Fast Report

08/02/05–Los Angeles mayor wants more control over schools

• The newly elected mayor of Los Angeles, Antonio Villaraigosa, wants to have control of the city’s public school system, but backed off from plans for an immediate takeover until his reforms have a chance to work.

He has convened a panel of education experts to offer recommendations on how the city can help the 742,000-student district in such areas as safety, health care, and after-school programs. A 30-member joint city-school commission also is exploring options for changing the district’s governing structure.

Meanwhile, state Sen. Gloria Romero (D-Los Angeles) has introduced a bill that would allow the mayor to appoint the superintendent and seven of the nine school board members.

Roberts is no stranger to education issues

• John Roberts, President Bush’s nominee for the Supreme Court, has extensive knowledge of and experience with public education issues. “Among the names that were floated, I think he was the best candidate for schools,” says NSBA General Counsel Julie Underwood.

As deputy solicitor general for President George H.W. Bush, Roberts wrote briefs representing the White House positions on several important Supreme Court decisions.

These cases involved sexual harassment in schools (Franklin v. Gwinnett,1992), graduation prayer (Lee v. Weisman,1992), school desegregation (Freeman v. Pitts, 1989, and Oklahoma City Schools v. Dowell, 1989), and equal access for Bible clubs (Board of Education of Westside School District v. Mergens, 1990).

Anyone attempting to read those briefs to gauge Roberts’ views on those issues should proceed with caution, Underwood points out. They were not court opinions written by a judge, but in essence a lawyer making the case of his client.

Roberts has been a speaker at several events sponsored by NSBA’s Council of School Attorneys (COSA), participated in several COSA moot courts, and authored a paper for COSA’s School Law in Review on how to present an effective oral argument.

When Roberts was nominated to his current position, as judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, NSBA submitted a letter of support.

Daylight savings time extended

• House and Senate negotiators on an energy bill have agreed to extend daylight-saving time by starting it three weeks sooner in the spring and continuing it by one week in the fall.

Sponsors of the measure say it will reduce energy consumption, primarily because there would be more hours of daylight, so people won’t have to turn on electric lights until later in the evening.

If the bill is enacted, daylight-saving time would start on the first Sunday in March instead of the first Sunday in April and would end on the first Sunday in November instead of the last Sunday in October.

The conferees rejected a House version of the bill that would have extended daylight-saving time even more -- to the last Sunday in November.

The National PTA opposed extending daylight-saving time because of concerns about children walking to school when it is still dark, thus increasing the risk of accidents.

NSBA does not have an official policy position, but Associate Executive Director Michael A. Resnick says, “There’s no price you can place on the safety of a child who could be exposed to traffic in a dark situation.”

Most districts will see drop in Title I funding

• About 8,800 school districts across the nation will receive less Title I funding during the 2005-06 school year than the previous year, according to a report by the Center on Education Policy. That comes to about two-thirds of the districts that participate in the Title I program.

About 4,400 districts will gain in Title I funding.

The number of districts losing Title I funding has increased significantly since 2004, when the center reported that 55 percent of districts would see declines in their Title I allocation.

While Congress approved a minimal increase in Title I funding last year (3 percent), the number of children in poverty grew by 6 percent. Meanwhile, districts are under increasing pressure to meet the goals of the No Child Left Behind Act.

The changes in funding levels are due to population changes, growing numbers of poor children, newer census data, and how districts are affected by the formulas used to allocate Title I funding.

The Conejo Valley (Calif.) Unified School District will lose nearly 38 percent of its Title I funding. Tipton County, Tenn., will lose 22 percent, and Eau Claire, Wis., will lose 21 percent.

Best practices on civics sought

• The Campaign for the Civic Mission of Schools is seeking submissions for its online inventory of high-quality K-12 learning practices designed to educate students for democracy.

The campaign is a long-term effort to renew and elevate civic learning in the nation’s schools. NSBA Executive Director Anne L. Bryant is a member of the campaign’s steering committee.