HUSD elex update: 6 for 4, 3 for 2

Lucy’s mom (and all of us): That federal money is supposed to go to rehire laid off teachers. Let’s make sure that it does not get stuck in Sacramento somewhere nor in the D.O. We should all keep reading the papers, check the CDE (CA dept. of Ed) website, the HUSD website and find other ways to stay informed. Call your state senators and assembly members at the first sign of trouble (or before). Let’s make sure that money gets to Hayward! Then we can “help” the school board and district spend it right. Lower class size, secure music/P.E./etc., bring back the middle school counselors, hire back the nurses, restore instrumental music, more electives for high schoolers . . . plenty of good ways to spend those funds in ways that directly benefit the KIDS!

Ms. Booth.

Annoying as it may seem. it is not my purpose to refute your every purpos, but in view of your being a lawyer, in your disputatious best, you make a comment suggesting that HUSD has a work atmosphere in which employees seem to elevate themselves to possession of status of superiority in social position,,,, how else are we to interpret your own remark that we are ‘commoners‘? Does the latter renark apply yo teachers?

Well, I respect lawyers just as I do Doctors or others in professional’ employment endeavor..however, I never tremble in their presence! That you are an attorney requires my respect for that accomplishment. However, I do not place you on a pedestal! Gee whiz, you use a non-existent word in the first sentence of your 8:00 pm post of the 13th. You used ‘proclude’ not preclude in your very first sentence.

Legalistically, you may be correct in stating that the ’five’ intended meetings at middle schools are open to all…. However, the intent is to bring as many of the ‘parents’ as possible into those meetings as well as those childless or empty nest souls who have a vested interest in seeing the public schools of Hayward succeed. Real estate values are heavily dependent on good schools.

The meetings are intended to gather those folks into an opportunity to speak to Trustees about any negative or pro-active concerns as they see them to exist. One of the considerations is that the all purpose rooms may not hold all those folk interested in attending as result of your apparent urgency, to do what? Impede solutions?

Under health and fire code regulation some ‘locals ‘ might be turned away! So when you bring up the right of all District wide parties at interest, to attend each of the five meetings and appear to make that an issue, are you not then seen as being an obstructionist and part of the overall problem faced by the District?

As to Ms. Bock and her rights as a citizen, consider that the woman offers nothing than the pursuit of a vendetta directed at Ms. Duran.
At the Burbank school meeting, she held up a sign which read
“Fire Duran” nothing more, nothing less. Will she pursue an opportunity to do that at each of the five meetings? Frankly, since she includes in her personal history, the fact of being a substitute teacher in the same district from which Duran retired with highly favorable comments of the San Lorenzo trustees and citizenry, then I suspect, reservedly, that Bock holds a grudge for which there is no solution outside her own mind. Yes, I oppose her candidacy to HUSD, and as a longtime admirer of Paul Hodges’ contributions to community, I will also oppose Bock’s effort to unseat him from his position on the Board of Directors at HARD. She runs for two seats in different areas of administration and interests?

That lady juggles a lot of balls in the air, too bad the political wind blows against the activity. You might have thought that after her defeat, when running for Governor, if you remember the event when about three thousand souls took the same opportunity in a laughable but never the less, harmful event in California’s history.

Funny, I do not think Armas would advance the idea if he were not confident of the vote to proceed. As manager of the City, he did not bring forward any of his actions which required a vote unless he was sure that there was genuine interest expressed by the majority at the City’s publicly open ‘Work sessions’. The HUSD Board meetings are in effect a ‘work session’ as that is described when they adjourn at 5:00 pm on meeting days it too is a requirement of the Brown act when salaries and job dismissals are on the table… (modified to the advantage of CTA around 1994 by the State legislature to prevent open discussion of the amounts given to teachers ‘perks’) ‘You could maybe ‘look it up’ in your law library !

It is nice that you acknowledge that in the instance of HUSD, ad hoc groups have not succeeded as well as they might have done if they were not under direct supervision of staff or HEA Representatives. One of which … the ’Concordia Project’ conducted on the premises of Glad Tidings Church, …. never really got of the ground….invited to be part of that, my first indication of failure, was the incredible numbers of name tags that were never picked up. A major part of those active in Chamber of Commerce, Service clubs and entrepreneurial types just never attended. I dropped out after about two months ( 4 or 5 meetings)!

Much to my annoyance, a small group of Fairway Park Ladies, living in New Haven School district were vesting the Concordia meetings and seen as attempting to ’capture’ HUSD’s Bidwell School Campus…. They had resurrected a long held ’story’ emanating from the days when that area was being developed, to the effect that they had been promised a Community center…. By God only knows whom. I’d give ’em Treeview since in my opinion it is in danger of being damaged or destroyed by the ’Big One’ if as and when that occurs.

So in a large sense you are correct, ad hoc groups sponsored by HUSD have not been too successful. On the other hand, the City has successfully used them as in the case of Stonebrae Develop- ment. I spent over 100 hours spread out over something in excess of a year working with that group….. On the day of the dedication, the celebration was ’handled’ by HUSD Staff, HEA Members etc… I did not even receive a name tag while Sarah Gonzales advised her annoyance that her name, written in bronze, on the dedication plaque was spelled wrong. School district contribution in achieving that school was pretty limited. Kathy the HEA President was deeply involved in contributions of design for interior of classroom amenity. Other than that HUSD was not seen involved.

So in essence, I agree that HUSD has some major administrative problems and I perceive that Mr. Armas’s management experience will be soon felt provided that takeover by State is postponed.

To wrap up this my response to your first presently unanswered communiqué dated Aug 13th

Another is response to that of August 14th will follow…my gosh 65 years from date of Japan’s surrender and 96 years since ‘official;’ start of WW I. If my memory serves me well!.

Teachermama,

Definitely! Somehow, we must make them accountable. It is time for us parents ( I know teacher have been trying to do this for years) to start asking for a VERY TRANSPARENT DISCLOSURE OF HOW THE DO SPENDS OUR CHILDREN’ MONEY! If some of us were a bit involved before, NOW is the time to sit down with our principals and look at the budget. How much of our dollars stay at the DO for adm., how much actually get to the kids. We need all the programs that they are trying to take away from them. From k-12 as you stated.
We need to have conversations with other parents, encourage them to vote this November. We need three new people on that board, well four, but she will be gone in two years, maybe earlier, we can only hope.
Mrs. Booth, are you an advocate for children and their families in educational issues? You will be great resource to many families.
Regarding the Community Outreach meetings that may take place in the future, I recalled during 2008-2009 Vigil had those meeting taken place at the old school by Tyrrell School. He made sure the principals were there to greet their parents and they had to sit with them. I noticed parents were intimidated by this, others were upset. How could they state their concerns? What if they felt the principal was at fault?, At the last meeting parents couldn’t speak; they had to write their questions in a card. The DO had so many staff members, again parents felt intimidated.
As parents, we need to let the DO know that none of the former settings have worked as far as Community Meetings go. Maybe the golden boy will come up with a friendly and productive setting.

OOPs sorry, that was meant for Lucy’s Mom. My brain is a little sluggish, after reading and responding to Mr. Kyle.

As I said good morning.

Mr. Kyle;
You keep telling us how impressive Armas is, all the while Duran sits on the board but the only time a super sits on the board is when the board is without direction and are week. The only member who objects is Reynosa it would imply that you support a weak and inefficient board. And your support of Armas says you support a weak and inefficient candidate.

To my fellow critics and bloggers. In the future I will be a much more pleasant person to the blogging community and my postings will not be so verbose. Of course I will have my own opinion and you will have one too, but respect will be practiced and attacks on your person or trying to find out where you live will no longer be a practice or priority. Let us all continue to blog just on issues and have differences respectfully and peacefully.

Ooops! I almost forgot that I will no longer spitefully attack Audie Bock for I realize that it is very irrational to do so and I am looking forward to have any accomplished scholars like Ms. Kathi Booth and Ms. Audie Bock to participate on intellectual discussion in this blog for all of us to read. I apologize to all if I had offended anyone for now on there will be only honorable debatable discourse.

The LA Times latimes.com has an interesting article on teacher effectiveness. In a nutshell, the idea is to base a teacher’s effectiveness on the level that their students perform at. For example, if they entered a grade testing at the 80 percent level, they ought to at least leave the grade at that level or better. The times found someone to grade a bunch of elementary teachers, so now you can look up these teachers and get an idea how they do with their students over a period of years. The idea is that its the teacher that is most critical to a child’s learning, not the school or other stuff. What do you all think about this?

Kathy Booth followers and devotees;

Wow ! Too bad I do not possess an abacus to aid count of blog submissions by Kathy Booth. That lady has submitted, as of 8:30 pm August 15, something like 32 separate items since the 2nd or 3rd day of this month. If that isn’t an example of verbosity, show me another! 32 out of a count of 61 since about August 3. (52.5 %) Keep in mind she is a newcomer to this thing!

Ms. Booth. With reference to yours dated Aug 14th, ( blog item #51 under Kurhi’s lead about HUSD elections,) I say to you and those who have not yet caught on to shortcomings, displayed by many previous occupants of seats on the Board of Trustees going back as far as the time of the hire of Ms. Kohl, is their inability to adopt actions which level the playing field for all intended public comment speakers, preceding actual move to the business of the day. ( your opportunity to deal with a ‘run on’ sentence ! .)

On May 10,2006, there were no public comment speakers thought by me to be in support of whatever little was known of Board’s intent relative to the Charquin’ project. It would seem to me that the proper time to address any action taken by the board, would be more properly supported or opposed at the time the item was actually on an evening’s agenda.

Two things occurred within the first of public comments, on the date above.

1.) The charquin kids were given a lesson in self defeating experiences, far from that lesson in civics as you maintain. Those adults, used kids to completely monopolize the total time allocated to the initial period of public comments.

2.) Those members of the audience, involving an unknown count, who had thought to speak about unrelated, subjects, were rudely ‘cut off’ from that opportunity; thus compelled to wait several hours; if intent on using ‘their three minutes’ they were probably deeply offended, as I was. That second period of public speaking time often does not come under item ‘J’ until a very late moment of the meeting. Hardly a recommended technique to gain substantive support for any particular cause.

Basically, the representatives of the Charquin project were either poorly led or just plain lacking in manners. Worse yet, the children were taught nothing in that particular experience especially during the ‘rant’ by the lady teacher whose attempts ‘to advise’ trustees were so ill conceived that I failed to understand that it was, as you put it., ‘common practice’ to allow students to speak so that they experience participation in public affairs and in addition, could return home to accommodate early bedtime hours.

Contrary to your opinion, Mr. Peterson was not correct; that poor old gentleman failed to recognize a technique, frequently urged upon him and other members of the board, to follow the rules laid down by the City Council when ‘hot topics’ are being approached. In their case, the Council is observing proper procedures, permitted by the Brown Act, so as to hear ‘others’ speak. An accommodation to ‘others’ to exercise the rights of citizenship has been well met by the public!. Had they, the members of the Board followed my frequent suggestion to them, that when a group arrives to speak on hot topics, they must first select from their ranks a leader who is provided five ( 5 ) minutes of speaking time which can be followed by two more from that same group, who are allotted 3 minutes each. If the subject is not well presented within an 11 minute period, then find solution in another form of communication but whatever is the result of that practice, do not deny others the right to address the board at the moments when public comments occur prior to taking up the formal agenda items.

On May 10, 2006, the children of Charquin were taught nothing but boorish manners and behaviors which are frequently self defeating. Yes, they should have gone home early, especially after about an hour’s worth of ‘demonstrations’ in front of City hall, prior to that meeting. Your surly remarks about my own scribbles are ignored….. Which is the best insult afforded to those who are resentful of opinions I hold. I wonder why you have not either run for the Board yourself, or at least come up with some pro-active ideas.

So, you are not actually a lawyer in the sense that you did not take the bar exam. Well do not feel alone, I had a classmate who failed the exam six or seven times.

There was once an occasion when I found myself in Superior Court of Alameda County which resulted in a fabulous pay check amounting to aggregated total of $495.00 (or $5,00 per day in that era).

Some of the antics displayed by trial lawyers would be amusing if not so sadly displayed under serious conditions. One of the things I experienced with some pleasure were the oral skills possessed by some lawyers having minds and tongues with ‘rapier’ like qualities.

I do not see that in your writings! Perhaps if you appeared at public comments, we might see something to change an opinion, or two? Surely you have at least one proactive idea!

Not having a positive suggestion of your own to offer the Board of Trustees, you attack my suggestion revolving around the Town Hall meeting idea. I offer the following in support of the Town Hall concept.

It would become a highly useful device by which to enroll folks who are either empty nest types or new arrivals seeking opportunity to develop contacts and friends as a means of maintaining mental acuity or ‘settling in’ with the community. If we had a group of older adults wishing, for whatever reason, to make a contribution of time, why not employ them in fund raising activity as support for athletic for music programs. I used the term ‘ad hoc’ groups; which set you off on one of your tangents about success of ad hoc groups within HUSD. Geez lady, I do not imagine my self ever again involved with an ad hoc group set up by HUSD. Volunteers directly appointed within the system are abused!

For the lack of a better term my favorite idea is an ’ad hoc’ group dedicated to the use of sports activity, such as a hole in one contest which alone, on an annual basis would probably see $10,000 raised for HUSD Sports or even music programs.

I once put on a ‘junktique’ at St Joachim’s school… it raised $4500. In two days of sales of discards. Clever me… I offered folks opportunity to attend the largest rummage sale west of Lake Winnipesauke in New Hampshire. The ad which appeared in Daily Review offered opportunity to haggle with our little old ladies in tennis shoes and then spring the ad upon them for an additional 10% in price reduction after the haggle had been completed. Use of the name, in bold type, “Lake Wiinipesauke , New Hampshire” set the jovial tone leading to success of the ‘Junktique’ activity. $4.500 profit earned in about 12 hours, spread over two days was no small achievement..

It is through use of a Town Hall meeting that funds can enually be raised in meaningful ways for HUSD. Get it?

Your repugnance to use of the words ‘ad hoc’ is not something you should continue. It is counter productive

Limiting your self to defense of lesser minds who are simply disparaging the reputations of others, is not worthy of your intellect.

Apparently you are unaware of the qualities of Mr. Armas whose management experience saw oversight of the City’s 900 plus employees, including police and fire departments. The man is no slouch… he has the respect of a great many throughout the whole community, not just the Latino segment. Let me ask this, is your opposition based on the Latino factor? Frankly, I think that to be the case with O’Bama new age! She has a subliminal fear of surrendering ‘a piece of the pie’ to Latinos at the expense of Afro Americans. Her slanderous remarks are absurd and might easily be attributed to what I just described.

While I am at it, the question of Mr. Armas’conflict of interest was covered by an attorney representing HUSD. That lady stated unequivocally, during the ’appointment process’ that Armas would be in conflict with the law, ONLY if he voted upon a contractual relationship between his spouse and HUSD. Armas knew that and as I recall touched on the subject without being asked. It is characteristic of the man to ‘BE PREPARED’!

Poor Reynoso, my memory suggests that the conflict of interest topic had also been reviewed by the County Supt. of Schools.

When might we see your pro-active appearance at public meetings of the Trustees ? Are you able to induce Obama new age to make an apperance, in pro-active stance?

The Charquin folks could be quite pushy. They had become a school unto themselves with quite different rules including one that parents had to donate a set amount of money each quarter, and students attended school when they felt like it. Parents were in the classrooms all the time, many doing the teaching instead of the paid teacher. All of these folks were nice until you disagreed with them. Unfortunately, this and other things Charquin did violated state laws.

Nice to have Mr. Kyle back. Your messages of yesterday sent me to double check my depression meds.

To all who have read or posted on this blog:

After reading Mr. Kyle’s postings 63-66 last evening, I was tempted to say that it was an imposter, however, I live by the rule that all should receive a second chance and that there is some good in each and every one of us. How foolish I now feel!!!

Mr. Kyle,
Again you make assumptions based upon no factual data regarding me or anyone else you choose to malign and attack in your postings.

1.You have no idea whether I did or did not take the bar, for that matter it is none of your business what my motives were for studying the law.

2.If you want to know how familiar I am with Mr. Armas and his time as city manager, I suggest you go straight to the source. But, for your edification, I am fully aware of his abilities and if you ask him I am sure that he will tell you that I stronly urged him to apply for the position of superintendent. It is in that position that I feel he could have made many positive strides for the students and employees of HUSD. Surprise, Surprise…Mr. Armas and I have actually spoken to one another.

I care not how many postings I have placed on this blog, as long as I am able to reach just one individual with factual information that may help them to understand the workings of HUSD.

By the way Mr. Kyle, perhaps we can make a deal, since I am relatively good at editing copy. Maybe before you post your rambling, viscious, diatribes I could help you with spelling and sentence construction.

To Qodrn,

I had a very positive experience in the Charquin Program and while each and every parent and teacher had free will and the guarantee of free speech, my grandson’s academic life was enriched and made stronger by the Charquin Program. If you truly understood the philosophy of Charquin you would know that having parents contribute, in what were at that time called “Centers” you would understand that the philosophy encouraged all adults to share knowledge with children. The Charquin Program stimulated many adults to return to school and obtain thier credentials so that they could contribute to public education.

Obviously Charquin was not for everybody but, it did instill in the students a sense of tolerance for those who were “different”, a love for learning, and an understandting of community spirit. Was it perfect? Certainly not, but it was a much better environment for my grandson to grow and blossom as a person and a life long learner.

Dear Lucy’s Mom,

Again I believe yours and Ms. Rocchio’s postings hit the nail on the head. Both of you are inciteful persons who seem to understand the underlying problems facing this communit. Keep up your monitoring of the district and the board. It is comments and observations such as yours that spur others to examine what is happening in HUSD.

Mr. Kile,

Once and for all you did reveal where I lived and you did reveal information about a member of my family. YOu know it and so do I and so does anybody who read your entry before Mr. Kurhi removed it. Don’t deny what you have done you are dishonest to do so.

I have simply stated that I have much knowledge about the history of HUSD and much experience dealing with the roadblocks placed in the paths of so many of its students and families. I related my years of direct volunteering in the classroom, school office and at various other venues within HUSD. It was done simply to assure people that I had some foundation to allow me to critique the district and its current administrators.

I really should be honored that you, on your own, have given me so much power of persuasion over those who post on this blog. Is that really what you are afraid of Mr. Kyle, that some other voice may be listened to and appreciated? I do not oppose constructive thought, I simply reserve the right not to fall lock step into what you believe is the one and only way to resolve a problem.

TTFN Mr. Kiiile

Dear Ms. Wilkes,

Thank you for letting all who read this blog for telling the truth. I have never had a problem with anyone disagreeing with my opinions or suggestions. My only beef is when there are uncalled for personal attacks.

My purpose for posting on this site is to let folks know that sometimes it is important to understand the history of HUSD, because so many time history repeats itself. Since I have “worked” during the time of approximately 8 superintendents and their various administrations, I have seen and experienced many different styles, educational “visions”, open and closed door policies and have assisted parents and students during each of them, I just felt that there may be some value in sharing my own lessons and observations.

If there are folks out there who wish to pick my brain or actually need assistance in walking thru the muck and mire I am only a question or request away.