Going aggro on the state of schools

What's new in public education?

Slashing and burning, chaos and confusion, fear and loathing.

The usual.

The only good news is that people are starting to fight back.

Students are complaining about budget cuts in letters to Gov. Schwarzenegger, who is responding with what Deputy LAUSD Supt. Ray Cortines calls "smoke and mirrors."

The "Grateful Dads" are singing protest songs in South Pasadena, where parents marched in the streets last weekend at a "Flunk the Budget" rally.

And as we celebrate the 30-year anniversary of Prop. 13's drain on funding for schools and other public services, commentator/author/agitator Sandra Tsing Loh, the conscience of public education, is toting around her very own drawing of Brylcreemed Public Enemy No. 1 -- Howard Jarvis.

"We're 46th or 48th in the nation in funding," the animated and outraged Loh said at Valley Alternative Magnet School, where she was picking up her daughter from an after-school ballet program.

Loh, who along with parent Romy Longwell and other volunteers worked to establish the after-school activities -- and also raised money for a music program at Valley Alternative -- invites other flaming-mad parents to join a rally planned for June 17 in Sacramento.

The Angry Tired Teachers Band of Hayward will be there, along with the Fresno Migrant Scholars and the Burning Moms, described by Loh as "underpaid, over-stressed public school moms tired of baking endless pans of Snickerdoodles" to fill funding gaps.

Watch out, Sacramento, Loh warned, because these are women prone to hot flashes.

"Perimenopausal, middle-class moms. Type A, aggro moms."

Loh provided a demonstration of what an aggro mom is capable of when she fanned out several copies of a slick brochure titled "Parent Guide, LAUSD Budget Crisis 2008-09." The publication, aimed both at explaining the budget mess and goading parents into action, is exactly the kind of inappropriate gesture Loh has come to expect from the financially pinched district.

So you don't get the wrong impression, Loh would agree that LAUSD has some swell schools and a record of steady if slow improvement, and she reserves true apoplexy for California's fall from national model to national embarrassment when it comes to per-pupil funding.

But her eyes also bug out of her head when she talks about L.A. Unified school board candidates spending MILLIONS OF DOLLARS on their campaigns, or the district's wildly expensive consulting contracts or the aforementioned parent guide.