Last night I attended a CLC community meeting whose subject matter could best be described as \u201chow should CLC move forward?\u201d What follows are my general impressions, and some specific reactions to what I heard.<\/p>\n
Bottom-line, I don\u2019t envy the CLC Governance Council\u2019s situation at this point in time. There are some significant potential changes to CLC in the offing, but \u2013 for perfectly understandable reasons \u2013 the broader CLC community appears unclear about what it all means. I applaud the GC for their outreach effort, but I think there\u2019s a lot more education that needs to take place.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Background<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n The GC and CLC administration are in the midst of making some significant changes to the way CLC is structured, and in its relationship to the District. While the changes don\u2019t directly impact the way instruction is delivered, they have the potential to impact the school.<\/p>\n These changes often get discussed in terms of relatively narrow issues, like \u201cbecoming a 501(c)3\u201d or \u201copening up a new charter school\u201d. But I think a better way of looking at them is that they are, collectively, a proposed response to two issues: CLC\u2019s structural financial deficit, and a desire for increased independence.<\/p>\n CLC spends about $150,000 more per year than it takes in, which is unsustainable for more than even a few years. However, roughly half of that structural deficit is based on the assumption that the expiring Measure D parcel tax will not be renewed by San Carlos voters this spring.<\/p>\n The rest of the structural deficit was presented as mostly due to CLC\u2019s compliance with a site-based fundraising cap that all of the parent-based fundraising groups at all of the schools in the District accepted. That cap exists because there is a difference of philosophy as to the best way to raise money philanthropically for the District. Outside of CLC, the belief is that more money is raised at lower \u201ccost\u201d when it is to done through the San Carlos Educational Foundation. My sense is that this belief also exists within the CLC parent community, but with an important caveat: if a site\u2019s perceived funding need is great enough, the site should be allowed to raise whatever is necessary.<\/p>\n Fundamentally, of course, this means that there isn\u2019t a shared belief regarding fundraising. The cap is a pragmatic attempt to split the difference and allow more site-based fundraising than the rest of the District parent community thinks is best, but not as much as the CLC parent community would like. The cap allows the Foundation to focus on fundraising (its leadership spent a lot of time last year dealing with the political fallout of a surge in CLC site-based fundraising), and gives the CLC community time to work with the Foundation to grow the community-wide fundraising to the point where the cap would be moot.<\/p>\n That point \u2013 the level of Foundation-orchestrated fundraising which eliminates CLC\u2019s structural deficit as it exists today \u2013 depends on whether or not Measure D is renewed. According to the GC, renewal sets the bar at $2.5 million per year, while non-renewal would up the ante to $3 million annually. Given that last year the Foundation raised $1.7 million, and this year they\u2019re targeting $2 million, the $2.5 million is in my mind achievable within CLC\u2019s timeframe, albeit with a lot of work. The $3 million level is more problematic within that timeframe.<\/p>\n Before leaving the structural deficit topic it\u2019s worth remembering that deficits have two components, income and expenses. The preceding discussion assumed expenses were essentially fixed. The reality is they\u2019re not. However, \u201creducing expenses\u201d at a school generally means \u201ccutting program\u201d, which few parents are keen to do. Part of last night\u2019s discussion was to get a sense of what programs, if any, the CLC parent community would be willing to reduce or cut.<\/p>\n Independence is a more complicated topic. Like fairness, it\u2019s in the eye of the beholder, and difficult to quantify, or even pin down. Historically, CLC has operated independently of the District. The environment that allowed that degree of independence is changing, however, as is the CLC leadership\u2019s approach to exercising its independence.<\/p>\n On the environmental side, the two biggest changes involve facilities and the District\u2019s need to operate more efficiently. Enrollment growth has resulted in a shortage of facilities, particularly classrooms, throughout the District. This has made CLC\u2019s recent enrollment growth, from under 250 students a few years ago to the current level of 301, with a desire to grow to 360 students in a few years, challenging for the District. The Board is not keen on installing more portable classrooms on the Tierra Linda campus. Acquiring a new school site would be expensive and time-consuming. All of which acts to limit CLC\u2019s independence as the District seeks to manage its overall growth.<\/p>\n Increasing the efficiency of operations at the District translates to doing more with less, particularly in the support functions like the business office. There\u2019s also been a big push on to maximize the value of the money invested in special education. Both these changes put a premium on streamlining and simplifying organizational processes. Which, unfortunately, doesn\u2019t gibe with CLC\u2019s desire to do things its own way. It\u2019s not a matter of which approach is right or wrong, because there are almost always multiple ways of achieving the same goal. But accommodating differences is costly, and time-consuming, neither of which the District can afford as easily as it did in the past when the fiscal environment was better.<\/p>\n The shift in the way CLC\u2019s leadership exercises its independence is one where I suspect there are differing opinionsJ. From my perspective, there\u2019s been an increase in unilateral decision-making in recent years.<\/p>\n A good example was the decision to increase enrollment. In fairness to CLC, they did approach Steve Mitrovich, the former superintendent, to discuss their desire to grow. But no one from CLC approached the Board, even though CLC\u2019s charter comes from the Board, and can only be modified by mutual written agreement with the Board. The superintendent is not a \u201csignatory\u201d to the charter, and the Board has not, in my years as a trustee at least, delegated negotiating the CLC charter to the superintendent. The end result of all of this was that the Board was quite surprised to learn, after the fact, that CLC\u2019s enrollment had increased significantly, and was expected to increase even more. The point being not who was \u00a0right and who was wrong, but simply that the decision ended up at least looking unilateral.<\/p>\n I’ve deleted the following paragraph because the information from which I drew the conclusion was in error. Please see https:\/\/board.olbert.com\/2011\/02\/11\/a-correction\/<\/a> for more information. I apologize for the mistake.<\/em><\/p>\n Another example was the decision to hire CLC\u2019s current Director, Chris Mahoney. All people working at CLC are District employees because CLC is not today a legal entity. Historically, the Board has rubber-stamped CLC\u2019s hiring and termination decisions to support CLC\u2019s independence. Chris is the only District employee whose hiring was never approved by the Board. So far as I know that\u2019s because the GC chose not to submit his name to the Board for approval. While much debate has occurred over whether or not this approach is allowed under the charter, my point here is different: whether or not it\u2019s allowed, it was a unilateral decision that was done differently than in times gone by.<\/p>\n Questions<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n At last night\u2019s meeting the 60-odd participants responded to several questions posed by CLC\u2019s leadership. Here are the ones that I heard presented:<\/p>\n In addition, there were presentations on the pending conversion to 501(c)3 ownership and the memorandum of understanding (MOU) being negotiated with the District. The MOU spells out the way the two organizations will work together on a day-to-day basis.<\/p>\n Takeaway<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n Because of the number of participants, the audience was split into four subgroups. All of the subgroups discussed all of the issues.<\/p>\n There was a lot of lively discussion in each of the subgroups. I spent time with each group, observing and not participating except in response to questions directed to me.<\/p>\n Here are my overall impressions:<\/p>\n This is interesting feedback for the GC as it seeks to define a roadmap for CLC moving forward. Making the case for cuts, particularly program cuts, will take a fair amount of effort. That will be more difficult given the desire to remain part of the Foundation, since the simplest response, at least so far as fundraising alone is concerned, would be for CLC to go it alone.<\/p>\n But beyond that I see a difference of philosophy or opinion between CLC\u2019s leadership and the CLC parent community when it comes to how independence is pursued. People clearly like that CLC is different \u2013 it\u2019s one of the most common reasons given for why people came \u2013 but they want to remain part of, and intimately related to, the San Carlos School District and the broader San Carlos parent community.<\/p>\n To put it another way, they seem less concerned about charter schools and independence than they are with maintaining the difference that drew them to CLC in the first place. That\u2019s different (to work the word to death J) from what I think is the collective view of CLC\u2019s leadership, which I see as placing a higher value on independence of action and decision-making.<\/p>\n Corrections<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n As anyone who has ever tried to explain a big, complicated set of issues knows, it\u2019s impossible to get everything \u201cright\u201d. There were a few statements made by presenters last night which I\u2019d like to correct (please bear in mind, as always, that when I write things like \u201cthe District\/Board does\u2026\u201d, I\u2019m saying \u201cin my opinion\u2026\u201d):<\/p>\n Last night I attended a CLC community meeting whose subject matter could best be described as \u201chow should CLC move forward?\u201d What follows are my general impressions, and some specific reactions to what I heard. Bottom-line, I don\u2019t envy the … Continue reading \n
\n
\n