Wondering about UUSD policy
I got a call from a single Mom who has two children, a kindergartner heading to first grade next year and a fourth grader heading to fifth grade. The two children both go to Frank Zeek School, which is not their neighborhood school. This woman got permission to put her kids into Frank Zeek (Nokomis is her neighborhood school according to UUSD) because she thought they would get a better education there and their father lives in the Frank Zeek neighborhood. The other day, this Mom got a letter from the principal of Frank Zeek saying that because her fourth grader had been absent from school four times in the past year and tardy 14 times, he was no longer welcome at Frank Zeek and that she would have to go register him at Nokomis next year. I understand she got a similar letter for her daughter who she admits had a tough kindergarten year tardiness wise, not wanting to go to a different school after a happy pre-school experience.
This woman lives in the neighborhood of the Grace Hudson School which she thinks would be a good place for her children, but was told by the administration there that her children would not be eligible to go because they do not speak Spanish. According to this Mom, she was told by the Grace Hudson School that kids going to that school must enter at kindergarten because of the immersion Spanish program which teaches English speakers to speak Spanish.
Apparently the waiting lists for local charter schools is long and her only option is to try for the lotteries at each school, which does not guarantee her children will go tot he same school.
Why doesn't she want her children at Nokomis? She says she knows that children there get bullied and beat up regularly and that the campus security is lax.
So, I am wondering:
- if it's true that only kindergartners or kids who already speak Spanish are allowed to enroll at Grace Hudson School even if they live in that neighborhood?
- if four absences in a 9-month long school year can result in your kid basically being expelled from the school?
- if Nokomis's reputation - and I recall our own news stories from four or five years ago about the bullying at Nokomis - is deserved and what the school district is doing about it?
Comments
i can't believe the school's nerve to only accept spanish speaking or kindergartners at this public school and suppose to be in the u.s.a? i know we have become the minority, but this is completely ridiculous!!! this school should be boycotted immediately!!!!our own children don't even come first anymore. this school should be ashamed of itself, and definitely is not a "california distinguished school"
Posted by: marianne anderson | May 14, 2008 04:28 PM
It sure would be nice if the Editor of the Ukiah Daily Journal would take the time to investigate allegations, especially those that are incorrect. The Dual Language Immersion Program at Grace Hudson Elementary School accepts kindergarteners who speak any language, English, Spanish, Chinese, French, German, etc. Shame on K.C. Meadows and shame on you Marianne Anderson for believing all you hear and/or read. And shame on you both for not taking the time to seek out the truth before you persecute others.
Posted by: Matt | May 15, 2008 10:48 PM
So, K.C., here is the scoop on Grace Hudson (and it would have been easy for you to get it if you had just picked up the telephone and spoken with the school). Grace Hudson Elementary School houses the district's Dual language Immersion Program. This is a program where students are given a bilingual education. At the end 6th grade students are bilingual showing competence in both English and Spanish. Students will leave Grace Hudson knowing how to read, write and speak two languages (English and Spanish). Many families who are native English speaking enroll their children at Grace Hudson. They know the value of giving their children a bilingual education. If a parent really wants to do their child a long term favor that will give him or her increased brain power and increased earning power, then the parent should take measures to have their child learn a second language. What a shame that every parent does not want their child to be able to speak more than one language. What is that old joke, "What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Tri-lingual. What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bi-lingual. What do you call someone who speaks one language? American." How sad that our self-importance is so limited that the majority of Americans limit themselves to learning only one language.
Posted by: Sally | May 15, 2008 11:15 PM
i think some of the comments being left are putting the cart before the horse, so to speak.
nowhere in the story does it say that the woman in question doesn't want her kids to have a bilingual education; her concern is that her kids are being DENIED ENROLLMENT because they are not already bilingual or not starting their schooling in kindegarten at Grace Hudson (she states her youngest has already completed kindegarten and is advancing to the first grade).
granted, this is all hearsay, but hopefully in the future people will absorb the whole story before firing off catty remarks.
Posted by: Anthony | May 19, 2008 11:04 AM