Editor’s note: I received permission to publish this letter from Shawn Garvey, who sent it out to fellow parents of Grass Valley Charter School. Some other parents had forwarded it to me. It underscores an ongoing challenge in the public schools, and the painful impact being felt by parents and students by some decision-making. It will continue too: We are an aging, declining population with declining school enrollment, so some exceptional and bold public leadership is required.
Friends:
I’m hoping that all parents of Grass Valley Charter School parents attend the meeting about school consolidation tonight at the Bell Hill Campus.
As some of you may know, Grass Valley Charter School had its campus split between Bell Hill and Hennessey this past year. That split of our school community has been controversial, and it fundamentally undermines the very philosophy of the Grass Valley Charter School Expeditionary Model and our school’s Character Traits.
By splitting apart our younger children from our older students, it violates a basic premise of the school’s Community and tears at the fabric of unity on our campus.
However, parents (in retrospect, regretfully) went along with this because it was promised that our school would be made whole in a years time, that this was a temporary situation.
What we realize in retrospect that this was somewhat cynical effort by the Grass Valley School District to simply maintain its declining enrollment and add revenue by adding additional GVCS classes that were never part of the school’s Strategic Plan in the first place. In essence, GVCS has been coerced to grow in order to secure dollars and students.
The school now has too many classes to fit back into the Bell Hill campus. But the parents of Hennessy students are fighting to preserve their school, which is only fair. And the result is, that as a direct result of bureaucratic mismanagement of the issue, parents of both schools are put in the unenviable position of being in conflict with each other, each about the future of their own school.
This didn’t need to happen. Frankly, this occurred as a direct result of failure to communicate with parents and the community by the school district and the GVCS and Hennessey school administrations.
If you are a GVCS parent, please attend tonight and let it be known that the outcome has to be that our campus and our community is made whole and complete in the next academic year, and that nothing less is a failure to live up to the District’s committments, but more importantly to the values that GVCS represents, and the very reasons the school is successful in the first place.
6:00 Bell Hill School — Tonight (yes, Friday, I know.)
For other parents — of GVCS students or any students in the Grass Valley School District — displeased by the Grass Valley School District’s ineptitude, make sure you attend the School Board meeting on Tuesday, December 10 at 7:00 PM at Lyman Gilmore in the Multi-Purpose Room.
Thanks for your attention.
/shawn
Filed under: Uncategorized
Jeff,
Thanks for putting this on your blog. I hope it generates lots of comments, as well as a great and fruitful discussion–I was one of the parents who forwarded Shawn’s letter to Jeff P.
Just a clarification to start: Shawn posted this letter not just to Grass Valley Charter parents, but to the Sierra Madres & Padres email list which has been doing social networking in Nevada County before the term was invented. Go here if you aren’t aware of who they are and what they do: http://www.sierramadresandpadres.com
Here’s a funny story: I met with a friend of mine today, a 68-yr.-old woman–4th generation Nevada County, and we were chatting about all sorts of subjects, mostly about Lake Wildwood and her young-girl admiration for now-99-years-old Bill Vogt, who sold a bunch of his ranch to create Wally World (that’s what she calls Lake Wildwood). Apparently he still drives around Wally World in his tractor, providing gardening services to this day.
Anyway, out of the blue my friend, who attended Hennessy as a young girl in the 1960s, said, “Did you hear they’re closing Hennessy school?” I explained to her that “they” were doing nothing of the sort, but she had no idea about the distinction between GVC and GVSD. As far as she was concerned, the school was closing and she was devastated.
Eric Fredrickson needs survey monkeys right quick. And a new campaign manager.
Michael A.
Thanks Michael. Any news to report from the Friday night meeting?
Sure.
It was a good informational meeting. Brian Martinez, principal of GVC, laid out in detail the dozen site alternatives being considered by the GVSD board.
The main take-away from the meeting that I received was that the GVSD board has a very difficult decision to make in the very near future (January 31!), and that this decision has the potential for being as controversial as was the closing of Nevada City Elementary and Gold Run in the NCSD.
Bottom line: we have too many school facilities in Nevada County and not enough students. Nevada County has the most active charter environment in the state (which is GREAT), coupled with a completely dysfunctional administrative bureaucracy and culture (which is HORRIBLE).
My feeling is that this latest battle in the Nevada County School Districts Turf War might be just the right wedge issue that finally empowers the electorate in this county to fix an infrastructure problem that has been fomenting for going on 3 decades. Nevada County has 10 districts for 12K students; Los Angeles School District, the largest in the state, has over 700K students. This is completely idiotic.
Dear Holly, perhaps things like IdeaPaint are silly distractions: http://www.nevco.k12.ca.us/nugget/EC1BC762-3048-7C5C-1F93B8401A27F94C.pdf
Got recall?
Michael A.
Well, perhaps you don’t know the history of how GVCS wound up at Bell Hill Elementary. What goes around comes around.
GVCS and the School Board had meetings behind closed doors and two weeks before school was to begin that year, they gave the Bell Hill Elementary parents and students notification that they were being ousted from their neighborhood school and sent to Hennessey. When the parents called an emergency meeting, they were told by the School Board that it was too late, it was a done deal and Bell Hill kids and parents had no recourse.