Superintendent Cortines has announced that he will leave his position in six months. When it was convenient for him, he would remind people that he had been a teacher. Years ago when he was also the Superintendent, he made a robo call to teachers and retired teachers when the district altered the health benefits and wrote the changes in a manner that confused everyone. His recorded call conveyed nastiness and a disdain for the teachers.
The new Superintendent of LAUSD should:
- Stop the iPad program immediately and put the money where it belongs—repairs and construction.
- Abandon MiSIS instead of throwing another $80 million at it.
- Treat the teachers and the other school staff members with total respect and dignity.
- Make sure that the results of the Grand Jury investigation into MiSIS and the iPads are turned over to the proper authorities so that anyone found culpable is dealt with to the extent of the law.
- Limit testing at every grade to one day a year with one hour for Language Arts and one hour for Math.
- Greatly reduce class sizes by putting 98% of the district funds into the schools.
- Return autonomy to the teachers so that they will move on to a new skill only when the class has mastered every previous skill.
- Make sure that every student has Music, Art, Library, Computers, and Physical Education.
- Allow the teachers to select the textbooks.
- Tell the school board members and the downtown administrators that they must be in schools 4 days a week, with the fifth day used for sharing fresh and innovative ideas that they have encountered.
- Sell the Beaudry headquarters building and move the offices to empty classrooms with 90% of the downtown administration retiring or becoming teachers.
- Make the budget information available to the public.
- Restore funds for the gifted and for special education classes.
- Return shops to secondary schools.
- Sell all district cars.
- Develop a truly effective discipline plan that holds parents accountable, which will assist teachers and not return disruptive students to class without intervention.
- Eliminate the Educational Service Centers with the staffs either retiring or returning to teaching.
- Establish family health centers with medical, psychological, and parenting support on every secondary campus.
- Make sure that every day, each child has a healthy, nutritious meal.
- Close down the rubber rooms.
- Provide sufficient college counseling and career counseling time for each high school student.
- Be available to everyone.
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