August 25, 2005

SCHOOL SCENEin Almaden Valley

South Valley breakaway school movement fueled by
small but vocal group of parents

Parent group considers nonprofit status, hiring petition-gathering
service to collect signatures for feasibility study

By Sheila Sanchez
Staff Writer

Despite being considered separatist, elitist and even racist by some, a small group of parents is still moving forward with plans to split from the San Jose Unified School District.

Randol parents Chris Brubaker, Joyce Seneshal, Suzi Knowles, Francesca Paist, and Vicky McCall met last January to discuss forming a new school district as a way to save their school.

Calling themselves the “South Valley School Committee,” the parents are considering becoming a nonprofit organization to collect money to pay a signature-gathering service to finally obtain the 9,300 names needed to get the Santa Clara County Board of Education to grant them formal secession from the SJUSD and become the South Valley School District.

The parents, who live in Blossom and Almaden valleys, maintain they began the breakaway movement before the district recommended closing Randol and Cory elementary schools to balance its $9 million deficit during the 2005-06 school year.

“We’re not political. We’re not running for office. The money would be strictly to help us complete the signature gathering process,” said homemaker Francesca Paist, one of the group’s key supporters.

Once the group becomes a nonprofit organization, Paist wants community volunteers to donate time and money to complete its goal so that a feasibility study can be conducted by county education officials to determine if splitting from the district would not adversely affect the racial makeup and desegregation efforts began by the SJUSD in 1985 when it was sued and ordered by a federal court to minimize racial isolation through choice of schools and enhance the academic achievement of Hispanic students.

The group, which purchased from the Santa Clara County Registrar of Voters a registered voter list for the new district boundary area, has collected 2,341 valid signatures, but needs to reach 25 percent of the proposed district’s registered voters, which would mean collecting 9,300 signatures to get county education officials to conduct a feasibility study to determine if the proposal meets the nine criteria to allow them to become a school district.

For the past several months, supporters have been acting as signature gatherers without much success standing outside South Valley supermarkets soliciting names from people because they need more volunteers. The signatures are then validated against the list they obtained from the registrar.

Paist said she has about 50 parents supporting the effort, but only 25 are interested in soliciting signatures. That’s why the group is considering paying a petition gathering service to do the job. One company contacted, American Campaign Services, gave the group an estimate of $57,000 or $6 per signature needed, Paist said. It’s now looking at other companies that do multi-petition signature gathering.

“We want to be a smaller district,” Paist said, citing educational benefits enjoyed by smaller districts like Oak Grove Elementary School District, which has less enrollment than the urban SJUSD, which has more than 30,000 students attending 26 elementary schools, six middle schools and seven high schools.

“The problem with our school district is that it’s huge. It has three separate, different communities. We can probably run the district without the state’s support and just rely on our property taxes,” Paist added.

The parents contend that the diversity of the new school district would be better than that of the SJUSD. On their Web site, the group says it’s tired of the district being unresponsive to the district’s southern community. The group is also frustrated that the district does not include academics and programs when considering school closures, wants an opportunity to maximize revenues and is the best long-term sustainability plan for their children’s education.

Until 2003, the SJUSD followed a plan to desegregate all of its schools in accordance with a federal court order signed on Dec. 31, 1985 on behalf of the Hispanic student population. The distribution of student demographic populations within the district is due, in part, to the odd geographical configuration of district boundaries.

The district is 24 miles long and four miles wide, which creates an ethnic imbalance between the far south and far north of the district. The court ordered the district to follow a plan, which is based primarily on parents making choices of the schools they wish their children to attend. The court order was modified in 1998 to allow elementary age students to attend their neighborhood schools.

As a result of the court order, the district offers parents and students a variety of middle and high school programs and school choices. In 2003, the district was released from 18 years of federal court oversight.

In 1971, a suit was filed by a class of Hispanic parents and students against the district for intentional segregation. Litigation continued until 1985 when the federal court found the district guilty of intentional segregation. As a result, the district was the only one in the state to have been found guilty of intentional discrimination by a federal court.

“The only way we’ll find out if this is feasible is if the county does the study. If our core group finds out that we would hurt a segment of the students we will voluntarily negotiate something else and look at other options. We won’t do this and hurt a group of kids... We’re not in it only for our kids. We realize that there could be a huge negative impact but we’ll never know without the study,” Paist said.

Twice before, within the past 20 years, Almaden parents have considered gathering signatures to conduct the study, Paist said.

Chris Brubaker, another breakaway proponent, said now that the school year has begun the group hopes to get the petitions needed in three months. “We think that once the school year begins, especially with the budget deficits that are projected to be announced and maybe even more school closures in the future that it will reenergize people and we’ll have the volunteers necessary,” he said.

Brubaker said the group doesn’t formally have any funds, but its core members have agreed to each donate $500 for the cause. The group is also interested in setting up booths at community festivals to raise awareness about its cause.

District officials are against the proposal citing ethnic and socioeconomic concerns.

“We’re speaking about a really small contingency of parents,” noted SJUSD spokeswoman Karen Fuqua about the group. “We feel we’re doing a good job of educating all of our students. We’ve done consolidation of schools.

We’ve created a positive vision for parents and students of Randol and Allen of how they’re going to move forward. The district offers a voluntary integration plan. Students can move based on socioeconomic status within the district. That’s how the movement of students happens in the district now. What could hurt them … is that desegregation dollars that follow students would probably not be available to them in the south end. There would be no movement to the south end of the district,” Fuqua said.

The 13 schools that would be included in the proposed South Valley school district are Allen Elementary, Almaden Elementary, Bret Harte Middle, Castillero Middle, Graystone Elementary, John Muir Middle, Leland High, Los Alamitos Elementary, Pioneer High, Randol Elementary, Simonds Elementary, Steinbeck Middle and Williams Elementary.

The schools are all located south of Branham Lane and Highway 85, in what is considered the most affluent and white section of the city.

For more information on the movement visit the group’s Web sites at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/svsd and http://southvalleyschools.tripod.com.

PhotoOp

Back to school blues

Five friends from Almaden share their last day of freedom before school starts shopping for supplies at Almaden Center. The girls were buying school supplies, getting haircuts and manicures and just keeping in touch before beginning the daily grind of classes and homework. They were also commiserating about their upcoming “lack of freedom.” The four freshmen were also talking about being nervous about entering high school and how hard their teachers might be. Pictured from left are Christina Muncy, 14, who will be an incoming freshman at Leland; Melissa Revhan, 13, an incoming freshman at Pioneer; Stephanie Bastians, 15, an incoming freshman at Pioneer; Ashley Giersch, 15, a sophomore at Pioneer; and Layna Richardson, 14, an incoming freshman at Leland. Photo by Carol Rosen

Apple iBooks enhance learning at Holy Spirit School

Holy Spirit School will be issuing Apple iBook G4s to its staff, faculty and all students in sixth through eighth grade as part of its Technology Assisted Learning (TAL) initiative.

This initiative also includes the upgrade and revamping of the school’s IT and wireless network technology, ensuring secure wireless Internet access to Holy Spirit’s online curriculum anywhere on campus. 

“We’re excited to begin a new school year with iBooks for our teachers and to introduce them to the students in this first year of our technology initiative,” said Eileen Cully, principal of Holy Spirit School. “This new infusion of technology is part of the school’s latest efforts to provide the very best education we can for our students, while ensuring they, and our teachers, have the necessary tools for teaching and learning.  Our school’s mission includes preparing our students for 21st century skills and this program addresses our mission soundly.”

Combined with a new wireless network infrastructure, Apple Xserve, Xserve RAID server and storage architecture, the iBooks will provide Holy Spirit with a learning environment that allows technology to enhance an outstanding curriculum and facilitate the communication and development of the students and teachers.

“We view Holy Spirit’s curriculum as first class already,” said Father Brendan McGuire, Pastor of Holy Spirit Parish.

“By incorporating technology into the classroom, we can enhance the effectiveness of this curriculum.  We view this not as a technology program but as a curriculum enhancement initiative.  That is what we believe the parents, teachers, and students will be excited about.”
 
Fr. Brendan stated that “this is the first year of a long-term plan to provide laptops and software tools to most of our students and all of our teachers.  This decision came about after an exhaustive review and analysis of the options available through the volunteer efforts of teachers, administrators and parents alike.”

Principal Cully added that “this year the emphasis will be on validating our assumptions, training the teachers, and allowing the fast adaptors to set the pace and raise the standard of performance throughout the school.  We are confident that everyone will enjoy being part of the initiative and the achievement that can be expected.”

Holy Spirit School is a Catholic diocesan school located on Redmond Road in Almaden, serving Holy Spirit Parish and many neighboring parishes. Currently the enrollment is 545 students from pre-kindergarten to grade eight.

Simonds teacher Terry Bermudez wins national award
for innovative teaching

An unsung hero is someone who strives to make a difference in the lives of others; however, their work often goes unnoticed. Many of these heroes can be found every single day—teaching in classrooms across the country. One of them, Terry Bermudez, a teacher at Simonds Elementary School, was recently recognized as one of the nation’s most innovative educators in the 2005 ING Unsung Heroes awards program.

Terry Bermudez

Bermudez was one of 100 winners who received a $2,000 award to help bring her innovative idea to life in the classroom. She now will vie with other winners for one of the top three prizes—an additional $5,000, $10,000 or $25,000.

The ING Unsung Heroes awards program recognizes kindergarten through 12th grade educators nationwide for innovative teaching methods, creative educational projects, and ability to make a positive influence on the children they teach. Created in 1995, this year marks the 10-year anniversary of the program that has now awarded more than $2.3 million to nearly 1,000 educators across the United States. The 2005 ING Unsung Heroes winners were selected from a group of nearly 1,150 educators.

“The Simonds Community Band” project is the brainchild of Bermudez. She successfully dedicated her time and energy to help bring together volunteers from the community to help run the program. This unique project is run solely by these volunteers and provides child musicians of all ages and skills the opportunity to study music together. The project also helps with the children’s self esteem and leadership skills.

“As we celebrate 10 years of the ING Unsung Heroes awards program, ING is honored to award educators like Terry Bermudez who go above and beyond to show their unwavering dedication and commitment to our youth,” said Bill Jasien, senior vice president of ING U.S. Financial Services. “Teachers are indeed heroes. Through our commitment to supporting educators, ING is striving to make a difference in the lives of America’s schoolchildren. We want to be a part of helping to build a strong educational foundation for our country’s future leaders.”

To learn about this year’s winning projects, as well as those from previous years, visit the ING Unsung Heroes website at www.ing.com/us/unsungheroes. Applications for the 2006 ING Unsung Heroes awards are available by calling 800-537-4180 or emailing ing@scholarshipamerica.org.

WELCOME Back to School!

Wednesday was the day. You know, the one most parents can’t wait for after a long summer filled with creative scheduling that weaves trips to Great America or Santa Cruz Boardwalk with work schedules that afford no such summer luxury. It’s also the day many pre-teens refused to devote even one minute of precious time to, much less mutter the “s” word.

And yes, it did seem to arrive much more quickly than years past, Wasn’t it just yesterday we were saying good-bye to the teachers for the summer?

While some children return to the comfortable familiarity of their school, others are just arriving for the first time and more still have moved on to the intimidating newness of middle or high school. It is indeed a school year filled with new students, new teachers, new principals, and new adjustments.

The Almaden Times Weekly welcomes each and every student, parent, and educator back to school. We’ve missed your smiling faces on the pages of our paper and look forward to bringing School Scene back in to production.

Don’t forget, this is your paper too. So keep us informed of anything and everything going on in your school.
Email us at newsroom@timesmediainc.com.