So, after nearly a year of COVID-19 related closures, let’s give the Lompoc Unified School District (LUSD) a “progress report”; how is it doing and what grade would it get if this were a classroom project? I am not an educator, but I think we can figure this out based on the progress made so far.
Does the LUSD have any incentive to reopen the schools for in-person learning? It doesn’t look like it because the school district’s learning facilities are still closed to students. In the meantime, we property owners are still paying school taxes as if the kids were still using all those empty classrooms. In fact, the teachers don’t even have to show up on school property or even be in the district boundaries to teach their classes.
When businesses were initially ordered shut, the owners promptly figured out how to reopen following the guidelines established by the county Health Department. Unlike local business owners who have lost their income due to closures, LUSD employees and administrators continue to get paid.
When classrooms closed, the state allowed what was termed “distance learning” in lieu of physical attendance in the schools so they could qualify for federal education funding. This meant that teachers had to learn how to effectively instruct students and get them to participate using electronic media, and it meant that students had to have the capability to access classes via the internet.
The plan failed to consider that many LUSD students and their families had no access to the internet and/or the fact that many parents either didn’t speak English or didn’t have the capabilities that credentialed instructors have to help their children with their lessons.
According to a recent superintendent’s letter to parents on Jan. 22, distance learning is summarized this way: “Due to the increased struggles of many of our students that have resulted in an increase in failing grades this school year, LUSD has developed a revised grading policy for this school year.”
So, instead of returning kids to the classroom where they may have a better chance of understanding the materials being presented, the LUSD is simply lowering the bar. To put this in perspective, the LUSD already has an incredibly low level of achievement according a 2020-21 evaluation by niche.com. “According to state test scores (for Lompoc), 26 percent of students are at least proficient in math and 46 percent in reading.”
To most that would be a failing grade, and if a private business had a track record like that no one would use their services. This means that students, parents, and taxpayers are being disenfranchised by the poorly run public school system.
The superintendent’s letter also discusses progress toward reopening schools this way: “Principals continue to meet weekly to discuss reopening. The current focus is on class creation and parent notification.” So instead of physically reopening the schools, they have sat around for more than 40 weeks talking about it and sending memos to parents trying to justify continued closures.
Even though the Centers for Disease Control has been publishing reopening guidelines for several months, the LUSD is just now getting around to submitting plans to the county. The superintendent’s letter explains it this way: “COVID Safety Plans (CSPs) and Illness & Injury Prevention Plans (IIPPs) are due to county health departments and the CDE by Feb. 1.”
How long it will take the county and CDE (California Department of Education) to return comments and/or approve the plans isn’t clear, and there is no mention if any of the steps in these plans have been implemented or how long it will take to complete required employee training, classroom modifications, or acquire needed materials.
The LUSD school board met in January, and one of the items discussed was just when the district planned to reopen. Only one member of the board was an advocate for establishing a date to start the process in early March.
But other board members, some who were former employees of the district, were hesitant to set a date. The county has established an unrealistic reopening threshold at 25 cases per 100,000 residents, a number that hasn’t been realized for several months—and considering the current case rate, in all likelihood it won’t be achieved any time soon.
Even though students are not present, there have been reports of infections at every school facility in the district. It appears that school children aren’t the problem but district employees who aren’t taking preventive measures seriously.
It makes you wonder if the district IIPP and CSP will be complied with or even enforced by management once the district reopens. Seems to me that there is a significant management issue that needs to be resolved.
Considering all the things I have discussed in this commentary, what sort of grade would you give to the LUSD? Using the new grading schedule published in the superintendent’s letter, I would give a “no credit,” and using the grading schedule used when I went to school, I would give a failing grade.
It’s important to note that Manzanita charter school located on Vandenberg Air Force Base is open for in-person learning; many other school districts and charter/private schools in the county are also open for business. If they figured it out, why can’t the LUSD; could it be that the employee unions, and not the school administration, are in charge?
The sad part of all of this is that the most vulnerable children of our community are being tossed under the bus by a public school system that has no incentive to reopen the schools.
Ron Fink writes to the Sun from Lompoc. Send your thoughts, comments, and opinionated letters to letters@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Feb 11-18, 2021.