Capistrano district lawyer has run afoul of open-meeting laws
October 03, 2008 Filed in:
Transparency
Scott Martindale, The Orange County Register
A school-law attorney who
sat in on a private Capistrano Unified school board discussion in
which open-meeting laws may have been violated has previously
advised school boards to do in private what courts say they should
do in public. Spencer Covert of Tustin was invited to an Aug. 11
closed-session meeting by board President Ellen Addonizio, who said
she wanted Covert's advice to ensure that the board would be in
compliance with the state's Brown Act open-meeting law. During the
meeting, trustees engaged in a sensitive evaluation of
Superintendent A. Woodrow Carter's performance…
Same frustrations, new school year
September 03, 2008 Filed in:
Public Education
Column: Nicholas Wishek, The Orange County
Register Confidence in public education erodes
over decades of teaching - I don't see things getting better. Also,
I know I will be asked to do things that make no logical sense.
Things that don't help. Things that the ivory-tower types in
Sacramento and Washington, D.C., would know were pretty useless, if
they had actually ever taught in schools similar to mine. Fact.
Despite all the hype about the successes of the No Child Left
Behind program, I do not see any real growth in the academic
performances of my students. Yes, our test scores have gone up,
but, as Mark Twain wrote, "There are three kinds of lies: lies,
damned lies and statistics"…
Extreme makeover, CUSD edition
June 27, 2008 Filed in: Elections
Editorial: The Orange County Register Capo Unified school district parents do the right thing and recall obstacles to reform: Perhaps now, finally, the tumult at the Capistrano Unified School District can die down, following a stunning and overwhelming recall this week of two of the school board's holdouts from the bad old days. Longtime Trustees Sheila Benecke and Marlene Draper were tossed out of office by overwhelming majorities, with about 70 percent of voters agreeing to recall both members. Ms. Benecke was replaced by former Assemblyman Ken Maddox, and Ms. Draper was replaced by teacher Sue Palazzo...