High absentee rates, low math scores and prospect of teacher layoffs cast a cloud over recent school board meeting; plus, city leaders discuss latest refinery incident, plan Feb. 15 meeting
Maybe, just maybe, if the schools hadn't been closed for so long performance in the basics wouldn't be plummeting. Distance learning was a wreck and kids whose parents couldn't work from home were left to do online school unsupervised, making it easy to just check out. Increases in
absenteeism has to be related to the failed distance learning. I hope the state and all school district learned their lesson, sadly it came at the expense to students.
I tend to agree with you on this. And I'll be the first to admit, I was slow myself to catch on to how much damage was being done from the prolonged closures. That said, I'd be curious to see if there's any evidence that scores and attendance rates are much stronger among schools that opened sooner, given the overall mental health crisis affecting students and teens right now.
The pandemic was really an impossible situation, and everyone was flying blind when it hit, but there really does need to be some real soul searching and reckoning over what happened from a public education standpoint so that the same mistakes aren't repeated. Schools in general put way too much faith in distance learning to see us through the pandemic, and it was an unmitigated disaster for many students (especially the most vulnerable and disadvantaged). I was lobbying early on for our district and others to explore other alternatives like outdoor learning (which was used successfully during the 1918 pandemic and that lots of people were advocating as well nationally), but there was absolutely no interest in the idea. The thing that was the final straw for me was when there seemed to be a greater desire to restart high school sports than there was to restart classroom learning. I'm a lifelong sports fan, but when a society places a higher priority on restarting sports and reopening bars and restaurants than reopening classrooms, something is seriously wrong. No one knows when the next pandemic or crisis will hit, and schools need to be prepared to do better next time. Some kids will never recover from the harm that was done from a year stuck at home with no real education or emotional support from schools, and the results will be life-lasting. Politicians (local, state and national) who say they're all about fighting for the disadvantaged and vulnerable need to show they'll walk the walk in ways that didn't happen during the pandemic.
All great points, I lay the blame on schools reopening squarely on the teachers unions and their excessive power and influence. Kids were the least at risk and if restaurant workers and others in "essential" jobs were showing up in person to work, so could the teachers. And the fact that they kept beaches, parks and gyms closed shows they didn't care a lick about people trying to stay healthy.
Additionally sadly is the number of people who forget a pandemic was raging and dead people were being piled into storage containers and looking for burial sites.
It is good that they are taking the absenteeism rate seriously. I see my neighborhood kids hanging about at weird times which makes me wonder if they are attending school at all. I think parents need to be infinitely more engaged with getting their kids to school. Time to restore BUSSING? It would alleviate the thousands of cars clocking through traffic all over town as well as give kids a ride to wo5rk when parents are busy trying to get to work! Charge parents a stipend to have their kids involved with the bus program. That is cheaper than gas and wasted time in long lines to pick up and drop off!
I give the district and at least some of the board members credit for facing up to the issue head on and showing a desire to get to the bottom of it. My biggest frustration with previous school boards (dating back to 2018 when I started paying attention regularly) was that they seemed to want to spend 90% of their time patting themselves on the back and 10% of their time dealing with real problems (of which there were many), when it really should have been the opposite. I recall prior to the pandemic there would be reports on dismal test score results, and board members would have little to say about the urgency of the problem or ideas for how they should all work together to fix it. School board meetings should not be cheerleading sessions that sweep real problems under the rug, especially when so many students are struggling both academically and emotionally; the crisis in public education long predates the pandemic, but it's reached a whole new level because of it. The problems in Martinez are not unique to Martinez. School boards everywhere should be spending the majority of their meetings having frank discussions about these problems and working to do what they can to fix them (and not just passing the buck and blaming everything on issues outside their control like state spending, which was another favorite practice of past boards).
I agree. Money is ALWAYS an issue and yet we pass bond measure after bond measure.
Whenever there is bond money there should be an oversight group established for the purpose of following the money and making recommendations. Technically, they don't work as a think tank all that much, and never have. Although the Brown Act and more public input have allowed for some slight improvements over the years. My father was on the Board for several years (Ray Ulmer) and he had to fight behind the scenes for autonomy of his vote because he found much to be opposed to. The structure and past leadership was not unlike other government agencies of electeds where Boards come to united decisions subtly before meetings, so they vote mainly as a means to forward the item publicly, (and make meetings go faster). But I agree, they spend what feels like wasted time on cordialities which has been extremely hard for packed meetings and the small conference room they use. One thing that became very apparent while I watched when dad was on the Board, is that the schools are not treated equally. John Swett had computers quite deliberately, before any other elementary school in the district. (Neighborhood schools accept a lot of funding from the neighborhood parents so a school in the "nice area of town" was inclined to act as a segregated community. (As opposed to a working class neighborhood). As you may have heard, they were about to get air conditioning at John Swett before Las Juntas until some of us brought attention to the many years of economic and teaching disparities, that led to low test scores AT LAS JUNTAS! This allowed people to look down on the children from that community as though they were less capable than their own kids from other schools. We need to constantly review their actions and 1. Make sure the schools are treated equitably and 2. MAKE restitution of the inequities they created in some of those schools by adding additional resources for parents and children like bussing and after school programs. I am greatly encouraged that new people have been taking these Board positions as it continues to be a work in progress!
Maybe, just maybe, if the schools hadn't been closed for so long performance in the basics wouldn't be plummeting. Distance learning was a wreck and kids whose parents couldn't work from home were left to do online school unsupervised, making it easy to just check out. Increases in
absenteeism has to be related to the failed distance learning. I hope the state and all school district learned their lesson, sadly it came at the expense to students.
I tend to agree with you on this. And I'll be the first to admit, I was slow myself to catch on to how much damage was being done from the prolonged closures. That said, I'd be curious to see if there's any evidence that scores and attendance rates are much stronger among schools that opened sooner, given the overall mental health crisis affecting students and teens right now.
The pandemic was really an impossible situation, and everyone was flying blind when it hit, but there really does need to be some real soul searching and reckoning over what happened from a public education standpoint so that the same mistakes aren't repeated. Schools in general put way too much faith in distance learning to see us through the pandemic, and it was an unmitigated disaster for many students (especially the most vulnerable and disadvantaged). I was lobbying early on for our district and others to explore other alternatives like outdoor learning (which was used successfully during the 1918 pandemic and that lots of people were advocating as well nationally), but there was absolutely no interest in the idea. The thing that was the final straw for me was when there seemed to be a greater desire to restart high school sports than there was to restart classroom learning. I'm a lifelong sports fan, but when a society places a higher priority on restarting sports and reopening bars and restaurants than reopening classrooms, something is seriously wrong. No one knows when the next pandemic or crisis will hit, and schools need to be prepared to do better next time. Some kids will never recover from the harm that was done from a year stuck at home with no real education or emotional support from schools, and the results will be life-lasting. Politicians (local, state and national) who say they're all about fighting for the disadvantaged and vulnerable need to show they'll walk the walk in ways that didn't happen during the pandemic.
All great points, I lay the blame on schools reopening squarely on the teachers unions and their excessive power and influence. Kids were the least at risk and if restaurant workers and others in "essential" jobs were showing up in person to work, so could the teachers. And the fact that they kept beaches, parks and gyms closed shows they didn't care a lick about people trying to stay healthy.
Additionally sadly is the number of people who forget a pandemic was raging and dead people were being piled into storage containers and looking for burial sites.
It is good that they are taking the absenteeism rate seriously. I see my neighborhood kids hanging about at weird times which makes me wonder if they are attending school at all. I think parents need to be infinitely more engaged with getting their kids to school. Time to restore BUSSING? It would alleviate the thousands of cars clocking through traffic all over town as well as give kids a ride to wo5rk when parents are busy trying to get to work! Charge parents a stipend to have their kids involved with the bus program. That is cheaper than gas and wasted time in long lines to pick up and drop off!
I give the district and at least some of the board members credit for facing up to the issue head on and showing a desire to get to the bottom of it. My biggest frustration with previous school boards (dating back to 2018 when I started paying attention regularly) was that they seemed to want to spend 90% of their time patting themselves on the back and 10% of their time dealing with real problems (of which there were many), when it really should have been the opposite. I recall prior to the pandemic there would be reports on dismal test score results, and board members would have little to say about the urgency of the problem or ideas for how they should all work together to fix it. School board meetings should not be cheerleading sessions that sweep real problems under the rug, especially when so many students are struggling both academically and emotionally; the crisis in public education long predates the pandemic, but it's reached a whole new level because of it. The problems in Martinez are not unique to Martinez. School boards everywhere should be spending the majority of their meetings having frank discussions about these problems and working to do what they can to fix them (and not just passing the buck and blaming everything on issues outside their control like state spending, which was another favorite practice of past boards).
I agree. Money is ALWAYS an issue and yet we pass bond measure after bond measure.
Whenever there is bond money there should be an oversight group established for the purpose of following the money and making recommendations. Technically, they don't work as a think tank all that much, and never have. Although the Brown Act and more public input have allowed for some slight improvements over the years. My father was on the Board for several years (Ray Ulmer) and he had to fight behind the scenes for autonomy of his vote because he found much to be opposed to. The structure and past leadership was not unlike other government agencies of electeds where Boards come to united decisions subtly before meetings, so they vote mainly as a means to forward the item publicly, (and make meetings go faster). But I agree, they spend what feels like wasted time on cordialities which has been extremely hard for packed meetings and the small conference room they use. One thing that became very apparent while I watched when dad was on the Board, is that the schools are not treated equally. John Swett had computers quite deliberately, before any other elementary school in the district. (Neighborhood schools accept a lot of funding from the neighborhood parents so a school in the "nice area of town" was inclined to act as a segregated community. (As opposed to a working class neighborhood). As you may have heard, they were about to get air conditioning at John Swett before Las Juntas until some of us brought attention to the many years of economic and teaching disparities, that led to low test scores AT LAS JUNTAS! This allowed people to look down on the children from that community as though they were less capable than their own kids from other schools. We need to constantly review their actions and 1. Make sure the schools are treated equitably and 2. MAKE restitution of the inequities they created in some of those schools by adding additional resources for parents and children like bussing and after school programs. I am greatly encouraged that new people have been taking these Board positions as it continues to be a work in progress!