Deal would give L.A. mayor say on some schools A partnership is expected to be announced today. The deal would take effect in 2008.. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and his former adversaries from the LosAngeles Unified School District are expected to announce a partnershiptoday that will provide the mayor with a scaled-back version of theauthority he has sought over city schools.Villaraigosaand his senior education aides will play a major role in overseeing twoof the city's lowest-achieving high schools and the middle andelementary schools that feed them under an agreement with the Board ofEducation and schools Supt. David L. Brewer. "I think you'llsee a change in the culture of our schools almost immediately," themayor said Tuesday of the partnership that would begin to exert itsinfluence over schools in the fall of 2008. But Villaraigosa must first win over skeptical teachers and community organizers. Thepresident of the Los Angeles teachers union said he wanted two-thirdsof the teachers at any school under consideration to agree beforejoining the mayor's partnership -- a higher threshold than the simplemajority required to convert to a charter school, which operates freefrom many rules. "While we are absolutely in favor ofpartnerships, whether with the mayor's office or other entities, therecan be no hostile takeover of schools," said United Teachers LosAngeles President A.J. Duffy. "For a partnership to be productive, thevast majority of the members have to want it." A spokeswoman forVillaraigosa said today's announcement would not specify a percentageof teachers who must vote for the partnership but instead would callfor a "significant number" of instructors, parents and communitymembers to favor such a move. School board member TamarGalatzan, a Villaraigosa ally, said Duffy's two-thirds demand wouldpose too steep an obstacle for grass-roots reformers. "If you make itharder to join [the partnership] than to join a charter, you're goingto push schools that don't want to go charter in that direction." Untilrecently, Villaraigosa and district leaders had been engaged in aprotracted legal fight over legislation that would have given himsubstantial control over the school district, which has struggled foryears to raise student performance and reduce the number of dropouts. Afterlosing two rounds in court, however, Villaraigosa abandoned hisoriginal plan in May and sought the partnership with district leaders,including a new board majority that he helped elect last spring. Themayor, Brewer and school board President Monica Garcia are scheduled tounveil the outlines of their collaboration at a news conference thismorning at John Liechty Middle School in the Pico-Union district neardowntown. The deal calls for the creation of a nonprofitorganization -- representing the city, the district, parents and others-- that would contract with the district to manage two families ofschools during an initial five-year period. The nonprofit group alsowould work with the district's innovation division to spread successfulpractices from the mayor's schools districtwide. Some L.A.Unified leaders said Villaraigosa can marshal resources for schoolsthat might otherwise be impossible. The mayor and his deputies alreadyhave raised nearly $2 million in philanthropic contributions for hiseducational initiatives, his top education advisor said. Garcia, the mayor's closest ally on the school board, applauded his overtures. Villaraigosa'saides said partnership campuses would be chosen by the end of this yearfrom 20 of the district's lowest-achieving high schools, including hisalma mater, Roosevelt High, in Boyle Heights. duke.helfand@latimes.com david.zahniser@latimes.com |
