District Tries to Sort Out the Jargon of Reform

First there were stake-holders who decided on cluster configurations. Then came cluster leaders. And on Monday, “complex cabinets” joined the oftentimes bewildering vocabulary of school reform in Los Angeles.

Simply put, the cabinets will be councils of parents, teachers and principals who will not have to take orders from Downtown bureaucrats and who will be able to decide on their own how to educate children in their schools.

Gone will be the six Los Angeles Unified School District regional offices that have served as liaisons between the 645 schools and officials Downtown. In their place will be the cabinets at 27 new self-governing entities to be called community clusters.

“In short, folks, we are talking about local control and local involvement,” Supt. Sid Thompson said.

In an 11-page report to the Board of Education, Thompson said the cabinets are essential to a major reorganization of the giant district. Under the restructuring, cabinets will help guide instruction at the new clusters, which will be created by linking elementary and middle schools with the high schools they feed.

Each cluster of schools will have the power to make educational decisions jointly for its campuses and will share resources. A cluster leader to be appointed by Thompson will act as the key manager.

“One criticism that has been heard regarding our planning process is that it lacks specifics,” Thompson said. “Our response is that we must have the courage and determination to let the schools be free.”

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He also said the restructuring plan will not cost any more money but will consume about $7.9 million now being spent on the regional offices.

For those in need of an interpreter to understand the new terms being thrown about by school reformers, Thompson’s report defined some elements of the most commonly used jargon.

A cluster comprises one or more high schools and all of their neighborhood feeder schools. Each high school is at the top of a complex of schools. Each cluster will have a cluster leader, a sort of ombudsman for the schools. The leader will interact with the stake-holders--essentially, anyone who cares about what is going on at a school.

Even for insiders who have put in time on school reform issues and try to talk the talk, this new vernacular is difficult to use.

“It really is hard to understand what is going on when you first get involved because of all the new words and acronyms,” said Kathleen Dixon, a parent leader. “We stutter before we say complex or cluster to make sure we are using the right term.”

Thompson’s plan also calls for creation of a Parents/Community Services Unit, or PCSU. The person to be hired for this office will be assigned the task of drafting a glossary of terms.

Thompson wants to set up another unit called “Support Services.” This unit will be charged with finding ways to link schools with health and social services. This districtwide unit would ensure that school nurses and psychologists are meeting the needs of individual schools.

The district restructuring plan is purposely high on goals and low on specifics. Although Thompson is calling for the creation of complex cabinets, he is leaving it up to schools to decide who and how many people should serve on them.

“For the district to be specific and directive in the development of any aspect of this restructuring process will defeat the purpose and will be contradictory to the principles of the process,” he said.

Although school board members said nothing to indicate that they will not approve the plan May 2, several want Thompson to come back with more details and are concerned that the new jargon is confusing the public.

Board member Barbara Boudreaux wants to see a timeline for implementing the entire plan. School board President Leticia Quezada said the job of a cluster leader needs to be more clearly defined.

“We ought to say it all in plain English, so everyone can understand it,” Quezada said. “Then we can translate it to plain Spanish, Armenian and everyone else on the street.”

A Cluster of Terms Under a new restructuring plan, the Los Angeles Unified School District will assign most campuses to “clusters” on July 1. One result is a bewildering new vernacular. Here are some examples:

* High school complex--One or more high schools, and all the lower-grade campuses in their area.

* Community cluster--A group of one or more high school complexes, which will make many instructional decisions jointly.

* Stake-holders--The parents, teachers, students and others who have a stake in a school’s well-being.

* Complex cabinet--A committee of stake-holders that will decide educational policy in each high school complex.