October 12, 2001 
 

SDUSD Board Crumbling: Community Says "Resign"  Latino Coalition Gives Blueprint "Vote of No Confidence"  
By Yvette tenBerge   

 Their 25 minute
>presentation in which they issued a "Vote of No  Confidence" for the
>implementation of the Blueprint for Student Success was  preceded by an
>hour and a half-long spectacle in which, as usual, the board  majority and
>the Superintendent did a great deal of verbal tap dancing and  little else. 
>    Trustee Frances O'Neill Zimmerman calls for Sue Braun's resignation. 
>Board Member Apologizes: In front of an audience packed with outraged 
>parents, 
>teachers and community members, Sue Braun issued a formal apology  to
>fellow board members John de Beck and Frances 
>O'Neill Zimmerman. She  labeled her sending of an e-mail in which she
>threatened to "shoot" de Beck and  Zimmerman with 
>"one bullet" a "terrible error in judgment" and admitted that  there was
>"no excuse for my having said, or written, such a thing." 
>She  followed this act of contrition with justification for her decision to
>remain on  the board, saying, "Of course, it was not meant 
>seriously, as the City  Schools Police and San Diego Police have found
>through their investigations."  Ms. Braun sent the e-mail in question on
>September 26. It was sent to four  district employees and two board
>members, none 
>of whom were either Mr. de  Beck or Ms. Zimmerman. In the e-mail, Ms. Braun
>mentioned that Mr. de Beck and  Ms. 
>Zimmerman "get so outrageous" that they make "the rest of the board 
>members, including me, crazy." She asked for ideas as to 
>how to "keep more  control" of the meetings, and finished by offering a
>solution: to "shoot the  both of them" with "one bullet."  Dave Cohen,
>Spokesperson for the San Diego Police Department, confirms the 
>depart-ment's decision not to treat this matter 
>as a crime. "In making a  `terrorist threat,' the threat must be
>communicated directly to the intended  victim or victims," said Mr. 
>Cohen, who indicated that investigators  considered a number of factors in
>the inquiry. The police department then passed  the 
>case onto the District Attorney's office, which "found no reason to 
>disagree" with the police department's decision.  The finding that Ms.
>Braun did not commit a crime did little to change the  attitude of the
>crowd attending the meeting, the 
>majority of whom still want  to see Ms. Braun "do the right thing" and
>resign from the board. The only way in  which Ms. Braun, 
>an elected official, can be removed from her seat is by  voluntary
>resignation or by citizen recall.  Despite the demands of Mr. de Beck and
>Ms. Zimmerman, and with the support of  Mr. Ottinger and Mr. Lopez, Ms.
Braun 
>refused to resign. She did, though,  agree to step down as president of the
>board. In a move that infuriated many,  she handed 
>her gavel to then Vice President Ottinger, one of the six people  to
>receive and not report her e-mail threat.  Among the dozen community
>members who spoke to this issue was Marc Knapp,  President of the San Diego
>Education 
>Association (SDEA). Although Mr.  Ottinger attempted to cut his time short,
>Mr. Knapp reminded him that he was  speaking on 
>behalf of 10,000 of the district's teachers.  "The members of the San Diego
>Education Association call for the immediate  resignation of Ms. Braun and
>for immediate 
>disciplinary action taken against  everyone who had knowledge of the threat
>and refused to report it to the  authorities or to warn 
>Ms. Zimmerman and Mr. de Beck," said Mr. Knapp, who  handed out copies of
>"Roberts Rules of Order" to each board 
>member and whose  speech garnered a standing ovation from the crowd.  Among
>the others who directly received Ms. Braun's threatening message were  Mr.
>Lopez, Joanne Sawyerknoll, General 
>Council for the District, Deberie  Gomez, Deputy Administrative Officer for
>Human Resources, and Kerry Flanagan,  Staff 
>Action Officer for the Chief of Staff.  Although the district has a
>notoriously tough "zero tolerance" policy on  violence in schools, not one
>of these people chose to 
>confront Ms. Braun  about her actions or to come forward to report the
>threat. Instead, Mr. de Beck  learned of the threat on 
>October 1, from employees working on the second  floor offices of the board
>of education, located at 4100 Normal Street.  Ms. Braun sat pale-faced and
>tight-lipped as parents, teachers, community  representatives, a United
>Methodist Minister and an 
>Episcopal priest  addressed the board as to her conduct. Although a few
>people spoke out in favor  of her remaining on the 
>board, all denounced her actions and pleaded for the  board to work
>together and strive for "civility."  Susen Fay, a member of the San Diego
>County Board of Education who came to  express her personal opinion, summed
>up the 
>attitude of many of the people  present. "Setting aside the police report,
>school board members have a  responsibility to set an 
>example for students, parents and the community at  large. In light of our
>zero tolerance policy to which we hold our children, I  
>would call on Sue Braun to remove herself from the board," said Ms. Fay. 
>If the crowd expected any sort of explanation from the Superintendent or a 
>statement to go along with his "No exceptions, no 
>excuses" mantra, they were  sorely disappointed. As Mr. Bersin stammered
>through a "call to civility...  particularly at a time 
>when our nation has been under attack," the members  of the audience broke
>out in laughter, groaned or pointed their fingers  
>straight back at him and shouted "civility needs to start with you, Mr. 
>Bersin."  Whether Ms. Braun's e-mail is considered a serious threat or not,
>one thing  became inarguably clear at this meeting: the people 
>whom the school board  represents no longer want Sue Braun to speak for
>them. For the time being,  however, she will continue 
>to do just that. This most recent action is only  one in a series of
>actions that have shaken the public's confidence in her, and  in 
>the board majority of which she is a part.  Latino Coalition: Vote of No
>Confidence                               After the cameramen and most of
>the reporters present headed back to their  offices to  
>                             meet deadlines, the board returned to business
>as usual. In the second formal  vote of "No  
>                             Confidence" issued in three months (the SDEA
>released their survey results on  June 25  
>                             which indicate that 93 percent of the 5,500
>educators who responded have "no  
>                             confidence" in Mr. Bersin), the Latino
>Coalition stated their position: they  have no  
>                             confidence in the implementation of Mr. Bersin
>and Mr. Alvarado's Blueprint for  Student  
>                             Success.                               The
>Coalition consists of Hispanic organizations from East County, South Bay, 
>North  
>                             County and Metro City. Each group does work in
>their own areas and joins  together  
>                             once a year at a countywide conference to
>share and discuss data concerning  Latino  
>                             education. 
>                                Dr. Alberto Ochoa announces that the San
>Diego County Latino Coalition on  
>                             Education has "no confidence" in Bersin's
>Blueprint For Student Success.  
>   Dr. Alberto Ochoa, Co-Chair of the Coalition and a San Diego State
>University  Professor of Education, stated that the 
>Coalition has "conditionally  supported the Blueprint for 18 months in the
>hopes of seeing tangible, positive  results in the 
>improvement of the achievement of Latino students." In light  of recently
>released data which includes STAR test data 
>independently  analyzed by local statisticians and district math
>instructors, the Coalition has  concluded that the results do 
>anything but validate the 
>Blueprint.  The Coalition raised eight, major criticisms of the district.
>Claiming to  have a "major disagreement with the district in the 
>definition and  implementation of the Blueprint," they found there to be a
>"continuation of the  achievement gap between Latino 
>and non-Latino students, despite significant  reallocation of funds and
>personnel," a "management and school leadership  profile 
>of appointments that are at odds with the diversity of the students  in the
>school district," a "biliteracy plan that has been 
>co-opted into a  structured English immersion approach," a "diminishing
>lack of due process and  respect for parents," a 
>  "lack of accountability in documenting the progress of Latino students," 
>and 
>the presence of "tracking of Latino students in Genre Studies for math  and
>literacy."  Many remember a March 2000 letter in which the Coalition jumped
>on the  Blueprint bandwagon. Rather than giving their 
>wholehearted endorsement,  however, the Coalition painted a picture in
>which they were hesitant to come on  board, but hoped 
>for the best. According to an October 8 press release, the  Coalition
>offered to work with the district to institute what seemed to 
>­ accountability, rigor and the promotion of literacy  and mathematics
>skills. "This support was given 
>conditionally, based on the  promise that authentic reforms would take
>place."  On June 4, 2001, the Coalition met with Superintendent Bersin and
>Chancellor  Alvarado to raise specific questions about the 
>Blueprint, and to discuss the  future of the 54,613 Latino children who
>account for 38 percent of the  district's students. Among 
>the concerns raised were: the lack of community  involvement, the
>district's failure to address the needs of second language  
>learners and concerns about access to equal staffing.  Although the
>Coalition requested that the district respond within 60 days,  they
>received what they consider to be a "superficial 
>and unacceptable"  response from the district on August 24. During this
>time, the Coalition  scrutinized district data regarding 
>student achievement and concluded that  the district's claim of "steady
>progress" is either "misleading and/or  inaccurate."  Throughout Tuesday's
>presentation in which representatives from the Chicano  Federation, the
>Mexican American Business and 
>Professional Association, the  California Hispanic American Medical
>Association and the Greater San Diego  California 
>Association spoke out, not one of the speakers questioned, or  even
>directly addressed, Mr. Lopez, the only Hispanic on the 
>board and one  of the board majority members responsible for pushing
>forward the very policies  that the Coalition is 
>denouncing.  Despite the large, red and green charts that the Coalition
>held up for all to  see, the pages of information that they handed to the 
>board and their  statement that "enough was enough," Mr. Bersin dismissed
>their grievances about  the school board's programs 
>and its non-communicativeness as merely a "part  of an ongoing dialogue." 
>Edward Olivos is the President of the Greater San Diego California 
>Association for Bilingual Education, as well as a teacher at 
>Audubon  Elementary School. He was not surprised to hear Mr. Bersin's
>reaction to their  presentation.  "What got me about Mr. Bersin's comment
>is that his idea of dialogue is that  he goes to a school, tells people
>what he is going 
>to do, people yell back  at him to say that they oppose it, and he goes
>back and reports that there was  `dialogue.' He takes any 
>disagreement as a personal attack against him. He  goes after the messenger
>without ever listening to the message," says Mr.  
>Olivos. "We expected this much from him because there has never been 
>collaboration or dialogue."  In keeping with the spirit of things, Mr.
>Lopez also brushed off the Latino  Coalition's concerns about the
>Blueprint, itself. In his 
>ramblings, he  mentioned the need to be "data focused" when looking into
>the Coalition's  complaints and then mentioned that 
>"thought should be given as to who will  look at this information and
>when."  Despite continued mentions of the need for an independent, third
>party  analysis of the STAR data, Mr. Lopez has not returned 
>La Prensa's e-mail  requesting details about this proposed analysis.  Ms.
>Zimmerman, Mr. de Beck and the majority of the audience shook their heads 
>as they listened to Mr. Lopez' scripted 
>response. It was Mr. de Beck who cut  to the heart of the issue. He pointed
>out that, despite years of community  concern about 
>the Blueprint for Student Success, Chancellor Alvarado, the  man
>responsible for concocting and implementing this costly and  
>much-criticized program, has remained shielded from the community.  "The
>absence of the engineer in all of this is a problem. Tony Alvarado has  to
>be present at school board meetings. Last I 
>knew, he worked for us, and  he was on our payroll. He's been insulated
>from the public by the board and the  Superintendent. 
>The community deserves to have the people who are part of  designing these
>programs here," said Mr. de Beck, who lamented 
>the fact that  it took a crisis to engage the board in an honest debate of
>the issues. "You can  talk about how you want to bring 
>people together after the fact, but it's  time that we stop saying `I'm
>going to do it' and really do it."