KPAO by Dave Cortright

Switching costs make it impractical to swap out reasonably equivalent alternatives

As a follow up example on my last post on reasonable equivalence, consider this example. Before anyone boards an airplane, all the seats within a given class (e.g. coach) are considered reasonably equivalent. This is why I can go up to the gate agent before boarding begins and request a different seat (such as a window, or one closer to the front of the plane) and they will accomodate me if they can.

However once I board the plane and I'm settled into my seat next to my traveling partner with my carry on stowed in the overhead above me, my shoes off, my book out, and my earplugs in, I really have no desire to swap seats with anyone else on the plane. Despite the fact that any other seat remains reasonably equivalent, there are now significant switching costs that must be factored in. If I were in some way compensated for my trouble (e.g. upgraded to first class), or if the switching cost is low (e.g. swapping my aisle seat with the person at the window) I might be enticed to trade. But the important thing is this is my choice. I am not required to.

So Bullis Charter School supporters, please stop asking to swap your site with a different one in the district. Unless you are willing and able to offer compensation to offset the switching costs, it's simply not going to happen.

A tale of two vehicles—a parable of reasonable equivalence

John has a wife, 3 kids, and 2 dogs. He and his family lead an active, outdoor lifestyle. They go hiking, camping, and in the winter they spend almost every weekend up in the mountains doing snow sports. John has a large SUV with 4 wheel drive and snow tires. It's big enough to fit the entire family (including the dogs) and their luggage. It also can get them safely to and from the mountains, even during a snow storm.

Mary has a husband, 2 kids, and 2 cats. She and her family prefer the city life. They spend their weekends attending theatrical performances, visiting art galleries, or even just staying home and playing board games together. Mary has a large sedan that fits everyone when they go out. The cats always stay home. It's a bit newer than John's SUV with fewer miles, but it also is smaller and doesn't have 4 wheel drive.

While John's SUV and Mary's sedan are not the same, they are *reasonably equivalent*. But that doesn't mean it makes sense for John and Mary to swap vehicles. If they did, now things are a lot less convenient for John. It's a real squeeze to get John's family into the sedan. And short of pulling a Mitt Romney and strapping their crates to the roof, there's no way to bring the dogs along anymore. In the mountains, John now needs to stop and put on chains.

Mary is a bit better off, but not much. She's spending a lot more money on gas for the SUV. She finds it more difficult to drive and park in the city than her smaller sedan. And since the SUV is older and not quite as reliable, it's now wearing out and has required several visits to the mechanic. She tried taking the cats out one day, but they just yowled the whole time they were in the car.

Moral of the story: Just because two things are reasonably equivalent doesn't mean it is beneficial for either party to swap.

In 2009-2010, Bullis Charter School outspent LASD by 29% on each student

I was looking at the the Bullis Charter School 2010-2011 School Accountability Report Card and I noticed that they spent $13,272/student in the 2009-2010 school year.

Looking at the numbers in the LASD Comprehensive Annual Financial Report for 2010, they report there were 4,385 in the district that year (first full paragraph at the top of p. ii), and the district paid $44,993,723 for its operations that year (the table at teh top of p. 9). That works out to $10,261/student in the 2009-2010 school year.

This means in 2009-2010, Bullis spent $3011 more than LASD per student, which is 29.3% greater. Based on my last post, the gap has closed. But at 20.6%, it's still significant.

Bullis charter spends $1903/student more than LASD (over 20% more)

From the Los Altos School District 2011-12 budget, total expenditures are $41,154,965 (from the table at the top of p. 4), and the projected total enrollment is 4460 (from the last sentence on p. 4). Dividing the two yields $9228/student for the year.

From the Bullis-Purissima Elementary School Foundation web site, Bullis Charter School spends $11,131/student.

That's a difference of $1903/student or 20.6%.

Thus, I would appreciate it if BCS supports would stop claiming that the LASD and BCS spend "about the same amount" on each student, or that the $5000 "suggested donation" is simply to "make up the gap". These assertions are simply not true.

I also want to note that I am making no attempt to drill into the different categories or line items to compare and contrast how LASD and BCS spends that money differently. That is a separate post. The point of this post is simple: BCS spends over 20% more on each student each year compared with students in LASD's traditional public schools.

Words of the day: zeugma and syllepsis

A friend recently wrote to me in an email "I'm off to make jello salad and history." That led me down a path of research leading me to discover the term for this turn of phrase: syllepsis.

Syllepsis, also known as semantic zeugma, is a particular type of zeugma in which the clauses disagree in either meaning or grammar. The governing word may change meaning with respect to the other words it modifies. This creates a semantic incongruity that is often humorous. Alternatively, a syllepsis may contain a governing word or phrase that does not agree grammatically with one or more of its distributed terms. This is an intentional construction in which rules of grammar are bent for stylistic effect.

I also like how the first example is from Flight of the Conchords.

I suppose this post is for the 3 of you who are still reading despite the sharp left turn this blog took several months ago to focus on Bullis Charter School. Thanks for sticking around. Maybe we can all meet up for a fan appreciation event at the Palo Alto Airport (which only seems fitting given the name of the blog).

An opt-out lottery would help charter schools fulfill 47601(b)

From: Dave Cortright
To: Santa Clara County Board of Education
Cc: Santa Clara County Superintendent and Staff 
Sent: Thursday, February 16, 2012 5:19 PM
Subject: An opt-out lottery would help charter schools fulfill 47601(b)

Members of the Santa Clara County Board of Education,

Back in December, I sent you a letter outlining some of the systemic problems with the current charter school system. Chief among them is the issue that academically low achieving students are more likely to come from families that are not as engaged in their child's academics. Thus, the very kids that charters were designed to help are less likely to even know about charter school opportunities let alone apply.

Michelle Sturiale alerted me to a public education advocacy group in New Jersey that has proposed a simple yet brilliant solution to this problem: make the charter school admissions lottery opt-out rather than opt-in. This article details it nicely:

Save Our Schools NJ also has an issue with the way many charter schools are filled on a first-come, first-served basis. According to [Dr. Julia Sass] Rubin [ associate professor at Rutgers University and founding member of the group], this is “cream skimming.” Since most disadvantaged families don’t have the resources to get the information needed about how to enroll their children into these schools, charter schools end up with children from the most affluent voters in their environment, who are able to access the necessary information first.

Rubin defended charter schools in one respect. “Charter schools aren’t discriminating, they can’t control it,” she said. “It’s an institutional problem.”

To correct this form of segregation, Save Our Schools NJ has proposed the Opt-Out Lottery Bill, which would require charter schools to automatically include everyone in their communities that qualify and give families the option to opt-out if they do not want to be considered for enrollment. The bill is designed to level the field for parents who don’t have easy access to information or are restricted by language barriers.

As the chartering authority for so many charter schools, you have a great opportunity to make this idea a reality. It could even be further refined; Rather than indiscriminately opting-in all students, it could focus specifically on those who are academically low achieving. I would think that any school district would enthusiastically work in concert with charters to make this happen, as it would target students struggling in traditional schools and give them the opportunity to attend a school that—in the words of CA Ed Code Section 47601(b)—"[places] special emphasis on expanded learning experiences for pupils who are identified as academically low achieving".

And while I would love to see an opt-out policy codified officially by an organization such as yours, at the same time I wonder if it could be implemented at a grassroots level. If I can get the help of my local school district, together we can identify a group of academically low achieving students and reach out to those families, letting them know that unless they decline, we will enter their child in the lottery for admissions to Bullis Charter School. I think this would go a long way toward making Bullis the kind of local charter school I can be proud of.

But don't let that distract you from my primary request: before you approve your next charter or renewal, ask the petitioners to include a commitment to automatically include academically low achieving students in their admissions lottery. It's a small ask, but I believe it will make a huge difference in helping the students who need it the most. And it will help cement your role as truly visionary leaders on the forefront of public education. It would be ideal if such a provision could be included in the Memo of Understanding your are currently working on with Bullis. And speaking of that, I hope you are able include as many of my 14 suggestions for inclusion in the MOU as possible.

As always, thank you so much for your time and attention. If you ever want to talk, please do not hesitate to reach out to me.

Respectfully,
·Dave Cortright

My reading of H035195 Bullis Charter vs LASD: more due diligence required

“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
―Christopher Hitchens

I have seen claims about the H035195 court ruling that to me do not appear to be supported by the language in the ruling, or as Christopher Hitchens might call it: evidence. In this post, I will interpret the ruling based on my reading of the ruling, backed up by quotes from within the ruling. If anyone feels my logic is in error, I encourage you to correct me. Or better yet, write your own interpretation of this ruling also backed up by quotes from within the ruling.

If you have not already done so, please download and read the entire ruling yourself. It is imperative to understand the source material directly rather than someone else's interpretation. The first 2.5 pages are what I believe are the most relevant.

For brevity, I will summarize some language here. The court found that LASD was failed to take several factors into consideration when doing the "reasonably equivalent" analysis of both teaching and non-teaching space. The court goes on to conclude:

Based upon these deficiencies in the aggregate, we hold that the facilities offer was inconsistent with the mandate of Proposition 39 that a school district conduct a fair assessment of the facilities needed by the in-district charter school students so that those facilities offered meet the reasonable equivalence standard.

...

the District acted arbitrarily by failing to apply the proper legal standards in its facilities offer to Bullis, in violation of Proposition 39.

In my reading of this, the court is saying that Prop 39 requires that school districts conduct a fair assessment of the facilities using proper legal standards. LASD failed to do this. The court is saying that LASD must be more dilligent, accurate, and complete with their assessment of what is considered reasonably equivalent facilities. That is all.

There are a lot of things the ruling does not say. It does not say specifically what reasonably equivalent must mean. It does not say that Bullis must receive a 10 acre site. It does not say that Bullis must recieve a single site. All it says is that LASD must dilligent, accurate, and complete with their facilities assessment.

Reading over the preliminary offer that LASD submitted to BCS for 2012-13, it appears to me that LASD has used more dilligent, accurate, and complete assessments, thus complying with the ruling. Here is a portion of the text from that document in support of this assertion:

"The District understands the court of appeals decision to mean that a facilities offer can satisfy Proposition 39’s requirements despite an alleged 'site size' discrepancy. Indeed, the court of appeal acknowledged that the District could neutralize an alleged size discrepancy by offering 'facilities qualitatively superior to those of the comparison group schools' by other measures under Proposition 39.

As set forth herein, the District’s facilities offer generally allocates teaching, non-teaching and specialized teaching space to BCS in excess of the amounts provided to students at the District’s comparison group schools. These classroom, administrative and specialized teaching spaces, rather than the marginal spaces included in the 'total site size' calculation, are the spaces most relevant to providing a quality education to students. As such, the amounts of space allocated to BCS for teaching, non-teaching and specialized teaching space provided to BCS in these spaces in excess of its allocation were considered in weighing the total site size factor."

One more thing: the CA supreme court did not—in fact—rule on this case. They simply declined to hear it. It is not the same thing.

A harbinger of what could happen in Los Altos School District because of Bullis Charter School

From: Dave Cortright
To: Santa Clara County Board of Education
Cc: Santa Clara County Superintendent and Staff
Sent: Wednesday, February 8, 2012 8:38 AM
Subject: A harbinger of what could happen in Los Altos School District because of Bullis Charter School

Members of the Santa Clara County Board of Education,

From a recent article in the Orange County Register:

Barcelona Hills Elementary is closing in June, but not because it's an underperforming school or because neighborhood parents are demanding sweeping changes.

The 34-year-old Mission Viejo school, a 2010 California Distinguished School recipient nestled in a middle-class Mission Viejo neighborhood of families who cherish and support their school, is closing because a charter school needs space to expand – and there isn't room for both schools.

The Capistrano Unified School District made the gut-wrenching decision to close Barcelona Hills in January, following a five-month experiment in which Barcelona shared its 25-classroom campus with the district's new Oxford Preparatory Academy K-8 charter school.

The Barcelona Hills parents who have been fighting to keep their beloved school open say that when voters approved Prop. 39, they couldn't have anticipated this outcome, nor intended it.

I have pointed out to you previously, BCS has repeatedly asked LASD to do exactly this same thing over the past 5 years: close a high-performing traditional school (or as BCS puts it in their 2012-13 facilities request, "any 10-acre or greater District K-6 school site within the Los Altos High School attendance area") and give it to them.

Sadly, LASD does not have any spare 10-acre or greater school sites going unused. I commend the LASD board for their out-of-the-box thinking thus far in providing reasonably equivalent facilities to BCS while minimizing disruption to LASD's provably effective educational plan. But this situation isn't going away, and BCS will continue to ask for the "Barcelona Hills solution" year after year unless some progress is made here.

This is why I'm reaching out to you. As the chartering authority for BCS, I would really like you to take a more positive and proactive role in helping BCS in its relations with LASD and the community. Specifically:

1. Provide coaching and guidance to BCS on some of the finer (and perhaps even coarser) points of negotiating. It appears to me that BCS is stuck in the mindset that they absolutely deserve their own 10-acre school site, and their intransigence impedes any progress. They need to be willing to talk seriously about scenarios that do not include getting exclusive access to one of the existing LASD school sites. I'm confident you can help them here.

2. Consider using county resources to help procure a school site for BCS. I'm sure the county has much broader access to real estate than LASD. If you could bring those resources to bear, it would certainly broaden the array of options we have to resolve this issue. I have suggested 8 tacks that LASD can consider here. I know you are not legally obligated to do this, but any you can add to the list would be much appreciated. Plus it would show the whole community your willingness to take your responsibilities as BCS' chartering authority seriously.

I do understand that your are actively working on both the MOU and setting up a meeting with all three parties. I encourage you to consider the two points I made above as you work on both of these items.

Thank you for your time and consideration. Don't forget that I am always open to your feedback, and I am always willing to meet with you in person or over the phone.

Respectfully,
·Dave Cortright

Out-of-the-box thinking for a long-term Bullis Charter School site

From: Dave Cortright
To: Los Altos School Board
Cc: Los Altos Superintendent and Assistant
Sent: Tuesday, February 7, 2012 1:10 AM
Subject: Out of the box thinking for a long-term BCS site

Members of the Los Altos School Board,

I have a few ideas for a long-term BCS site. Of course all of these are predicated on a BCS board that is truly open and willing to consider sites other than Gardner Bullis. As my knowledge and experience of this situation grows, my belief that such a situation can ever exist dwindles. But that is not for us to decide. All we can do is put in our best good-faith effort in an open and honest way, and hope that eventually clearer heads will prevail.

Keep in mind these are rough, brainstorming ideas. They are here simply to provoke thinking in directions you may not have considered. For any of these to turn into a serious plan or offer, a lot more work will need to be done.

0. Keep BCS in the portables at Egan and Blach. In decision-making, there is always the option of taking no additional action. This option should always be on the table, as it requires the fewest resources and entails the least risk. BCS has these facilities for 8 years, and one could make a good case that anything that happens in public schools over 8 consecutive years is "long-term". BCS has shown that they can not only make do with this site, but that their students can thrive in that environment. They made a point of emphasizing this in their presentation to the SCCOE at their charter renewal last year. Moving them to a different site could negatively impact their success.

There are also slight variants on this idea where you consolidate BCS onto one site (Egan or Blach) and/or grant them additional outdoor acreage.

1. Sell the land BCS is on today and use the proceeds to buy a new site. I'm personally not a big fan of the idea of raising $50-$100 million in a bond for the purchase of a new site. And I admit it: the bad attitude of the BCS administration has done much to color my opinion. But I don't think you need to raise new funds to buy a new site; you already have existing resources you can leverage: your land.

Look at it this way: if we keep going down the path of option 0, then that land will never be available to the Egan or Blach students. So selling it has the same effect as keeping BCS on it. One big advantage is that the new site can be physically separated from the other LASD schools which will eliminate complaints and bad interactions that come about from sharing a single site.

It might even be possible to arrange a land swap if we can find the right land owner. And maybe we could even parlay that 6 acres at Egan or Blach into a 10 acre parcel somewhere else (such as up in the Hills). Talk about a win-win situation!

2. Pay BCS a facilities stipend and let them site themselves. I know there are some amazingly large houses and properties up in the Hills where they very much want to be located. It might be a challenge for them to find a single site to hold them all, but they could spread individual classes across multiple sites, and then find a larger site for part time for school-wide functions. I think there's a lot of potential that could be explored in this area, if BCS is receptive to it.

3. Storefront school. I'm not sure what sort of regulations govern where a public school can be, but it does seem that in the economic downturn there are a selection of empty commercial properties that could be configured for a school. Of course getting contiguous outdoor space that can be physically separated from traffic (and no doubt a host of other constraints) might make this a non-starter. But hey, this is out of the box thinking. Let's not censor ourselves now.

4. Recruit a wealthy donor (or donors). BCS really wants the Gardner Bullis site. Perhaps in order to get it, they could raise a bunch of money to build a new traditional school for LASD in the Hills. Or I suppose they could choose to build their own campus in the Hills. I hear tell that some wealthy folks live there, and some of them send their kids to BCS. Who wouldn't want their legacy to be forever enshrined as a true hero in support of some of the best public schools in California? Mark Zuckerberg promised $100 million to the Newark, NJ public schools. Can our Hills residents stand idly by and let themselves be out-philanthropied by a 27-year-old?

5. Sponsorships. I know that Target is a big corporate sponsor of K-12 education. There is a Target store within LASD. Maybe they would be willing to help out here? If not with money, then maybe land? They have a massive parking lot, and I've never even seen it nearly half full. I bet we could squeeze 10 acres out of them. Or we could expand out into the old DMV building too.

I'm not sure what restrictions there on advertising or sponsorships in public schools. But if you could sell banner space along your fence lines, have the cafeterias sponsored by food companies or restaurants, or even sell the naming rights to your schools much like stadiums do, I think that would go a long way to defraying the costs of a new campus.

6. Acquire land from other government agencies. I believe I heard a reference to something like this in the meeting tonight. If the city government (the Flats or the Hills) has land that could be used LASD for a new school, that's definitely worth investigating. The same goes for any other public agency: parks, sanitation, police, fire, etc.

I'll stop there. That should be enough to get you started. I'm happy to help with additional brainstorming in the future if you need it. But really I'm not sure you need more ideas. I think what you need is a school board that is open to negotiation over litigation. I wish you nothing but the best of luck in that regard.

Respectfully,
·Dave Cortright

If a male mugging victim were treated the same as a female rape victim

Man: Hello, I'd like to report a mugging.

Officer: A mugging, eh? Where did it take place?

Man: I was walking by 21st and Dundritch Street and a man pulled out a gun and said, "Give me all your money."

Officer: And did you?

Man: Yes, I co-operated.

Officer: So you willingly gave the man your money without fighting back, calling for help or trying to escape?

Man: Well, yes, but I was terrified. I thought he was going to kill me!

Officer: Mmm. But you did co-operate with him. And I've been informed that you're a successful businessman and quite a philanthropist, too.

Man: I give to charity, yes.

Officer: So you like to give money away. You make a habit of giving money away.

Man: What does that have to do with this situation?

Officer: You knowingly walked down Dundritch Street in your expensive suit when everyone knows you like to give away money, and then you didn't fight back. It sounds like you gave money to someone, but now you're having after-donation regret. Tell me, do you really want to ruin his life because of your mistake?

Man: This is ridiculous!

Officer: This is a rape analogy. This is what women face every single day when they try to bring their rapists to justice.