KPAO by Dave Cortright

California Education Code section 47601(b) is the single biggest reason why Bullis Charter School should not exist

From: Dave Cortright
To: Santa Clara County Board of Education
Cc: Santa Clara County Superintendent and Staff 
Sent: Friday, December 23, 2011 10:21 PM
Subject: California Education Code section 47601(b) is the single biggest reason why Bullis Charter School should not exist

Members of the Santa Clara County Board of Education,

In the past few months I've spent a lot of my free time digging into charter schools in general and Bullis Charter School specifically. And as you know (because I've shared them with you :-) there are numerous issues once could focus on. But in this letter, I want to focus on one issue in particular. For me, it is the key issue as to why Bullis Charter School (BCS) is not currently—and has never been in its entire eight year existence—compliant with the California Education Code regarding charter schools. It is section 47601, which says:

It is the intent of the Legislature, in enacting this part, to provide opportunities for teachers, parents, pupils, and community members to establish and maintain schools that operate independently from the existing school district structure, as a method to accomplish ALL of the following:

Let me pause here to emphasize the fact that the word "all" appears in this statement of law. There are 7 requirements listed in section 47601 (identified by the lowercase letters a-g), and this sentence—in no uncertain terms—requires that a charter school must accomplish all seven requirements. The second requirement in section 47601 (identified by the letter b) states:

Increase learning opportunities for all pupils, with special emphasis on expanded learning experiences for pupils who are identified as academically low achieving.

From everything I have seen regarding BCS and their educational program, there is nothing to indicate that they are in any way attempting to recruit academically low achieving students. In fact the evidence points to the exact opposite: they are recruiting students who are overall academically high achieving.

I searched the most recent Bullis Charter School petition, and in that entire 117 page document there is not a single mention of Section 47601 (compared with 29 mentions of Section 47605). There is also no mention of academically low achieving pupils (or any synonymous phrase like "under-served") in the document. All references to student recruitment in their charter petition refer specifically to achieving racial and ethnic balance so that they may meet the requirement of Section 47605(b)(5)(G). (And I feel the need to point out here that even with all of the language surrounding their desire to achieve racial and ethnic balance, they are still failing for the 9th straight year to do so, with half the number of Hispanic students as the district.)

Now LASD is one of the best school districts in the county (and state for that matter). But even in this great district, there are academically low achieving students. BCS is the only charter school in LASD, and charter law section 47601(b) requires that BCS place a special emphasis on expanding learning experiences for these students. Yet here we are, in the 9th year of BCS' existence and they continue to flagrantly ignore this section of charter law. But what disappoints me the most is that you are letting them get away with it.

To me, section 47601(b) is really the essence of charter schools. They should exist to help the kids who are struggling in traditional schools. They should be an means by which we can reach the bottom 5-10% of our students and pull them up to where they should be. BCS is not doing this. BCS is flagrantly breaking charter law by spurning section 47601(b). And it is primarily for this reason that articles like the Bloomburg one get written.

So I ask you—nay, beg you—to please start enforcing the California education code section 47601(b) with BCS. If they cannot or will not follow the charter law as written, then they must no longer exist as a charter school.

Thank you for reading, and for your consideration of my points. Happy holidays.
·Dave Cortright

What is Bullis Charter School's process for electing/appointing a new board member?

From: Dave Cortright
To: Bullis Charter School Board
Sent: Friday, December 23, 2011 9:08 PM
Subject: What is BCS' process for electing/appointing a new board member?

Members of the Bullis Charter School Board,

I have searched your web site, your most recent charter petition, and the California Education Code regarding charter schools. I wasn't able to find any information on how someone becomes a member of your board or what the term limits for board members are. Could you please point me to this information? And it would be great if you could post or at least link to it from this page on your site.

Thank you. Respectfully,
·Dave Cortright

PS I presume that since I am officially addressing these emails to the entire BCS board, and since you are a public school, that these emails become part of the official public record of the school. If I am mistaken, please let me know what I need to do to ensure they do become part of public record.

LASD paid $243,000 in 2011 for Bullis Charter facilities

I emailed with Randy Kenyon, who is the Assistant Superintendent of Business Services for the Los Altos School District. He reports that LASD spent $243,000 in 2011 for Bullis Charter facilities. This is an expense that would not have to be paid if BCS did not exist, since there would be no need to maintain the portable classrooms at Egan. There is sufficient space in the district schools to absorb the student population of BCS.

According to Ken Moore, president of the BCS board, there are 465 students at BCS this year. That means LASD is spending $523/student-year on facilities for BCS. This is of particular note as BCS makes no mention of this fact in any of the information they make available about the school. They gripe about how there is a "shortfall" of public funds, but they conveniently leave off resources like this, or the fact that they don't have to pay for any facilities update, they don't have to pay for special ed services (which are provided by the county), don't have pension liabilities like LASD does.

Then again, they do have some expenses that LASD does not. They are paying Wanny Hersey, BCS' principal, a salary that is well above average for a public school principal. And they like her so much, the BCS board even gave her a really sweet deal on a $250,000 loan for her newly-remodeled home (which in the blessed Bullis-Purissima 2003 attendence area, of course). I wonder how the Bullis parents feel about paying $5,000/student-year and then having the board choose to spend extravagently on Wanny and other frivolous things like nearly $1 million on the lawsuit against LASD?

If only there were some way for parents to have a say on the board. But there isn't, because the board selection process is not an open election like it is for traditional public schools. In fact, I can't see exactly how board members are selected. I will have to dig into this further. Stay tuned.

Conversation with Julia Hoover-Smoot regarding charter schools

From: Dave Cortright
To: Julia Hoover-Smoot
Cc: Santa Clara Country Board of Education, Superintendent, and Staff
Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2011 5:03 PM
Subject: Re: Issues surrounding traditional schools vs. charters—especially default values

Thanks for the response, Julia. I do believe we are both striving toward the same goal. And I do want to emphasize that I am not anti-charter. I do believe they serve a purpose. However I believe they are a short-term, stop-gap measure to implement while tackling the very difficult task of fixing the root cause of why the traditional public schools aren't working.

The question I would like us all to be asking when considering (or even when approving) a charter school is why can't the traditional school system do exactly what this charter is proposing? Is it that the staff isn't engaged enough? Is it that the administrative bureaucracy prevents them from implementing the needed changes? Do they not have the right staff in the right jobs to get it done? Are they not engaging enough with parents to help out? Whatever the reasons are, it needs to be a top priority for us all to get in there, figure out what is broken, and fix it. Yes, this might involve more legislative changes at the state level. And yes it won't be easy. But it is worth the investment.

We can't look at a new charter school as the final solution. While each new charter is an expedient solution to an immediate need, in many ways I consider it a badge of shame. The situation that drives the creation of a charter school is a symptom that points to underlying systemic problems. It is a wake-up call that traditional schools are failing our students, and they desperately need to be fixed.

Please don't interpret my use of the word "default" as derogatory. "Default" is a neutral concept. If you watch this video I linked to in my original message, you'll see that defaults can be good or bad. The key point is that—when confronted with complex decisions—it is human nature to take the default option. This is why it is so essential in systems design (and to be clear, my career is in systems design) to ensure the default option is the best for all. In our case, a traditional school is the default option for students. That's why it is imperative that we make it the best possible option.

So yes, kudos to you for approving those charters and getting some quick fixes into the system that will help some portion (20% maybe?) of those 40,000 kids who are falling through the cracks. But my question to you is what are you doing to fix the traditional system so that we can help ALL of those 40,000 kids? Charters schools are not the solution; They merely point out the problems in the traditional schools.

Thanks again for listening.
·Dave Cortright

---

From: Julia Hoover-Smoot
To: Dave Cortright
Cc: Santa Clara Country Board of Education, Superintendent, and Staff
Sent: Monday, December 19, 2011 4:14 PM
Subject: Re: Issues surrounding traditional schools vs. charters—especially default values

Dear Dave,

Thank you for the lengthy and thoughtful email. I felt I needed to respond to a few of your points. I too am passionate about fixing our weaknesses in our public schools -- you and I share that interest.

I disagree with you that we are sending a message that our public schools are "failing". We actually have many, many excellent schools in our county and I have great respect for the quality job they deliver every day.

However, a huge number of students are falling through the cracks -- 40,000 students to be exact. The system doesn't seem to be capable of meeting their unique needs and many of them are two or more grade levels behind.

For these children, something different is needed and we have something different available. To withhold it just to pretend we don't have problems would be a violation of these children's civil rights ( in my opinion).

I liken it to the standard of care in medicine. To give less than the standard of care is actionable in court. I believe there should be a standard of care in education and if I have it and won't provide it, it should be actionable.

It is not a zero sum game because the money does not "belong" to the school. The money is provided for the education of the individual student and follows the student.

Children in great need actually have more choices under a county charter because they need not reside in the specific district to attend a county charter.

I think you would find in speaking with parents that they rarely consider their school a "default" school. Both traditional and charter parents are usually very proud of their children's school.

Best wishes for a wonderful holiday. No doubt we will talk in the new year!

Sincerely,
Julia

Bullis Charter School, How do you value the facilities given to you by LASD?

From: Dave Cortright
To: Bullis Charter School Board and Superintendent
Sent: Monday, December 19, 2011 8:30 AM
Subject: How do you value the facilities given to you by LASD?

I attended the K-6 info night a couple of weeks ago. From the presentation, I found the attached "Public Funding Shortfall" slide particularly noteworthy. On this slide—and throughout the entire presentation—there is no mention of the value your school gains each year in the form of the site and facilities that you receive from the district.

Now I know that technically this isn't "funding". But it is an asset that can be assigned a dollar value. There are several ways one could calculate this. One would be the amount it would require you to obtain a similar site and facilities on the open market. Another is simply the dollar value that LASD spends in order to build and maintain the site.

So the question I would appreciate an answer to is "How do you value the facilities given to you by LASD?" What is the dollar figure per year that you assign to this asset? I contend that it cannot be zero as the omission from the attached slide implies.

And I do have a request. Could you include this value on the "Public Funding Shortfall" slide in the future? I believe it is disingenuous to not acknowledge the value of this asset that you receive.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Respectfully,
·Dave Cortright

Issues surrounding traditional schools vs. charters (e.g. Bullis)—especially default values

From: Dave Cortright
To: Santa Clara County Board of Education
Cc: Santa Clara County Superintendent and Staff
Sent: Sunday, December 18, 2011 1:19 PM
Subject: Issues surrounding traditional schools vs. charters—especially default values

Members of the Santa Clara County Board of Education (SCCBOE),

The past week has certainly been a notable one for you. I read this op-ed piece in the Mercury News by Mrs. Hoover-Smoot and Mr. Mann advocating 97 new charter schools in Santa Clara County, and saw that SCCBOE approved 20 new Rocketship charter schools on Wed. The message you are sending is loud and clear: public schools are failing our kids, but rather than investing in fixing the problems inherent in the public school system—the same public school system that you oversee for the entire county—you choose to turn your back on them and use charter schools as a panacea. But charter schools are not the panacea they appear to be. They may superficially appear to improve things, but if you dig into it, they do not address the root problems that plague our school system.

I can certainly understand your zeal for charters. Charter law makes it quite clear. Section 47605(b) states "the intent of the Legislature [is] that charter schools are and should become an integral part of the California educational system and that establishment of charter schools should be encouraged." And section 47601(g) states that charters will "provide vigorous competition within the public school system to stimulate continual improvements in all public schools." So I can see how it is easy for you to point at this and say that you're "just following the law". But if all we want of our board is to simply follow the letter of the law, then we should have a board full of lawyers. No, I expect you are on the board because you are passionate about education and deep down you want to do the right thing. And that's why I encourage you to think not only about what charter law says, but also about what the implications of your actions and whether it is really helping improve education in the county. 

One important consideration is that charters vs. traditional schools is at best a zero-sum game. There is a finite pool of resources available for public education in any given district. Resources given to a charter necessitates that those resources be taken away from traditional schools. Every time you approve a charter, the message you are sending to the school district is "we don't think you are doing the best you can with these resources, so we are going to give them to someone else we think can do better." As the organization overseeing traditional public schools, it not only shows a lack of support in those you oversee, it also shows a lack of trust in your own ability to fix the problems inherent in the current system.

What makes this even worse is that districts are not only forced to give up money to the charter schools, they are forced by law to give them reasonably equivalent facilities. This is where the situation becomes worse than zero-sum: economies of scale are lost when resources are divided between traditional and charter schools. A prime example of this is the Bullis Charter School (BCS). If BCS did not exist, the Los Altos School District (LASD) could easily accomodate all students across existing locations. With BCS, another public school now exists in the district that must be given it's own space. The district is now forced to operate an additional campus, or choose to close down an existing campus and deal with the repercussions from the community.

Charter law explicitly states the desire for "vigorous competition" between charters and traditional schools. Competition requires that there be winners and losers.

compete |kəmˈpēt|

verb [ no obj. ]

strive to gain or win something by defeating or establishing superiority over others who are trying to do the same.

I am in favor of competition. The problem I have with the current system is that charter schools and traditional schools are not playing on a level playing field. As I've already pointed out, traditional schools are forced to give money and facilities to charter schools. Since it's a zero-sum game and a competition, is it really any surprise that this situation generates such conflict? But this is just the beginning.

Charter schools are unencumbered by issues that traditional schools must deal with. Traditional schools have pension agreements with retired teachers. Traditional schools have to work with the teachers union, and as a result have more difficulty getting rid of low-performing teachers or properly rewarding high-performing teachers. Traditional schools must deal with all of the special needs and disabled students after they are discouraged from applying to charter schools. Traditional schools have a publicly elected board that is accountable to the public for their actions. And perhaps most importantly, traditional schools are the default choice for students, whereas applying to a charter requires an explicit action on the part of the parents. You must explicitly opt-in to the charter school. It requires effort. There is great influential power in the default values built into a system.

This last point is extremely important, and perhaps the most overlooked. The fact that a parent is involved and cares enough about their child's education to make the effort to apply for a spot in a charter means that the population of students in a charter are self-selected. Studies have shown a strong correlation between parental involvement and student achievement, so it should come as no surprise that charter schools will generally outperform a random sampling of students from the traditional schools in the district.

Here's a thought experiment: how do you think a charter school like BCS would do if getting into the charter was the default vaule? What is BCS' student body were made up entirely of a random set of students pulled from LASD? Or even more extreme, how would it look if BCS were to actually start following section 47601(b) of charter law and pulled its student body from only the lowest performing students in LASD? I can guarantee that in either case, their API wouldn't be nearly as high.

And when you have a charter school siphoning off the most engaged families, you necessarily leave the traditional schools with the less engaged ones. All you are doing is rearranging the deck chairs, putting the nicer ones on one side of the pool and the remainder on the other side. You are creating schools that are—instead of being a random sampling of the community—are sorted into schools with highly-engaged families and students, and schools with less engaged families and students.  And this means that traditional schools API will look worse in comparison. If you are not accounting for this in your evaluations, the you are just setting traditional schools up for failure.

I want to be clear: I am not against charter schools per se. I just want them to exist in a system where they are not given unfair advantage over traditional schools. I want you to be aware of all the ways in which traditional public schools are hindered when you are comparing performance of the two.

Here's another thought experiment: if 20 Rocketship charters are worth sponsoring, and you think 97 would also be worth sponsoring, why not turn ALL of the public schools into charters? I know that BCS receives 6 times as many applicants as they have spots. What if BCS simply accepted anyone who applied? They could essentially take over the entire LASD. LASD could just become a property management organization and BCS could handle all of the education duties. Would this eliminate the issues regarding pensions, teachers unions, special needs kids, and uninvolved parents? Or do you think that maybe—just maybe—the charter system is selecting out the kids who are motivated and will ultimately do well, and leaving the remainder for the traditional school districts to deal with?

So what is the call to action from all this? There are actually a few of them:

1. Please do not give up on the traditional schools. Yes they have problems, but work on fixing them, not on diverting resources away from them.
2. When you evaluate performance of charter schools, understand that it is not a level playing field. Charters do not have the legacy issues that encumber school districts. And the system is set up to non-randomly select motivated kids to attend charter schools.
3. The kids who would most benefit from attending a charter school are often the kids who's parents are least likely to know about or apply for such an opportunity. Make sure you create a system to address this.

As always, thank you very much for your time in reading this, and your consideration of my points. I am always available to talk via phone or meet in person. I am passionate about this, and I am willing to do what it takes to help you fix the education system.

Happy Holidays,
·Dave Cortright

Why do I have to close all browsers to update Microsoft Office for Mac?

Oh Microsoft. Why do you make the user experience of your products so sub-standard? I previously blogged about how Microsoft Office pessimizes the use of screen real estate with the ribbon UI, whereas a formatting palette would be a much better solution.

Now here I am trying to apply an update to Mac Office, and they want me to close down all of my browsers. Why on earth do you need me to do that? You shouldn't be touching any browser code or settings at all. I think it's just lazy programming, and that sucks. You can do better, and you should.

Bullis charter is asking Los Altos School District to make the same mistake twice

From: Dave Cortright 
To: Santa Clara County Board of Education
Sent: Monday, December 12, 2011 4:11 PM
Subject: Bullis charter is asking Los Altos School District to make the same mistake twice

Members of the Santa Clara County Board of Education (SCCBOE),

As the chartering authority of Bullis Charter School (BCS), you should be aware of what your school is asking of the Los Altos School District (LASD).

In 2003, LASD made the difficult decision to close Bullis Purissima school in Los Altos Hills. This decision so incensed a group of parents, that they used this event as a catalyst to form their own charter school: BCS. And since their inception, BCS (under Prop 39) has requested facilities of LASD with the old Bullis Purissima site stated as their preferred location. And I can understand that—at least up until 2008.

In 2008 LASD reopened the school under the new name Gardner Bullis. The decision to close the school back in 2003 was reversed 5 years later as enrollment increased in the district and after LASD finished substantial and much-needed renovations on the site. And since 2008, there has been a thriving public school open in Los Altos Hills at Gardner Bullis. The situation had changed.

However, BCS' Prop 39 requests have not changed. In every year since 2008 (including 2011) BCS has asked LASD to give them the Gardner Bullis site. BCS wants LASD to close the only public school in Los Altos Hills. BCS wants LASD to do the same thing to their neighbors that LASD did to them back in 2003.

What bothers me about this is that it shows a certain level of selfishness and hypocrisy. It was bad when LASD did this to them in 2003, but it's ok for them to do this to their neighbors in 2011.

If you visit the BCS home page, you can read their mission statement which includes references to teaching "about the interconnectedness of communities" and nurturing "mutual respect [and] civic responsibility". I want to believe that BCS embraces these values, but to me their actions say otherwise.

As always, thanks for reading this and taking the time to consider my points.

Respectfully,
·Dave Cortright

PS Leon and Charles, if you have read this far, then perhaps you are willing to read a bit further. This article on The Backfire Effect is quite interesting and informative.

The Misconception: When your beliefs are challenged with facts, you alter your opinions and incorporate the new information into your thinking.

The Truth: When your deepest convictions are challenged by contradictory evidence, your beliefs get stronger.

 

Pillar of Davidson by Live (Throwing Copper)

Warm Bodies, I sense
are not machines that can only make money
Past, perfect, tense
words for a feeling and all I've discovered

...

Old, bad eyes
Old, bad eyes
Old, bad eyes, almighty fear

The shepherd won't leave me alone
He's in my face and I
The shepherd of my days

I bought Louis CK's DRM-free video for $5

I like Louis CK. He was definitely an acquired taste. But his raw,self-deprecating honesty resonates. Of course this bit of him on Conan is a classic:

From that I watched his stand-up on Netflix, and more recently I discovered and watched his sitcom Louie.

So when I saw that he had a new video of his stand-up (Live at the Beacon Theater) for sale for $5, I had to check it out. And I saw this on the bottom of the page:

To those who might wish to "torrent" this video: look, I don't really get the whole "torrent" thing. I don't know enough about it to judge either way. But I'd just like you to consider this: I made this video extremely easy to use against well-informed advice. I was told that it would be easier to torrent the way I made it, but I chose to do it this way anyway, because I want it to be easy for people to watch and enjoy this video in any way they want without "corporate" restrictions.

Please bear in mind that I am not a company or a corporation. I'm just some guy. I paid for the production and posting of this video with my own money. I would like to be able to post more material to the fans in this way, which makes it cheaper for the buyer and more pleasant for me. So, please help me keep this being a good idea. I can't stop you from torrenting; all I can do is politely ask you to pay your five little dollars, enjoy the video, and let other people find it in the same way.

Sincerely, 
Louis C.K.

Again, raw honesty. I love it. So I bought it. I think he's worth it.