What is a board of education? Or at least what is it supposed to be?

School board members make up the largest body of elected officials in the United States. We entrust them to set the policies of our most treasured institutions: our public elementary, middle and high schools. Every district has a board of education, and boards generally meet once or twice every month in meetings that are open to the public. Sort of.

These gatherings range from tame rubber-stamping sessions to intense, provocative discussions with the community where controversial issues are debated and landmark decisions are made.

School boards are nonpartisan at least on paper. In most districts, members serve four-year terms, and terms are staggered so seats don't become open all at once. In general, to run for school board, you have to be at least 18 years old, a citizen of the state, a resident of the district, a registered voter and eligible under the state constitution to be elected to public office. In makes ethical practical sense if members have had previous experience in the education field.

In most cases, a school district employee can't be a board member in that district. This means no teacher, principal, librarian, custodian or anyone else that works in a school in the district can serve on the school board, unless they resign from the employed position.

School districts are complex corporations; they' re often the largest employers in a community and the decisions they make reach far, affecting jobs, resources and most importantly, the education of all children.

What do they do?

Somewhere in between the agendas, public comment sessions and resolutions, school boards make a number of important decisions. School boards establish a vision for the community's schools. They have to set up and maintain an effective, efficient organizational structure for the district that lets the superintendent and administrators manage the schools, teachers teach and students learn.

They are responsible for hiring and evaluating a superintendent, evaluating and adopting policies that affect all schools in the district, serving as a judicial and appeals body when conflicts go unresolved, monitoring and adjusting district finances, and managing the collective bargaining process in the district.

A school board has a symbolic role as well. The behavior it shows off in the meeting room, the rapport among school board members and the relationships that members have with teachers and administrators in the district all add up to the climate of public education in a community. Whether healthy or dysfunctional, a school board has a heavy influence on the spirit that characterizes a community's impression of its school system.

How can I tell if my school board is doing a good job?

By attending a few school board meetings, you'll learn firsthand what school boards do. Call your district office to find out where and when meetings are held. Once you've observed your school board in action, you'll be prepared to ask the following questions:

·   How does the school board make decisions?  Do the members function as predictable, single-issue advocates, or do they approach each decision with an open mind? Do they seem to make strategic choices for the well-being of the district? Strong decision-making requires analysis, the balancing of needs and concerns, and the ability to see the long-term implications of an action.

·    How's the team spirit?  Does the board exhibit a healthy group dynamic, or is it a parade of egos marching single-file? Do members show respect and trust for each other, and for the operating rules of the board?

·    Is the board's authority well defined?  The classic challenges of management don't skip over your board of education. There's a delicate balance between the board's act of choosing a strong chief executive (the superintendent) and letting him or her lead the way and the board's tendency to get involved with many levels of decision-making.

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     Does the board understand the community?  One of the most difficult parts of school governance is creating a strong relationship with the public. An effective board knows and respects its community, and encourages the community's trust in its school system.

What should I look for in a school board candidate?

First of all, you should think about the issues that are important to you in your school district. Are you concerned about student transportation, textbook adoption, funding for extracurricular activities, new curriculum standards and/or construction of new school facilities? What's your hot button? You'll want to find out where the candidates stand on issues that are important to you.

You might also look for the following qualities:

·   The ability to work well with a team and support group decisions, along with an understanding that the board sets a climate for the entire district

   
    A desire to work toward a stronger relationship between the district and the public it serves

·       
    A keen eye toward serving the needs of all students, regardless of their     abilities and backgrounds

·       
    A professional, poised demeanor and respectful, respectable behavior    Respect for diverse points of view

    Commitment to the time and energy required each week for meetings, phone calls, conversations, visits to schools, and professional development seminars and workshops

    Knowledge about district policies, guidelines, needs, challenges and strengths. Experience working as an educator should be essential.


    At the heart of it all, members of a district's board of education must believe, unequivocally, in the value of public education. They must be dedicated to serving and teaching all children. They must believe in the democratic process and understand that their role is to act strategically, in line with the interests of the entire school community

2011 marred by test cheating scandals across US

DORIE TURNER, AP Education Writer 

Dec. 27, 2011 9:16 PM ET

ATLANTA (AP) — It was the year of the test cheating scandal.

From Atlanta to Philadelphia and Washington to Los Angeles, officials have accused hundreds of educators of changing answers on tests or giving answers to students. Just last week, state investigators revealed that dozens of educators in 11 schools in Georgia's Dougherty County either cheated or failed to prevent cheating on 2009 standardized tests.

In July, those same investigators accused nearly 180 educators in almost half of Atlanta's 100 schools of cheating dating back to 2001 — which experts have called the largest cheating scandal in U.S. history. At least 20 students have been charged on Long Island with cheating on SAT and ACT college-entrance exams by paying someone to take the test for them.

"It's a year in which cheating became a national scandal, a scandal of national proportions," said Bob Schaeffer, a spokesman for the National Center for Fair & Open Testing, which advocates against high-stakes testing. "The Atlanta case forced policymakers and journalists in other jurisdictions to look to see if there's anything similar going on in their backyards."

Experts say some educators have bowed to the mounting pressure under the federal No Child Left Behind law as schools' benchmarks increase each year toward the ultimate goal of having all children reading and doing math at their grade level by 2014. Teachers in Atlanta reported that administrators created a culture of "fear, intimidation and retaliation" where testing goals had to be met no matter what, according to investigators.

"This problem existed before No Child Left Behind, but NCLB has exacerbated the problem, clearly," said Walter Haney, a retired Boston College education professor and expert on cheating. "I think testing is really important, but the problem has been the misuse of test results without looking behind the test scores to see who and who is not tested."

Federal officials have been saying for more than a year that the law, which is four years overdue for a rewrite, doesn't accurately depict what's happening in schools. While federal lawmakers agree the law needs to be fixed, an overhaul has become mired in the partisan atmosphere in Congress.

At President Obama's invitation, states have begun filing waivers to get relief from the law. Under the 11 waivers already filed, states are asking to use a variety of factors to determine whether they pass muster and to choose how schools will be punished if they don't improve. Among the factors that could be used are college-entrance exam scores or the performance of students on Advanced Placement tests.

At least 39 states, plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, have said they will file waivers, though it is unclear how many will get approved.

In Pennsylvania, an investigation continues into irregularities found in 2009 state standardized tests in reading and math. The probe began last summer after a routine forensics report flagged "highly improbable" results in 90 schools across the state.

The state education secretary ordered the 50 districts representing the named schools to conduct internal investigations and submit reports to him by Aug. 15., But nearly four months later, the reports are still being analyzed and have not been made public.

Twenty-eight of the flagged schools were in Philadelphia, the state's largest district. District representative Fernando Gallard said the system is talking with the state Department of Education over how to move forward with the cheating investigation.

In Washington, D.C., federal and city officials are investigating possible cheating in more than 100 schools from 2008 to 2010. The unusually high rate of erasures in those schools became known after a USA Today investigation into improbable test gains in more than 300 schools in six states and D.C.

City officials tossed out test results for three classrooms in May because of proven cases of cheating.

A Waterbury, Conn., principal resigned earlier this month over an alleged cheating scheme on the Connecticut Mastery Test. A dozen teachers who were also caught up in the scandal lost 20 days of pay and have to perform 25 hours of free tutoring.

In Los Angeles, teachers at three schools have resigned after being accused of coaching students or changing answers on tests. The test scores at two of those schools have been thrown out.

Schaeffer, who follows cheating scandals closely for years, said he's seen as many cheating stories this year as in the last half-dozen years combined. He said there have been confirmed cases of cheating in 30 states and D.C. in the last three years.

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Reporters Kathy Matheson in Philadelphia and Brett Zongker in Washington, D.C., contributed to this report.

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Study Warns of Limited Savings from Closing Schools

Edited by I, Praetorian

·         Printer-Friendly

Closing schools doesn’t save air academic progress. And it says school districts can help generate some acceptance for a downsizing plan by involving the community early and establishing clear reasons for why certain schools must close.

The report, released Oct. 19, was written by the Philadelphia Research Initiative to foreshadow what the 154,000-student Philadelphia district can expect over the next few years as it plans to close a number of schools because of declining enrollments. The district currently has 70,000 empty seats, according to the report. School administrators have not decided which schools to close and how many, but internal school documents published in June by the website Philadelphia Public School Notebook listed 26 schools that could be shut down.

The report looks at school closings in Chicago, Detroit, Kansas City, Mo., Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, and the District of Columbia. Each of those districts has closed at least 20 schools in the past decade, and most of the buildings have been shuttered in the recent past.

For example, Pittsburgh, with around 25,300 students, went through a “right-sizing” effort that closed 22 schools in 2006. The district is now discussing closing seven more schools. The 17,400-student Kansas City district closed 29 schools—nearly half of its school buildings—in 2010.

A Matter of Context

Closing schools does save money, but in districts whose budgets add up to hundreds of millions of dollars or more, the final savings are relatively small, said Larry Eichel, the program director for the Philadelphia Research Initiative, which is a project of the Pew Charitable Trusts. Philadelphia’s current annual budget, for example, is $2.8 billion.

Six Cities Shuttering Buildings

To inform deliberations over plans to close schools in Philadelphia, researchers conducted case studies of recent school closings in six other urban districts.

Chicago
Closure Period: 2001-2009
Number Closed: 44
Buildings in Use: 602

Detroit
Closure Period: 2009-2010
Number Closed: 59
Buildings in Use: 130

Kansas City, Mo.
Closure Period: 2009-2010
Number Closed: 29
Buildings in Use: 29

Milwaukee
Closure Period: 2005-2010
Number Closed: 20
Buildings in Use: 137

Pittsburgh
Closure Period: 2006
Number Closed: 22
Buildings in Use: 64

District of Columbia
Closure Period: 2008
Number Closed: 23
Buildings in Use: 11

*As of 2011.

Source: The Philadelphia Research Initiative

“The savings are under a million dollars per school,” Mr. Eichel said. “That’s real money, but not money that changes anything fundamentally.”

The biggest chunk of district money is spent on teachers, and those staff members typically are still needed, just at different locations.

A district also has to pay for some maintenance on shuttered buildings so they don’t become neighborhood eye sores.

And districts should not expect a windfall from selling their old buildings. Those facilities are undesirable to businesses for some of the same reasons that districts decided to close them: The buildings are often located in areas that are losing population. Also, they tend to be in poor condition, and it may be hard to convert them to other purposes, Mr. Eichel said.

The study found examples of repurposing, however. In Milwaukee, a former middle school was bought last year for $600,000 to be converted into senior housing. In Chicago, several closed schools have been converted to charter schools.

Impact on Learning

In examining the academic performance of students in schools slated to be closed, the report focused on a study by the Consortium on Chicago School Research that looked at students whose schools were closed between 2001 and 2006. That study found that student performance fell at schools that were slated to be shut down and remained low for the rest of the school year. A year later, though, the academic performance of those displaced students had rebounded to preclosure levels.

The Pew report also cites a study led by researchers from the RAND Corp. that examined achievement from students from closed schools in a “midsized urban district in the Northeast.” Though the district was not named, the paper noted that the district closed 22 schools in the 2005-06 school year, which corresponds with Pittsburgh’s experience.

That paper said students in the district whose schools were closed did see a drop in their reading and math scores, but researchers found the effect could be mitigated or eliminated if the students were moved to schools that were higher-performing than the ones they left behind.

The Pew report offers several tools that districts can use to reduce the pain of closing schools. For example, it suggests that outside experts can bring a level of objectivity to the proceedings. Seeking community support early is also essential, the report notes.

It says that the 45,000-student District of Columbia school system committed a misstep by moving too quickly to close schools in the face of a 30 percent decline in enrollment. Under the leadership of then-Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee, the school system announced that closures were coming in September 2007, and the final vote to close 23 schools came, after much controversy, four months later.

Mary Filardo, the executive director of the Washington-based 21st Century School Fund, studies school facilities issues and agrees that the system in Washington moved too quickly to shut down schools. Too many school districts distrust the public when it comes to closure decisions, she said.

Taking It to the Public

“The reason you involve the community is not to make [closings] palatable,” she said. “The reason you involve the community is because you want to make better decisions.”

She added that people whose children attend school in such urban areas often “are working-class or low-income. They know about making tough decisions and struggling” and can understand the necessity for some closings.

As District of Columbia school officials learned, making a misstep in school closings can cause political fallout. The community uproar over the closings in Washington was one of the ingredients that led last year to the primary-election defeat of then-Mayor Adrian M. Fenty, who had selected Ms. Rhee, and to the chancellor’s departure.

And after community members in Chicago protested that school- closure decisions were being made in secret, the Illinois legislature passed a law in August that governs how that 409,000-student system can make facilities decisions.

“The political fallout is from not having a trusting relationship with your public,” Ms. Filardo said.

Being Transparent

But involving the public can be a delicate balancing act, said Nancy R. Kodman, the executive director for academic and operations integration for Pittsburgh schools. Just introducing the problem to the community, she said, leads to people saying, “You don’t have any solutions? You don’t have any ideas?” But a full plan is criticized for being drawn up in secret.

“You lessen that by being as transparent as you can,” Ms. Kodman said.

When Pittsburgh closed more than 20 schools, she said, the district talked with the public about what it was hoping to achieve. Academic improvement was put forward as the top goal, and to eliminate some political horse-trading, the closures were considered as a group, in a single up-or-down vote by the school board.

While many urban districts are struggling with how to handle excess space, Ms. Filardo noted that Seattle is dealing with overcrowded classrooms, thanks to unexpected population growth. The Seattle Times reported in October that in one school, a 4th grade class is meeting in a hallway, and many classes are meeting in portables. An infusion of about 1,500 more students than expected is prompting the district to reopen some schools that it had closed, over community objection, in the past few years.

Part 1 of Deconstructing Hate Sites

This Information is Provided by the Victim of Such A Hate Site: A Man Still Fighting One Year Later to Clear His Name From the False Accusations of Belonging to Such Hate Based Internet Sewage... I am that Victim along with another outstanding person and Journalist MVgordie (mvgordie.com). I, Praetorian Responding to Online Hate When people see hate on the Net, they just say: "Well, what can I do about it?" And they move on. But the only way people can start to get rid of the hate is by taking some interest in the ways in which we, as human beings, can prevent hate from spreading. A Vancouver Island high-school student MNet’s 2001 survey "Young Canadians in a Wired World" showed that when young people came across a "hateful" Web site, more than a third (36 per cent) simply ignored it. If they received hateful e-mail messages, again more than three in ten did nothing—though a similar percentage told a friend, an adult, or the police. There is no reason to believe that adults’ rate of response is any higher. Granted, it’s not always easy to tell whether hateful online content is actually illegal, rather than just offensive and annoying. Sometimes material can only properly be defined as illegal by the courts. Still, the courts can’t prosecute what they don’t know about—so public response is crucial. If people want to do something about hate material they see on the Internet, there are several options: Contact the Internet Service Provider All over the world, Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are being forced to become more proactive about hate material on their servers. Most ISPs now have Acceptable Use Policies that clearly define the guidelines for using their services, as well as the penalties for violating those guidelines. In Canada, most ISPs belong to the Canadian Association of Internet Providers (CAIP). CAIP’s Code of Conduct states that its members will not host illegal content, and will make a reasonable effort to investigate legitimate complaints about illegal content or network abuse—taking appropriate action, if needed. However, ISPs do not have the legal power to decide what material is illegal; and so most are reluctant to remove suspect content from their servers without official direction from a law enforcement agency. Report online hate to the police Some urban police departments now have a High-Tech Crime Unit to investigate online offences. If none exists, a complaint can be made to the local police. It’s advisable to attach a copy of the offending material to the letter of complaint. File a complaint with the F.B.I. Good for the records otherwise pretty useless unless threats of violence are made. Check out "hate watch" Web sites A number of sites exist to monitor and document illegal material on the Internet. Some notable examples are B’nai Brith League for Human Rights, which hosts a hate hotline; and the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which has identified thousands of offensive Web sites. Its CD entitledDigital Hate 2002 lists sites that promote antisocial and illegal activities ranging from hate music to suicide bombing. The Southern Poverty Law Center is another good resource. Any hate found on a California Web site is now subject to new legislation—though hate encountered on other states sites must be dealt with differently. However, the U.S.-based Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Anti-Defamation League both recommend that surfers alert them to any online hate, so that they can try to get the offending material removed. And since the active promotion of tolerance is one of the Abest responses to hate, check out the online pamphlet 101 Tools for Tolerance: Simple Ideas for Promoting Equity and Diversity, developed by the Web-based group Tolerance.org. For more detailed information about the organizations mentioned here, as well as information on how to report online hate, see the links in the sidebar.

The Self Harm Cycle

Latest Evidence Suggests

Self-harm is most common in children over the age of 11 and increases in frequency with age. It is uncommon in very young children although there is evidence of children as young as five trying to harm themselves.


Self-harm is more common amongst girls and young women than amongst boys and young men. Studies indicate that, amongst young people over 13 years of age, approximately three times as many females as males harm themselves.


A study in Oxford found that approximately 300 per 100,000 males aged between 15 and 24 years, and 700 per 100,000 females of the same age, were admitted to hospital following an episode of self-harm during the year 2000. Community based studies report higher rates of self-harm than hospital based studies.


A national survey of children and adolescents carried out in the community found that 5 per cent of boys and 8 per cent of girls aged 13-15 said that they had, at some time, tried to harm, hurt or kill themselves.
In the same national survey, rates of self-harm reported by parents were much lower than the rates of self-harm reported by children. This suggests that many parents are unaware that their children are self-harming.


A study carried out in schools in 2002 found that 11 per cent of girls and 3 per cent of boys aged 15 and 16 said they had harmed themselves in the previous year.
Greater incidence of self-injury amongst gay and lesbian young adults; five times more likely than their heterosexual counterparts. A greater number of occurrences of self-injury exist among those with physical disabilities and epilepsy.


The UK has one of the highest rates of self-harm in Europe, at 400 per 100,000 population. It is estimated that there are at least 170,000 cases of self-harm which come to hospital attention each year. Many more incidents of self-harming behaviour probably take place but are not included in any statistics because people may choose not to seek medical help.


New estimates have been made about the most common form of Self Harm
Cutting: 72 percent
Burning: 35 percent
Self-hitting: 30 percent
Interference w/wound healing: 22 percent
Hair pulling: 10 percent
Bone breaking: 8 percent
Multiple methods: 78 percent (included in above)

If you would like to email Stop Self Harm, to ask for help or advice email us at stopselfharm@hotmail.co.uk or leave a message in our guestbook and we'll get back to you.

We Now Have Myspace. Check It Out

We also ask, if you are visiting this site, please leave us a message in our guestbook with what you thought of the site or ideas on how to improve it, we appreciate any feed back.

THE DEFINITION OF COURAGE. YOU NEED TO KNOW.

Please understand this is a 70 year-old former U.S. Prosecutor! This man, Dr. Richard I Fine, PHd is my hero (see video series below, courtesy of Full Disclosure) and model for my fights to come  with Moreno Valley USD  also one of the most litigated school districts in the inland empire. For over 20 years of corruption spearheaded by the personalities of the COWARDS and BULLY BOYS RUNNING MVUSD'S HUMAN RESOURCES.  One of the former participated in felony misuse and theft of public funds, one a convicted felon who used an unregistered pistol firing at a car fleeing his house with his own daughter inside the car. He is still employed and partially running a MVUSD middle school. This school was formerly the flagship of the entire district. The current coward is helping to cover up directly or indirectly the theft of  or miss use of  student funds that totals in the multiple $100,000s in cash  EVERY YEAR.


The man most responsible for this system wide cover-up, a man who lied more than once to me when I was looking for help with the criminal activity I stumbled upon, was fired early this year then allowed to stay on with a double demotion to assistant principal. The Board was afraid that out and out firing would tempt him to tell all. For years covered up by some of the Superintendents and their assistants, including Bob Crank who was one of the key players Most area taxpayers are paying twice over for there child's education without knowing and some of that money is stolen in cash! Watch for the documentation and names to come.  BUT lets not forget the School Board who hires these people, among which contains a documented CHILD MOLESTER and a yet to be charged criminal who used the power of the office for... well, come back and see. Another is on the payroll of local Developer and member of the shadowy Jewish "Gold Trust" and its silent members. An organization who's home is somewhere in Beverly Bills, CA. I have fired off a letter to the Jewish Defense League* asking point blank if they are associated... 

Did I mention the possible cover-up of an alleged murder of a 17 year-old student at the hands of a former school district employee? One of whom was working here until two years ago. I am still working on this. Time and the efficiency of the alleged cover-up has made it hard to follow.
Sincerely, I, Praetorian.

*The Jewish Defense League or JDL is a Jewish nationalist and far-right organization whose stated goal is to "protect Jews from antisemitism by whatever means necessary".^[1] While the group asserts that it "unequivocally condemns terrorism", and claims to have a "strict no-tolerance policy against terrorism and other felonious acts,"^[2] it was described as "a right-wing terrorist group" by the Federal Bureau of Investigation^[3] in 2001, and as a hate group involved in "anti-Arab terrorism" by the Southern Poverty Law Center.^[4] According to the FBI, the JDL has been involved in plotting terrorist attacks within the United States.^{[3] Outside the FBI, the}  Anti-Defamation League (ADL)^[2] and the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).^[3 are the largest watch dog organizations in the US monitoring hate groups. 

TEST SCORES

September 28, 2011|By Brad Lendon, CNN; edited by Praetorian
7 arrested in alleged SAT cheating scam in New York

Authorities have arrested seven people in an, high school and are investigating whether the cheating extends to other schools. Samuel Eshaghoff, 19, of Great Neck, New York, was arrested Tuesday on felony fraud charges that could result in four years in prison if he's convicted, the Nassau County District Attorney's Office said.

Six students face misdemeanor charges. Their names are not being released because they are minors.

Prosecutors allege Eshaghoff impersonated six Great Neck North High students between 2010 and 2011, charging between $1,500 and $2,500 to take the SAT test for them.

Eshaghoff would take the test at schools other than Great Neck, where proctors would not be familiar with the students' identity, and present fake, unofficial identification, prosecutors say.

Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice said authorities uncovered the scam after hearing rumors of cheating, comparing the test scores of suspects to their school grade-point averages, and finding a "wide gulf" in the cases of the six suspects.

The district attorney's office said it is investigating possible cheating scams at two other Nassau County high schools as well as possible further instances involving Eshaghoff.

Eshaghoff's attorney, Matin Emouna, said his client pleaded not guilty in the case.

And he said cheating on tests is something that should be handled in schools, not in criminal courts.

"At what point are you going to draw the line?" Emouna asked during a phone interview with CNN Wednesday. "No one has had a case like this in the U.S., and I think attorneys are going to have a field day with it."

The victims in the case are other students who are denied admission at the colleges of their choice by the students who cheated, Rice said Wednesday on CNN's "American Morning."

"Honest kids should not be bumped out of college slots by kids who cheated," she said.

Rice called on the Educational Testing Service, the nonprofit entity that administers the SAT nationwide, to establish procedures to combat cheating, including photographing students as they take the test and attaching the picture to the answer sheet.

"We need ETS to tighten security they have at these test centers," Rice said.

She also called on ETS to inform colleges if cheating is suspected. ETS currently deals with suspected cheating by canceling test scores and offering refunds, retests or arbitration, according to the district attorneys office.

Rice said authorities have no evidence implicating parents in the cheating scandal.

Great Neck North identifies itself as a high-performing high school, with a 97% graduation rate and almost 97% of students planning to pursue higher education.

The mean scores achieved by Great Neck North students on SAT tests in 2010 were well above the national average, according to the profile.

Eshaghoff, a 2010 Great Neck North graduate, tested in the 97th percentile, Rice said. He is now enrolled at Emory University in Atlanta after attending the University of Michigan for his freshman year, the prosecutor's office said.

The next SAT test dates are this weekend, and Rice said authorities will be vigilant.

"These arrests should serve as a warning to those taking the SAT this Saturday that if you cheat, you can face serious criminal consequences," Rice said.