No Child Left Behind (NCLB) will be coming up for renewal. The testing and school labeling has not been without controversy.
School administration internally can use test results to reallocate resources and measure effectiveness and efficiency. Externally citizens can use test results to assist in evaluating school performance. NCLB is a net benefit if the combined internal and external utility exceeds testing costs, testing requiring resources to administer and publicize, and reducing instruction time among things.
I am unaware of any explanation other than the aggregation of immigrant children at Sequoyah Middle and Cross Key High based on the schools’ attendance boundaries. I accept that as effective and efficient when resources are allocated and deployed accordingly.
I am now of the opinion NCLB has benefited Cary Reynolds and Sequoyah schools. NCLB has resulted in more resources and better administration at these schools, something of special significance given parents that are not generally well-equipped to advocate for the schools. I’m less certain of NCLB net benefit districtwide however, and don’t have much opinion on state or national scales. What are others perceptions of NCLB’s effect on our local schools?
(Please respect this as a local blog by maintaining a specific local schools connection in comment thread!)
[this letter has also been sent to the AJC]
To The Editor:
I take exception to the DeKalb Development Authority’s Mr. Walker’s claim that the North Druid Hills Road area Sembler Development is not jeopardizing schools because the schools relocated for the project are magnet schools (Look at big picture in DeKalb, AJC July 10). Nancy Creek Elementary in north DeKalb was closed as a general purpose elementary school to accommodate the relocation of the Kittredge Elementary magnet school, instead of changing school attendance zones to relieve decades-old overcrowding at nearby Cary Reynolds and Dresden Elementary Schools.
The result is a magnet school that serves the whole county being relocated from a somewhat central to a peripheral location, while simultaneously leaving no way to relieve Reynolds and Dresden overcrowding without building another school in north DeKalb. There is no plan to build a new school but not to worry, 40 year old Reynolds and Dresden schools serve low income immigrant schoolchildren, so there is little opposition to the overcrowding.
Dave Bearse
PS – I intend to advocate for these schools at least for a time. Doraville residents should known that the area’s school Board representative, Jim Redovian, voted to oppose the Nancy Creek closure, while our superdistrict representative, Cassandra Anderson-Littlejohn, approves of the continuing the overcrowding at Reynolds and Dresden schools.
Dave Bearse weighs in on school boundary changes…
From: “David Bearse”
To: “‘Chris Avers’” ,
“Susan Fraysse” ,
“Marlene Hadden”
Subject: Oppose Chamblee feeder school attendance boundary changes
Date: Tue, 1 May 2007 09:08:24 -0400
Chris, Susan, Marlene:
My research indicates that there currently is no plan to eliminate overcrowding at Reynolds or Dresden schools, and absent action that the overcrowding will continue indefinitely. Other concerned citizens may want to express concerns to the DeKalb school board or administration (Board members e-mail addresses in the message header below). I also understand others residing in the vicinity of Nancy Creek Elementary advocate continuing operation of the school as a general purpose elementary school. They may want to advocate for school attendance zone changes extending to Reynolds and Dresden to bolster their cause, if you have means to provide the information in the message below to them.
Dave Bearse
_____
From: David Bearse
Sent: Tuesday, May 01, 2007 8:29 AM
To: ‘jim_redovian@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘lynn_c_grant@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘sarah_copelin-wood@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘bebe_joyner@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘jay_cunningham@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘thomas_bowen@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘zepora_w_roberts@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘cassandra_m_anderson-littlejohn@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’; ‘elizabeth_andrews@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’
Cc: ‘redistricting@fc.dekalb.k12.ga.us’
Subject: Oppose Chamblee feeder school attendane boundary changes
Dear DeKalb School Board members:
I support DeKalb Schools increasing school enrollments at schools operating at less than capacity in order to maximize state funding. I however request you oppose at least for the present the proposed Huntley Hills and Montgomery Elementary Schools school attendance boundary changes, and eliminating Nancy Creek Elementary School as a general purpose elementary school. An effort should be made (or greater effort if one has already been made) to develop attendance zones that would relieve substantial and long time overcrowding at nearby Cary Reynolds and Dresden Schools, before closing Nancy Creek as a general purpose school.
There are currently seven classroom trailers at Reynolds and six at Dresden, schools that are adjacent to the Huntley Hills-Nancy Creek-Montgomery group of schools. School attendance boundary changes that would relocate the Reynolds and Dresden trailer students to the Nancy Creek-Huntley Hills-Montgomery group should be considered, or reexamined if they have already been considered. Thirteen trailers at 18 students per trailer yields 234 children that if relocated to the Huntley Hills-Nancy Creek-Montgomery group of schools would bring total attendance at that group of schools to over 1200, in excess of the desired 400 each minimum required to maximize state funding.
Attendance zone changes could relieve overcrowding without new construction. There is nothing to indicate the overcrowding will ever subside without attendance zone changes or new construction, given the land development and resident population in the Reynolds and Dresden school attendance zones is mature and stable, or if anything is increasing. (I am personally familiar will at least 100 new housing units under construction within the attendance zones served by Reynolds and Dresden.)
Reynolds and Dresden are by most any reckonings special needs schools. There is nothing in the SPLOST construction program to eliminate trailers at either Reynolds or Dresden. Reynolds is on at least its second generation of trailer classrooms (I don’t know about Dresden) thus overcrowding is clearly a long-time circumstance. Relieving systemic overcrowding that will not subside on its own and that dates to or before the first SPLOST should take precedence to attending to overcrowding at schools that only more recently have become overcrowded, or areas that are only now being developed.
As a starting point, that part of the Reynolds attendance zone bounded by Shallowford Road, Chamblee-Tucker Road, and MARTA likely has 126 or more (7 trailers worth) of overcrowded Reynolds students. This area is separated from Reynolds by both Shallowford Road and Buford Highway, as is nearly as close to either Huntley Hills or Nancy Creek as it is to Reynolds.
Dave Bearse
PS – William Moseley is to be commended for taking the time to respond to my initial inquiry and discuss this matter with me.
In the mail today, we received what I think is one of the meanest flyers Jill Chambers has ever sent out. It acuses Bob Roche of not supporting “our schools” because he failed to vote in 2 elections (held on March 18, 1997 & March 19, 2002, respectively). She arbitrarily gives him an F- for missing this vote (which was probably missed by plenty of other people in Georgia & the 81st district–if you’re one of them, you get an “F” too, I suppose).
From what little information I can dig up about these missed elections, they seemed to be referendums asking voters to approve a Special Purpose Local-Option Sales Tax (SPLOST), the proceeds of which would go to Dekalb County schools. It’s hard for me to get too upset over someone missing a vote on this issue–especially if they might be ambivilent about raising taxes to fund a school board whose policies he or she might not agree with. In fact, if you think about it, it’s kind of funny that Chambers (a self described “fiscal conservative” Republican) is upset that someone didn’t vote to raise taxes.
The thing that offends me most about the flyer is a picture of a fat guy in his underwear with dirty socks, and a beer…picking something out of his teeth. The caption reads “Hey Bob, what was more important than supporting our schools” — basically trying to paint Mr. Roche as a fat slob who was too lazy to vote. The ad hominem personal attack is what really bothers me.
When comparing the two candidates, it becomes obvious that Roche’s campaign is a real long-shot. At the end of September, Jill had raised over $235,000 versus Roche, who has raised less than $12,000. She certainly has name recognition, and a record to run on. And somehow, even with all of this in her favor, Chambers still feels a need to paper our neighborhoods in mean-spirited attack ads. It’s like she thinks she can’t win unless she rips the other guy apart. I don’t get it–and it makes me question her character.
Since she’s a reader of and commenter on this blog, I’d love to hear Representative Chambers explain why she feels she has to run on non-issues & ad-hominem attacks in order to win elections. Trust is the issue, and it’s hard to trust someone who does everything she can to disgrace her opponents.
Below is a letter to the AJC that you may post to doraville.org. The AJC publishes about one-tenth of the letters it receives, but it’s now rare that anything I write is published. I’d estimate the AJC publishes less than 5% of my letters—guess I write too often or there’s some other reason.
Dave Bearse
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To The Editor:
The rigidity of Perdue’s classroom size legislation burdens school districts, particularly small districts and especially small elementary schools. The legislation could mandate kindergarden classes as small as 10 students. (A school with 21 kindergarten students would be required to have classes of 10 and 11 students each at nominally 50% higher cost. A school with 61 kindergarten students would have to have three classes of 15 and one of 16 students at a nominal 25% greater expense than two classes of 20 and one of 21. Pity planning at schools with a number of students near thresholds that require a change in number of classes.)
The property tax and other burdens that the class size legislation will impose on small and/or poor districts will be in some measure an unfunded mandate as well as lawsuit ammunition for state takeover of school funding. The latter may be desired given that many of those in power desire a state sales tax to replace local property taxes. It’s very disappointing that the principle of local control that was loudly proclaimed when out of power has been nearly abandoned when in power—shades of George Orwell’s “Animal House”.
School districts with multiple elementary schools can realign attendance boundaries to meet the law’s requirements. It must however be remembered that this General Assembly also saw fit to enact legislation (again ignoring the principle of local control) encumbering the changing of school attendance boundaries by Boards of Education. This classroom size legislation like the Voter ID legislation was not thoroughly thought through and most likely will have to be revisited. Parents of children that are subject to or will be shifted from one school to another in response to this legislation and taxpayers in general who will be footing the bill should at election time consider the current state leadership prefers to shoot first, ask questions later.
It’s an election year though. Perdue rode to power on teacher disenchantment with Roy Barnes’ education initiatives and even poorly thought out legislation is preferable to none because Georgia after four years of Perdue administration is still dead-last in K-12 education by most standards of measurement, with no indication that that standing is changing.