Part II. Open letter to fellow Waldorf parents: Questions to consider before signing the charter petition

Last week I posted Part I of my open letter to fellow LWIP parents about a number of questions that need to be answered before we sign the charter petition. The following is the remainder of that open letter.

5.     Will forcing our children to take standardized tests contradict our values and damage their learning? The AC’s March 4^th memo says our children may be forced to take standardized tests. If so, how will that take away or undermine our Waldorf curriculum? How much time will teaching to the test take away from our core curriculum? What are the risks of our school being sanctioned and shut down if the test scores are too low or too many students do not take them?

6.     What will our maximum class size be? Are we going to have 30+ kids in our classes as one of the Waldorf charters in Petaluma has?

7.     Who are the consultants the AC has hired, have they been paid with LWIP parent donation funds, what have they been promised, and do they have any conflicts of interest? The March 4^th memo says that the Administrative Counsel (AC) has been working on this for a number of months, raised money and has hired consultants. I understand the AC is working or has worked with the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) and a lawyer to prepare the petition, feasibility study and 3 year budget. When were these decisions made? When were they announced to the parents in the program? Who on the AC signed the contracts with the consultants? Do our bylaws authorize the AC to use LWIP money and sign contracts? Has LWIP money has been used to pay consultants? If so, who will reimburse the costs to LWIP? Who are the consultants? How much have the consultants been paid? Do they expect to be hired as consultants if we go charter? Who will make that decision? Who will pay them? Do these consultants have a conflict of interest or expect to be hired if we go charter?

8.     Does going charter contradict our values and principles? If the AC is being or has been advised by the CCSA shouldn’t it be disclosed that CCSA is funded by the Walton Family Foundation which was established by the Walton family that runs the Walmart corporation? Shouldn’t we also know that CCSA itself is run by a Walton family member? CCSA just received a $15 million grant from the Walton family foundation and more money from the Gates and Broad Foundations. All of these foundations are notable for their hostility to public schools and push standardized testing and computers in the classroom? Do we really want to be associated with a corporation that pay low wages and virtually no benefits to its employees, has underpaid its female employees for many years, and drives out small local businesses?

9.     Does hiring a lawyer contradict our values and principles?

Hiring a lawyer is inherently adversarial, confrontational, divisive, and extremely expensive. Did the AC hire Sacramento attorney Lisa A. Corr at $195 per hour to work on the petition? If so, our community should be informed that according to published accounts Ms. Corr’s law firm Middleton, Young & Minney LLP appears to work with CCSA and joined CCSA in several lawsuits by charter schools against their local school districts. Ms. Corr is listed as a “CCSA General Manager” on her law firms’ website. Her law firm is also a major sponsor of CCSA’s recent charter school conference. We should also be asking Ms. Corr if her firm is also directly connected with the Walton Family Foundation in any way. What are the consequences of aligning ourselves with organizations with values that appear to be fundamentally counter to the Waldorf approach?

10.     Would going charter reduce the amount of money per student in our program and District wide? As a charter school wouldn’t we receive significantly less—as much as 50% less—per student than we now receive? To make the charter work wouldn’t we need to take in more students? But wouldn’t taking in more students from Basic Aid districts like ours give us no extra money? And wouldn’t our program get significantly less money for students from all other districts (these details were given by Superintendent Larry Enos at the 3/20/12 board meeting). Would the District have to contribute money to pay for each new out of district transfer student thereby reducing funding for all the other programs? What would be the impact on our children be if we had a bigger enrollment and less money per student? How would we make up the gap? Would we have larger classes, cut teacher pay and benefits or less specialty teachers? How will we make up the $45 lost for each absence per day—about $6,000 per month at our current approximate 15% absentee rate—that we do not currently lose as part of the District?

11.     How would the charter be run? What are the bylaws and articles of incorporation? Who wrote them or will write them? When will they be submitted to the parents for discussion, amendments, and a vote?

12.     Which state open meetings laws must a charter follow? Will we comply with the Brown Act (open meetings law)? Doesn’t an elected Trustee need to be on the charter board for the charter to covered by the Brown Act? How will decisions be made? Will we need to form a new board? If so, will it be elected? Who will run the election? Who will be in charge of making sure we comply with the complex state education code? 

13.  Would going charter weaken our public school district as a whole? If the District will have to provide extra funds for each new out of district transfer student will we be taking away resources from the other 2 programs and the middle school?

14.  Would going charter generate further animosity and tensions between our program and the other programs? How do parents in the other two elementary programs feel about our potentially going charter? Is anyone already experiencing animosity and opposition?

15.  What will our admissions policy be and who will decide it? Will existing students and in-District families have priority? Will there be a lottery?

16.  How will our school fund everything we now get from the District? How will we pay for the classrooms, school bus, subsidized and free lunches some of our children now receive, school nurse, psychologist, counseling, and remediation, and services for children with special needs? If these costs go up will there be pressure for these children to leave the school?

17.  Will we parents have to do a lot of work ourselves that ordinarily would be done by the District? Being such a small program with a lot of work to do already what can we expect to have to take on and who will do it?

18.  Would we parents be required to donate more money to cover the gap between our declining public funding and what we offer? If so, how much do we raise now, where has the money been spent and how much more will we have to spend on other necessities beyond what we cover now? Will our donations have to cover renting the classrooms, counseling, lunches, etc as well as Spanish and handwork, etc?

19.  Would remaining on the campus isolate and generate animosity towards our children? Will our children be ostracized or put in harms way?

20.  Would we have to hire an administrator to do all the administrative jobs now done by District staff? Will our program have to hire an administrator? Will our school have to subcontract out this work? Who will do it? How much will they be paid? Will parents be expected to do the work? How much will new administrative expenses take away money from our children in the classroom? If so, who will hire, fire, discipline and pay these people? Who will write the job description, employee handbook, etc. If we currently have contracted consultants, do they expect to be hired as the administrator?

21.  Who will handle the accounting and budgeting? In the 1.5 years we have been in this program I have not received one balance sheet to see how our funds are being spent despite asking that we have one several times. This is hard work that has yet to be done. Who will do the even harder work of handling the much larger budget our charter would have? What is the projected 3 year budget being drafted? Will this be discussed?

22.  Who will we hire, fire, discipline, and pay our teaching staff? The March 4^th memo says the program will have “more autonomy over faculty” in our program. What standards will our teachers need to meet? Will the teachers vote to remain in the teacher’s union? If not, who will do the complex work of negotiating a separate contract with them? Will we require the teaching staff to have Waldorf training? If so, will we pay for them to get it if necessary? How long will they have to complete the training?

23.  If the District votes against the charter petition would we continue to appeal over the heads of the District community? Would we then petition the County Board of Education and if unsuccessful there will it then go to the state? If so, who will make these decisions, how much will it cost, who will do the work, and will it generate more animosity from other parents in the District? 

Until these questions are discussed in a calm, careful and transparent manner and we parents are given a chance to change and vote on the charter petition I urge you to not sign the petition. We just do not know enough about what is being proposed, why it is being proposed, and the impacts on our children, the District and our families to turn our program into a charter.