Parent group prepares new fight against SBR school district

Leaders of a Baton Rouge parent group formed a year ago to oppose the creation of a new Southeast Baton Rouge school district told an audience of about 45 people Tuesday night that they are gearing up to do it all over again.

Belinda Davis, president of One Community, One School District, said the situation reminded her of the movie “Groundhog Day,” where a character played by Bill Murray relived the same day repeatedly.

The proponents of a new Southeast Baton Rouge school district, which would be the fifth in East Baton Rouge Parish, announced at a public meeting in January that they plan try to get the proposal through the Legislature when it convenes April 8. A year ago, they fell a few votes short of getting the issue sent to voters statewide via a proposed constitutional amendment.

Davis told the audience gathered at the Unitarian Church on Tuesday that creating a new district would saddle the remaining school system with millions of dollars in “legacy costs,” largely medical expenses of future retirees. She said some of them worked in public schools in southeast Baton Rouge and have educated children who would attend school in the newly independent district.

“When legacy costs go up in East Baton Rouge Parish, that means less money to go into your child’s classroom,” Davis said.

Davis said southeast proponents offered at first to pay nothing for legacy costs, but when the bill was in trouble they offered to put a “paltry” $2.5 million and have the state Department of Education figure out how much should be paid out later. Davis said that should be determined up front.

“My contention is that is not enough,” she said. “Our children deserve certainty in what they will have to bear.”

Davis also was critical of the community group, Local Schools for Local Children, that is promoting the new school district. She said the group has not updated its Web page to highlight much improved school report cards at the schools they’re seeking to run, nor has the group posted online its plan to add new magnet and other programs in the southeast area if the new school district is created.

“We need information before we as parents can vote, and our legislators need more information,” she said.

Rep. Ted James, D-Baton Rouge, who opposed the breakaway proposal, urged audience members to call legislators throughout the state and to sign a forthcoming petition. He said One Community, One School District’s petition last year showed lawmakers that the proposed new school district had substantial opposition in Baton Rouge.

“When they saw they had over 900 names on this petition, it changed some minds,” James said.

Much of the opposition to the new school district has come from parents in magnet and gifted-and-talented programs who are worried the new district will jeopardize those programs.

Danielle Smith said she’s concerned that the school she wants her child in won’t be available to her if the new district comes into being.

“Our goal has been Baton Rouge High, and they’re taking that away from me,” Smith said.

One Community, One School District supporters said Baton Rouge has several standout schools and could have more if the district remains intact.

Kerii Landry-Thomas said her two children are in private schools now but she is trying to get them into public schools. She said she lives inside the proposed southeast Baton Rouge district boundaries and worries what it would mean for her children. She said she’s not alone in her desire to shift to public schools.

“The private schools we’ve attended, there’s so many parents who want to make a jump,” Landry-Thomas said.

Comments

1) Comment by Dawson - 21/02/2013

The EBR schools are so amazing and have such high achievement as a whole I cannot figure out why anyone would want to break away and form another district. How about this. We completely drop attendance zones and we no longer allow the government to dictate to us where our kids go to school? Let the parent decide what is best for their child. That would be a novel idea wouldn't it?

2) Comment by bluelotus63 - 21/02/2013

@nimby You make an excellent point. You have hit upon the exact problem with judging students and teachers based solely on test scores. Content knowledge is important, however, it does not help people function better in society. These are the intangibles of education that will directly affect student’s skillful functioning in society. They can show up on high stakes tests in ways that undermine student’s academic success. Teaching them involves developing relationships and the major undertaking of changing someone’s life perspective. The test is life and our current education system is leaving them unprepared. When we discourage teaching and learning of this kind, we ARE lowering the bar. These student’s experiences are real to them and they need to be unlearned; a much more challenging task. What we are experiencing now in education is a direct result of leaving them behind. This breakaway district would only perpetuate that trend. @MBW Right on!

3) Comment by MBW - 21/02/2013

Those who oppose wasteful government should oppose a breakaway district. A breakaway district would have to have a superintendent, HR people, central office staff, etc.....just another chunk of cash to be spent on central office staff. It wouldn't just be schools running themselves.

4) Comment by nimby? - 21/02/2013

and what happens when they join the real world ? lowering the bar to level the playing field helps no one ...

5) Comment by bluelotus63 - 20/02/2013

For anyone who is interested in examples of how test questions can be biased against low-income students, here is an example from the classroom right here in EBR. In a 6th grade English class we read Aesop's The Ant and the Grasshopper, in which the ant works and works to store food up for the winter while the grasshopper fiddles away his time. When winter comes the ant has food and the grasshopper does not. The grasshopper asks for some of the ant's food and the ant says no because the grasshopper wasted his time and the ant worked hard for his food. When asked to interpret the ant's behavior, several students agreed that the ant was greedy and should have shared his food with the grasshopper. Low income communities survive more on sharing what they have with each other and even though that may not be the moral of Aesop's fable or the "correct" answer on that test, this understanding reflected these student's life experiences. The two teachers in the classroom, both female, one white and one black looked at each other in disbelief because they were raised to believe people should work hard to prepare for the future and not ask for handouts when they spend their time in other ways. The teachers understood these students brought their life experiences to bear on Aesop. Their experience did not match the test and they appeared to have less knowledge, when in fact they have different knowledge from their experience.

6) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

@Noel: "I notice neither commenter made any reference to the tests being biased against low-income students." I actually mentioned low income students in both of my posts directed at you. Look, I'm a reasonable person, and the examples you gave DO directly show bias (unintended though it may be) and those questions should possibly be removed from those tests. However, you referenced international tests using the metric system (which we desperately need to switch to, btw) and a national test with a bias question about weather damage (very regionally bias). Both were clear examples of bias, but not in the ways you've mentioned previously (higher class whites and Asians vs lower class minorities and others). Like I said, I'm reasonable. Show me examples of how the ACT is geared more toward upper class than lower class or more toward white and Asian students than Hispanic, native American, and black students.

7) Comment by Noel Hammatt - 20/02/2013

@attila & @wherearewegoing: Again, if you read my comments you will note that the debate is not about questions referring to "knowledge of 1+1=2 or spelling C-A-T." All knowledge is, actually, relatikonal and relative to the need for same. Knowing which streets are safe to walk down in the late evening in New Orleans is incredibly useful knowledge to anyone in New Orleans, but practically worthless to anyone not living or traveling there. Questions dealing with a passage concerning "crewing" and "shells" would be easier for a person growing up in Boston to understand than a student in Los Angeles. Yet it is the information contained in the narratives or "passages" that has to be teased out. In a timed test, someone who has experienced a crewing event is favored over one who has not. To give you another exampled from an international test. Students are given a passage about how a company was trying to make decisions about which vehicles to buy. The story included information about the number of kilometers driven along with the number of liters of fuel used by different vehicles. The final question was... Approximately how many liters per hundred kilometers was achieved by the most energy efficient vehicles? Ok, stop for a second... is a student in Germany going to treat this question the same as a student in Baton Rouge? Answer, no way! In Germany, fuel economy in vehicles is measures in liters per hundred kilometers traveled. In the US... economy is measured in miles per gallon. So, a question written in the metric system, using a completely different way of measuring economy, is written to elicit some basic knowledge of how to do "math." But, in a timed test, the student from Baton Rouge is at a great disadvantage to one in Germany. In a final example (and I am using race and socio-economically neutral examples, and I think you are smart enough to figure out how this plays out, and it has nothing to do with parental qualify of number of parents, even) I give you one form a national test that was given a few years ago. Third graders were given pictures, drawings of trees twisted and town down, and asked the question. Was this most likely a result of A) Hurricane, B) Cyclone, C) Tornado, or D) hailstorm. More Louisiana students than students in Kansas got this one wrong. Does it mean our students are stupid, or have bad teachers? It is simply that our students, seeing such damage, or much more likely to associate it with hurricanes. Oh, the correct answer? Tornado. BUT, guess what, most tornado damage in Louisiana occurs during....... you guessed it... hurricanes. Finally (I know I said the last one was the last, but bear with me) I want to share a question on that same 3rd grade national exam. It had to do with the meaning of "basement." How many kids in Louisiana at that age are familiar with "basements?" I notice neither commenter, or another who shall remain nameless as he slithers off to drop some droppings elsewhere) made any reference to the tests being biased against low-income students. Why the focus on race? On ever test... including the ACT, if you divide groups of students up by income levels, the average score of the students from higher income households will ALWAYS be higher than the average of students from lower income households. The ACT, like the current system, simply measures student demographics... NOT the achievement of the students or the schools, especially not in any meaningful way.

8) Comment by nimby? - 20/02/2013

the majority of students are average . all who want to learn deserve a chance . as expected , those entrenched in the elite programs will object the most . what of all the deserving students who cannot get into the magnet programs due to limited space , or that mom and dad don't know the right people ? in the meantime Zachary and Central schools carry an A rating , the parents are happy , while Baton Rouge is ......

9) Comment by Horse Sense - 20/02/2013

As a parent on children who will be impacted by this, I strongly disagree with the breakaway district. First, there is this idea that it will give parents more control over local schools. If you are involved in the school systems at all, you understand that state and federal policies prevent "personalization" of the educational experience. Even the calculation of how Louisiana teachers are paid comes from "value-added" modeling system. Second, there is the belife that a smaller system is better for students. It MAY be a boon for parents of children that are average, but for kids on both sides of the educational spectrum, both the students needing special services and the gifted, it will be a disaster. The SE district will have to provide federally required special services for these students, but do it with a smaller tax base. As for the gifted/magnet students, they are outta luck. There are no federal requirements for these expensive programs and there are no plans for them to exist in the new district, so these kids will have to stay bored in regular classrooms. It will be much like Zachary, which has a decent graduation rate, but has no specialty programs, and likewise, no National Merit, Rhodes, Fulbright, etc scholars. Why not let the parents here choose to stay in the system, and the dissatisfied can leave the system?

10) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

I will admit that some are not afforded the experiences of others, but to be honest, I don't know how to fix that. Certainly not by throwing money at them (at the expense of others). I don't know. I just don't know how to better gear a test toward specific social/economic groups. The standard old "knowledge is knowledge" approach actually does seem to work. People in lower class minority families rise up and succeed every day.

11) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

@Noel: The correlation between ACT scores and college GPA, though interesting, isn't what we're talking about here. A lot can change between the time a high school student takes the ACT and they get to college. I, for instance, slept my way through high school on banner roll, did well on my ACT, then had a hard time with college due to laziness and overall unpreparedness. It happens (and now I suffer the consequences). But I still don't buy that the test is bias. The reason these researchers found that the test material is more likely to have been encountered by middle class whites and Asians is because of how they're raised (typically). The majority of middle class white and Asian families raise their children better than the majority of lower class minorities. Can you dispute that? The knowledge gained through proper upbringing is imperative to a child's success. If parents (and people in general) could be held to a higher standard instead of being given excuse after excuse, maybe our society would look a little better.

12) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

@Unity: I agree, that seems to be a pretty messed up method. Like you said, a 60% is better than a 0%. Hell....a 30% is better than a 0%. Seems like they should get at least SOME credit for scores <18.

13) Comment by jeffsadow - 20/02/2013

The problem being encountered here by some commenters is they ask the wrong questions and thereby draw the wrong conclusions. As @attila perceptively notes, knowledge is knowledge. Now it may be unfortunate if schools with a preponderance of minority members don't seem to get that kind of information, but that does not then logically mean the tests themselves are unfair or biased, because knowledge is knowledge (unless you buy into the discredited notion that all knowledge is relative). So the problem is not with the test, but with (at least some of) the schools: their administration, organization, and culture. Which recent reform efforts are very logically and compellingly aimed at changing for the better. Which then upsets the people who claim the tests are biased ....

14) Comment by Attila - 20/02/2013

What are you slaying Mr. Noel? Does not one plus one equal two regardless of where a student goes to school. I think that cat is still spelled C A T regardless of where a person goes to school. I will admit that I am ignorant of the reasons why some folks claim that the ACT is biased against minorities. Please enlighten me....and please don't give me that same old song and dance about their lack of two parent homes and economic disadvantage. Those two excuses are worn out. I will concede that poor parenting has an effect on the kids, but that is not a problem that can be solved by the good intentions of others. It requires an change in attitude, culture, and basic values; something that cannot be legislated.

15) Comment by Noel Hammatt - 20/02/2013

@wherearewegoing: You raise an excellent point. To claim that a test is biases there should be more basis for that claim that simply having lower test scores. And there is. The first things that raise flags are that the ACT does not actually reflect the curriculum that is taught in the schools, nor does it provide much in the way of predicting how well a student is gong to do in college. For White male students, there is a less than 25% correlation between the scores on the ACT and the first year's college GPA. For African-Americans, it is less than 17%. Beyond the first year, the validity if you will, of the scores goes down. Now, in looking at the questions and the content on the ACT, researchers have found that the subject matter is much more likely to have been encountered in middle class White and Asian families, and less likely to have been encountered in Hispanic, Native American, or African-American households. There is nothing "sacred" about the content or subject matter used to create the tests, except it CAN introduce bias in the resulting test scores. All that can be measured is not necessarily meaningful, and all that is meaningful is not always measurable. John White and the "reformers" are well aware of these problems, and we need to ask the question, why do THEY put so much faith in a test that has less validity for some groups than for others... Why indeed. Follow the money! Ask yourself, what does John White get for closing schools filled with African-American students, and opening them up to for-profit charter groups that cherry-pick their students? What does the Chamber gain? Who are the winners, and who are the losers here. Some don't want to ask the tough questions.

16) Comment by unity - 20/02/2013

@wherearewegoing: check this out http://www.louisianaschools.net/lde/uploads/19942.pdf See page 10 I'm in no way saying that the ACT is racially biased, but I can't understand why if a student gets an 18 on the ACT the school gets 100 Accountability Formula Points Awarded, but if a student scores one point lower they school gets zero points awarded. The rest of the scores are applied to a graduated scale, but 17 or below is counted as zero. What is the purpose here? I have a kid in high school who is very bright and, in general, does very well but every once in a while he bombs a test. Making a 60% on a test is much easier to recover from than getting a 0% on a test. It is as if the state would like to make struggling schools look worse that they actually are by using this false scale. Why don't they give a score of 17, 97.8 formula points? seems more fair than zero.

17) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

@Noel: Is the ACT bias against minorities and low income students based on the statistics that minorities and low income students do more poorly on the test than whites, Asians, and high income students? You think that, maybe, white, Asian, and high income students are parented better and have better home lives than low income and minority students? Maybe this is a cultural problem, not a problem with how the test is made up. I don't really understand how people jump to that conclusion. A group isn't doing well at something, so obviously it's bias against them. I don't claim that running is bias against white people simply because I can't run as fast as other blacks can, nor do I think basketball is bias against whites simply because the majority of successful NBA players are black.

18) Comment by Noel Hammatt - 20/02/2013

From what I heard last night, the group has focused on the overall issue of splinter-districts. Increased costs to all, inequitable division of long-term obligations shared by all, but paid by those remaining in the "home" district. The increasing lack of diversity along both social and economic lines in the new movements to pull out, not just in Baton Rouge, but elsewhere. This, coupled with a heightened sense of the ridiculous nature of our accountability system, which simply plays on an elitist version of "accountability" and ignores all research and patterns that exist, but that might be troublesome if we actually had to deal with them. It was mentioned last night that a student scoring less than an 18 on the ACT would be counted as a "Zero" under the new accountability system promoted by John White. What was unsaid, is that the ACT has been known to be incredibly subject o bias against minorities and low income students. In every iteration, the average scores of higher income students are higher that the average score of students from lower income households, and Whites and Asians outscore Black and Hispanics even at the same income levels. In fact, the 18 point cut-of for a school getting credit for a student's score on the ACT is nearly a full point higher than the average score for African- Americans in the US on the ACT. Surely White knows this is not a fair assessment of a school. Surely. I applaud the work of this group in trying to get some truth out there. @werearewegoing: it is a Constitutional issues, hence the state-wide vote. @tradewinns: those of us who were involved in break-aways over the years are well aware of clear racial overtones in the discussions held in multiple venues. If one looks at Central, for example, one might notice a particular gerrymandering of their lines. Those in the know are well aware it was to exclude a certain neighborhood. Let's be honest about the fact that racism has, and does play a role in this. Not for all, but definitely for a large number... and it is not always in the closet.

19) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

@unity: Thanks for clearing that up. If the amendment does indeed read the way you stated, then I can understand why it would need to be decided by the whole state. I agree that it wouldn't be good to allow all the rich areas to have their own school systems and the poor theirs, but something does need to change. The same people (or same type of people) seem to cause the majority of the problems in school systems that lead them to failure. Some people simply can't or don't want to be educated, and they use the school system as daycare more than education. These people should be removed from the public education system so that those that WANT it can thrive. And before all the hate comments out, I'm not stating that we should kick people out based on the color of their skin or how much money they have. We should give them the boot based on the content of their character (or lack thereof).

20) Comment by unity - 20/02/2013

@wherearewegoing, please be aware that this proposed legislation will affect everyone in Louisiana. If the proposed constitutional amendment were to pass through the legislature and be approved by the citizens of the state, any collection of neighborhoods (ungoverned by any municipal entity) would be able to form its own school district, and have its own school board. This would certainly result in the wealthier areas of the state being able to separate from the poorer areas, leaving the neediest on their own (without a viable tax base) and unable to pay for quality educational programs. I, for one, think that draining public education resources from the people who rely on public schools the most would be a travesty. If we want our state to succeed in the future we should be making sure that public dollars are available to educate the poorest citizens, giving them a fair shot at getting a quality education. Or we could resegregate our school system and spend our tax dollars on fighting off lawsuits and building more prisons.....

21) Comment by wherearewegoing - 20/02/2013

While I support the citizens of south east EBR, I don't know that it's my place to have a vote in this situation (I don't live in that parish/area). Why should those living outside the affected area get a say? People in Shreveport, New Orleans, Monroe, Lafayette.....they know nothing about this situation.

22) Comment by tradewinns - 20/02/2013

it is not racist to want to give your child the best education possible. teaming up your child with one who has not been taught how important education is doesn't improve the failing student it reduces your child's chances in life. the only real reason ebr wants to keep the southern part of the district is to raise the educational grade for their failing schools. good luck to the southern part in their ability to run their own district.

23) Comment by nimby? - 20/02/2013

continuing to ignore a problem won't make it go away .

24) Comment by WhoCares - 20/02/2013

The Magnetic Empire is clearly alive and kicking. What a bunch of elitist segregationists they are.

25) Comment by spqr - 20/02/2013

No doubt, many parents are more than willing to pull their children out of private schools. All they need is a public school system that does not carry the acronym "EBR".