Reconstitution and magnet convert at Crenshaw High draws protests



Parents, teachers and students held a press conference outside of Crenshaw High School on Monday to push back against a plan to magnet convert and reconstitute the South Los Angeles high school. image

Community members are upset at LAUSD Superintendent John Deasy’s proposal to convert Crenshaw High School, including Orville Wright Middle School and Central Region Elementary School #20 (CRES 20), into a magnet school, and reconstitute Crenshaw High, which means all teachers and staff must re-apply for their jobs, according to parent Loutrisha Swafford.

Swafford questioned the necessity of having existing staff and teachers re-apply for positions they were already hired for.

“It doesn’t necessarily stabilize what we’re trying to build here. It destabilizes it,” said Averie Blackwell, student at Crenshaw High School. “It kills everything that we worked for. It doesn’t allow us to be students, to be free, to learn from the same teachers every single day. You know how hard it is to learn in a classroom that has a different teacher every single day?”

Supporters held signs with slogans like “Stop Educational Racism, Keep Community Control” and “Keep Our Schools Public,” while several students sang songs in protest as their peers played the drums.

“We have students here who are high-achievers because they’re coming through the streets filled with crime,” said Swafford.

Anita Parker, a senior at Crenshaw High School, said reconstitution would not help a school with already low resources. She said many lunch tables are broken and some classrooms are so full “you have to sit on the floor.”

image Those at the press conference expressed outrage at LAUSD for not consulting with parents, teachers, students and staff. According to Swafford, there was no prior knowledge or mention to the community by LAUSD of their intention to convert Crenshaw into a magnet school.

Swafford said the community is demanding that LAUSD reverse reconstitution and postpone any vote until further discussions are made with the community. They are also demanding support and resources for a recently implemented Extended Cultural Learning model from LAUSD.

The Extended Cultural Learning model offers a more well-rounded approach to curriculum, according to a statement by members of the school. The model focuses on cultural relevance, behavioral support and services, and outside activities like internships. Based on that model, the school was awarded a grant of $225,000 from the Ford Foundation.

By using the Extended Learning Cultural model, Swafford outlined a list of achievements made by students and staff. In 2011 – 2012, the school was able to improve its API by 15 points, including higher API levels among African-American students that were above six of the seven major South LA high schools.

Haewon Asfar, an organizer with the Community Rights Campaign, said the Extended Cultural Learning model showed improvements in more than just measurable ways. Many of her students in the after-school program she runs at Crenshaw feel more empowered and excited about coming to school.

“It has to be put within the context of their everyday lives…more than half are below the poverty line,” said Asfar, who also mentioned that many students come from single parent households. “It’s not the same conditions as other communities.”

Left behind by the LAUSD, parents get organized



By Martha Sanchez, a parent and community organizer at 28th St. Elementary School

imageTwenty-Eighth Street Elementary School is one of the most overcrowded schools in the LAUSD. The school was built in 1800s to accommodate a maximum of 800 students. In 2003, it housed over 2,300 students turning the school calendar in to a multi-track system with four tracks. In 2007, the LAUSD facilities department invited me to participate in the process of selecting two sites for the construction of two new elementary schools to relieve overpopulation. Since then, I have participated in all phases of the construction, including site selection, cleaning of soil, and architectural design.

Historically our community has been victim to stereotyping and lack of support. Since 2004, I have been organizing at the grass-root level parents, teachers and community members to improve education, bring economic resources to the area and sustain the environment. After years and years of struggle I was relieved to know that we would finally have new schools and could return to a traditional calendar.

However, it appears that once again we have been left behind.

Since the approval of the School Choice Resolution, our community has requested that the LAUSD allow us to participate in the process by giving us access to accurate information in a timely manner. The LAUSD called on us to choose a plan for the new building at site #18 that would take our overflow. But apparently, as was soon revealed, the LAUSD has not yet finished the design of the new school boundaries. “We cannot tell you who will be attending the new school until the process is completed,” LAUSD officials said.

But we were missing vital information. Who can vote? Who are the affected families? What alternatives do parents have if the new school turns into charter and they don’t want that option? What if parents want their children to stay in a regular school system instead? A community meeting was held at John Adams Middle School but no answers were given by the LAUSD. The translation services were so poor that many of our Spanish-speaking parents no idea what was being said. Everyone left disappointed.

imageTherefore we decided to organize a grass-roots effort to involve most of parents at 28th St. School. On January 22, 2010, I began a campaign to organize and obtain the authentic opinion and desires from parents about who they want to control school site #18.

For that reason, we organized a survey to ask parents to choose among the options that they felt could best improve their children’s education. Out of 900 surveys, 739 parents voted for the Local District 5 Plan. Just 9 voted for the Partnership for Los Angeles Schools to take over.

So, on Monday, a group of parents headed for the LAUSD head quarters to deliver the surveys, and try to encourage the board members to support the community voice. As a result, the board not only ignored the advisory vote (566 votes) but the surveys as well (788 votes) that favored the Local District 5 Plan. Parents and teachers are astonished at the LAUSD decision to support the Partnership for L.A. Schools instead.

But we won’t give up.

We will re-organize to make clear what we expect from the partnership in the following days. We will not let our schools fail again in hands of people that haven’t showed results in our community.

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The South Los Angeles Report will be publishing regular updates from Martha Sanchez as her organizing effort continues.