Props 15 and 16 Are Good for Kids

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Props 15 and 16 Are Good for Kids

By voting yes on Propositions 15 and 16, Californians have the opportunity to improve K-12 public education, particularly for the state’s lowest-performing students. This is critically important, especially now with all the learning loss resulting from campus closures during Covid-19, which has had an outsized effect on students of color.

Study after study has shown that educational inequity impacts every aspect of our public education system. Prop 16 helps to fix this.

Even while California’s population grew more diverse, eventually becoming the most diverse state in the nation, equal opportunity to access a quality public education was cut off by Prop 209. The proposition was touted as an anti-discriminatory protection when it passed nearly a quarter century ago. In reality, it had the exact opposite effect, banning any consideration of race, ethnicity or gender in programs closing achievement gaps. As a result, students and student groups who consistently fall below grade level do not receive the support they need.

It’s a particularly perverse result of Prop 209 that we are able to see data on student performance -- year after year we are still failing Black and Latinx kids -- but we aren’t able to meaningfully respond.

“The state’s hands have really been tied around our back in terms of being able to target some of the lowest-performing student groups,” said Dr. Elisha SmitArillaga, Director of Ed Trust West, on a recent This Week in California Education podcast. “Having Prop 16 is going to be a really important tool to be able to target funds to the students who need it most, which now, without Prop 16, we’re really unable to do.”

Of course, the state budget determines to a large extent what districts and individual schools have the resources to do. That’s where Prop 15 comes into play, which goes hand in hand with Prop 16.

As a result of Covid, California is facing one of the worst economic crises since the Great Depression. We have already seen significant cuts to public education and social services. Given the state’s projected $8.7 billion deficit, more cuts are likely on the way. Those discussions, in fact, have already begun in Sacramento.

Prop 15, the Schools and Communities First Initiative, will counter some of these negative effects and help California once again become an education leader. It will do this without impacting homeowners or renters. It also maintains full Prop 13 protections for small businesses and businesses owning $3 million or less of nonresidential commercial property. What it does do is close corporate tax loopholes.

Currently, billions of dollars in property taxes are lost because the wealthiest corporations and industries aren’t paying their fair share. Since Prop 13 passed in 1978, the residential share of property taxes has skyrocketed from 55% to 72%. Prop 15 is a balanced reform that closes these tax loopholes by requiring nonresidential commercial properties to be assessed based on their actual fair market value.

The passage of Prop 15 would bring in an estimated $8 to $12.5 billion in additional funds annually. Sixty percent of that would go to cities, counties, and special districts for community improvements. Forty percent would go to schools and community colleges, with the exact allocation determined by enrollment figures. These funds, in conjunction with the passage of Prop 16, will positively impact thousands of K-12 California students.

The California Teachers Association estimates that LAUSD will receive roughly $360 million a year if Prop 15 passes. Prop 15 brings more funding to all public schools, including independent charter schools.

Voting yes on Prop 16 will reverse the ban on equal opportunity policies so that every Californian, regardless of race, ethnicity or gender, has access to great schools and a great education. Voting yes on Prop 15 will close the loopholes wealthy corporations and industries use to avoid paying their fair share of property taxes that help fund our public schools. Voting yes on both Props 15 and 16 is good for our kids today, and for a brighter, more equitable future for all Californians.

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Schmerelson’s Campaign Rep Calls Opponent Marilyn Koziatek a 'Dumb Blond,' a Pattern of Sexism from Board Member Schmerelson That Damages Girls Like My Daughter

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Schmerelson’s Campaign Rep Calls Opponent Marilyn Koziatek a 'Dumb Blond,' a Pattern of Sexism from Board Member Schmerelson That Damages Girls Like My Daughter

As the mother of a daughter in middle school, I know first-hand that the messages our girls receive from education leaders make a critical difference in their lives. Those messages can either build up or tear down their confidence, signaling to them what place girls and women hold in our society. It’s one reason we chose a single-sex STEM school, LAUSD’s Dr. Michelle King’s Girls Academic Leadership Academy, for our daughter -- to empower her and shield her from the harmful messages about gender roles that society still sends to women in 2020.

So imagine my dismay to see that Scott Schmerelson, a current member of the Board of Education who is up for reelection in the San Fernando Valley on Nov. 3, and his campaign representatives, have been sending appallingly sexist and retrograde messages to girls like my daughter and women leaders everywhere.

Last week, a campaign representative for Schmerelson, someone who appeared in one of his recent online campaign ads, posted a message on Schmerelson’s Facebook page calling his opponent in the race a “dumb blond.” Schmerelson has allowed the message to remain posted publicly on his page for more than a week.

A dumb blond? Really? Let’s put aside Marilyn Koziatek’s obvious qualifications as someone with a business degree from USC, the chair of the Education Committee for the Valley Industry Commerce Association and a member of the 38th Assembly Education Advisory Committee. Not to mention the fact that she’s on the leadership team of one of the most successful high schools in the state of California and the only candidate in the race who currently works at a school during this pandemic.

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Speak UP Endorses Change Candidates Marilyn Koziatek and Tanya Ortiz Franklin

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Speak UP Endorses Change Candidates Marilyn Koziatek and Tanya Ortiz Franklin

The Los Angeles Unified school board elections in Districts 3 and 7 present a clear choice between change and the status quo. The current four-member board majority, captive to adult employee special interest groups, enacted distance learning plans without any parent input that resulted in massive and discriminatory inequities against our most vulnerable Black and Latino students, low-income kids, English Learners and kids with disabilities.

The current board majority allowed Los Angeles Unified to violate federal law and stop serving the majority of kids with disabilities after campuses closed in the spring. It also made live teaching optional, which led to schools falling entirely out of touch with thousands of high-needs kids during the pandemic, creating potentially irreparable learning loss.

Six months later, LAUSD and the board are simply ignoring the Los Angeles County Board of Public Health’s recent order allowing schools to safely reopen for small cohorts of kids with disabilities and English Learners, because United Teachers Los Angeles opposes it. UTLA is even actively discouraging its members from volunteering to help high-needs kids 1:1 after school.

Despite persistent calls from parents, the current board also failed to hold a single public meeting to discuss the terms of distance learning this fall until a week before school started and after an agreement with UTLA was already reached. Instead, the board spent hours and hours on divisive politicking and devising new rules intended to scapegoat and harm the minority of students who attend public nonprofit charter schools in order to distract the public from its failures to properly serve the 80% of kids attending district schools.

Parents currently hold no power within LAUSD, and the only way to change this dynamic and get students the education they deserve is to vote in a kids-first board majority that is not beholden to and controlled by adult employee special interest groups. We have a chance to tip the balance of power this fall and create change by electing qualified candidates who are independent and able to have arms-length negotiations with the employee groups they are charged with overseeing.

We need candidates who are responsive to parent concerns and who support giving parents a seat at the table in the decision-making process. Those two candidates are parent and school leader Marilyn Koziatek in District 3 in the West San Fernando Valley, and educator and attorney Tanya Ortiz Franklin in District 7, which runs from South L.A. to San Pedro. Speak UP enthusiastically endorses Koziatek and Ortiz Franklin in the Nov. 3 election.

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LAUSD Board Candidate and Mom Marilyn Koziatek Discusses Challenges of Distance Learning and the Politics of Reopening Schools

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LAUSD Board Candidate and Mom Marilyn Koziatek Discusses Challenges of Distance Learning and the Politics of Reopening Schools

Marilyn Koziatek is the mother of two kids who attend their LAUSD neighborhood elementary school, and she’s part of the leadership team at Granada Hills Charter High School. She’s running for the school Board seat in District 3, which includes the West San Fernando Valley, Van Nuys, Studio City and North Hollywood. Our first interview, which took place prior to the pandemic, can be found here.

Speak UP: The education landscape has shifted completely since we spoke in January. How is distance learning working for your kids this fall? Marilyn Koziatek: I have a second grader and a fourth grader, and my local school has wonderful leadership. Our principal is a visionary, and she has a really dedicated group of teachers. They have done a phenomenal job. One of the unique things they did was they kept my second grader’s first-grade class intact. They just moved them all up into second grade. That was great because of that sense of isolation our children are experiencing right now. So when they log on, it is people they already know because they went to school with them last year when we were in person. With that, they went above and beyond, and I have seen a level of organization and curriculum development for my fourth grader that has astounded me. It is almost like a college-level type of organization, which I really appreciate because as parents, we are in charge of keeping them on pace. We are so integral to this process.

Speak UP: How are you juggling your job on campus at Granada Hills High with your kids’ distance learning?

Marilyn: My husband is home two days a week working remotely, but we have to put them in daycare the other three days. To be clear, my daycare is one I am paying for. My school I work for is not providing employee daycare, and I don’t have access to the district childcare because I am not a district employee. I have the ability to pay for it, but that is not the case for the majority of our students in LAUSD. So it’s very difficult. I’ve even heard stories where some essential workers have sent their children to other states to be with grandparents because there was no daycare option. But they are still LAUSD students. It’s a crisis.

Speak UP: Parents are confused why it’s safe to have employees’ kids on campus and parks and recreation centers open for supervised distance learning but not to have others kids on campus for childcare or teachers teaching kids.

Marilyn: I agree with the confusion.

Speak UP: What do you think about the L.A. County Health Department’s decision to allow schools to reopen for kids with disabilities and English Learners and UTLA's contention that it’s not safe.

Marilyn: I believe that science needs to lead this discussion, and we have to rely on our epidemiologists and our public health officials. So when they say that it is safe, with risk mitigations in place, we have to believe them.

Speak UP: Recently, a recording came out of Public Health Director Barbara Ferrer saying schools will not reopen before the November elections. There is a concern that some decisions are more political than scientific.

Marilyn: The concern about politicizing this crisis is a real one. That is one of the reasons why I am running, because I don’t think politicizing this process for our kids is healthy for anyone. As a board member, the lens I am always going to be looking at is, instead of some sort of political agenda, how this is impacting our children and our students, which is our North Star, and make our decisions from there.

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Speak UP to Co-Host LAUSD School Board Candidate Forum

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Speak UP to Co-Host LAUSD School Board Candidate Forum

LAUSD parent and Granada Hills Charter High School leader Marilyn Koziatek will face off against incumbent LAUSD Board Member Scott Schmerelson Wednesday, Sept. 23 in the first joint appearance at a candidate forum for the general election in District 3, the West San Fernando Valley.

Telemundo anchor and reporter Sandra O’Neill will moderate the forum, co-hosted by Speak UP, the League of Women Voters Los Angeles, NALEO Education Fund, Our Turn, Our Voice: Communities for Quality Education, and the L.A. Coalition for Excellent Public Schools. Parents are invited to RSVP to the 6 p.m. online forum here: http://bit.ly/BD3FORUM2020.

The school board elections in District 3 and District 7, which runs from Watts down through Gardena to San Pedro, are expected to be a referendum on the current state of education during the pandemic, which has exposed vast inequities in terms of access to quality Wi-Fi, technology and teaching time depending on race, income and disability status.

The League of Women Voters, Speak UP and other partners had hoped to hold a similar candidate forum for the open board seat in District 7 to replace Board President Richard Vladovic. However, only one candidate -- educator and attorney Tanya Ortiz Franklin – was available to attend. Patricia Castellanos, a workforce deputy, had a scheduling conflict.

As a result, Speak UP, Alliance for a Better Community, Innovate Public Schools, NALEO Education Fund, Our Turn, Our Voice: Communities for Quality Education, and the L.A. Coalition for Excellent Public School will host a virtual meet and greet with Ortiz Franklin on Thursday, Sept. 24 at 6 p.m. RSVP to that meet and greet here

The campaign season kicked off on Thursday night with a student-led candidate forum hosted by the ACLU and Loyola Marymount University. Only Koziatek and Ortiz Franklin attended and addressed questions about education equity, special education services during the pandemic, school police funding and mental health services.

Responding to a question about services for kids with disabilities, Ortiz Franklin said “It’s frustrating, it’s disappointing and it’s unfair” that LAUSD is not yet assessing students for disabilities. Where public health officials have said it’s safe, she said schools should be trying to get kids with disabilities back on campus in small groups to receive services.

Likewise, Koziatek called it an “injustice” and said there is “no longer an excuse” for students with disabilities to not be receiving federally mandated services.

UTLA, which has endorsed their opponents, has said it is unwilling to allow special education teachers back on campus to help high-needs kids until it’s safe for all students to return for classes.

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With Runoffs Expected in School Board District 3 and 7 Races, Schmerelson Likely to Face Koziatek in November

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With Runoffs Expected in School Board District 3 and 7 Races, Schmerelson Likely to Face Koziatek in November

Votes are still being counted in the Los Angeles Unified school board races, but results as of Friday suggest incumbent District 3 Board Member Scott Schmerelson will likely head to a November runoff against parent and school leader Marilyn Koziatek in the San Fernando Valley, while workforce deputy Patricia Castellanos will face teacher and attorney Tanya Ortiz Franklin for the open seat in BD7.

Meanwhile, District 5 Board member Jackie Goldberg is expected to win reelection in Southeast and Northeast L.A, and District 1 incumbent George McKenna won reelection with no opponent on the ballot.

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Everything You Need to Know About L.A.'s New Voting System

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Everything You Need to Know About L.A.'s New Voting System

Busy parents should have a much easier time than usual voting in the upcoming March 3 presidential primary and school board elections. 

Gone are the days of having to find your polling place or rushing to vote before work, while juggling school drop-off on election day. 

Voters will now have 11 consecutive days starting Feb. 22 to cast their ballots in person at any of the nearly 1000 new vote centers across Los Angeles County.

Instead of marking bubbles on paper, you’ll now be casting votes on state-of-the art digital touchscreen tablets, which then print out paper ballots that are submitted and counted. 

The devices are equipped to serve voters in 13 languages and are fully accessible for those with disabilities. For those worried about security, the devices are not connected to the Internet so there’s no danger of hacking or identity theft. 

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LAUSD BD3 Candidate Marilyn Koziatek: Parents ‘want a voice and a seat at the table’

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LAUSD BD3 Candidate Marilyn Koziatek: Parents ‘want a voice and a seat at the table’

Marilyn Koziatek is the mother of two young boys who attend their neighborhood elementary school in Chatsworth, and she’s part of the leadership team at Granada Hills Charter High School. She also chairs the Education Committee for the Valley Industry Commerce Association and sits on the 38th Assembly Education Advisory Committee. She’s running for the LAUSD Board seat for District 3, which includes most of the West San Fernando Valley as well as Van Nuys, Studio City and North Hollywood.

Speak UP: Tell us about yourself and why you're running for school board.

Marilyn Koziatek: Professionally, I lead the community outreach department for Granada Hills Charter High School. I've been doing that for many years. I'm in charge of the staff that works on parent engagement, parent empowerment. I build relationships in the community with our civic groups and corporate groups, to be a link between the students and the community for internships and volunteer opportunities. I also do grant writing to bring resources to the classroom, and I manage our digital assets like our mobile app.

I'm also the mom of two little boys, 6 and 8 years old, who go to our neighborhood LAUSD public school in Chatsworth. We love it. My kids have really been able to thrive there.

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LAUSD Board District 3 Candidate Elizabeth Badger: 'It’s time we have someone who cares about our children’

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LAUSD Board District 3 Candidate Elizabeth Badger: 'It’s time we have someone who cares about our children’

Elizabeth Badger is a candidate for the LAUSD Board of Education in District 3, which includes much of the San Fernando Valley. She is the mother of six children, a small business owner in Canoga Park and the founder of the nonprofit Minority Outreach Committee. She serves on the board of the North Los Angeles County Regional Center and has been elected to seven terms on the Los Angeles County Democratic Party Central Committee. She ran for the same office in 2015 and placed fourth.

Speak UP: Tell us about yourself and why are you running for school board?

Elizabeth Badger: I am running because I know I can do good work and make a difference in the lives of our children. As you know, in L.A. Unified, our children are continuing to fail, and we need new leadership. Not only do I think that, parents think that. It's really time that we have someone who cares about our children. It's also important that we have a qualified LAUSD parent on that board, and we don't. There's nothing wrong with old men. There’s a lot of old men up there in our district who never had children. Not that that's a criteria, but it's important to know what children are about.

Speak UP: The District 3 incumbent, Scott Schmerelson, is not a parent.

Elizabeth: I know that he's been a school teacher, but you know, that's a job. That is not the same thing as day-in, day-out parenting. I have a supporter, he has children with special needs and he was like, "I would never vote for somebody who hasn't walked the hallways in the middle of the night with their children, people who don't understand what it feels like, even as they get older, to pace the floor, to wait for them to come home and worry about their safety.” And I'm like, "You are so right." It is so true. Being a parent is really important.  

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Four Pivotal L.A. School Board Races Coincide with March Presidential Primary

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Four Pivotal L.A. School Board Races Coincide with March Presidential Primary

While the presidential election is top of mind for voters in 2020, one of the most important school board elections in recent years will coincide with the presidential primary on March 3.

Voters will decide on four school board seats. Incumbents are running in three districts, and there’s one open seat in District 7 currently held by Board President Richard Vladovic, who is retiring. If no one gets 50% of the vote, runoffs will be held on Nov. 3, the same day as the presidential general election.

Board elections will be held in District 1, where George McKenna is the incumbent; District 3, where Scott Schmerelson is running for reelection; and District 5, where Jackie Goldberg won a special election earlier this year.

Previous school board races have not been aligned with presidential elections, and turnout typically has been low. In a huge Blue Wave presidential election year, though, turnout is expected to surge, and the outcome could shape the direction of the school board for years to come.

In fact, we’ve seen that a change in just one board seat can dramatically alter the course of the board. The addition of Goldberg this year, for instance, led to the board dismantling a new system to let parents know how well their schools are serving kids on the eve of its launch, which the board had supported in a 6-1 vote just last year.  

The deadline for candidates to file their intention to enter the races was Nov. 9, and multiple candidates have thrown their hats into the ring in every district. Here’s a look at the candidates, who have until early December to gather enough signatures to qualify for the ballot.

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