Carin Geathers, the new principal of Burckhalter Elementary School, tells us about her first months on the job. -Katy

Stimulate: to rouse to action or effort, as by encouragement or pressure; spur on; incite…

As I reflect on my first five months on the job as a new principal, the analogy that comes to mind is akin to how I felt as I welcomed home my new baby daughter eight years ago. I looked forward to and welcomed the new addition to my life, but had no idea how this little person would completely change it.

Assuming the leadership of Burckhalter Elementary School has changed my life in ways too numerous to mention. The school and those there have acted as a balm during one of the hardest times of my life, the loss of one of best friends and ardent supporters; and has caused me to summon and call forward experiences, teachings and “learnings” and roused me to take actions and exert effort to help shape the school into a thriving and vibrant community.

I began the school year with the uncertainty of school closure but refused to let myself or anyone inside of the school dwell there. There was and continues to be much to do… Students need teachers focused on delivering the best educational program they are capable of, teachers need leadership that provides stability, instructional expertise and directs dwindling resources toward helping all students meet the increasing demands of a fast changing and evolving world.

The learning curve has been steep: Read the rest of this entry »

Three-fourths of the children at North Oakland’s Berkley Maynard Academy come from poverty, but they participated in the spirit of giving all the same, though a toy drive coordinated with local firefighters. Sam Humphrey, a teacher at the Aspire charter school, wrote the below account of the experience. -Katy

photo by D. Ross Cameron/Staff

Blessed with tremendous parent support that most teachers can only dream of, I had a visitor — Ms. Martha, as the kids call her — come to my class with an opportunity for my students to take part in the season of giving. She brought in flyers about Toys for Tots with the incentive of a pizza party and a visit from the Oakland Fire Department.

With the magical motivational powers of pizza in full effect, my students were immediately on board. Eventually, the lesson took a more valuable turn once students began asking who would receive the gifts. We had a discussion on giving and the importance of selflessness during the holidays, and the true meaning of the project came to light. Read the rest of this entry »

Way back in April 2007, I had the pleasure of observing the first of many sessions about overcrowding in a severely undercrowded district. It was on a Sunday afternoon at Hillcrest Elementary School, and boy was it intense.

Tonight, literally more than 30 meetings later, the board voted to send all Hillcrest-area kids for whom there’s no space to nearby Kaiser Elementary, a high-performing arts magnet school. They also agreed to eventually expand capacity at the also crowded Montclair Elementary School by up to 100 more students, which the school’s faculty council apparently opposes. No boundary lines changed.

You can find the presentation here.

Dozens of parents at various “hills schools,” some of whom live across the city from where their kids go to school, attended tonight’s meeting to voice support for Oakland’s Options policy.

School choice advocates take note: Read the rest of this entry »

You don’t need to have served on a board of education to know this: Closing schools is a political nightmare. Imagine hundreds of impassioned teenagers marching eight miles from their school in East Oakland’s King Estates neighborhood to protest its fate. I don’t need to describe the indignation, the tears, the news trucks and cameras everywhere.

But phasing schools out, one grade at a time? Allowing them to die a slow death, without forcing out any existing students? Families and kids who don’t yet attend a school are much less likely to rally around it.

I have a feeling that’s the wave of the future here in Oakland.

Tonight, the state administrator is set to approve plans to phase out BEST High School, one of two small schools remaining at West Oakland’s McClymonds campus, by 2011, and to close the nearly phased-out only Peralta Creek Middle School (Calvin Simmons) after its last group of eighth-graders is promoted to high school.

Fremont Federation’s Paul Robeson School of Visual and Performing Arts has suddenly Read the rest of this entry »

Around this time each year, the state education department gives props to schools whose low-income students cleaned up on high stakes tests.  These are high-performing schools with ”socioeconomically disadvantaged” populations of at least 40 percent. 

This year’s Oakland winners are: Read the rest of this entry »

This morning, 20 of Oakland’s best 8-year-old math students strutted into Lafayette Elementary School’s auditorium to adrenaline music and applause. It sort of felt like that moment before a big boxing match or basketball game, when the competitors enter the arena in their warmups.

Photos by Laura A. Oda/Oakland Tribune

The organizers of OUSD’s first math competition of its kind were careful to say, over and over, that everyone was a winner. All of the kids had already out-multiplied the other third-graders at their schools, so it wasn’t just a platitude. But you could see, in their eyes or in the cross of their fingers, how much they wanted to win it all.

The room fell still as the rules were explained: Erase your last answer. Start the problem. Markers down. Repeat. Read the rest of this entry »

Why go to the ballet when the ballet can come to you? This afternoon, the Oakland Ballet Company made a stop at West Oakland’s Lafayette Elementary School to perform selections from “The Nutcracker.”

D. Ross Cameron, one of our staff photographers, took the below photos.

Read the rest of this entry »

photo courtesy of Cool the Earth

North Oakland Community Charter School parents might be wondering why, all of a sudden, their kids are bugging them to use compact fluorescent lights (CFLs), to eat one less pound of beef per week, or to take shorter showers.

The Oakland charter school is one of more than 20 schools to join the Cool the Earth initiative. Started in 2007 by Marin County parents, the program educates kids (grades K-8) about global warming and gives them “action coupons” for saving water, paper, electricity and gas at home.

Cool the Earth is run by a small team of parents and/or other volunteers at each school  Read the rest of this entry »

The East Bay Express had an interesting story this week on Cleveland Elementary. Under the leadership of Principal Mia Settles, the diverse school near Lake Merritt has broken down language barriers and encouraged various forms of parent involvement – from stapling papers to picketing the district’s administrative offices because of overcrowding.

 
photo courtesy of Lynne Wardell

Read the full story here. Read the rest of this entry »

Staff proposals for addressing overcrowding at Hillcrest and other popular elementary schools have been swinging back and forth in recent months, as if there were some sort of behind-the-scenes tug of war on Second Avenue — which, of course, is entirely possible.

If the latest set of staff recommendations to the Special Committee on School Admissions, Attendance & Boundaries holds its position, Hillcrest will keep its middle school — and its attendance boundaries — intact. And Montclair, which has a crowding problem of its own, would eventually expand.

Hillcrest-area kids who are rejected from their local kindergarten for space reasons would have the option of attending Kaiser Elementary School under this proposal. Read the rest of this entry »