Education Blog: Oakland Goes Back to School

By Katy Murphy

This is a sampling of the Education Report, Katy Murphy’s blog on Oakland schools. Read more and post comments at www.ibabuzz.com/ education.

Aug. 26: Eight of Oakland’s elementary schools could really use some elbow room, according to a space formula used by school district staff members.

But what to do about the increasingly popular Chabot, Hillcrest, Kaiser, Lincoln, Montclair, Redwood Heights, Thornhill and Peralta? Most of those schools have already added portable classrooms in recent years, and they still don’t guarantee neighborhood kids a seat.

At 7:30 a.m. Friday morning, the school board’s Special Committee on School Admissions, Attendance and Boundaries returns from summer vacation to discuss the problem.

Should crowded schools move to half-day kindergarten to make more space? Should they make class sizes bigger in the fourth and fifth grades? You can learn more about the space issues and possible fixes in a staff report posted on this blog, www.ibabuzz.com/education. Please share your own ideas.

Aug. 26: If you want to learn more about the conditions in some Oakland schools, you need only pay a visit to DonorsChoose.org., or other Web sites on which teachers post their wish lists for supplies. I ran a search for Oakland and came up with 80 requests. Here is one of them:

“The gray carpet is covered from years of stains, and there are large, 2-foot-by-8-foot patches where the rug has come apart entirely and reveals the underlay beneath. A new rug would help my students to take greater pride in their classroom and brighten their surroundings.”

The requests ranged from notebooks and art supplies to more costly equipment, such as a $1,000 LCD projector screen and a digital video camera.

One teacher, who asked for watercolor sets, wrote: “Can you picture it now? The lights are dimmed, jazz music is faintly playing in the background, and each child has a watercolor set and is deeply focused on their creation. Beautiful!”

Oakland schools made significant cuts to their supply funds this year. How is that affecting your classroom, or your child’s?

Aug. 25: In honor of the First Day of School 2008, I offer you the following statistics, according to the district’s back-to- school report:

Estimated enrollment (as of Aug. 22): 39,227

Amount spent on summer renovation projects: $85 million

New teacher hires: 300

Teacher transfers: 145

Vacancies: 4

How was opening day at your school? Does it feel good to be back?

READER RESPONSE

Cranky Teacher: Four vacancies! Ha. I’m sure we have that many at our school alone.

And that doesn’t count the teachers who don’t have credentials yet so a substitute has to be in the room.

Catherine: My daughter was very nervous.

It seems to me that the principal grouped the children more by learning style: highly motivated (regardless of test scores), average, lower motivation and parental involvement. The principal also seemed to be happy at the narrowing of the achievement gap last year in our school scores.

It was great reuniting with the teachers, parents, kids and the principal. It was great having “coffee” with the parents new to the school because their kids were new and/or their kids were incoming kindergartners. I hold high hopes for this year. Let the learning begin.

BJ: I would not believe any of the OUSD spin on the vacancies. We have three unfilled vacancies at our school site alone. Two of them are at the primary level (kindergarten and second grade). Today, two substitutes and another staff member filled in. At my friend’s school, they filled up the kindergarten, first- and second-grade classes to 30 because of vacancies.

So let’s see “… three vacancies at my site, four from cranky teacher’s site, three-plus from my friend’s site. Hmm … that’s way more than the number OUSD released to the media.

Originally published by Katy Murphy, Oakland Tribune.

(c) 2008 Oakland Tribune. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.