Psychiatrist R. Claire Friend, M.D. retired after 35 years in private practice. She was editor of two professional publications and is now editor of the UCI Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior’s Quarterly Psychiatric Journal. She serves on the volunteer faculty as an assistant professor.
All politics is local. The ageless proverb reminds local communities of the importance of stewarding their local government and voting on local issues. Perhaps no issue is a more important investment in our communities than local education. However, when investments fail to payout, action is necessary. The Inland Empire, home to 11% of the state’s...
Three of the nation’s five most expensive schools are in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Each ranks among the lowest performing schools in California. With a $578 million price tag, Robert F. Kennedy Learning Center is the most expensive school ever built. Boasting an auditorium modeled after the famous Coconut Grove nightclub, a state-of-the-art...
LFor those of us old enough to remember its beginnings, the United Negro College Fund’s iconic “A mind is a terrible thing to waste” campaign is still haunting. It began in 1972 with TV images of black students shut out of classrooms, and ended with an almost undeniable appeal: donate to UNCF so that black...
Even a brief glance at the 1908 7th and 8th grade reading lists or the 1895 Salina, Kansas 8th grade exit exam graphically illustrates the profound decline in public education produced as a consequence of the progressives who dominate our academic institutions and federal government. Less obvious is the threat this presents to the future of the American Republic....
The annual cost of K-12 education in the United States has increased steadily for decades. For 2015, the cost is about $600 billion. Fiscal reality has not diminished the demand by politicians and their powerful union cronies for even more money, a substantial portion of which would be earmarked to fund the high salaries of...
Social justice, climate change, racial inequality, immigration and world hunger have replaced the classics as the focus of the curriculum in America’s schools and colleges. The goal of public education has shifted from academics to cultural indoctrination. The problem, which has come to Orange County’s Foothill High School, one of the state’s most elite high...
The yearlong battle with the Anaheim City School District and Anaheim City Board of Education has ended. The parents of the 733 students enrolled at Palm Lane Elementary School have finally been granted the right to restart their decade-long failing school as an independent charter school. Judge Andrew P. Banks, Orange County Superior Court, issued...
Albert Einstein Academy of Literature, Arts and Science-Huntington Beach opened its doors to 164 K-5 students in August, 2014. The charter school, designated a Blended Learning Center, includes a home study program in addition to the tradition classroom program. The campus is an extension of AEA Santa Clarita, its authorizing authority. Current enrollment has expanded...
Albert Einstein Academy for Letters, Arts and Science, Huntington Beach (AEALAS) opened its doors In August, 2014 to 164 K-5 students. The current enrollment is 264. For reasons of expediency, its founding charter was authorized by the Agua Dulce Unified School District, where several other schools are located. Since its first days, the small elementary...
The Palm Lane Elementary School parents and their attorneys squared off against the Anaheim City School District and Anaheim City Board of Education on June 15th in Courtroom C11 in the battle to determine whether the parents will succeed in their efforts to restart the academically troubled school as an independent charter school. The parents are...
If the parent activists at Palm Lane Elementary School are successful in their battle to invoke SB54, the Parent Trigger Law, they would be well advised to study the network of high-performing charter schools in New York City founded by former teacher and City Councilwoman Eva Moskowitz as the template for the school it must...
Palm Lane Elementary School in Anaheim, a failing school for at least the past decade, has become a battleground in the war against union power and its unconstrained efforts to retain absolute control over public education. At stake may be America’s future itself. Palm Lane parents, disheartened by the school’s abysmal academic record and the...
Project TALENT, a government-funded study that tracked the development of 364,000 high school students from 1960-1971, reported significant differences in the academic performance and adult achievement between children who were raised by an unmarried mother in a fatherless home and children who were raised by two biological parents. The results were independent of race and...
Public and private charter schools have emerged as a striking exception to the dismal system of U.S. public education that has performed so poorly on international assessments of student performance such as PISA and TIMMS. Despite the virulent opposition to them by the powerful California Teachers Association, National Education Association and their political allies in...
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