By Sandra Tsing Loh
(A writer and performer, Ms. Loh appears regularly on Public Radio's Marketplace with "The Loh Down" and on KPCC with "The Loh Life." and has written several books, including "A Year in Van Nuys." This article was submitted as a comment to "Come back to LAUSD and make a difference.)
Thanks to all for a frank and amazing discussion, although I always
wonder what it means to comment "anonymously." (Does that reflect a
fear LA's roving Armenian gangs will come after one online? Presumably
the ones who don't graduate and hence cannot type? We digress.)
All questions of morality aside, here is a practical flea's eye--or
parent's--view of the LAUSD. In certain middle-class, educated,
more-tending-towards-white generation(s) before ours (I am 46 and my
daughters are elementary-aged), there was an unspoken assumption that
most urban public schools were the pits, and it was completely socially
acceptable to move to where the white people were or grab a silk-lined
parachute into private school. The mentality was to each his own, and
the faster better-heeled families could pull that portcullis down
behind them the better.
Unfortunately, such dog-eat-dog thinking is a bit like strip-mining in
that it leaves behind, for the next generation of families, a blasted
dog-eat-dog landscape. When I started looking at kindergartens for my
older daughter in 2004, houses in a "good school district" like La
Canada started at $1 million while tuition at a "good" private
kindergarten started at $15,000/year (now it's more like $20,000).
Such are the economics of fear which, while destructive for new
families with more than one child and limited incomes, are fabulous at
lining the pockets of Realtors, private schools, private school
"counselors," and (inadvertently) the city of Portland.
So that's why many of us have our children in the LAUSD. We love this
city--its vitality, its energy and yes, its diversity--we're staying,
and we simply can't AFFORD to parachute our children out and away from
the world in which we live.
(A writer and performer, Ms. Loh appears regularly on Public Radio's Marketplace with "The Loh Down" and on KPCC with "The Loh Life." and has written several books, including "A Year in Van Nuys." This article was submitted as a comment to "Come back to LAUSD and make a difference.)
Thanks to all for a frank and amazing discussion, although I always
wonder what it means to comment "anonymously." (Does that reflect a
fear LA's roving Armenian gangs will come after one online? Presumably
the ones who don't graduate and hence cannot type? We digress.)
All questions of morality aside, here is a practical flea's eye--or
parent's--view of the LAUSD. In certain middle-class, educated,
more-tending-towards-white generation(s) before ours (I am 46 and my
daughters are elementary-aged), there was an unspoken assumption that
most urban public schools were the pits, and it was completely socially
acceptable to move to where the white people were or grab a silk-lined
parachute into private school. The mentality was to each his own, and
the faster better-heeled families could pull that portcullis down
behind them the better.
Unfortunately, such dog-eat-dog thinking is a bit like strip-mining in
that it leaves behind, for the next generation of families, a blasted
dog-eat-dog landscape. When I started looking at kindergartens for my
older daughter in 2004, houses in a "good school district" like La
Canada started at $1 million while tuition at a "good" private
kindergarten started at $15,000/year (now it's more like $20,000).
Such are the economics of fear which, while destructive for new
families with more than one child and limited incomes, are fabulous at
lining the pockets of Realtors, private schools, private school
"counselors," and (inadvertently) the city of Portland.
So that's why many of us have our children in the LAUSD. We love this
city--its vitality, its energy and yes, its diversity--we're staying,
and we simply can't AFFORD to parachute our children out and away from
the world in which we live.
And it makes utter financial sense. Debt
and bankruptcy are not responsible family options; while private school
tuition isn't tax-deductible, donations to public schools via
educational foundations are; amazing parental "superdelegates" like
Westchester's Kelly Kane--a formidable new type of highly-skilled/full
time/working mom--are bringing public education into the 21st century;
and, perhaps surprisingly to some who read this blog, it turns out not
all Armenians are gang members. Some happen to be brilliant violinists
with a weakness for Bartok, like the extraordinary CSUN grad who
teaches violin at our Title One (58% poor) LAUSD school. In Van Nuys.
Where violin starts in kindergarten. Why? Because--here's
what--working together as a community, we can!
That said, I realize there are people in LA who find even the words
"Van Nuys" themselves scary (north of Victory! north of Victory!) and
I'm fine with that. The city is big enough to hold the LAUSD AND all
private schools. I've got Korean kids down the block graduating from
Van Nuys High right into Harvard and Stanford who've never even HEARD
of Harvard-Westlake. As a child of immigrants myself, I can tell you
those immigrants do find value. (And we have an AWESOME 99 Cent store.
But I suppose that's a subject for another blog.)
and bankruptcy are not responsible family options; while private school
tuition isn't tax-deductible, donations to public schools via
educational foundations are; amazing parental "superdelegates" like
Westchester's Kelly Kane--a formidable new type of highly-skilled/full
time/working mom--are bringing public education into the 21st century;
and, perhaps surprisingly to some who read this blog, it turns out not
all Armenians are gang members. Some happen to be brilliant violinists
with a weakness for Bartok, like the extraordinary CSUN grad who
teaches violin at our Title One (58% poor) LAUSD school. In Van Nuys.
Where violin starts in kindergarten. Why? Because--here's
what--working together as a community, we can!
That said, I realize there are people in LA who find even the words
"Van Nuys" themselves scary (north of Victory! north of Victory!) and
I'm fine with that. The city is big enough to hold the LAUSD AND all
private schools. I've got Korean kids down the block graduating from
Van Nuys High right into Harvard and Stanford who've never even HEARD
of Harvard-Westlake. As a child of immigrants myself, I can tell you
those immigrants do find value. (And we have an AWESOME 99 Cent store.
But I suppose that's a subject for another blog.)
Ron Kaye is the former editor of the Los Angeles Daily News where he spent 23 years helping to make the newspaper the voice of the San Fernando Valley and fighting for a city government that serves the people and not special interests.
Twice in recent years, Los Angeles Magazine listed Kaye among the city’s most influential people, specifically in the area of politics. Kaye has been variously described in the media as the “accidental anarchist,” “the Patrick Henry of the San Fernando Valley” and a “passionate populist.” He is now committed to
carrying on his crusade for a greater Los Angeles as an ordinary citizen. Previously, Ron worked at the Los Angeles Herald Examiner,
Associated Press, Cleveland Plain Dealer and The Australian as well as papers
in Fairbanks, Alaska and Yakima, Wash. He also wrote for Newsweek magazine, The Guardian in London and the National Enquirer.
Portcullis? Somebody with a vocabulary is finally reading this thing! Thank you, Sandra. You've improved the neighborhood. Now if we can just close down that pesky tenement down the street from Ron.
Oh, I'm sorry. For the rest of you:
Dictionary
portcullis |pôrtˈkələs|
noun
a strong, heavy grating sliding up and down in vertical grooves, lowered to block a gateway to a fortress or town.
portcullis
DERIVATIVES
portcullised adjective
ORIGIN Middle English : from Old French porte coleice ‘sliding door,’ from porte ‘door’ (from Latin porta) + coleice ‘sliding’ (feminine of couleis, from Latin colare ‘to filter’ ).
For those interested in the movement to return to the public neighborhood middle and high schools in West L.A. (sort of like in Westchester), you might check out the Act4Education group's website:
http://www.act4education.org/act4education/home.html
I'm not a huge fan of some of their tactics, which seem to be a bit too adversarial and confrontational. This is in part because the organization primarily consists of parents of local public elementary schools who are trying to improve the schools in advance of their own child's entry to middle/high school. It is therefore not the kind of change from the inside with committed and involved parents that has been proven to be effective and it probably comes off as elitist to the staff and existing parents. Nevertheless, the website has good information (albeit now a year old) and the effort has energized some more moderate and more cooperative parents to get involved. Many meetings have been held in the local elementary schools and in people's homes with existing Emerson faculty, staff, and students to answer questions and dispel rumors. With the end to busing of kids from overcrowded schools, the scores will almost necesarily rise when they are announced in the coming school year. More importantly, the parents already there have instituted things like pot luck dinners and other community building events and there is a real optimism about the school.
While I find Sandra an always clever writer, she's writing for one demographic and from the point of view of someone whom, she readily admits, can't afford the $1 million "membership fee" to get into San Marino and parachute into a more affluent school district. For those of us also in our 40's and with kids in elementary to middle schools, who are lucky enough to have homes that are (at least were) more than that and in some cases much more, and could well move to San Marino or Palos Verdes Estates or Hermosa but have chosen to stay in homes and areas we otherwise love, the situation is very different.
(Instead of bashing people for pointing out the real failings of "their" local schools, how about acknowledging that self-interest and saving money would prompt them to just move, as you apparently would in a heartbeat if you could afford it. Instead, these people are contributing to their communities and cities, INCLUDING by banging the drum about the failures of LAUSD to include them.)
The person(s) describing the public and middle schools they're assigned to but are in fact, neither academically nor otherwise acceptable (and that has nothing to do with genetic makeup as such of the student -- more affluent black families and those coming here from wealthier Latin American families feel the same way) is a fact of life on the more affluent westside, where Loh clearly doesn't live. Maybe she lives in an area like Silver Lake, where less traditional types with less money AND less busing and more local schools, live -- whatever, this city is made up of many different sub-cities, and being condescending because she's made her choice given her options, is just that -- condescending.
And Sandra, no one ever said all Armenians rove around in gangs and none listen to Bartok -- however, if you take your PC blinders off for a minute and look at what's happening, read about ethnic tensions in places like Glendale or actually visit a school where the white kids are almost all split between Armenian and Russian gangs -- where their native languages, traditions and exclusiveness are their bonds and protections, against each other and the Latinos who make up the rest, leaving "anglos" of other ethnicities a minority who fits in nowhere -- you might be less likely to make such sweepingly condescendingly statements based on just your experience. Then again, maybe not. You'll continue to heroically battle through LAUSD and expect to receive kudos and PC pats on the back for it, and for putting down people who have choices not even available to you.
P.S. to above: Sandra, your comment that you know Korean kids graduating right from public schools to Harvard "without ever having heard of Harvard- Westlake" is supposed to mean WHAT, exactly? Other than another PC dig at "scared white people." For the record, I'm a graduate of Yale and most years, volunteer on my Alumni Associations high school interviewing committee -- and guess what, like all the other Ivies and most competitive schools, Yale is most actively seeking the smart, "under- privileged," poor immigrant kid with great grades, scores and a good story. If they're Latino even better (and the same for AA's). White kids from Harvard-Westlake are in fact at a huge disadvantage competing against each other, all smart kids without a good "story" in most cases. Just like with LAUSD magnets, or even more so, being white and middle/upper middle class is a negative.
White kids who graduate at the top of public high schools are at a much bigger advantage in getting in than the same student who manages the top 1/3 of H-W or Brentwood, which are much tougher. So I'm more than aware it would behoove my kids to go to a good public high school, both to save money AND to facilitate getting into my college or others. (Being a legacy doesn't help nearly as much as some think.) Too bad we don't have that option. MAYBE in 4-5 years, if efforts like that mentioned by previous poster succeed to bring in more locals as busing programs cease and kids stay at their local schools, but its MAYBE. This certainly isn't an option now, and hasn't been since my older child started kindgergarten in 2001.
Anonymous 4:29:
"So I'm more than aware it would behoove my kids to go to a good public high school, both to save money AND to facilitate getting into my college or others. (Being a legacy doesn't help nearly as much as some think.) Too bad we don't have that option. MAYBE in 4-5 years, if efforts like that mentioned by previous poster succeed to bring in more locals as busing programs cease and kids stay at their local schools, but its MAYBE. This certainly isn't an option now, and hasn't been since my older child started kindgergarten in 2001."
The question is WHY are you so definite about this? On what facts do you base this very strong conclusion that leaves no room for doubt? My oldest child is going to Emerson for 6th grade in September. I'm an Ivy League grad myself and both my wife and I have advanced degrees. Many of my son's classmates are going there, indeed more of the kids who received Presidental Awards for academic achievement at graduation are going to Emerson than any other school, including private, Revere, and New West Charter. Many of his older friends from Westwood are already there and they love it and their parents love it. They walk to school and they do school projects with kids in the neighborhood. The school is down to 1150 from 1400 the year before - the difference being the departure of the kids from overcrowded schools in South LA. This makes it a much more intimate and personal middle school (Paul Revere has DOUBLE the number of students and Palms has almost 2000 students) and the new principal is very responsive and pro-active. The scores of SAS and IHP students are just as good as the scores of Revere, Palms, and Beverly Hills students. The 6th graders went on field trips to Yosemite and elsewhere for science - paid for in part through foundation grants. The parents report that the kids have challenging work in all subjects and they have expanded the IHP program from Math to Language Arts because of increasing quality of students. The drama program is phenomenal and the auditorium facility is outstanding. The kids' most recent production was first rate and they were a diverse group - not just SAS/IHP students. Students report no safety concerns and the stats back that up. This isn't to say all is rosy, but just that it isn't a warzone or a juvenile detention hall either. And they're working on the needs of some of the non-SAS kids. They've instituted after-school tutoring for kids who need it, they've started personally calling all kids on IEPs before they arrive in September to try to get on top of the special education testing problems, and they have a partnership with UCLA Grad school of Education to provide teaching assistants in classes to work one-on-one with students having difficulty.
Not to pick on you specifically, but the general question for people who claim that it "certainly isn't an option" is what are you really basing that upon? Too often, I think people just look at the number of Title I kids, the number of kids on free or reduced lunches, the racial makeup of the school, and the general test scores. They add in some rumors and third hand anecdotes that support their prior views and, presto, it isn't an option. For this important and costly a decision, how could you rely on such a small number of indirect proxies for safety and educational quality in your child's classroom (which would likely be SAS or IHP with kids at or above your child's level)? You would never do that if someone asked you to invest $200,000 in a company, so why would you do so here? This is especially true where private schools and long drives to other public schools have downsides (prejudice, elitism, materialism of spoiled kids, drugs) and where the evidence is very sketchy that those options contribute to educational success in life (in many cases, kids underperform their socioeconomic status at private schools, vis-a-vis the kids with the same socioeconomic status at public gifted programs). The more parents who stop the rumor-mongering, stop justifying their decision based on half-truths and suppositions, and who honestly ask themselves these hard questions, the more likely they WILL have a good public middle and high school in their neighborhood. It will still be LAUSD and it won't be perfect, but that's a good life lesson in and of itself.
I'm 4:29, and my school isn't Emerson. My friends at Fairburn are transitioning to Emerson, and have visited the school, know Fairburn families with older kids there, etc. -- and the fact that 3/4 kids there are eligible for Title I, the test scores, and L A Times articles about counsellors' problems there (read L A Times archives from last few years) is an indicator of the fact that most parents have had enough serious concerns that they've not gone there. Personal experiences of those who have gone there are not encouraging; a few insist the experience was fine, but actively looked around for options, Anyway, that's not "my" school -- from Coldwater Canyon we're assigned a school that's even worse, in a poor area and poorly performing, with very few "anglos," none from our area have gone there in maybe two decades and won't.
You can attack "us" all you want for not following your PC mandates toward sacrificing our kids for the greater goof of some future generation, but it's just stupid to do so -- in every successful city, people who buy homes that cost what ours do in "nice" areas know that good schools are a key to their continued sustainability and vitality. You mention Beverly Hills, and their 3 key cornerstones include schools and cops. Yes, they're struggling with the fact that even there, test scores are down and more people are choosing private school, so many who move go further, to Palos Verdes and Hermosa. That's largely because of people fleeing LAUSD and renting to get into the district, and diversity permits; after a contentious debate about that, the B H School Board recently decided to cap diversity permits, even if it means laying off teachers and cutting classes and "extras." Their objective is to restore their district's former educational level.
In towns with good school districts, including La Canada which Loh mentioned enviously, for less than what their homes cost here, they've got excellent schools, well- maintained streets and above all, a school board which isn't mired in PC and ethnic politics.
Ron talks about how people get a lot more for their tax money in Chicago, and Lopez/Times seems to feel the same: in addition to clean, safe streets, schools are the other major key to quality of life. Why is that so disputable?
"The mentality was to each his own, and
the faster better-heeled families could pull that portcullis down behind them the better.'
Sandra, there is an attitude problem demonstrated here. Those who perceive of America as being Anglo-Saxon and therefore because they are not, somehow the Anglo-Saxons are rejecting them and their kids and are always trying to be better than the rest. Boring.
My experience as a first generation American has always been an education in itself. First, this is the only country in the world with the words "All men are created equal" in their Constitution. So instead of complaining about others, why not step up to the plate and work
(secret word WORK) up to your abilities? All of us who believe we are equal to all the rest do that. You get to do what you wish and I will do as I wish. Do you have a problem with that?
My dear departed husband who was Anglo-Saxon, and I were always partners in our friendship, our marriage and our lives together. He was my best friend. He was honorably discharged from the Navy in 1948 and went to school on the GI bill and graduated as an EE. He never felt anyone owed anything. We have transferred that to our family of four kids and 8 grandchildren.
We also obey the Scout Law, both girls and boy.
And I was a Girl Scout Volunteer for 15 years, and a Den Mother for two years.
No one gets special privileges from me and I do not expect them from others. What I do expect is honesty in any relationship. Good luck to you and yours. Theodora Howell
Hey Sandra---love your work and love how you somehow made science and being a smart lady, cool.
I post anonymously so I can tell what I know----all the deep, dark secrets of the city and surrounding areas. ;-)
Were I to use my real name...lol...oh I'd be in deep doo-doo.
By the way, I LOVED your description a few years back of how to get one's kid into an LAUSD magnet school. I heard it on the radio and thought it was the best description I'd ever heard of how such a screwed up bureaucracy can make something so relatively simple----like elementary school---into a labyrinth of mystery, confusion, kabala, and boiling chicken heads!
My son is starting college. Holy cow, I'd better get a damn monk or medicine man or a 1040 Federal long form in here real quick or he'll NEVER get into community college!!!!
Oh, by the by, I'd love to work for the LAUSD, but only at a site where the parents are more like me. Why? Because I have found that the diversity that makes L.A. a rich city is the same diversity that divides us, causes misunderstandings, causes people to despise each other and makes the place so very difficult to change.
Having been hurt deeply as the naive outsider in L.A. education I just don't have the time or energy to go through that again. So, I'd love to work for the district if I could just find a niche with like-minded adults.
Apparently, that's like trying to find a 2-bedroom apartment in this town, in a decent area, for less than $1,200 a month. I know, I know---I'm crazy to even mention such an idea.
Thank you all for your great comments, though I'm still puzzled about the anonymity of my Yale grad critic in particular. Why so fearful of putting one's name down, to stand behind words one believes in? An Ivy League grad interviewing other potential Ivy League grads--absent a prison sentence, it appears there's little to be ashamed of. So I invite you to name yourself, and be proud.
To sweeten the invitation, let me hasten to say I absolutely AGREE with the idea of personal and economic self-interest being real motivators. When I began my Los Angeles school journey, I would definitely have chosen to purchase my way out of our family's educational troubles if I could have! (I've described my hysterical attempts to do so in my show "Mother on Fire" and in my upcoming book of the same name.) I'm very "out" about my La Canada (angel voices) fetishization--online, you can read my Atlantic Monthly piece on Jonathan Kozol that confesses all (I think you can find it on theatlantic.com).
My friend(s), I agree that we've had enough of PC folk TELLING us what to do--moral indignation from on high changes nothing (this was my beef with Kozol). But enlightened self-interest--those of us parents "with a dog in the fight"--is an incredible daily motivator. Necessity is the mother of invention. Los Angeles (and America!) NEEDS its middle class to upwardly-aspire, in resourceful, creative and economically-efficient ways. I could name 20 hard-working PTA moms (in the Valley alone!) that I feel are contributing much more to a better LA, on a daily basis, than many legislators. We middle-class public school parents--we're not better than anyone, just poorer! It's simply survival--if LA is representative of the future our middle-class kids are facing, they will have to be smart, resourceful, creative, hardy, optimistic, thrifty with a dollar, and comfortable with seeing many brown faces around them. (Won't hurt them to have exquisitely-developed senses of humor either.) As the high price of gas has driven (at least some!) commuters to public transportation, the unaffordable cost of "quality" education has driven the middle class "back into the streets". . . Although I must say what I continue to find, in education, is that there are many/many/many! emperors who have no clothes. Many. Did I say "many"?
Let's put it this way, in both public and private education?
MANY NUDE EMPERORS. (Paging Ron Kaye? Costume idea for Monday?)
(And re: Emerson, clearly I have to visit to see for myself what all the fuss/buzz is about, but to the one commentator I would say I personally would NOT believe every word I read about public school in the LA Times. . . See my "Outside the Tent" several years ago on latimes.com.) (While there still IS an latimes.com!)
That said, to spiffy(?), I agree that one can't fight one's battle alone. I'm a fan of Thomas Putnam's "Bowling Alone," where he differentiates between community dynamics of "bonding" versus "bridging." We need both types of connections in LA (and in the LAUSD). Spatially, I think of both the clubhouse and the town square--"bonding" with Those Like Oneself in the clubhouse gives you the strength to "bridge" with Those UNLIKE Oneself in the town square.
So invitation to spiffy--AND Yale anonymous! (although I'm still puzzled--since when does anyone go to Yale to become anonymous? I would be trumpeting my name and degree everywhere, flying that Yale blue high, filled with very real La Canada envy as I am!)-- Anyway, if you ever want to join our festive, growing (we're getting critical mass now) bring-the-LAUSD-into-the-21st-century clubhouse, give a holler. Although I'm (surprisingly!) pleased with the excellent free educations my daughters are getting so far, my first pet peeve is the LAUSD's hideous customer service. . . but oh, topic for another day!
Regards from portcullis-impaired Van Nuys,
Sandra
I think everyone can agree that we would like to have the following, for free (or for our tax dollars and deductible charitable contributions), and within a short drive or walk of our houses:
1) strong academics
2) safe environment
Some would also like to have some diversity and less materialism and elitism, but others want the opposite on all three things (although few would admit that).
Regardless of exactly what we want, most would also prefer all of this was possible without much parental effort. That is, if we could get away with it we would like to free ride on the efforts of others, including parents of prior generations of students who established such a great school. A few would like nothing better than be involved at a micro-manager level, often to the detriment of their kids and the regret of their kids' teachers and principals, but that's another story and they are the exception.
All Sandra's saying, if I'm reading her correctly (and all I'm saying if I'm not) is that she found this latter preference was impossible to achieve the former goals within the LAUSD. The former goals, though, are not impossible in LAUSD if you are willing and able to get involved and if you do the work to investigate all of the options. For instance, you may not be zoned for Emerson, and it may not be a magnet, but you can still apply to and go to the SAS program as a permit kid because there is space. So, she (and I) have investigated and worked our way through the system and have found it is not as bad as it is described in the papers and by neighbors with distant recollections and it actually can be quite good (especially if you also want diversity and a lesser amount of materialism and elitism).
When you declare defeat on the goals (at least the free or close-by goals) and you flee for private schools, just like when you retreat to gated communities and hire private police forces from ADT, waiting for the city to improve on its own, you will be disappointed. Things won't improve magically and through other people's efforts. Ellen Vukovich's original column was about exhorting people to get involved and come back to be part of the solution, rather than fleeing to criticize the problem from on high. This is a classic collective action problem. If we all came back to our neighborhood public schools in these great neighborhoods, they would be great almost overnight by most people's definitions (even though the curriculum wouldn't have changed one whit). It doesn't take that, though. It just takes people coming back who care. I think many would find out that they have been throwing $20-25,000/year down the drain.
Oh Sandra- you have the wrong idea. As someone who has lived in The Valley all my life, let me tell you something - it's north of Ventura, not north of Victory!!
Sandy Valadez
##
(I have no respect for people who sign "anonymous.")
Thanks for the invite Sandra. The words "Van Nuys" do not scare me either, nor do the words "North Hollywood" or "Arleta" strike dread into my heart. (However, it should also be noted that the those areas didn't get more than a few cops a day until the whole region threatened to get a divorce from its neglectful, flashy spouse L.A.---a movement I heartily supported from afar. I would not have been so comfortable with them 10 years ago as I am now.)
Volunteering would be swell if school were open at night, which is the only time I have available.
I do appreciate those mongo parents who are changing school sites but even that is not enough justice, in my opinion. While working parents make donations of time and cash to improve the schools, the district leaders continue to throw millions of dollars into poo. Dung.
I would like to see the board put a little barbecue in front of the mic of the board room and all the attendees and board members could take turns burning singles and twenties there.
It could become a ritual----a weekly ritual to illustrate the money that gets wasted in the school district. Most people are visual learners. If they put a barbecue in the middle of the room and burned money the participants would all learn why the public gets so upset with them.
Suddenly, $95,000,000 spent on a faulty payroll software system might feel like real money if they burned it each week in the board room barbecue. (See....I'm a good teacher. That would be one heck of an engaging lesson, wouldn't it?)
Tahnks for posting