Too bad John Ramirez's leaving the Alisal

John Ramirez Jr. has been around five years on the job as superintendent. If you eliminate the two years that the district was under state receivership, he’s really been in charge for about three. Judging by the reports I hear – and the standing ovation he got when he announced he was leaving – Ramirez had finally gotten the hang of the district and with the help of his team good things were happening. Plus, having been raised in the Alisal, he genuinely loves the students and cares about their success.

In my years as an education reporter I’ve come to learn many important things, but chief among them is how children are hurt by lack of consistency. Turnover matters, whether it is in the classroom, in the principal’s office, or at the district’s headquarters.

The board that’s now in charge of the Alisal seems to be working well and accomplishing great things. But old grudges are hard to let go and the bad blood that developed when the old board was in charge appears to linger. Which is too bad for the kids, who will have to endure yet another leadership style, another set of rules, another set of ideas. In the end, it’s always the kids who pay the price for the adults’ actions.

May First Alliance vs. Alisal teachers and employees

It should come as a no surprise to anyone that a group of friends and family members of Alisal Trustee Meredith Ibarra, Alisal employee Jose Ibarra, and those who support José Castañeda and Superintendent John Ramirez have come out publicly against salary increases for Alisal teachers and employees.

And they've done it via You-Tube.

The video is exactly what you would expect from this group, AKA the May First Alliance, who are now calling themselves Red de Padres por el Respeto y la Igualdad en la Educación -- Network of Parents for Respect and Equality in Education.

First the group takes credit for changing the school board and electing the group seated now -- the people who routinely rubber-stamp Ramirez's decisions with hardly any questions. Then it takes credit for kicking out the state trustee in two years -- wasn't that what the state said it was going to do in the first place?

Then the group says the teachers should not be getting salary increases because the children of the Alisal are not doing well -- 60 percent of them are reading below level, 40 percent are below level in Math level.

But wait a minute. Hasn't Supt. Ramirez been touting how much progress the Alisal has been making? How the achievement gap has been narrowing?

So which is it? Is the achievement gap narrowing or are the children still lagging? Are the teachers doing their job or not?

While no doubt the video is a blatant attack on teachers, it makes a point that is very important. A leader of the California School Employees Association is quoted repeating several times that parents of the Alisal don't know the legal names of their children, which causes undue burden on the employees as they have to spend a lot of time searching for their records.

So now it's parents who don't know the names of their children? How about parents living in a system that practically eradicates the existence of one of them in their children's lives? How about the system being disrespectful of people's right to give their children two last names -- the mother's and the father's?

Unfortunately, these are the type of comments that May First Alliance, Red de Padres, the Ibarras, the Castañedas, seize on to demonstrate how Alisal teachers and employees disrespect them. It's unfortunate. The district is not moving forward by having one group attack the other, and viceversa. An eye for an eye does make the world go blind.

It will be interesting to see how the unions respond to this video. Maybe with another one, with fewer inaccuracies? Stay tuned.

Alisal teachers, administrators bury the hatchet -- for now

Ah, it's going to be a long, boring summer.

Or not.

Teachers and administrators with the Alisal Union School District have agreed not to return to negotiations table until Sept. 6, after all the uncertainties with the California budget have been clarified.

That means, no protests outside board meetings, no tense encounters between José Castañeda and Fernando Armenta. What's KSBW going to do???????

According to Susan Midori Jones, a representative with the California Teachers Association, both parties made significant progress at their last meeting on June 6, and they both agreed more information was needed before returning to the bargaining table. The district withdrew its proposal to discontinue health benefits for retired teachers, but the parties still have not reached an agreement regarding class sizes and transfer of teachers from school to school or grade to grade. To read the joint statement of the Alisal Teachers Association and the district, click here.

"Alisal (Teachers Association) still feels that class sizes are important for student achievement, especially for English Learners," Jones said in an email. "The current Alisal contract language forces the district to keep class sizes low. They would have no stipend costs if they abided by the class size limits in the contract. Teachers feel the required stipend is the only pressure on the district to keep class sizes below 30 students."

A showdown coming to the Alisal

A showdown is expected at the Alisal Union Board of Trustees meeting Wednesday to protest the administration's decision to remove the director of the Alisal Family Resource Center.

Apparently, Rodriguez was given direction to move services out from the Alisal Family Resource Center, a well known and beloved organization in the heart of East Salinas, into surrounding, district schools. For 20 years, the center has provided a wide variety of services ranging from cooking classes to English as a second language.

Administrators wanted to go on a different direction, my sources tell me. They removed Rodriguez because she would not comply with their directives.

But most of the center's funding comes from grants, not from the district's general fund. Funders were not happy to hear their moneys would not be used the way it was originally proposed.

Now, the rumor mill is spinning the tale that Superintendent John Ramirez will reinstate Anabelle because he's planning to run against Nancy Kotowski for superintendent of schools when she's up for re-election, and a controversy of this size would not serve him well for a county-wide election. It'll be interesting to see what happens tomorrow. And in the upcoming election. Stay tuned.