Special Feature

+| SPECIAL FEATURE Sum Total

BY TOM FRANCISKOVICH

Before I get into this article, I would like to make a full disclosure: Two of my three kids go to Bishop’s Peak Elementary, my youngest will soon, but he is still in preschool. Bishop’s Peak is our neighborhood school and we decided to live where we do specifically because of the school. We had done our research before moving to town and Bishop’s Peak, as we learned, was a highly respected school. And, when we found out that Teach School, an optional accelerated learning program for 4th – 6th graders, was also on campus, it was icing on the cake. Our daughter, who is our oldest child, is now in the fourth grade. Last year, when she was eight-years-old, we had to make a decision about whether or not she would continue to attend Bishop’s Peak or move over to Teach where many of her friends had applied. I will admit that the decision was not free of conflict and, ultimately, we supported our daughter’s choice, which was to remain at Bishop’s Peak. In the spirit of this full disclosure, I will share that going through that process felt strange and arbitrary and unsettling—as kids who had been in class together since kindergarten were asked to pledge their allegiance to one school or another. While my wife and I both strongly support the notion of accelerated learning— we benefitted personally as childen growing up in the G.A.T.E. (gifted and talented education) program—it appears that the way we are addressing the needs of our students can certainly be improved. So, when the controversy surrounding Teach School erupted recently, I decided to look into it further. While I care deeply about the outcome for my kids and their friends who share a campus, I do not have a prescription for the cure and am not advocating one particular outcome or another. I, like you, and all of the people who have shared their thoughts for this article, want the best possible result for everyone concerned. Hopefully, the following will help you come to your own conclusions…

The month of August is always a nervous time for administrators at the San Luis Coastal Unified School District. Since the district has an open enrollment policy, any student can transfer to any school with few limitations. Students—as is the case with most other school districts nationwide—are not required to attend their neighborhood school. And, at San Luis Coastal, there is no destination more popular for local 4th graders than Teach School. Dan Block, the much-lauded principal of both Bishop’s Peak and Teach Elementary Schools, settled into his desk early one August morning to catch up on some work. The school year was still a few weeks away, so the halls of the shared campus were quiet. Nothing else was calling for his attention, except for the blinking cursor on his spreadsheet. But as Block, who resembles NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, clicked the “Sum” button he was convinced that the numbers were wrong. “I kept looking at the bottom line, and it was showing growth of 50 kids for Bishop’s Peak alone,” he explains. “The growth rate was alarming and it was not going to be sustainable.”

Much like Commissioner Goodell, who is dealing with major problems concerning concussions and player safety, Principal Block had a major problem of his own. In some ways, he was becoming a victim of his own success, as Bishop’s Peak and Teach have become two of the most desirable schools to transfer into via the district’s open enrollment process. But, there were other dynamics at play. Recently, there had been a lot more young families moving into the neighborhood around the campus, making Bishop’s Peak their default destination for elementary school. It appears, in part, that Cal Poly’s efforts to bring more students to live back on campus has created more opportunities for local families to buy or rent homes in the neighborhood that sits not far from the college. Whatever the case, there were more neighborhood kids feeding into Bishop’s Peak than had been expected. The campus that houses both Bishop’s Peak and Teach School was determined by a study commissioned in 2005 to have a maximum capacity of 525 students. The final number at the bottom of Block’s screen read “522.” Although it would take some doing, he figured he could make it work this school year, but if the trend continued there would be what he characterized in his letter to the school board as “an enrollment crisis” next year. Block, after double and triple checking the numbers on his screen, took a deep breath, picked up the phone and dialed Superintendent Eric Prater down at the district office.

It is no secret that Prater is an unabashed supporter of neighborhood schools, who has since the beginning of his tenure been uncomfortable with the concept of Teach School—at least in the form it existed when he took over almost 3 years ago—citing concerns of fairness having to do with access and equality. So, when Block began explaining the situation, he found a sympathetic audience on the other end of the line. Prater, a middleaged Clark Kent look-a-like, is known by those who work with him for his bounding energy and unshakable optimism, saw the impending enrollment crisis as an opportunity. “Dan and I talked it over and decided to look at this in a positive way, thinking that some real good could come out of it,” reveals Prater. “Perhaps something that could have a wider impact throughout the district.”

The result of the conversation was that Block would be hosting a series of public forums on campus to alert stakeholders—parents, teachers, neighbors—of the impending enrollment crisis and to get input for possible solutions.

This revelation has caused some parents to ask the question: “If the classroom programs at Teach are so effective, why aren’t they being implemented district-wide? ”

There is not much more important to parents than their child’s education. And with the shared campus of San Luis Coastal Unified’s Bishop’s Peak and Teach Elementary bursting at the seams, the topic has garnered a lot of attention lately, and for good reason…

Things went well at first and since the campus, which happens to be the smallest one in the district, was already bursting at the seams with its current headcount, no one was surprised to hear the news. Most took it in stride and a cooperative, collegial dialogue ensued. Thoughtful suggestions were made, despite the palpable anxiety hanging overhead. But, that all changed one chilly October evening when it became clear that, in the face of an $8 million deficit, there were not going to be any easy answers. Many of the Teach School parents realized that the most attractive option to the cash-strapped district might, in fact, be to close the school. In that moment the tone and tenor of those meetings went from calm, rational question and answer sessions to a British Parliament-style outpouring of objection, and a “Save Teach School” movement was born.

When Sputnik was taking its first victory lap around the planet, American lawmakers realized that we had lost significant ground to the Soviets and that our kids were going to have to become a lot smarter to keep up. In 1957 the Cold War was raging and any advantage gained by our communist antagonists was dealt with swiftly and immediately. So, the counterpunch to this particular issue was handled by Congress, who passed the National Defense Education Act (NDEA), which allocated $1 billion (in those days this was an unprecedented expenditure) to bolster science, math, and technology in public education. The goal, though not expressly stated, was to create our own generation of rocket scientists who would be smarter than our commie foes. The plan worked as expected and our kids got smarter, but, as it turns out, you only need so many really smart scientists to build an ICBM (intercontinental ballistic missile). After that, the United States turned its attention away from accelerated learning and toward the arms race. Who cares how smart we are? As long as we have more nukes than the other guy, we’re good. By 1983, the fact that we had taken our eye off the ball was beginning to show. And an eighteen-month-long study called “A Nation at Risk” was published showing that, not only had our students fallen behind the Soviets, they had also fallen behind most of the other developed countries—even kids in places like Sweden were outperforming our children. Around this same time, especially in California, a program called G.A.T.E. was introduced as a supplement to standard classroom curriculum. Children tested into the program and were given more challenging work to stretch them academically while also meeting the needs of their mainstream friends. In 1980, San Luis Obispo was already ahead of the curve having taken G.A.T.E. to its next logical conclusion, as a group of parents persuaded the school board to create an entire standalone optional accelerated learning program for 4th, 5th, and 6th graders at the “Old Pacheco” campus on Grand Avenue. By 1987, the program had grown to the point where it needed more space, so it was moved to the current Pacheco School location and five years later assumed the name “Charles E. Teach School Alternative Program.” In 1993 the school board came to the conclusion that describing the program as “alternative” was “creating confusion and/or a sense of elitism among certain members in the community,” so they changed the name to “Charles E. Teach School.” Attendance at Teach peaked in 2001 with around 175 students then declined throughout the decade until 2011 when it enjoyed a resurgence of popularity. Today, Teach is not technically considered a G.A.T.E. program, as enrollment is not based on aptitude, however, it is designed for accelerated learning.

One does not have to look far—the other end of Foothill Boulevard, actually—to find another highly successful education institution with a close kinship to Teach: Cal Poly. With historical roots as a hands-on technical school, Cal Poly has rocketed to the top of the many “Best Colleges” lists that are published each year mostly by focusing on one relatively simple concept: “learn by doing.” Although Teach began its existence as a collection of G.A.T.E. kids who took on an advanced curriculum, the program has evolved into what it is today by embracing that same “learn by doing” philosophy, which in academic circles is referred to as “constructivism.” This form of learning,

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Attendance at Teach dropped to just 66 students during the 2006/2007 school year. This year it’s at 156. And it would have been a lot more if it weren’t for the lottery.

which has its theoretical underpinnings with Maria Montessori, manifests itself at Teach with heavy parental involvement, hands-on learning, including some extraordinary field trips. For example, the fourth graders at Teach go to space camp for three days, which contrasts with their Bishop’s Peak counterparts who take a day trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. And, aside from the G.A.T.E. students, who commonly have a lot of support from academically inclined parents at home, some of the greatest beneficiaries of the Teach School program have been kids that were struggling in a traditional classroom setting and may have “slipped through the cracks” at other elementary schools. The classroom environment, with its highly interactive curriculum, has been able to reach many of those students who are now thriving academically. In Principal Block’s report to the school board outlining the impending enrollment crisis, he included a stack of letters from Teach parents, many of whom detailed this phenomenon claiming that their child is thriving at Teach where they had not elsewhere. This revelation has caused some parents to ask the question: “If the classroom programs at Teach are so effective, why aren’t they being implemented district-wide?” As the school board held public forums recently to openly discuss the fate of Teach School, it became clear that they had run head-long into a buzz saw of parent opposition. Yet, equally energized, but much less vocal, were the neighbors living in the homes on Craig Way and Jaycee Drive which provide the narrow passage to idling cars during pick-up and drop-off. They described being blocked in their driveways by distracted, multi-tasking soccer moms flying around blind corners in 6,000 pound SUV’s. The Bishop’s Peak contingent, for the most part, focused on the anxiety caused by splitting up the fourth graders (last year 37% of Teach School was fed by Bishop’s Peak transfers, making it, by far, the largest source of students), as well as the impact of having to give up campus resources to Teach. There is also a complaint that is not often vocalized—one that popped up in the 90’s, but is still alive today— that Teach school carries a certain elitism that harms the morale on campus, which can undeniably be the perception to a nine-year-old kid when their neighborhood friends are away at space camp while they are on a bus heading north to look at jelly fish. No one knows for certain the fate of Teach School. For now the school board has elected to punt—having decided to keep the status quo for the next school year, albeit capping the number of new enrollees. This school year, for the first time, admission was limited by lottery—in other words, random chance. Going forward, however, it is likely that Teach’s future will be determined by a recently convened advisory committee, which has been comprised of 17 locals who are not affiliated with the school board. Their findings are expected to be shared in November. The simple solution, of course, would be to move Teach elsewhere. Many of the letters submitted by Teach parents suggest the Old Pacheco School location. There’s only one problem with this: the charter schools currently renting the location from the district are generating $400,000 per year in revenue. And during a time when deficits are in the $6 - $8 million range, that is significant. Not to mention the cost for a separate principal, janitors, and so on. As Block says, “The solutions are easy. They just all require money, and a lot of it.” Another popular proposed option is to add portable classrooms to the current campus. The cost to do that, even if they did somehow get permission, as well as a blessing from the neighbors, to exceed the 525 student enrollment cap, is a cool million. Despite the deficits, despite the lack of options, you get the feeling from talking with Prater, who plainly states, “This whole matter isn’t going to go away,” that he is just a phone booth visit away from transforming into Superman and solving this issue with a single bound. In fact, he takes it one step further, as he explained during a reflective conversation to critique his own handling of the “Save Teach” movement, that “despite some of the emotions, I do believe we’re going to be a better district because of it.” Prater, who readily admits to “mistakes of communication” is quick to point out that he is the superintendent of all the schools in the district and wants the “most good for the most kids.” He remains hopeful that the success Teach has had over the years can be spread district-wide—perhaps adopting a similar program in each of the neighborhood schools— enticing parents to keep their children at the school down the street from where they live, thereby making it and their own neighborhood better and stronger. Yet, while in theory it sounds great, there’s just one thing—they don’t make phone booths anymore. SLO LIFE