California Life News Room

The State of California Department of Education recently released its annual report on dropout and graduation rates in California. The numbers do not look good: the overall dropout rate in California for the school year 2008-2009 went up to 21.7 percent. That is up from 18.9% in the 2007-2008 school year. This puts California in the middle of the pack, nationwide. Nevada has the highest dropout rate in the nation, at just over 50 percent.

Some school administrators say those numbers can be deceiving. Jane Mills of Palm Springs Unified School district says part of the problem could be inadequate data collection – because some students move out of the school district and receive a second state identification number when they re-enroll in another district, and thus get counted as a dropout because of the snafu. In addition, some students move out of state or out of the country, and re-enroll elsewhere without notifying their previous school where they went.
Nonetheless, Mills says, the dropout numbers are too high, and many schools are attacking the problem in innovative ways. Palm Springs Unified School District has ten Community Liaisons whose job it is to track down students who have stopped coming to school, find out where their difficulties lie, and offer them counseling, etc. to bring them back into the fold. PSUSD also did a study of exactly who their dropouts were, and found that most of them had a common trait: excessive absences and poor academic performance in English and Math in 7th and 8th grades. They also interviewed students who met those criteria but nonetheless did go on to graduate. They found that those students who stayed in school despite difficulties early on did so because someone (like a teacher, coach or counselor) took a special interest in them, or they found a passion for an extracurricular activity, like sports, band or art class. So the district targets at-risk middle schoolers with extra counseling and tutoring to catch them before they get to the point of dropping out. It’s called the Essential Student program.

The Coachella Valley Unified School District struggles with a 28.5 percent dropout rate, in part because of high poverty rates and because so many students’ families move often. They have a special program called Operation Graduation. It’s a partnership with Dell Computers that allows the district to purchase netbooks for $300 apiece.  They distribute the laptops to 9th graders who excel at the four A’s: good attendance, strong academics, extracurricular activities, and good attitude. It’s been in place for one year, so it will be a few years before the end of those students’ senior year. At that point it will be clear whether “Operation Graduation” has led to a higher graduation rate and lower dropout rate. You can see the State of California’s report on dropouts and graduation rates at:
http://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr10/yr10rel140.asp.  

Much of this education story sponsored by the California Lottery was shot in the Palm Springs area. In this week’s episode, Heather Dawson hosts the show from the Palm Springs International Film Festival, where she interviewed the mayor and close to a dozen PSHS students! Check it out at www.californialifehd.com!

Combine the torrential downpour and the biggest game day in the Bay and you have a massive traffic jam. Working as a traffic reporter and producer for nearly three years I should have anticipated this but somehow I thought leaving three hours in advance would be enough time to travel 30 miles. Clearly, I underestimated the magnitude of the 49′ers/Raiders fan base. As I sat on the Bay Bridge stuck with thousands of other Bay area football fans the radio DJ was hyping game day, the cars around me donned their 49′ers and Raiders decals and all I could think about was what was happening before the battle even began. At 12:30 some of the Bay Area’s most amazing teachers were going to walk on the field in front of a sold out crowd and be recognized for hard work and dedication teaching the future football fans of America.  The California Lottery makes it their mission to give back to education and honor those who have given so much to California kids and I had less than 30 mins to make it across the bridge and capture their award winning achievement on camera. Working in this business more more than a decade it takes a lot to get me nervous and let me tell you as I weaved my way across the bridge and into Candlestick Park I was nearly as nervous as my first live shot in Pocatello, Idaho ten years earlier. I got to the the stadium, grabbed my gear, dodged tipsy tailgaters, made it past security and found the teachers on the field. Even with sopping wet clothes, makeup down my face and hairspray in my eyes their accomplishment was crystal clear. There they stood pelted with rain and proud representing the best of the Bay during the biggest battle of the Bay.
Check out my education story on this  week’s episode of  California Life by clicking on this link www.californialifehd.com

Monique Soltani ~ msoltani@californialifehd.com

For this week’s education story I went to the Ventura County Fair to watch Will Rogers Elementary teacher Kris Guzman get recognized as the Ventura County Teacher of the Year. She received a plaque as well as a goody bag from the Fair filled with tasty treats. I think she liked both equally Guzman, who currently teaches second-graders, has been an educator for over 20 years. She thanked her staff members as well as the California Lottery for their many contributions to bettering education in the state. Guzman was more than pleased with the honor, but her teacher of the year ride isn’t over yet. She will compete later this year for district and hopefully statewide teacher of the year. Good luck Kris! You can watch my story on California Life by clicking on the website: www.californialifehd.com
Christina Erwin
cerwin@CaliforniaLifeHD.com

Watching the show for the first time gave me such a sense of pride as a Californian and as a member of California Life’s production team! Uplifting and relevant, California Life’s motivations in highlighting the most positive aspects of our Golden State were quite evident from show open to close.

Notably, I was impressed by one featured story on California Life about Helen Papadopoulos–a math teacher in Walnut California and 2007 recipient of the Teacher of the Year award. I have always believed that it takes a special kind of person to be a great teacher. It is a huge responsibility to instill the value of knowledge into a group of thirty students, 7 hours a day, 5 days a week. Nine months out of the year, students spend more time with their teachers than they do with their parents. So, it is always refreshing to see California teachers like “Mrs. Pop” take this responsibility so seriously. From our footage, I could tell she enjoyed waking up for her students everyday. It did not seem like a chore for her, but rather, it is, as she puts it, her “calling.”

Now a college graduate from UCLA, in light of this story, I was compelled to reflect on the teachers and mentors of my formative years from elementary through college. Some are now Facebook friends, and two are pen pals (yup, I still find time to handwrite letters on lovely stationery and send them in an envelope through the postal service). Whenever I can, I make sure to let these important figures know the indelible mark they have left on my life. I am sure Ms. Papadopoulos’ students will hold similar sentiments in the years to come.