Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has had a rough enough week. First he took a beating in a poll on his performance, and then, his star tarnished, he announced he would take a rain check on a run for governor.
So I hate to be the bearer of more bad news, but I've been gathering up the results of polling at the 10 schools that for the last year have been under the mayor's wing, and there's no way to sugarcoat this.
At eight of the 10 campuses, the mayor's Partnership for Los Angeles Schools got a resounding thumbs down from teachers.
You read correctly.
Eight out of 10 schools delivered a "no confidence" vote, and we're talking landslides (84 to 17 at Santee Education Complex, 96 to 13 at Stevenson Middle School, 70 to 13 at Gompers Middle School, 61 to 8 at Markham Middle School and 184 to 15 at Roosevelt High, which the mayor himself once attended).
At a ninth school, Hollenbeck Middle, there was no vote, but teachers have made their unhappiness known verbally.
At the 10th school, Ritter Elementary, the partnership was supported by 68% of the faculty, but there were still major grievances.
And now some teachers active in United Teachers Los Angeles are circulating the draft of a scathing letter they intend to send to Villaraigosa, telling him "these votes reflect concerns about the extent of your leadership" in addressing concerns about layoffs and class size. The teachers say the mayor's partnership is "in deep trouble," and they "cannot impress upon" him "strongly enough" that they're tired of "empty promises."
But how do they really feel?
I guess an optimist would say there's nowhere for the partnership to go but up. But it's hard to be terribly optimistic after such a resounding rejection.
Late in 2007, after bad-mouthing LAUSD and bungling an attempt to grab control of the entire district, Villaraigosa convinced teachers at these 10 low-performing schools to vote to put themselves under his sway. Fall in line behind him, he said, and there'd be less bureaucracy, more parental and community support, schools would be cleaner, smaller, safer, better, and all students would aim for college.
Well, it sounded good.
"Some teachers not only have no confidence, but they want to get out" of the partnership, said Harold Dolan, a science teacher at Stevenson Middle School. "It just doesn't seem to be going anywhere."
