Commentary from Stuart Goldurs

A friend called me this.

Actually, there are a few of us who blog to share the truth about Los Angeles Unified School District and public education. There are Facebook groups who advocate for the positions that we take.

Who are our readers? They are teachers, friends, and family. They already share our thoughts and our beliefs about LAUSD and public education.

I began to write six years ago to tell the truth about LAUSD. I expanded my coverage to write about public education nationwide.

There are thousands of people out there who agree with everything that we write. There are also tens of thousands who are uninformed about what is going on, so they just accept the changes at their schools. Many of the uninformed get their information from the newspapers, T.V., and radio stations—ignorers of the truth, supporters of the status quo, and defenders of the establishment.

We voted for the school board members to represent our interests and beliefs and to look out for our children. Instead, they represent the interests of the Superintendent who represents the interests of his billionaire masters.

There are always so many issues, so many controversies. Just recently, iPads versus school repairs; MiSIS; the closed school libraries; decreasing the teaching time of itinerant orchestra teachers; LAUSD going eight years without a raise and having to take furlough days which are a pay cut; teachers sitting in teacher jails for months without knowing why they are incarcerated, when the real reasons are their seniority, their top of the pay scale salaries, and the fact that they are close to retirement and retirement benefits.

LAUSD may look like it’s ripe for bankruptcy (the state won’t bail it out), while the superintendent and his associates are preparing for corporate positions with their benefactors. The school board members will continue to search for higher elective offices.

While LAUSD burns, they better themselves.

Meanwhile, the billionaires will swoop down and acquire the school land, sending the students to for profit charter schools, thus benefiting the investors in two ways.

The media, the local politicians, and the civic leaders will stand there with their arms spread wide to indicate their innocence and the fact that they didn’t know and that they couldn’t do anything as the sky was falling on LAUSD.

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Stuart has been a Los Angeles elementary teacher for 35 years. He started writing to make people aware of the district waste, large bureaucracy, and other major issues of the time. He expanded his writing to include public education nationally with particular focus on the excesses of testing, Common Core, and the so called reformers. He writes both prose and poetry and occasionally take an old rock song and changes the lyrics to fit schools or testing. His Twitter handle is @LaIndianFan.