a long email from a neighbor mom

my, aren't i feeling productive? maya is taking a nice long nap and i am cooking a big pot of lentil soup with produce from our farm (eatwell farms, that is). we carved a "really cute and spooooooooooooooky pumpkin" before 8 am this morning, with very little controversy aout whose pumpkin it really was. it's a grey, still, day. miles wore his puffy jacket to school. yesterday was sunny and warm, we played in albany for che che's 2nd birthday and then miles and maya and our little neighbor downstairs turned our backyard into a mudwallow, water throwing, plant drowning and spray running through and screaming parTAY that reached right into the homestretch of dinner and bedtime.

but enough of that. as i said last time, this blog will now be used for the official business of obsessively considering every angle of every school in sf unified.

here are the ones on my mind at the moment:

if we do immersion:
leonard flynn
marshall
alvarado
buena vista
fairmount

below is a LONG and helpful email about immersion and choosing schools from a neighbor mom of another boy names miles, whose son goes to leonard flynn:

HER WORDS:
The short and sweet is, I am very happy with Flynn, and immersion. The Kindergarten teachers are really great and work closely with each other (2 English and 2 Spanish). The kindergarteners all have recess and lunch together. The school has a lot of momentum which is great and I think always fun to be a poart of something that is on its way up. It was interesting to see in touring last year how some of the schools seem to be on the rise, some seem to be plateau-ing (my sense at Alvarado which I put 7th on my list) and others were dipping a bit. Sometimes that's due to Principal turnover which was my impression at both Alvarado and Buena Vista last year.

We were seeking Spanish Immersion and 5 of my 7 choices were SPI. We chose Flynn first because it was so close and because in interviewing parents (on their way to school past my house!) everyone seemed happy with the school. So we thought, we're going to do this! Support our neighborhood school and be involved! It appealed to me to be another middle class family to participate in an up and coming school because the reality of all public schools is that when middle class families send their kids there, they usually bring with them energy, money, organization etc which benefits ALL the kids there.

We also had Fairmount on our list which has a great set of extra programs and good principal leadership and strong PTA. Also a very nice library. Also on our list were Monroe, Alvarado and BV (and Harvey Milk and Rooftop).

The PTA at Flynn makes almost no money ($31,000 last year as compared to the $200,000 that Alvarado makes) but the PTA is active and growing. The fundraising is more challenging because the population of the school is quite poor. We are just not a school that can have fundraising auctions or gala dinners. On the other hand, as a poorer school we get more money from the district, and we are eligible for grants like the grant that chose Flynn for one of 10 new place structures in the State last May (part of Maria Shriver's CaliforniaVolunteer effort.) Flynn also has a great upgraded library/Media center which was christened in 2005 and will soon implement a $125,000 yard greening grant they were awarded. Lot of things are happening.

Here is the "enhanced listing" about Flynn on Great Schools.net http://www.greatschools.net/cgi-bin/ca/pqview/6366

Also attached is a piece one of the parents wrote last year. I would add to it that the Principal, Mr. Addcox is a very calm, elegant Latino man who I think sets great tone for the school, and is a great role model as well.

I bleive that the English program is just as good, but it seems scarier because the English only classes ar enot as diverse - meaning they are msotly Latino and black and I think the uncertainty about that can make white parents nervous. But what I am seeing is that in any given class there might be a problem kid or two, but that will be true in any class in the district. The reality is that the district in general has very few white kids and even schools with more caucasian kids, only have about 20-30 percent max. Our hope is that more middle class families of any race will choose Flynn because any time a school is chosen, it means the parents wanted their kids there and are maybe more invested in their child's education - which is good for any school.

Flynn is doing tours on Thursdays at 9:00. No appointment necessary. Just meet outside the office. Also there is a Kindergaretn Information night on Nov 29.

and more questions from me, and her answers in red...

yes, this is daunting. i find myself thinking about WAY too many variables. diversity, money,equity, safety, random bad kinder teachers I've seen, proximity to home, school hours, enrichment, and now...immersion. I did this too - had my spreadsheet, rated the things most important to me etc. If you use greatschools.net you can create a list of schools you are interested in and then sort them by many things: ethnic make up of a school, scores, size etc.
i just started considering it because i was afraid miles wouldn't like school if he couldn't understand what was happening. now I guess my questions are more along these lines...
do you think/have you read any research that english-speaking kids in this kind of program end up being fluent writers in english as well as spanish? i really want miles to be a fluent writer.

do you understand why this model works for kids who don't know spanish when historically kids who didn't speak english did poorly in english only instruction? i'm very confused about this, as i know the district created bilingual education for kids who came in with only chinese or spanish partly because many didn't succees when put in "english immersion". Here's what I think: The old model of just sticking an immigrant kid into school and expecting them to learn english as lessons are being taught may not have worked for these reasons: first, immersion is not for every child. There are Sp-speaking kids at Flynn who are in the Spanish immersion program where they will move slowly toward English, while learning the skills of kindergarten (reading, writing, early math) in theoir native language.

There are other SP-speaking kids who went directly into the all English classes (they are in Immersion themselves). I think this decision may be based solely on what's best for the kid. Whether the kid has an aptitude for language, what the priorities of the family are, whether they have any other variables (immaturity, inability to focus or whatever) that might hinder their success in immersion. Also the old model may not have addressed the fact that the kids didn't speak any of the language. In immersion, it's all about insuring they come to understand what's going on through repetition and pictures and acting it out. I see that Miles is learning Spanish exactly the same way he learned English - through attention to the repetition and putting the patterns of language together. "She used that word "pack" the other day when she put things in a lunchbox, now she used it while putting clothes in a suitcase." Make mental note.

One other thing is that (to grossly generalize) one of the primary problems that immigrant and lower economic status kids face is that in the early years they have not been read to or spoken to to the degree that middle class parents do. I read a fascinating study recently about how we can pour all the money we want to into education now to get poor kids up to speed, but the necessary building blocks of language and learning are laid in the early years of hearing many many different kinds of words, and that they many never really catch up because of the missed opportunity when they were little.

what happens after 5th grade? i'm assuming miles would be a fluent spanish speaker by then, but would he retain his great new language skills when he transitioned to a non-spanish academic setting, where he might or might not have spanish speaking peers? I heard, in touring many immersion schools last year, that children may not score as well as their non-immersion peers on English tests in the grammar school years. But that by 6th grade, and on up, they score above average in all language-related testing. I don't know if this is about native English speakers or if the statistics include all immersion kids who come from either English or Spanish backgrounds. I have not been concerned about Miles falling too far behind in English. I figure we will always be reading and speaking English using lots of big words. Also I think that there will be a huge pool of kids going into Jr High from Spanish immersion and that many more schools will have immersion level courses in Jr High. My hairdresser's daughter went through immersion at Alvarado, then had some immeriosn coursses at James Lick (in Noe Valley) and now is at Lowell, and completely fluent - worked last summer speaking all Spnish at her job.)

i, too, would love to be part of an up and coming neighborhood school but i really am nervous about immersion. people keep telling me they think it's great but don't seem to know many details about how the program affects kids academically, other than the fact that being bilingual is good for people's brains in general. From my own experience of learning languages (at different points, I studied French, Spanish and Italian) is that it really makesyour brain work hard to order things, and that there are many skills to be gained from the leanring of a language.

Honestly, I think if you have some interest in Miles learning another language you should try it. Then if it's not a good fit, transfer him out the next year or the next or the next. (It is MUCH easier to get into any elementary school in the district after the kindergarten year!) I thought: we'll try the neighborhood school and enjoy the benefits of it being close by and all. He'll learn some Spanish which will be good for his brain evenif he doesn't continue. And if in a couple years it doesn't seem like a good fit (I fear that a chasm will grown between Miles' abilities and those of his peers as they get older) that we can transfer to another school - immersion or otherwise.

The choosing of a school is ultimately so subjective. Some schools will speak to you more than others, and ultimately the program itself may not be the most important factor. Get a feel for the teachers, the environment, the play yard, the library, the way of life. Keep in mind your own sanity - you may love a school like Sherman on Union and Franklin but try to envision the twice daily round trip haul across town. Does that still make the school "ideal"? I loved Miraloma - liked it best of all the schools I saw, but didn't put it on my list as it was too far and too early. Just a lifestyle choice. I wasn't totally wowed by Flynn. I had some concerns that maybe they didn't have enough arts prgrams or whatever. But I liked that we could walk, that the school has momentum, and I oved the library and liked the pricipal. We did want him to learn Spanish so that was big. Would Miles do better at Miraloma than Flynn? I doubt it. As a Mom, would I? Doubt it!

wow, that's a lot. but i swear, that much thought about the schools is flowing through my brain approximately every 5 minutes, and it happens a lot late at night. like between 2 and 5 in the morning.

here are the non-immersion schools currently on my radar:

miraloma

sf community

moscone

grattan

rooftop

harvey milk?

alvarado?

mckinley?

creative arts charter school

oh, now maya is awakening. the soup is bubbling away. if anyone has anything to share about these schools or others, join in please!!

love

jamie