The latest enrollment numbers have been tabulated and show the Tucson Unified School District’s enrollment down while tensions between the new superintendent and the Board are increasing. Over 190 students left the District in the first ten days of school alone.
The loss of over 1600 students will result in a $4.8 million loss of revenue.
At last night’s Governing Board meeting, the new superintendent, H.T. Sanchez, fought hard against a proposal to hire an internal auditor. Sanchez implied that the proposal request was an insult to him. However, the plaintiffs in the District’s desegregation case have asked for an internal auditor for years due to the District’s misuse of desegregation funds.
As the District’s Multicultural Director Auggie Romero prepares to release his latest book, The Public Option for Educational Revolution, the Governing Board was asked to approve supplemental material for the Culturally Relevant Social Studies classes. Romero crafted the new “Culturally Relevant” courses, which began this school year.
While the District offered a wide variety of books that represent both conservative and liberal perspectives, Romero’s curriculum is based on his revolutionary ideology and Critical Race Theory. As a result, the list of materials has little meaning for the classroom. The Board voted 3-2 to adopt the materials.
Proposed materials include: Declarations of Independence: Cross-Examining American Ideology by Howard Zinn, Intellectuals and Race by Thomas Sowell, A People’s History of the United States: 1492-Present by Howard Zinn, A Patriot’s History of the United States: From Columbus’s Great Discovery to the War on Terror by Larry Schweikart, The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B. Dubois, Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices on Resistance, Reform, and Renewal An African American Anthology by Manning Marable, Leith Mullings, Mumia Abu-Jamal, and Richard Allen, Black Conservatism: Essays in Intellectual and Political History: Crosscurrents in African American History by Peter Eisenstadt, and Pedagogy of Hope: Reliving Pedagogy of the by Paulo Freire and Ana Maria Araújo Freire.
Notably absent from the list are Mexican American history books or books written by Mexican American authors. However, those familiar with the program’s political agenda say that the classes have never been about Mexican Americans and their contributions and struggles in American society. The classes are and have always been about promoting a radical political agenda.
Board member Michael Hicks, at the request of some desegregation plaintiffs, asked for a revote on the District’s newest Student Code of Conduct. The Code, voted on earlier this month, appears to not only violate state law but according to Desegregation Plaintiff Representative Gloria Copeland, it will create chaos across the District. Hicks read a statement (which Copeland had reviewed prior to the meeting) into the record:
“I have serious concerns about the new student code of conduct. The need for change in our discipline policy is real. Inequities exist, and they must stop and be prevented. However, this new policy we passed recently ignores the data, and goes to an extreme to solve a problem without actually addressing the problem. I voted to change the policy because the inequities are indisputable. We were told that without the drastic change, nothing would change.
Nothing could be further from the truth, but we are hoping to ignore the uncomfortable truth.
There are cases in which our administrative staff is inequitably delivering punishments, and the data shows exactly who and what they are doing. We can accept our shortcomings, and educate our administrators on equity issues. We can train them to recognize the inequities and work with them to change their particular decision making process, or we can throw the students, teachers, and administrators into chaos by removing any ability to maintain discipline in the classroom. That is what we have done. We must create a committee to study the issue and the data and work to arrive at a system that represents the sentiments and common sense of the community.
We have time to craft a policy that protects all children and ends the inequitable system.”
The District has been compiling data over the years which clearly shows highly inequitable patterns established by individual administrators. For years, the District looked the other way as administrators meted out punishment to students of color and young men at a disproportionate rate. Desegregation Director Sam Brown told the Board, “We trust our administrators with this discretion.”
It was that inequity that caused the plaintiffs to raise a red flag about the disparity. But they say, that the DOJ has used the issue to inject itself unnecessarily into the situation. “They’ve been doing it all over the country,” says Copeland. “TUSD had an opportunity to clean the whole situation up, but they didn’t and I don’t agree with them, but I understand why the DOJ did it. The bottom line is the District doesn’t want any accountability.”
Hicks described an incident he witnessed earlier in the day while visiting a high school site. He and an administrator watched as a teenaged student walked up to a window, broke it, and then walked away. Hicks expressed concern that because known administrators have acted inequitably, other principal’s hands would be tied. Stegeman expressed his concern that the administration took considerable time to propose a policy that was plagued with inconsistencies. “A policy that can be interpreted 8 different ways is not a good policy,” said Stegeman.
Grijalva cut off discussion and the proposal failed in a 3-2 vote.
Across the district, teachers have expressed very serious concerns about the safety of the classrooms. The concerns have been largely ignored and morale throughout the District is, according to staff, at the lowest point it has been in years.