What A Tragic Mess In Los Angeles

I’m sure most readers of this blog have already heard about the L.A. elementary school where two teachers have been arrested on molestation charges, and the District’s decision to remove all of the teachers at the school.

Parents are justifiably upset about the danger their children were in, and now many appear doubly upset at the decision made (perhaps unilaterally, but that’s not clear to me) by District officials to take so many teachers away from students with whom they have developed relationships.

All I know is what I hear in the media, and it sounds like an awful situation. From what I see in the media reports I have at the end of this post, though, it seems like removing all the teachers with what appears to be minimal input from parents might not have been the wisest choice.

What do you think?

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New staff arrives at embattled Miramonte school in L.A. is from USA Today.

Go To Parent/Teacher Conferences Or Get Your TANF Benefits Cut-Off, Says D.C. Council Member

In yet another bizarre and punitive effort to force increased parent involvement, a Washington, D.C. City Council Chairman has announced plans to introduce legislation that would cut-off TANF benefits to parents who didn’t attend parent/teacher conferences and PTA meetings.

He attempted unsuccessfully to do the same thing in 2008.

I’ve previously written many posts and articles about how and why punitive actions like this are terrible ideas.

And I’ll be adding this effort to my list, The Worst Parent Engagement Ideas.

This Week’s “Parent Teacher Chat” On Twitter

In January , Joe Mazza wrote a guest post about Parent Teacher Chat on Twitter. Joe has accepted my invitation to write a short post on this blog regularly to announce future topics for these chats:

Next #PTchat – 2/8/12 “Most Innovative Family Engagement Efforts by Classroom Teachers”
This Wednesday’s #ptchat is a great opportunity for K-12 classroom teachers to not only see what other educators in similar roles are doing to engage parents across multiple timezones, but also to build upon your own efforts and capture which innovative approaches might best fit your class and school needs. Don’t miss this week’s #ptchat during the one hour chat- Wednesday, February 8, 2012 from 9 EST  / 6 PST. For more information, head over to Joe Mazza’s eFACE Today blog. Archives of all #ptchats can be found here