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Educators: Ending ‘tenure’ no magic bullet By Dave Boyce Almanac Staff Writer
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court decision last week to throw out state teacher tenure rules may lead people to think that this is the solution for providing quality education for all students, a shortsighted view in the opinion of local educators. A Los Angeles Superior Court judge on June 10 decided that tenure rules, which allow teachers to get lifetime job protection after just 18 months, were unconstitutional because they allow ineffective teachers to stay
in the system, thereby depriving equal access to a quality public education for all students. “I think some people believe that if you get rid of tenure, you’ve solved the problem and quality (of education) will go up,” said Deborah Stipek, dean of the school of education at Stanford University. The problems are elsewhere, she said, in teachers’ lack of social status and paychecks that don’t reflect their value to the community. Society needs to invest in the best and brightest, train them well and provide on-the-job support, she said.
“Tenure is a red herring,” Woodside High School English teacher Tony Mueller said is an email. “Rather than going after labor unions and worker’s rights, ‘reformers’ should confront the real problems with our education system: gross inequity in funding based on geography, the drastic cuts in social spending for the poor, the obscenely small amount of money spent per pupil in California, the constant attack on teachers from those intent on privatizing the system, and inherent American anti-intellectualism that is suspicious of science, poetry,
foreign languages, and history.” The lawsuit
Nine public school students represented by Students Matter, a nonprofit with a mail-drop in Menlo Park and founded by Atherton resident and Silicon Valley entrepreneur David Welch, sued the state and the state Department of Education in May 2012, alleging “outdated state laws that prevent the recruitment, support and retention of effective teachers.” The statutes in question — on tenure, dismissal and last-infirst-out teacher-layoff policies
— were declared unconstitutional in a June 10 decision by Judge Rolf M. Treu of Los Angeles County Superior Court. Judge Treu suspended the decision pending an appeal by the state. The lawsuit asserted that teachers play a crucial role in the lifetime achievements of their students, and that ineffective teachers can have a dramatically negative impact. Lawyers for the students claimed that such teachers are “disproportionately situated in schools serving predominantly See EDUCATORS, page 14
Sheriff changes policy on cooperating with immigration agents By Dave Boyce Almanac Staff Writer
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choing decisions made by local law enforcement agencies around the state and across the country, the Sheriff ’s Office in San Mateo County recently changed its policy with respect to cooperating with federal immigration agents. Agents from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have been routinely asking local authorities to temporarily detain arrested immigrants whom agents find of interest. As of May 23, immigrants eligible for release after being arrested will be released, despite ICE requests to detain them, unless there are “significant public safety concerns” about the person arrested, in which case the executive staff in the Sheriff’s Office has to approve the detention. Twenty-four other California counties have made similar policy changes, according to a list compiled by Jennie Pasquarella, an attorney with the Southern California branch of the American Civil Liberties Union. There is a state context: Effective Jan. 1, the Trust Act, authored by Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, and signed by Gov. Jerry Brown in October 2013, sets minimum standards for not cooperating with ICE. The Trust Act recommends honoring ICE detention requests if the immigrant has a criminal record of being convicted of a
serious or violent felony, or a felony punishable by imprisonment by the state, or a misdemeanor that can also be punished as a felony. ICE did not respond to an interview request. According to the ICE website, the Obama administration has set “clear and commonsense priorities for immigration enforcement focused on identifying and removing those aliens with criminal convictions.” ICE claims a total of 368,644 “removals” for the 2013 fiscal year, including 133,551 people apprehended away from the borders, 82 percent of whom had criminal records. The new policy at the San Mateo County Sheriff’s Office sets aside the “criminal record” standard and simplifies the matter to detaining immigrants who represent a “significant public safety concern,” adding that these instances are expected to be the “rare exception.” ‘Secure communities’
ICE makes its detainment requests through its Secure Communities program, which was launched in 2008 and, by January 2013, had reached “full implementation,” including all law enforcement jurisdictions in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and five U.S. territories, according to the ICE website.
Photo by Michelle Le/The Almanac
Helen Seely answers questions about her time in Uganda after her presentation to third-graders at Laurel School.
Building a health center in Uganda By Renee Batti Almanac News Editor
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n the era of big-buck philanthropy in which sixfigure donations get you a seat at the table and eight figures will mean your name’s on the building, a $1,300 check almost doesn’t seem worth mentioning. Unless the money was raised, a few coins at a time, by third-graders over a two-week period. Such is the case with thirdgraders at Laurel School, who saved their allowances, worked around the house, and staffed lemonade stands to contribute to a $20,000 fund for the con-
struction of a health center in Uganda. Leading the effort was former Laurel School and MenloAtherton High School student Helen Seely, who through the nonprofit Mama Hope spent four months this year in Budondo, Uganda, to help residents there realize their dream of establishing a health center in the community. The appeal to third-graders at the K-3 school in Atherton was a natural: Helen’s mother, Priscilla Seely, teaches one of the six third-grade classes there. All six classes participated, which adds up to about
120 students, the elder Ms. Seely said. Helen Seely visited the campus recently, equipped with a PowerPoint program to show the students “the progress you helped make — the impact that you had ... and the lives that you helped change” in the tiny African village. Others were inspired to support the $20,000 fundraising effort after hearing about the third-graders’ contribution “because people were so inspired by your dedication,” she told them during the mornSee BUILDING, page 8
See IMMIGRATION, page 8
June 18, 2014 N TheAlmanacOnline.com N The Almanac N 5