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Matthew Carrington died more than five years ago, but people continue to remember him, his story and Matt’s Law.

Carrington died Feb. 2, 2005, from water intoxication during a hazing ritual in the basement of the Chi Tau house, an unrecognized fraternity at Chico State.

As a result of his death, Carrington’s mother, Debbie Smith, decided to create a law that would protect students from being hazed, she said.

Background

It didn’t take long after Carrington’s death for Smith to come up with the idea for Matt’s Law, she said.

Carrington died on a Wednesday and by Thursday evening “a light went off” and she knew there needed to be a law, Smith said. By Saturday she had spoken to an attorney.

“There’s a problem with the way the laws are written,” she said.

However, she did not do anything until her attorney, Alex Grab, brought up the idea of implementing a hazing law sometime in June, Smith said. Soon after talking about it, they began to move forward.

One of the advocates for Matt’s Law was Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey.

Carrington’s case had a big impact on Ramsey, because he had a friend die from hazing, he said.

Ramsey served as a resource for Sen. Tom Torlakson, who introduced Senate Bill 1454 or Matt’s Law as it is more commonly known, he said.

After passing by the Senate and Assembly, the bill was signed by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger Sept. 29, 2006.

Matt’s Law moved hazing from the Education Code to the Penal Code and people could be charged with a felony if someone is seriously injured, according to the bill. It also allows for a person to bring a civil action lawsuit against individuals and organizations.

“It’s not a minor offense that will get you suspended from school,” Ramsey said.

Offenders could end up in prison, he said.

Matt’s Law has been applied in two cases since it was passed.

Cases tried under Matt’s Law

The first case to be tried under Matt’s Law involved Chico State’s Beta Theta Pi fraternity, according to an article by the Chico News & Review. Chico State students Christopher Bizot, Michael Murphy and Butte College student Matthew Krupp, were accused of hazing pledges just seven blocks from where Carrington died.

Although the pledges involved admit to being submerged in water, they said they never feared for their lives and the jury acquitted the three members of the misdemeanor charges, according to the television station KHSL’s Web site.

The most recent case came after the death of Carson Starkey, a Cal Poly San Luis Obispo student.

Starkey, 18, died Dec. 2, 2008, after a hazing ritual by members of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity, according to a press release by the San Luis Obispo Police Department. He was instructed to consume a large amount of alcohol in one and a half hours.

Sometime during the ritual, Starkey became unresponsive and Sigma Alpha Epsilon members decided to drive him to a hospital, police said. They assumed he would be fine after he vomited in the car and turned back. More than four hours later, Starkey was found unresponsive by a Sigma Alpha Epsilon member and was pronounced dead at Sierra Vista Regional Medical Center.

Starkey died of respiratory arrest due to alcohol poisoning, police said. Analysis of Carson’s blood, vitreous humor and urine revealed a blood alcohol content ranging from .39 to .45 percent.

The case, which is still ongoing, was filed Sept. 22, 2009, to coincide with the beginning of the school year to allow incoming students to be aware of what happened, said Ivo Labar, a lawyer representing the Starkeys who helped draft Matt's Law.

Haithem Ibrahim and Zachary Ellis are being charged with felony hazing causing death and misdemeanor furnishing of alcohol to a minor causing death, according to an article by The Mustang Daily. Fraternity members Adam Marszel and Russell Taylor pled not guilty to both charges.

Nine former members of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, the national Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity and the Sigma Alpha Epsilon chapter at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo are being sued for wrongful death by Starkey’s parents, according to The Mustang Daily. However, a date for the trial will not be set until March 18, to avoid conflict with the criminal trial, which is ongoing.

The outcome

Despite wide support from the community, there are still questions about how effective Matt’s Law is and what its purpose is.

Before the first case under Matt’s Law, Richard Ek, then-retired journalism professor, said the case against members of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity would be a waste of time and money and would trivialize Matt’s Law, according to the Chico News & Review. After the trial, a member of the jury agreed with him.

Greek Adviser Larry Bassow credits a revamp after Carrington’s death by administration and Greek advisers for the turnaround at Chico State, not Matt’s Law, he said.

“The D.A. tried one case and failed,” Bassow said. “I don’t know, has it reduced hazing?”

However, Ramsey thinks it has made some difference, he said.

Like any new law, there will be a decrease in incidents, Ramsey said. From what he has heard, there has been a downturn in hazing cases.

Initially, when Smith thought about creating Matt’s Law, she didn’t want there to be a need to use it, she said. It was more so students would be deterred from hazing because it is illegal and they would be held accountable.

With the recent Starkey case, Smith thinks the purpose of Matt’s Law was unsuccessful, she said.

“It makes me sad and makes me feel like we failed,” Smith said. “The whole idea is for them to get a clue.”

The Starkey case will be the first time Matt’s Law is being used in a felony situation, she said.

The effect of Matt's Law on the Greek System in Chico
Matt’s Law hasn’t had much of an impact at Chico State, Bassow said. It was the death of Carrington that had the impact on the Greek community.

“We supported Matt’s Law, but we revamped way before Matt’s Law,” he said.

After Carrington’s death, there was a call for a review of the Greek system by President Paul Zingg, according to the Greek System Review Task Force Report. From 2004 to 2005, a traffic fatality after a fraternity event, the near-death alcohol poisoning of a fraternity pledge, the death of Carrington and the filming of a pornographic movie at a fraternity house left Zingg with little choice but to issue an ultimatum to the Greek system and charge four task forces with making recommendations for change.

Zingg addressed about 1,000 students April 12, 2005, to tell them about changes that needed to be made, according to the report. If they did not live up to the standards, they would not be welcome at Chico State.

Since then, there has been a turnaround and Greeks are held accountable for any misconduct, Bassow said.

The hope is that students know what to do because it’s the right thing to do, not because they fear punishment, he said.

“If we had our stuff together then Matt’s Law shouldn’t be an issue, that’s my hope,” Bassow said. “If that’s not the case, then there’s Matt’s Law.”

Unaware of Matt’s Law, sophomore Kevin Mandrup, a Theta Chi member, thinks Greeks at Chico State are ahead of the rest, he said. They have done several leadership conferences and have learned about proper ways of pledging.

“I don’t know exactly what they did five years ago,” Mandrup said. “But now there’s nothing near to what it was like.”

State Assembly Member Tom Torlakson took a break from the election on Tuesday to visit Marylin Avenue Elementary School in Livermore. “This is a good way to spend Election Day, seeing something inspirational,” he said. “This visit reinforces what I’ve known for some time—how well targeted resources can help a school.”

Torlakson, a Democrat representing the 11th District, is serving his third and final term in the California State Assembly. He previously served two terms in the State Senate and is now running for State Superintendent of Public Instruction.

For his compaign manager Gloria Omania, the visit was a homecoming and a reunion. She attended Marylin Avenue as a child. Her sixth grade teacher Jim Kashiwamura, or “Mr. K” as she knew him, stopped by the school to say hello.

Torlakson and Omania toured the school with principal Jeff Keller, Livermore School Board president Stu Gary, superintendent Kelly Bowers, and several staff members. A highlight of the visit was the staff room, which is covered wall to wall with graphs and charts of assessment results and student achievement. Keller explained some recent successes, like the fact that second graders, on average, made 15 months worth of progress in their reading ability over the course of the 9-month school year.

Torlakson wanted to visit Marylin Avenue because over the past three years, the school has received $850,000 in funding from the Quality Education Investment Act (QEIA), which Torlakson authored in 2006. The legislation (Senate Bill 1133) was the result of a lawsuit settlement over State education funding.

“I’ve been sharing the Marylin Avenue story with many people. This is what we mean by reform that works,” he said. “What I’ve learned from visiting Marylin and other schools receiving QEIA funds, is that smaller class sizes really do enable differentiated learning.”

Marylin uses the QEIA money to lower class sizes, hire new staff, and provide professional development. “The extra professional development time was critical,” said Keller. “Our teachers had to learn how to drive data and prepare many kinds of assessments. We were able to send our teachers to several conferences that really helped us change the culture at the school.”

Keller also used the QEIA money to increase Marylin’s second science specialist’s hours from approximately 30% to full-time. With two science specialists, science instruction does not interrupt the literacy block that happens during the first two hours of each school day. During the literacy block, the science specialists assist with reading intervention.

Marylin has made impressive academic gains. In the 2009 Academic Performance Index (API), Marylin raised its score by 40 points, from 744 to 784. The school was one of about 50 statewide to emerge from Program Improvement (PI), from nearly 3,000 schools in PI. Over a three-year period, Marylin gained 117 points on the API, making it one of the top schools in the state in terms of point gain.

Keller is confident that this year the school will pass 800, the target for all schools in the state. “We will gain 30 to 60 points on the API when the results come out in August,” said Keller. “I know this because we’ve been measuring our students all year.”

Keller and Gary also talked about how Marylin has benefitted from strong community support. A community outreach worker, funded by the United Way and City of Livermore, has helped parents become more involved in their children’s education. The school contains a food pantry. In addition, Open Heart Kitchen provides weekend meals for children. The Rotarian Foundation of Livermore’s mobile health unit pays regular visits to the school to ensure that students receive preventative medical and dental care.

Torlakson described Marylin as a model school, both for its academic success and the level of neighborhood, city, and community involvement. Marylin’s small class sizes and extra resources are a rarity among public schools.

“We have to turn around what is happening to education in this state,” he said. “I’m convinced I’ll be able to help the legislature see its way back to adding money to education instead of cutting and to give more local control by changing the threshold for passage of a parcel tax to a simple majority.”

The race for state schools chief in California will extend to the state's general election in November, after none of the three leading candidates captured a simple majority to claim the nonpartisan office in Tuesday's primary.

As of early this morning, with 99 percent of the state's precincts reporting, retired superintendent Larry Aceves led the pack of three with 18.8 percent of the votes, followed by state assemblyman Tom Torlakson with 18.1 percent, and state Sen. Gloria Romero with 17.2 percent. Those are some very tight results.

If those numbers hold, then Mr. Aceves and Mr. Torlakson will face off on the November ballot—not the result that most close watchers of this race were expecting.

That Mr. Aceves, who has never before run for public office, emerged as the leading vote-getter was somewhat of a surprise, though he had substantial financial backing through an independent expenditure committee set up by the the Association of California School Administrators. For months, the campaign to replace outgoing state chief Jack O'Connell had been widely cast (including by this blogger) as a fight between the California Teachers Association, which backed Mr. Torlakson, and EdVoice, a non-profit education reform group which supported Ms. Romero. All along, Mr. Aceves pitched himself as outside the union-vs.-reformer battle and touted his decades-long experience as a district superintendent.

The CTA, along with the California Federation of Teachers, sank money into radio spots for Mr. Torlakson, while EdVoice, with money from wealthy supporters, bought television ads for Ms. Romero.

Of course, the race for the Republican gubernatorial U.S. Senate nominations overshadowed all others in California as two female, former corporate executives, sailed to easy victory over their rivals. Meg Whitman, former CEO of eBay, won decisively over Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner (a founder, by the way, of EdVoice). She will take on the Democratic state Attorney General Jerry Brown in November. Former Hewlett-Packard chief executive Carly Fiorina won the GOP Senate primary and will take on Democratic stalwart Barbara Boxer, who is seeking her fourth term.

In South Carolina, where the state chief's race is a partisan one, Democrat Frank Holleman, who was a top aide to former U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley, won his primary with 56 percent of the vote. Who he will face in November won't be decided until June 22 when the top two Republican vote-getters—a college president and a home-schooling mother—duke it out in a runoff.

Current South Carolina schools chief, Jim Rex, lost his bid to become the Democratic nominee for governor.

While the GOP primary for governor gobbles up most of the major media attention today in California, education policy geeks will be more interested in what goes down in the three-person contest for state schools chief. (Yes, there are a total of 12 candidates, but only three that are viable.)

This race, and it actually is a race, is viewed widely as a referendum on the influence of the California Teachers Association, the 325,000-member teachers' union that has, for decades, been one of the state's most formidable special interest groups. The CTA, along with the other statewide teachers' union, the California Federation of Teachers, has sunk close to $1.5 million into the campaign of Tom Torlakson, a former teacher and coach who is an assembly member from the San Francisco Bay Area. Interestingly, the union money has not been used to produce and buy television time for Torlakson. CTA invested in radio spots, which are cheaper than TV.

But the contest's outcome could just as easily be seen as a measure of the influence of wealthy philanthropists with very specific ideas about improving public schooling, folks by the name of Broad (as in Eli), Hastings (as in Reed of NetFlix fame), and Fisher (as in the family of the late Don Fisher, founder of The Gap and major benefactor of KIPP). Those heavy hitters, individually and through their reform organization, EdVoice, have poured about the same amount of dough into the campaign of Gloria Romero, a state senator from Los Angeles. Romero, who is pro-charter school, has also become one of the loudest state voices for the Obama administration's school-reform strategies, particularly its $4 billion Race to the Top sweepstakes. The EdVoice money bought Romero television exposure.

Then there's Larry Aceves, a retired district superintendent who was recruited to run by the Association of California School Administrators. Aceves' candidacy, buoyed by ACSA's independent expenditures, as well as important endorsements from the Los Angeles Times and the Contra Costa Times newspapers, is expected to keep Romero or Torlakson from scoring an outright victory today.

Which will likely mean even bigger spending from CTA and EdVoice for the November runoff. CTA will no doubt have to carefully balance its spending priorities for the general election, though. With state Attorney General Jerry Brown, a Democrat, expected to be facing billionaire GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman, every penny of labor union political action committee money will be in great demand from the Brown campaign. And while it really matters who sits in the state's schools chief's office, who becomes governor matters a whole lot more.

Tom Torlakson, veteran East Bay legislator and a leading candidate for state schools chief, totes a black book around the Capitol these days that someone might mistake for a Bible.

Instead, it's Diane Ravitch's latest work detailing her transformation from education adviser to George H.W. Bush and advocate for standardized curriculum, privatization and punitive accountability - to the nation's leading critic of those principals she once embraced.

To hear Torlakson talk about education, it is clear that he doesn't support much of what Ravitch calls "the market reforms" - probably he never did. But like Ravitch today, Torlakson questions the fundamental premise that many of these ‘reform' measures are based.

His vision is to return to methods and programs that have proved successful in the past, to give teachers and principals the resources they need and target spending. An example of this, he said in an interview last week, is how the state has used funds from the Quality Education Investment Act that Torlakson helped create out of a lawsuit with the governor in 2006 and resulted in sending $2.9 billion to low-performing schools.

"The idea was that we would commit the money for 7 years and see if extra funding made a difference," he said. "And not just to spend it on flashy new text books or computers or something, but to do team building and enhance the learning environment.

"There's a lot of success with the QEIA schools," he explained. "I think a full evaluation needs to be done. But, again the idea was to keep it for seven years and not, after three or four years of progress say, oh we'll take the money back because you're on the right track. You've got to sustain the investment."

Torlakson said he is doubtful the aggressive restructuring mandates on low performing schools being pushed by the Obama administration will work. He's even more suspicious that the emphasis on charter schools will lead to any widespread student improvement.

"There's a Stanford study that says that 16 percent of charters are outperforming public schools but 35 percent or so are underperforming and have sold a bill of goods to parents," he said. "They're not getting the education they would have got if they stayed at the public school. And then there's the whole bulk in the middle that are about the same as public schools but public schools have been undermined."

Torlakson said he disagrees with the notion that charters can help ‘scale up' the school system enough to help all students. "I think that's totally unrealistic," he said. "Many of these charter schools get extra funding from philanthropists and they get enough money to do after school programs, Saturday programs, intersession programs.

"I don't see how we could scale up that quickly to have the other 6 million students join the 300,000 students in charters schools," he said. "And not all of the 300,000 charter school students are all succeeding, there's only about 15 percent that are succeeding."

A big part of his agenda is finding ways to get public schools more money.

"At this point, we're going to have to get back what's lost, pay back the maintenance factor on a steady schedule and as quickly as possible," he said.

"Californians don't know we're 44th in the Nation in math scores," he explained. "They don't know we're 45th or 47th in language arts scores and science scores. They're appalled when they hear that. They get it and business increasingly gets it. They're not able to have the trained technicians and engineers, auto repair, craftsman - they're not coming out of our schools like they use to. I think the state is set for a calamity of this crisis."

One of his ideas is to once again allow a general fund tax increase to be approved on the local level by a simple majority. He's also talking about pulling together a statewide debate on a new tax for schools that might be brought forward two years from now.

"I believe I can pull together a team and the business community will find in itself interest the idea that investing in education if its guaranteed and doesn't cause money to go out the back door or when you put money through the front door that the public would be willing to vote YES for more taxes," Torlakson said.

A key issue that separates many in the education community these days is the question over merit pay for teachers - or even linking teacher evaluation with student test scores. Torlakson said he does not support the concept.

"I think it (test scores) could be in the mix but I don't think it should be a substantial part. If you are trying to build teams of teachers and administrators cooperating and focusing on the students in that school, in that neighborhood, and engage the parents, you have students learning at home as well," he said. "Having a model that pits teachers against each other or gets down to possible nitpicking over scores could be detrimental to this idea of team spirit I see works so well in the schools are that working so well. In terms of it being a major component I don't think so."

Reprint Permission of SIA/Cabinet Report

By Timm Herdt
Ventura County Star
January 22, 2010

SACRAMENTO — Delivering his final annual assessment of the state of public education in California before he is termed out of office next year, Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O’Connell on Friday praised the progress schools have made during challenging times and expressed hope that President Barack Obama’s Race to the Top education initiative will lay the groundwork for productive reforms.

“It’s a historic opportunity to make systemic changes that could fundamentally improve our educational delivery system,” O’Connell told an audience of education leaders from around the state.

O’Connell is entering his eighth and final year as the state’s top education official. To mark that occasion, his friend and mentor Willie Brown, the former Assembly speaker and former mayor of San Francisco, came to Sacramento to provide the introduction for O’Connell’s annual state of education speech.

Brown described O’Connell as an elected official who throughout his career has been “always working to build a consensus. That’s an unusual trait for a successful politician.”

O’Connell, 59, who spent two decades representing portions of Ventura County in the Legislature before being elected superintendent, has announced he will retire from politics when his term ends next January. Brown said he hopes the departure will be “a pause,” rather than an end.

“Without term limits, there is no question in my mind that Jack O’Connell would be eternally the superintendent of schools, and the state would be better off,” Brown said.

Befitting a final assessment, O’Connell spoke of some of the progress that has been achieved over the past seven years: The percentage of students who test proficient in English language arts has climbed from 35 percent to 50 percent, those proficient in math has climbed from 35 percent to 46 percent, and the number of career technical education classes that are rigorous enough to count for college-admission credits has soared from 289 to 7,650.

He said those gains “take on particular significance at a time when our schools have lost tens of billions of dollars in much-needed funding.”

O’Connell pledged to continue to fight for adequate school funding but advised that “as stewards of our children’s future, we cannot afford to sit back and wait for conditions to improve.”

The Race to the Top initiative, he said, can be a springboard toward improvements in such areas as making better use of assessment data to inform decision-making, creating better methods to assess student performance, and establishing better ways to evaluate teachers and principals.

In a line that drew enthusiastic applause, he said: “Surely we have the capability to figure out how to assess knowledge in a valid and reliable way beyond simply asking our students to fill in a bubble test.”

Chuck Weis, the former Ventura County schools chief who now is president of the Association of California School Administrators, praised O’Connell’s optimism.

“If there is no money, we’re still going to do these things,” Weis said. “What I know about reform is that you’ve got to start somewhere.”

In an interview after the speech, O’Connell said educators must continue to forge ahead even at a time when schools are being starved of money. “We can’t wait,” he said. “The students aren’t going to wait for us.”

Assemblyman Tom Torlakson, D-Martinez, one of three leading candidates seeking O’Connell’s job, said he and his fellow lawmakers cannot allow education funding to deteriorate further next year. The $2.4 billion reduction in school funding sought by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, he said, “dwarfs the amount of money we can get from Race to the Top. I’m going to fight to see to it that the next state budget doesn’t represent a tumble to the bottom.”

By Steven Harmon
Contra Costa Times
December 14, 2009

SACRAMENTO — Charter school advocates were livid. The Assembly's "Race to the Top" legislation was trying to "change the DNA of charters," as one charter school leader put it, by clamping down with "stifling" oversight provisions.

They had little doubt, however, that they'd have a potent weapon to beat back the proposed changes: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Schwarzenegger's deep ties to the charter school movement haven't been a secret. He has taken at least $1 million in contributions from charter school advocates, stacked the State Board of Education with charter school educators, overseen since taking office in 2003 more than a doubling in the number of charter schools and steered hundreds of millions of construction bond money to charter schools.

Now, with a potential $700 million in federal cash dangling before lawmakers who have seen $17 billion drained from public schools over the past two years, some critics say Schwarzenegger has used the Race to the Top competition to further his long-term goal of cutting into the powers of traditional public schools while elevating his own sacred cow — the charter movement.

"One can say that the charter school lobby has defined how the governor tries to craft school reform," said Bruce Fuller, director of the Policy Analysis for California Education at UC Berkeley. "Because he's got well-heeled donors that remain very supportive of charter schools, it's a no-brainer for the governor, given his affection for market remedies."

Schwarzenegger has blasted the Assembly's Race to the Top plan for tightening oversight measures for charter schools, calling it a "poison pill" that makes it "impossible for charter schools to survive." He has repeatedly vowed to veto the bill, ABX5-8, if it came to his desk.

Supported by most public school educators, the Assembly legislation includes tighter auditing requirements on charter schools than current law, stronger tools for measuring academic progress, and prohibitions against renewing continually failing charter schools.

"We believe charters should be held to the same accountability standards as public schools since they're on the public dime," said Dean Vogel, vice president of the California Teachers Association. "If I believe my charter school is high-performing, I should have a measure to prove it. You've got to demonstrate that high achievement and they don't want to do that."

Schwarzenegger's own plan, SBX5-1, shepherded through the Senate last month by Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, seeks to streamline the authorizing or renewal of charter schools, bolster their ability to obtain state funding, and codify their own standards of auditing.

Supporters don't deny that Schwarzenegger has been an unapologetic ally of charter schools.

"It's fair to say that Gov. Schwarzenegger has been the most important champion California has ever had for charter schools," said Jed Wallace, president and CEO of the California Charter Schools Association. "He understands and is focused on making sure nothing comes forward that would compromise charter schools."

Under Schwarzenegger, the number of charter schools operating in California has more than doubled — from 382 in 2003-04 to the current total of 809. Though the state is nowhere near its maximum of 1,350 charter schools, he wants to lift the cap — a provision in both the Senate and Assembly bills.

Schwarzenegger has packed the nine-member State Board of Education with five leaders of the charter school movement, including board President Ted Mitchell, who is president and CEO of the NewSchools Venture fund, a national San Francisco-based firm that provides startup money for charter schools.

Other state board members with ties to the charter school movement are Yvonne Chan, a principal of the Vaughn Next Century Learning Center, which focuses on "conversion" charter schools; Jonathan Williams, founder and co-director of the Accelerated School; Jorge Lopez, executive director of the Oakland Charter Academy; and Rae Belisle, president and CEO of EdVoice, a school reform lobbying group with strong ties to the charter school movement. Belisle defended the constitutionality of charter schools while serving as chief counsel to the State Board of Education.

EdVoice board members have rewarded Schwarzenegger, contributing at least $1 million to his various campaign committees.

Eli Broad, a co-founder of EdVoice and billionaire Los Angeles developer who has run a Superintendent Academy, which trains CEOs how to run schools, has contributed $430,000 to Schwarzenegger.

Don Fisher, the late Gap founder and a co-founder of EdVoice, and his family have donated $245,000 to Schwarzenegger, and Netflix founder Hastings Reed, also a co-founder of EdVoice, gave $251,491 in stock to the Proposition 1A-1E campaign pushed by Schwarzenegger this year.

Many of the same donors are beginning to bring Romero, the Los Angeles senator who is pushing Schwarzenegger-backed Race to the Top legislation, into their orbit. Romero, who is running for state superintendent of public instruction, has received at least $72,000 from various members of the EdVoice board, including $13,000 from Broad's wife, Edyth, and $6,500 from Hastings.

The Fisher family, deeply involved in school reform causes, has contributed $45,500 to her campaign.

EdVoice is likely to dig deep into their political treasury to finance Romero's campaign through unlimited independent expenditures against state Sen. Tom Torlakson, D-Antioch, who will likely have the backing of public school teacher unions.

"We haven't determined to what degree we'll support her," said Bill Lucia, EdVoice's policy director and Chief Operating Officer, "but Gloria Romero is clearly the strongest candidate for education reform and promising parental choice and not continuing to be apologetic for persistent failure."

By Diana Lambert
Sacramento Bee
November 30, 2009

Charter schools have come into vogue as an attractive alternative for parents and kids looking for innovative learning environments and higher test scores.

They've also become a priority in President Barack Obama's plan to overhaul the nation's education system.

And California legislators have pushed through laws that simplify charter funding and lift a cap on how many can operate in the state.

A new report by the California Charter Schools Association shows that more charters have opened this school year than in any year since 1992, when legislation first made them possible. The addition of 88 charter schools this year brings the total to 809 schools in California. Collectively, they enroll 341,000 students – about 5 percent of the state's student population.

"I think we are seeing a fundamental shift in the way our education system is being structured," said Jed Wallace, president of the California Charter Schools Association.

Will the shift toward more charters be the answer for a cash-strapped state where only 45 percent of its students passed standardized math tests last year and five out of 10 weren't considered proficient on English tests?

It's hard to tell from test scores. On the Academic Performance Index, California's primary yardstick for student achievement, charter schools and district-run schools score similarly, on average.

Sacramento County students at traditional district schools scored a little lower on standardized STAR tests this year than the area's charter school students.

Charters are part of the public school system and receive public money based on how many students they enroll. They don't have to comply with all the rules and regulations of traditional public schools but must meet student performance goals. Some, like the Performing and Fine Arts Academy at Natomas Charter School, offer a specialized curriculum. Others bill themselves as more- efficient alternatives to public schools.

"Charter schools could have a place in education if what they were were laboratories for trying new things," said Marty Hittleman, president of the California Federation of Teachers. "The problem is they aren't regulated and (aren't) held to any standards."

Teachers union leaders also say charter operators have an unfair advantage because they can be selective about who they enroll and avoid working with students who are difficult to teach or need more resources.

Despite the debate, the charter school movement is gaining traction.

In August, the Los Angeles Unified School District approved a dramatic reform effort that puts the operation of some of the district's lowest-performing schools up for grabs.

The school district has received 219 letters of interest from large charter companies, nonprofits and the United Teachers of Los Angeles union.

"We hope that spirit will spread across the state," Wallace said.

36 in Sacramento County

Sacramento County has 36 charter schools – the fourth-highest number in the state.

Among them is Sacramento Charter High School, a stately campus in Oak Park that was facing state takeover under the Sacramento City Unified School District because of low student achievement. In 2003, the district granted a charter to Mayor Kevin Johnson's nonprofit St. HOPE to run the school.

"The school wasn't serving students well," said St. HOPE's superintendent, Ed Manansala.

St. HOPE set high expectations and increased accountability for students and faculty, Manansala said. The school also set up a system to identify and help struggling students.

St. HOPE lengthened the school day by an hour, and college preparation became a priority.

"There is no room for 'I don't want to do my homework,' " said junior Ashley Leach, as she helped guide a recent tour of the campus.

Since the school reopened as a charter, its four-year dropout rate has decreased from 9.4 percent to 3.7 percent, and its API score has increased from 568 to 731. The state target is an API of 800.

Among schools with similar demographics – 91 percent of Sacramento Charter High's 952 students are minorities and 69 percent receive free or reduced-priced lunches – the charter school ranks in the top 10 percent.

But St. HOPE Public Schools, which also operates the K-8 PS7 school, has had high turnover in its leadership and was $729,742 in debt to Sacramento City Unified School District at this time last year.

District spokeswoman Maria Lopez said last week that St. HOPE is making timely payments.

Not all charters make it. In the past decade, 10 Sacramento County charters have closed, most within a few years of opening. Critics say closures and problems that precede them happen because charters are often run by people with little experience.

Pending state legislation may assuage some of those concerns. Last month, Assemblyman Tom Torlakson, D- Antioch, introduced a bill that would make charter schools more accountable by connecting student academic performance to renewal of school charters.

In the past few months, the governor has signed a flurry of bills regarding charters, including a law that allows charters to hold title to their own facilities and legislation that simplifies their funding formulas. Another bill that would lift the state's cap on charter schools is still making its way through the Assembly.

State politicians are following the lead of Obama, who has vowed to replace some of the country's lowest-performing schools with charter schools. And he's made it clear that states need to make it easier to open and operate a charter school if they want any part of the $4.3 billion in federal Race to the Top funds.

"The administration and the department believe charter schools are an important tool in the education toolbox," said Justin Hamilton, spokesman for the U.S. Department of Education. "We're looking for them to play a significant role."

The government is doing that by pumping more money into charters. Federal grants for charters grew from $6 million in 1995 to $217 million in 2005, with Obama promising $400 million more for charters. These funds supplement state and local funding, and private donations.

Public schools anxious

The focus on charter schools and the movement of students to those schools is causing increasing angst among public school officials battling reduced budgets and declining daily attendance.

Many local charters, which must be allowed to use vacant school district facilities, are setting up on campuses shuttered by districts.

In the Natomas Unified School District, the success of Natomas Charter means 807 fewer students in district-run schools. The district of 12,000 students took additional hits this year when Natomas Pathways Preparatory School, another charter, added a middle school, culling 400 more students from the district's ranks. The preparatory school's high school already had taken 512 students, and Westlake Charter school has taken another 321.

Public schools now have to compete for students. School district open-enrollment fairs these days often feature slick brochures for public schools and elaborate performances and presentations.

Some reports say the competition is improving grades in regular public as well as public charter schools, but sometimes it cultivates hostility.

"There are districts in the area, where we advise folks you would have a rough ride there," said Eric Premack, director of the nonprofit Charter Schools Development Center in Sacramento.

He cited Davis Unified as an example of a district where declining enrollment, budget cuts and the leadership make the district an unwelcoming place for charters. Natomas Unified and San Juan Unified districts are more supportive, despite their declining enrollments, he said.

Natomas Charter School started in 1993 with 80 students and has since been named a California Distinguished School and a state charter school of the year. The school's Performing and Fine Arts Academy program was one of five in the country to receive a National School of Distinction award from the Kennedy Center Alliance for Arts Education Network in Washington, D.C., in 2004.

Natomas Charter School students must apply for admission, and those interested in the performing arts academy must audition. Students who fall beneath a 2.0 grade-point average are put on academic probation and given a year to improve before they are asked to leave the school.

Last year, only 3 percent of Natomas Charter students were English learners, and 23 percent were low-income.

Ballet instructor Anne David ticked off a list of required moves – plié, arabesque arms, pirouette – to her advanced ballet students on a recent Monday afternoon as they moved gracefully along metal bars.

David has performed with the Sacramento Ballet and still performs professionally, but five days a week she is a full-time instructor at Natomas Charter School Performing Arts Academy. She's an example of one reason kids and parents like charters. They offer students something they aren't necessarily getting at other schools, she said.

By Anna Bloom
New York Times Bay Area Blog
November 18, 2009

Last night, the city of Richmond honored Margarita Vargas, the young woman who called 911 to report the gang rape of a girl outside of Richmond High School’s homecoming. Tonight, she will be honored by the West Contra Costa Unified School District.

Amid the celebrations of Ms. Vargas’ actions—she was the only person who called 911 say police—is a rebuke of the 10 or so bystanders that police say witnessed or heard about the two-hour-long attack but did not call police. Some of the witnesses have said they were scared. Six people have been charged in connection to the rape.

While there is a law requiring that witnesses report a serious crime against anyone 14-years-old and younger, the law does not apply in the Richmond case because the victim is 16.

State Assemblyman Tom Torlakson, who represents northern Contra Costa County, is exploring how to expand that law to raise the age to 16 or 18, and potentially alter it to include any person physically harmed on a school campus. He was the author of the Sherrice Iverson Child Victim Protection Act in 2000.

“In our world today there’s so much anonymity, people don’t know each other and they are reluctant to get involved in other people’s business,” Mr. Torlakson said. “They have to be reminded of their responsibility to people who are in trouble.”

State Sen. Leland Yee, who represents portions of San Francisco and San Mateo counties, is also looking into how to change the law to address the age limit issue.

“My office is still researching a number of legislative remedies and we have not ruled out amending the law to include crimes committed against people of all ages. That said, crime statistics indicate that children under age 18 represent a disproportionate number of sexual and violent crime victims, so providing them additional protections is more than just appropriate, it’s our obligation.”

Mr. Torlakson said that his office is currently researching the effectiveness of the original act, working with the California District Attorneys Association, schools and police officers throughout the state to compile data and analysis.

The Sherrice Iverson Child Victim Protection Act requires witnesses “to murder, rape or lewd conduct with an under-14-year-old” to report the incident or face a misdemeanor charge with a fine up to $1,500 and in some cases, a sentence of up to six months in jail.

Officer Mark Gagan, a spokesman for the Richmond police department, supports the idea:

What it does, effectively, is to change the status of everyday people to mandated reporters - doctors, teachers, principals of schools, etc. When they are overseeing children 14 and younger, the law says they have a societal obligation to protect them. In essence, what it says is youth and children are vulnerable and people in society need to protect them. As we saw with our victim, who is 16, there is still vulnerability and innocence. Judging from the amount of community outcry, I feel that doing nothing in witnessing this crime is condemnable and should also be illegal. Every law creates an authority, and when used appropriately, gives law enforcement a tool to use in an investigation like this one.

By Sigrid Bathen
Sacramento Bee
Friday, Nov. 13, 2009

Twenty-five University of California students and graduates from UC campuses were gathered around a long table in a windowless basement conference room in downtown Sacramento for a brown-bag lunch. On one side were 10 recent graduates, many working in and around the Capitol, who had participated in a popular public policy program – a program they say prepared them more than any other college experience for the realities of working in politics and public policy. Across the table at the recent gathering were 15 current students, many about to graduate with bachelor's degrees from UC in such diverse fields as political science, mathematics, economics, sociology, psychology and literature.

The session was part of an intensive orientation at the University of California Center in Sacramento before students begin internships in state legislative and government offices, at nonprofits and lobbying and consulting firms. The grads were advising the new students on what to expect in their internships, how to get the most benefit from the experience. "Don't be afraid to ask questions," they said. And "show initiative."

More than 500 students have completed the program since it began in 2004. But this gathering was "bittersweet," as one student put it, because the fall-quarter class may be the last in a widely praised program that was abruptly suspended by UC President Mark Yudof in August, as UC officials struggle to balance a precarious budget. The action has generated a storm of criticism, and UC administrators are reportedly rethinking how they can keep the effective program in Sacramento.

One of the grads at the brown-bag lunch, Kelly Bradfield, came to the center as a "scholar-intern" in the summer of 2007; she was about to graduate from UC Berkeley with an English degree, specializing in gender and sexuality in literature. While considering a public policy career, she lacked practical experience. Placed in an internship with Planned Parenthood, she wrote a paper on the public policy aspects of mandatory vaccination for the HPV virus that causes cervical cancer and was later hired as a policy analyst at the UC Center. Echoing the views of other grads, she said the program "prepared me more than any other academic experience" for working in the Capitol.

Bradfield's job and those of four other staffers, several adjunct professors and a visiting scholar were eliminated. Director Gary Dymski, who founded the center six years ago and taught many of its public policy classes, is teaching the current – and likely final – class but is expected to return to his tenured position as a UC Riverside economics professor.

Associate Director A.G. Block, a veteran Sacramento political editor who was hired in 2005 to oversee the center's summer public affairs journalism internship program, remains as the center's administrator. While the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism is one of the finest in the nation, UC has no undergraduate journalism major and offers few journalism classes; the intensive summer program was an effort to fill that gaping academic void.

University officials say the cuts to the UC Center saved the budget-strapped UC system $850,000, but those familiar with the center's most recent proposed budget say it had been slashed to a bare-bones $650,000.

One block from the Capitol, the center served a rich mix of academic and public service functions and fostered an unusual sharing of public policy and media expertise among UC and California State University faculty, legislative and administration officials, nonprofits, lobbyists and other policy experts who participated in seminars on wide-ranging policy issues.

"It's too valuable an institution to lose," said Barbara O'Connor, a communications professor who heads the Institute for the Study of Politics and Media at CSUS. She suggests UC administrators help "break down the silos" so ingrained in academic politics and work with CSU and the California Community Colleges to keep the center open.

State legislators and members of the UC Board of Regents have also reportedly urged Yudof to reconsider his decision. Rich Zeiger, chief of staff to Assemblyman Tom Torlakson, D-Antioch, whose daughter was a UC Center intern and whose office employs another intern as a scheduler, said the UC Center is "one of the few programs that demonstrates to policymakers exactly what the university does – the teaching, the research and the public service. All are brought directly into legislators' offices every day." To abruptly discard that role is foolish, he added "particularly when UC relations with legislators are not the best."

UC spokesman Peter King said the UC administration is engaged in "more detailed discussion" about the future of the center, and a decision will likely be made in December. UC Davis spokeswoman Maril Stratton confirmed reports that UCD administrators are having "initial discussions" with Yudof's office about a possible "lead role" in maintaining the center.

Placing administrative responsibility for the center on one campus creates its own set of political hurdles and potential for inter-campus rivalries. "At the end of the day," said Zeiger, "this needs to look to the students and the Legislature as it looks now – an independently functioning unit."