Birmingham Community Charter High School Grand Opening

BY KAREN PACKER

The band played, cheerleaders cheered, and a stadium full of students and staff joined in the celebration under early morning gray skies as Birmingham High School began the 2009-2010 school year August 19 with its new charter status and a new name: Birmingham Community Charter High School (BCCHS).

From a podium on the fifty yard-line, Principal/CEO Marsha Coates welcomed the crowd, and student body president Melissa Alvarez introduced the roster of speakers. Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, Congressman Brad Sherman, Tamar Galatzan (who serves as both Los Angeles Deputy City Attorney and LAUSD school board member and is currently campaigning for City Council District 2), and keynote speaker Jack O’Connell, State Superintendent of Public Instruction, each took turns presenting certificates, proclamations and other tokens of acknowledgement.

“This is a school that really does meet the new R’s in public education: rigor, relevance, and relationships,” commended O’Connell who was once a school teacher.

The crowd broke into applause when Congressman Sherman handed Coates and Alvarez an American flag flown over the capitol during the inauguration of President Barack Obama.

The speakers also expressed their anticipation of community collaboration and their expectations of high student achievement. Blue and gold balloons surrounded her and swirled overhead as Galatzan spoke of her involvement with the charter conversion process of her alma mater and issued a challenge to the students.

“There’s a part of me that’s a little sad to say goodbye to Birmingham High School, but there’s a bigger part of me that’s so excited about the undertaking that you guys are about to start on,” said Galatzan. “The process by which this [new charter] school started was not an easy one. I want you to promise me that you will prove all of those naysayers wrong.”

It was April 2008 when the original charter petition was filed, and July 2009 when it was approved by the LAUSD School Board. The five year charter improves flexibility in academic, professional and budgetary decisions and gives students, faculty, parents, and community members more control over school governance.

Some students are still uncertain of the changes coming their way.  Nataja Jennings, a junior, expressed her concern over the controversy surrounding the conversion process which caused a split between the new charter school and the Daniel Pearl journalism program that shares the same campus but opted out of the charter. “It’s really confusing to me. I don’t understand how the school will change,” she said.

One anticipated change has already taken place. The August 19 start date of the fall semester is three weeks earlier than usual and will allow students to finish the semester and finals before the December holidays.

Roslyn Riboh, a counselor in the Social Justice Academy is certain more positive changes are coming. “It’s a wonderful opportunity for the entire community to collaborate more effectively. Now we all have a voice.”

Karen Packer is originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, but now calls the San Fernando Valley home. She has spent the last 15 years working as a freelance writer, teacher, and publicist.

Charter status approved for Van Nuys’ Birmingham High

BY ERIKA OBLEA

After much debate, Birmingham High School will open its doors for the 2009-2010 school semester with its new charter status.

Approved last Wednesday by LAUSD boardmembers, the charter status will allow the school to exercise more discretion with its budget and educational goals separate from the district.

According to the office of LAUSD boardmember Tamar Galatzan who represents schools in the San Fernando Valley, the petition, which was submitted last April, came out of a desire from the school to implement more innovative measures for its students and faculty.

“I think what you’re seeing is schools that for one reason or another want a flexibility of the curriculum, staffing, and freedom to innovate, and unfortunately LA Unified doesn’t have many places for them to do that and remain in the district,” Galatzan said, who herself is a graduate of Birmingham High School.

One of the many changes that has been proposed by the school is to have the fall semester begin on August 19, three weeks earlier than before. According to the petition, the calendar change will allow students to end the school year earlier and enable them to take community college courses.

However, according to Galatzan’s office, a need for more budgetary freedom fueled much of the school’s petition to become a charter school, considering a principal controls about 4 percent of the school’s budget.

According to Director of Charter Schools Division for LAUSD Jose Cole-Gutierrez, the process of approving the charter involved making sure that Birmingham would have plans for a balanced budget and would promote extracurricular activities and athletics.

“First and foremost, when the superintendent and the board approve a charter, they are looking to see that it will help improve student achievement, that they will get increasingly better opportunities in terms of education,” Cole-Gutierrez said.With a more flexible block grant from the state, the school is expected to enact many of its decisions faster than it would while under the district. Some of these changes include possibly eliminating a life skills course requirement for freshmen and having more classes that will increase verbal SAT scores.

Birmingham High School is not the only school to have gone done this path. Granada Hills High School, the largest charter school in the nation, was approved for its charter petition in 2003. Galatzan’s office estimates that nearly 125 schools in the district have been approved for charter status since the early 2000’s.

For now, Galatzan said that like all other charter schools, Birmingham High School will still have a contract with the district to ensure quality education for its students.

“That’s the next step – to make sure that Birmingham is meeting the goals that were set out,” she said. “That’s really the most important thing – that is offering students a chance to succeed.”

Erika  Oblea is a rising sophomore at the University of California, Berkeley where she is studying Political Science and Statistics. When she’s not cramming for exams at the library, she’s reporting on businesses in Berkeley for The Daily Californian. She is a graduate of Chaminade and has lived in the Valley ever since she  could remember –and could probably recite the exits off the 101 backwards and forwards.