6/7/05 -- Student population peaks at nearly 50 million
• The number of students enrolled in elementary and high schools in 2003 -- 49.5 billion -- surpasses the previous all-time high of 48.7 million set in 1970 when baby-boomers were in school, the U.S. Census Bureau reported June 1.
The enrollment increase is due to both population increase -- the children of baby boomers are now in school -- and immigration. In 2003, more than one in five students had at least one foreign-born parent, the Census Bureau reports.
The student population is more diverse than it was in 1970, when it was 79 percent non-Hispanic white, 14 percent black, 1 percent Asian, and 6 percent Hispanic. In 2003, it was 60 percent white, 16 percent black, 4 percent Asian, and 18 percent Hispanic.
Suit targets testing of English language learners
• Ten California school districts, three non-profit organizations, and two individuals sued the state of California June 1 in an effort to end the state’s practice of testing English language learners in English only.
As a result, the plaintiffs charge, many schools and districts with large numbers of English language learners are failing the No Child Left Behind accountability standards and facing sanctions.
The Coachella Valley Unified School District first announced plans to sue to state last fall. The other districts that have joined the suit are Chula Vista Elementary, Alisal Elementary, Terra Bella Union Elementary, Pajaro Unified, Oxnard, Hawthorne, Hayward Unified, Sweetwater Union High, and Salinas Union High.
Other plaintiffs are the California Association for Bilingual Education; Californians Together, a coalition of parents, teachers, education advocates, and civil rights organizations; and the California League of United Latin American Citizens.
“Our complaint is not with NCLB, or skirting accountability, or Proposition 227,” a state law that banned most bilingual instruction, says Superintendent Lowell Billings of the Chula Vista Elementary School District.
“Our complaint targets language in NCLB that has been misapplied in California,” he says. “NCLB requires the use of ‘valid and reliable’ instruments to test students. When you have a language arts assessment to test students in a language they are not familiar with, that is not a valid and reliable instrument.”
Twelve of Chula Vista’s 43 schools are in “program improvement status,” including 11 due to English language learners, Billings says.
“The state labels our students and teachers educational failures,” says Foch “Tut” Pensis, superintendent of the Coachella Valley Unified School District. “Our students are outstanding achievers despite the obstacles many face in learning a new language and [adjusting to] a new country.”
Other states with large Hispanic populations -- Texas, New Mexico, and New York -- do not test limited-English students in English only.
The suit asks that students who enter their state’s public schools already literate in their primary language be tested in that language and that modifications be permitted for students who are learning English, such as oral directions in their native language.
Strict junk food ban passed in Connecticut
• Connecticut lawmakers approved what is believed to be the toughest school nutrition bill in the nation May 25. Other states, such as Arkansas and California, with junk-food bans restrict them to elementary schools.
Proponents of the bill, which outlaws soda and junk food at K-12 schools, say it will help reduce childhood obesity.
The law would ban most sodas and snacks in school cafeterias, school stores, and vending machines. Junk food could continue to be sold after school and at football games and other school-sponsored events.
The Connecticut Association of Boards of Education (CABE) has urged Gov. M. Jodi Rell (R) to veto the bill because it requires 20 minutes of physical activity every day in grades K-5. CABE is “cautiously optimistic,” because Rell has indicated she might consider a veto.
Speaking at a news conference, Rell said, “I think it should be left to local school boards to make that decision.”
Takeover approved in New Orleans
• A divided New Orleans school board voted May 23 to allow the Louisiana Department of Education to take over the district’s finances.
The vote gives a private management firm selected by the state control over payments, contracts, and the hiring and firing of non-academic personnel.
While the $16.8 million deal gives Alvarez & Marsal complete control over financial matters, the school board would retain control over academic issues and would still have to approve the budget.
Board President Torin Sanders, who voted against the takeover, called it an exercise in “disenfranchising” his constituents, the Associated Press reports. The Orleans Parish’s three black members voted against the measure, while its three white and one Hispanic member voted for it.
State Superintendent Cecil Picard proposed the takeover in response to financial mismanagement, a deficit of about $30 million, and the indictment or conviction of dozens of employees for theft.
Alvarez & Marsal recently completed a similar project in St. Louis, where it cut the district’s deficit by making steep funding and staff cuts and closing 20 schools.