide of parents leaving public schooling.

My written statement provided to the OVSD School Board Meeting is attached HERE.


The opinions herein are the sole responsibility of John Briscoe and do not reflect the views of any school board. By John Briscoe, Elected Trustee Board Member of the Ocean View School District. You may contact John Briscoe at John@Crestwave, or phone: 714.903.8774. His web site is: www.Vote4Briscoe.com

When Should a Child Start School? Let The Parents Decide.

Last year the voters turned down Proposition 82 - a tax increase to fund pre-school being offered in the public school system. This year the state government is projecting that its revenues will fall far short of prior predictions and the state's current budget needs. Some politicians in Sacramento think the best response to these two facts is to introduce legislation to lower the compulsory age for a child to enter the education system - a decision that would go against the people's decision of last June 2006 and increase the state's education budget by millions (likely by billions) at a time when we can least afford it. That bill is AB 1236 which would lower the age a child starts school from six to five.

A competing bill is AB 683 which would change the birthday for a child to be required to enter school from December 1st to September 1st - effectively raising the age a child is required to be before he/she enters the school system. AB 683 is sound public policy and should be supported. It recognizes that not all five year old children are ready to enter the school system. Not all children are the same developmentally and some may need more time before they can successfully enter the formal education system. This is especially true as kindergarten and 1st grade are becoming more challenging academically. In addition, if a child is "held back" a grade because they entered the system to quickly, the public education system (if the child is in the public school) must pay for another year of that child's education.

AB 1236 should be opposed as bad public and fiscal policy while AB 683 should be supported as good fiscally and it respects the rights and decision making of parents (with the help and advise of teachers and school administrators).

Attached are two letters - one in opposition to AB 1236 and one in support of AB 683. I urge you to send each one to your state assembly person, state senator and to the Governor.


Craig P. Alexander, Esq.
Education Alliance Member


Letter in opposition to AB 1236:
No%20on%20AB%201236.doc


Letter is support of AB 683:
Yes%20on%20AB%20683.doc

HPV Vaccination - Who Should Decide Parents or Government Bureaucrats?

We have all read about Texas Governor Rick Perry's decision to require all female students entering Junior High School to have the HPV vaccination which will prevent a young lady from contracting cervical cancer following sexual activity (the Texas legislature has overturned that decision). Because HPV is contracted through sexual activity (which can result in cervical cancer) it is an "STD" or sexually transmitted disease. It is NOT a disease a young woman can receive from simply being in the same area as an infected person. Thus the only way to receive this STD is by sexual activity or via a blood transfusion - and donated blood is screened for any signs of disease prior to it being released into the blood supplies.

Of course the controversy here is that the government is mandating that young female students, some as young as 12 or 13, are being required to receive a vaccination for a disease that they can only get via sexual activity. No parental impute required or wanted please! Never mind that the young lady may not be sexually active and may (shock, shock!) be waiting until marriage before becoming sexually active! Also never mind that there is evidence that some vaccinations may have harmful side effects. The HOV vaccine is relatively new and all of its long term affects are not yet known.

The controversy has become so intense that the HPV vaccine's maker Merick stopped all lobbying activity trying to have other legislatures around the country to make rules similar to Gov. Perry's.

Not wanting to be left behind with their command and control method of governing local schools, our state legislature has gotten into the act via AB 16. At first AB 16 would have required the HPV vaccine to be administered before a young lady would be allowed to enter Jr. High. It has now been amended to give an unelected bureaucrat the ability to order what vaccines a child must receive (and when they must be received) prior to him/her being allowed into school. Thus, without any hearings or public impute, this unelected official can simply order that children receive this and any other vaccine.

The decision to have a child receive a vaccination should be that of parents and medical health care professionals (and the child when he/she is old enough) especially regarding a vaccine to prevent cervical cancer due to sexual activity. It is bad enough that the legislature was considering mandating the HPV vaccination. But to pass this decision off to a bureaucrat where no public hearings or impute from the community is received is even worse. The legislature should simply drop its entry into this arena or at the very least, keep the authority to order vaccinations within the legislature where the politicians will be accountable to the people for their votes.

Attached is a sample letter to oppose AB 16. I recommend you download it, amend it as you deem necessary and send it to your assembly person, state senator and the Governor.

Craig P. Alexander, Esq.
Education Alliance Member

Letter in opposition to AB 16:
No%20on%20AB%2016.doc

SB 564 Expanded School Based Health Clinics - Another Top Down Mandate from Sacramento

Two of the pillars of The Education Alliance are local control by local school boards and parental rights which should be respected by school authorities and the state. SB 564 is another example of proposed legislation from Sacramento that violates these pillars - at the taxpayer's expense.

SB 564 would increase the tax outlay and provide for the expansion of school based health clinics. Its stated goal is for the schools to be a place for children to have maximum access to health care of all types including physical examinations, immunizations, "reproductive health services" (i.e. abortions), basic laboratory tests and even mental health services - all apparently without any input from or the permission of parents. SB 564 includes the planning and implementation of methods to transport students from the schools to health care providers if the school based clinic does not provide that service the on site clinic determines the child needs. Of course picking up the tab for this expansion into health care is the California taxpayer.

In reviewing the latest version of the bill, I did not see anything in the bill that provided that parents would have any impute into the schools providing these health care services or that the parents would even be notified when their child was given these "services."

At a time when there is no serious debate that our public school system in California is failing to teach students even basics such as reading and writing and studies have concluded that throwing more money at the school system will not solve these problems, we do not need to sidetrack our school district boards, administrators and teachers with providing for their student's health care - a function much more suited and appropriate for parents.

In addition, our state's finances are once again suffering from "bloated budget syndrome" - a disease that free spending politicians in Sacramento and Washington, D.C. have caused. The cure for this disease is a fiscal diet, not passing mandates that force our schools (at taxpayer expense) into the health care business and disrespects parental rights.

I urge you to contact your State Assembly person, State Senator and the Governor and express your opposition to SB 564 and to ask your friends to do so as well (refer them to this web site!).

Craig P. Alexander, Esq.
Education Alliance Member

The Anti-Spanking Bill (AB 755) - An Update; Amended But Still Bad Public Policy

On April 24, 2007 AB 755 received its first policy committee hearing. It passed on a party line vote but with an important amendment. The "rebuttable presumption" language that a parent was presumed to been unjustified in giving his / her child a spanking with a switch or other similar object was removed.

While this amendment is good, the bill is still based on flawed public policy. The state government has no business telling parents that a time honored method of disciplining children will now be illegal. Millions of parents in California use spanking as a method to reinforce to their child proper behavior and to protect them from harm (example: A child may not understand intellectually not to run out into the street due to the dangers of being run over by an automobile. However, that same two year old will likely associate running out into the street with a prior instance of pain from a spanking curbing the temptation to "go exploring" in the street). Not all parents or child rearing experts agree that spanking is a proper method of child rearing. But there is no cry for the banning of spanking coming from the state's District Attorneys claiming that child abuse can not be controlled without the wholesale banning of spanking, even by parents that would never use a spanking to abuse their child.

No one condones child abuse and there are laws on the books now that make child abuse by a parent or anyone else a serious crime. Unfortunately AB 755 is the proverbial "throwing the baby out with the bath water" with a wholesale and unnecessary banning of a method of child rearing and discipline that has been in existence since men and women have first had children. AB 755 is another example of the state legislature's current tendency to pass laws that reach far into the family life of Californians in an improper and destructive way by not respecting parental rights.

I encourage you to write to your State Assembly person and State Senator (with a copy to the Governor) urging them to oppose this bill. Attached is a sample letter you can download, amend if you desire and mail out.

Craig P. Alexander, Esq.
Education Alliance Member


No%20on%20AB%20755.doc