Community Corner

HUSD Board Postpones Charter School Vote

Teachers' union asks for more time to air concerns about equity between the regular and proposed programs.

Healdsburg Unified School District board members decided Wednesday night to delay a vote on a until the next board meeting Jan. 8.

Board members also reorganized for 2011, welcoming newly elected trustees Vince Dougherty and Tony Pettis and saying goodbye to board member Mary Burke after almost six years of service. Board President Judy Velasquez finished her term and  welcomed new board President Ted Crowell, with board member Genevieve LLerena moving into the vice-president slot.

A delay on the charter school vote was requested by science teacher Barbara Pinney, president of the Healdsburg Area Teachers Association. Pinney said her union members needed more time to air their concerns about the need for equity between the regular school program and the proposed charter.

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"It's really important for our teachers to put everything out on the table and make sure there's an understanding," she said.

With the extra time, Pinney said the teachers will be able to attend a Jan. 6 staff meeting to discuss the potential charter school, and also have a chance to meet with a specialist in charter school programs statewide and ask a lot of questions.

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"We're concerned about educational equity and about funding equity,"  Pinney said.

Pinney's remarks echoed those aired by teachers and parents in the District's English Learners Advisory Committee, which oversees the program. They said said they were worried the charter would lead to "segregation" of Spanish speaking students.

HUSD's Spanish immersion program is scheduled to begin phasing out next year, at the same time the charter school, if approved, would be launching its new program.

Superintendent Jeff Harding, in a presentation Wednesday to the board, said he "didn't want to repeat the mistakes made in the past by this district and other districts" in launching a charter school or immersion program that resulted in two separate demographics -- such as a "brown," or ethnic minority, school, and a "white" school.

"I think the fact that we're sharing a campus with the  two programs will be enormous [in favor of equity]," Harding said. "We will have equity -- the equity being that each student will be supported equally according to what he or she needs."

 Velasquez, a retired elementary school teacher, said she understood the teachers' fears of inequity because when she taught at Fitch Mountain School, one of two district elementary schools, it was considered the "brown school," she said.

"Since that time, I've seen changes in our program so that we've now created an environment where all students can excel," she said. "I've watched English learners' performance levels increase."

She said that she was hopeful that the charter program would not be a polarizing choice.

"I know the pressures that teachers face when they have to change their strategies," Velasquez said. "But we have good teachers in both programs -- and I don't want to call one a 'mainstream' or 'English-only' program," she said.

"I'm looking forward to the opportunity to create two exciting programs," Velasquez said.


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