The Superintendent of California Schools, Jack O’Connell, and
other policy makers discussed the importance of parent involvement
in their children’s education, and he urged students and
administrators to re-focus on state standards at the Tri-County
Education summit Friday.
San Juan Bautista – The Superintendent of California Schools, Jack O’Connell, and other policy makers discussed the importance of parent involvement in their children’s education, and he urged students and administrators to re-focus on state standards at the Tri-County Education summit Friday.
O’Connell, State Sen. Jeff Denham, R-Merced, Assemblyman Simon Salinas, D-Salinas, two local teachers and a student from Anzar High School sat on a panel and answered questions about issues in education from more than 100 people in the audience at Anzar High School. The event, which is organized by Denham, gave teachers, administrators, parents and students a chance to voice their concerns, and hear what O’Connell and others think about the state of
California schools.
“Here in San Benito County, there are so many differences in education,” Denham said. “We’ve got school districts with one room school houses, and then we have very large schools. This is a way of pulling us together in a bipartisan way and look at how we can improve on education together.”
Before the panel started answering questions, O’Connell addressed parent involvement.
“I want to re-engage parents with their children more than ever before,” he said. “They need to know it’s OK to turn off the cell phone and computer and read to their kids and get involved. And today, it’s much easier for them to be involved. Many teachers have Web pages where they can find information.”
Along with the need for parents to share accountability for student success, O’Connell touched on the issue of needing to prepare high school students for life after graduation, even if they don’t plan on attending college.
“I’ve always been a supporter of career and tech education,” he said. “Our career and tech classes have been ignored for a long time. The work place is changing and evolving and we need to prepare our students for the careers out there.”
O’Connell also mentioned a need for more rigor in high school curriculums, and called on teachers and administrators to re-dedicate themselves to the state standards. He believes a large number of the state’s 1.8 million high school students aren’t getting the requirements needed for college.
But Flannery Fitch, a senior at Anzar High School who sat on the board, disagreed.
“I think the standardized tests don’t really show what we’re learning,” she said. “Instead, they’re taking time out of the class when we could be learning, and if anyone doesn’t think our classes are rigorous, they should sit in my AP biology class and my AP physics class, which I took while also taking calculus.”
During the question and answer portion of the summit, Denham and Salinas answered questions from Anzar students in the audience. One of their questions was “why doesn’t the state give money to fund high school sports?” Anzar, which has been an established high school for more than 10 years, still has no football team. Denham said that with a tight state budget, there isn’t much funding for anything extra, but in the future it’s something he will look at.
“I wish the state could fund athletics,” he said. “I know it helped me out a lot when I was in school.”
Anzar student Kelsey Stone, who asked the question, said listening to Denham and Salinas helped her understand more about the priorities in education right now.
“They kind of gave a perspective to stuff that I wouldn’t have thought about, and I never realized that funding was so low,” she said.
As the hour-and-a-half of questions and answers came to a close, Denham thanked everyone for their input, and promised to continue to work with Salinas, and the senate and keep education a high priority.
“I want to thank you all for your participation here today,” he said. “I think it’s good to have Mr. O’Connell down here to our rural areas because a lot of the time we come to him with concerns that he doesn’t see in the bigger urban areas.”
Tim Foley, superintendent of San Benito County Schools, was pleased with the way the summit wrapped up, and said it was very helpful to have teachers and students involved on the panel.
“I’m glad we had the two teachers and the student on the panel because it brought a different perspective to the discussion,” he said.
O’Connell will be holding his own education summit Oct. 25 and 26 in Sacramento. For more information, log onto: www.cde.ca.gov.
Christine Tognetti covers education for the Free Lance. Reach her at 831-637-5566 ext. 330, or
ct*******@fr***********.com
.
