MannyIsGod
02-27-2005, 05:04 PM
Equity not enough in Edgewood
Web Posted: 02/27/2005 12:00 AM CST
Mc Nelly Torres
Express-News Staff Writer
Every time a new superintendent is hired to lead the Edgewood School District, Mary Lee Reyna makes a lunch date.
More coverage
Spreadsheet: Area school district expenditures
Slide show: Edgewood is Shrinking
The retired Edgewood teacher and longtime resident is a player in this tightknit community, and the gesture is a chance to get acquainted.
Since 1992, Reyna has laid down the law for four superintendents — Dolores Muñoz (lasted 8 years), Noe Sauceda (lasted 9 months), Luis Gonzalez (gone after 21/2 years) and Richard Bocanegra, who took over in 2003.
Edgewood, Reyna says, is like an extended familia. Its 16 square miles contain few secrets, and residents treat outsiders with a skeptical eye.
"I told both Sauceda and Gonzalez, don't underestimate the power of the people of Edgewood," Reyna says. "You don't come to Edgewood and to my house and tell me what's good for me."
That fighting spirit has made Edgewood ground zero for the ongoing debate over how to provide high-quality public education to Texas students, rich and poor.
The fight began in 1968, when 400 students at Edgewood High School marched to the administration office demanding better supplies and qualified teachers. That year, Edgewood parents filed Rodriguez vs. San Antonio (School District) in federal court, setting off decades of legal battles.
They turned to the courts again in 1984, scoring a victory when a Texas state judge ruled the school finance system unconstitutional.
The remedy legislators crafted — dubbed Robin Hood — requires 134 property-rich school districts, including Alamo Heights, to share their wealth with the rest of the state's districts, Edgewood among them.
The district's per-pupil spending last year was $7,891, compared with the state average of $9,948.
There's little doubt that Robin Hood has helped Edgewood. The district has seen a $700 million infusion of state money in the past decade, along with a healthy dose of federal money. Total revenue per student was $8,729 last year, compared with $4,315 in 1994, according to the Texas Education Agency.
The money brought progress in the 1990s; more certified teachers appeared in classrooms, new programs were implemented and schools upgraded.
But Edgewood continues to suffer from a divided board, near-constant changes in leadership, parent distrust and a host of problems common to historically poor schools.
As the overall population of the district has aged and dwindled, enrollment also has declined, setting off a round of controversial school closings and consolidations. Student performance, though improving, continues to lag.
Legislators are working to meet a court-mandated Oct. 1 deadline to once again design a better way to fund the state's poorest schools. As they debate, the San Antonio Express-News visits the district where it all began and asks: Can equity solve Edgewood's problems?
Progress slow
Bad news, no stranger to the Edgewood schools, remains in abundance.
Last year, the district's two high schools — Memorial and Kennedy — landed on the list of schools labeled "needs improvement," along with 15 other Bexar County schools in seven districts.
The federal government applies that label to schools that fail to make sufficient progress for two consecutive years as required by President Bush's public school overhaul.
Over the past decade, Edgewood's enrollment dipped from 14,547 to 12,617, a 13 percent decline that has translated into a loss of millions in state funding.
At the same time, school choice proponents have swooped in with voucher programs such as the CEO Foundation's Horizon program, created in 1998. The program targets the Edgewood district and so far has given 5,414 students up to $4,700 each to attend a private school at one time or another.
Last year, 94 percent of Edgewood students qualified for free or reduced lunch. The district's enrollment is 97 percent Hispanic.
"Many of my students don't have the luxury of being full-time students," said Daniel Piña, who teaches social studies and economics at his alma mater, Kennedy High School. "Many of them work to help their parents and others work because they are parents themselves."
Linda Bononcini, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, echoes Piña's lament.
"In Edgewood, you can't just teach, you have to do so much more," she said. "Our students have developmental, financial and social challenges."
Improvement has come, but not overnight.
Last week, the Texas Education Agency notified Edgewood that it had won its appeal of the "needs improvement" designation. The victory removes Kennedy and Memorial from the list and from the risk of sanctions under the No Child Left Behind federal school reform law. Thirteen of the other 15 Bexar County districts on the list also won their appeals.
Ten years ago, 36 percent of Edgewood's 10th-graders could pass the math portion of the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills, while 57 percent of third-graders passed the reading and math portion of the test, according to the Texas Education Agency.
Last year, 41 percent of 10th-graders passed the math portion of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills, the more rigorous required exam adopted two years ago. Eighty-one percent of third-graders passed both the math and reading portions of the test.
And after years of being rated "acceptable" — essentially, average — under the state's system, Edgewood won "recognized" status in 1999, second only to "exemplary" in the rankings.
Muñoz, the superintendent during that time, didn't stay around to enjoy her success. Bruised by fights with a newly elected school board majority, she left in 1999, waving goodbye to the two years left on her contract.
She took a job as superintendent of Point Isabel schools in Port Isabel, and now is retired.
"Muñoz had a vision and a plan," said Lucy Hall, a retired teacher and administrator.
Tina Morales, a former board member, said Muñoz's only weakness was that she was fair. "And politics, being the animal that it is, pushed her out."
Extended familia
Edgewood parents and educators say they have been betrayed too many times to trust outsiders. But Edgewood has betrayed itself, too. Turned inward, the district's fighting spirit has, at times, become corrosive.
In 2001, Sauceda shocked the community when he left after nine months. Luis Gonzalez's leadership style clashed with the board's majority and the union representing school workers such as janitors. He left in 2003 after 21/2 years.
"People come here with the attitude that they know what's best for us," said Demetrio Rodriguez, for whom the 1968 school equity lawsuit is named. "Every time we get a new superintendent, they bring their compadres. They really think that we are a bunch of Mexicans who don't know any better."
The near-constant leadership changes have hampered progress, even those who believe strongly in Edgewood's potential say.
"It was horrible," administrator Bononcini said of the revolving door of superintendents. "It is disheartening when they come and change the rules on us."
After Gonzalez's departure, trustees decided it was time for stability. A divided board selected Bocanegra — its first homegrown superintendent — to lead the district 38 years after he graduated from Edgewood High School.
"We needed someone who knew the district, but we also needed someone to unite the district," board President Ramiro Nava said.
That decision left some school board members bitter.
"I have nothing against Bocanegra," said Jesus Calvillo, who resigned in protest in 2003. "But you don't place a man who is a freshman in curanderísmo (witch-doctor medicine) to cure cancer."
That year, hoping to mend their turbulent relationships, trustees traveled 45 miles to the Flying L Guest Ranch, a Hill Country resort, where they spent three days with a facilitator named Mary Rauch.
The final bill was $8,449 — $2,699 for the meals, entertainment and lodging package in addition to the fee for a facilitator, according to a bill provided by the district.
The district paid Rauch, of Mary Rauch Communications, $5,750. Rauch, whose Web page describes her as a professional communicator who has taught communication skills, writing and public speaking for 22 years, was hired two months later to conduct a team-building session for the superintendent's cabinet.
The final tab for that session was $2,500.
Trustee Jesse Alcalá said board members, who were known for fistfights behind closed doors, enjoyed a short honeymoon period after the retreat.
"It worked out for a while," Alcalá said.
But critics question why the district spent thousands on a resort and consultant.
"Are we really underfunded or are we crying wolf?" longtime resident Teri Kilmer asked. "We are spending money that should be going to educate our children."
Fewer students, schools
Fifth-grade teacher Debbi Verstuyft uses her creativity to give hands-on science lessons at Hoelscher Elementary School. Like most older schools, her elementary doesn't have a science lab and her classroom doesn't have a sink.
"We are lucky that we have the bathroom across the hall," she said. "It is a challenge and we have missed some things, but we've found ways to improvise."
Built in 1961, Hoelscher can't meet the demands of 473 students, not to mention the added pressure that a new state-mandated science test for fifth-graders has put on teachers and kids.
Some classrooms are too warm, others too cold. Pre-kindergarten and kindergarten students — about 110 of them — share a small bathroom down the hall.
Computers sit crammed next to each other, and wire dangles from the desks in the school's computer laboratory. When the room gets too warm, the computers crash, said Pam Reece, Hoelscher's principal.
Next year, Hoelscher will close and most students will transfer to newly renovated Roosevelt Elementary, scheduled to open in the fall with Reece as principal.
It's a sign of Edgewood's family spirit that the thought of losing the aging school fills many with sadness. In this district, it is not uncommon for three or four generations to attend the same schools.
"It's pretty sad because I like this school," said James Ventura, a fifth-grader and third-generation student.
But dwindling enrollment and a $3.6 million budget shortfall have forced tough decisions. In December, officials announced they would shutter Hoelscher, H.K. Williams, Emma Frey and Burleson elementary schools, sparking outrage and a petition drive among parents asking the board to reconsider.
Anger was exacerbated by a $56.6 million bond package trustees placed before voters last June. The money was going to pay to tear down and rebuild two aging schools and make other improvements. As they campaigned for the bond, board members said nothing about a plan to shutter schools.
Edgewood voters approved the bond only to learn later that four schools would close for good, intensifying the feeling of betrayal.
"We understand that there's been a decline in enrollment and that we are a poor district," said Rudy Lara, whose children attend L.B. Johnson Elementary School. "I don't think people are against new schools, but they can't justify closing four schools at the same time."
Those who support the school consolidations have pleaded with parents to face facts: Edgewood is shrinking.
"People said that we deceived them, but we've known this for a long time," Nava, the board president, said, dismissing opponents' argument that closing schools means shutting down communities. "I said we are making it bigger by consolidating our schools."
Whatever their concerns, parents are slowly coping with the changes, said Frances Madrigal, a parent facilitator at Hoelscher.
"Parents are starting to also understand that this is a reality and they are encouraging their kids."
Little jewel
Edgewood's many boosters, among them ninth-graders Nicolette Muñiz and Sarah Ríos, like to show off the Edgewood Academy of Communications and Fine Arts.
"We are so blessed to have this equipment on this side of town," Muñiz said as she escorted a visitor through television and radio studios.
Opened in 1998 and intended to one day be a magnet, the school boasts a state-of-the-art building and courses in dance, sculpture and music for the seventh-through 12th-graders who attend. Last year, the academy received three gold performance awards from the TEA for attendance, advanced academic courses and writing.
District officials converted Edgewood High School, which has suffered from declining enrollment, into the academy. The decision to close the old high school angered residents who felt loyal to it.
The $13.6 million face-lift included an auditorium that was closed several years ago because of problems with leaks and mold. Newly elected board members also rejected a plan that had been carefully crafted by a committee to open the academy to district high school students first and then, after two years, to students throughout San Antonio.
Today, the school, which has a 700-student capacity, remains just over half-full and still is open only to students in Edgewood.
"We had a beautiful plan," former board member Morales said, but it never was carried out.
The board painted the academy red and white — Edgewood High's colors — and restored the old high school's emblem.
When the academy opened, no dedication ceremony took place.
Catching up?
Edgewood educators say equity funding has made a clear and positive impact on their district. They point to last year's improved TAKS scores and an increased number of elementary schools winning the state's exemplary and recognized ratings in recent years as proof.
But the challenges never seem to stop coming.
"Equity has helped tremendously," retired teacher Diana Herrera said. "But every time we make some strides, the government comes and throws another hurdle at us."
Jimmy Vasquez, superintendent when the equity lawsuit started, has seen Edgewood through its journey from poster child for school equity to a shrinking urban district fighting demons both internal and external.
A staunch advocate for Edgewood's students, Vasquez taught math and government and was a vice principal and principal at Kennedy. He rose through the administration ranks and was named superintendent in 1978. He left the district in 1991 and is now executive director of the Region 19 Education Service Center in El Paso.
"Every year it was a battle to survive," he says.
It still is.
"Edgewood is not a community that ignores education, but they have to overcome decades of racism and neglect," Vasquez says. "How can you undo 100 years of neglect and underfunding? We had a flawed and unfair system that denied the most basic right to colored children and this is a deep, deep wound that would take time to overcome."
Web Posted: 02/27/2005 12:00 AM CST
Mc Nelly Torres
Express-News Staff Writer
Every time a new superintendent is hired to lead the Edgewood School District, Mary Lee Reyna makes a lunch date.
More coverage
Spreadsheet: Area school district expenditures
Slide show: Edgewood is Shrinking
The retired Edgewood teacher and longtime resident is a player in this tightknit community, and the gesture is a chance to get acquainted.
Since 1992, Reyna has laid down the law for four superintendents — Dolores Muñoz (lasted 8 years), Noe Sauceda (lasted 9 months), Luis Gonzalez (gone after 21/2 years) and Richard Bocanegra, who took over in 2003.
Edgewood, Reyna says, is like an extended familia. Its 16 square miles contain few secrets, and residents treat outsiders with a skeptical eye.
"I told both Sauceda and Gonzalez, don't underestimate the power of the people of Edgewood," Reyna says. "You don't come to Edgewood and to my house and tell me what's good for me."
That fighting spirit has made Edgewood ground zero for the ongoing debate over how to provide high-quality public education to Texas students, rich and poor.
The fight began in 1968, when 400 students at Edgewood High School marched to the administration office demanding better supplies and qualified teachers. That year, Edgewood parents filed Rodriguez vs. San Antonio (School District) in federal court, setting off decades of legal battles.
They turned to the courts again in 1984, scoring a victory when a Texas state judge ruled the school finance system unconstitutional.
The remedy legislators crafted — dubbed Robin Hood — requires 134 property-rich school districts, including Alamo Heights, to share their wealth with the rest of the state's districts, Edgewood among them.
The district's per-pupil spending last year was $7,891, compared with the state average of $9,948.
There's little doubt that Robin Hood has helped Edgewood. The district has seen a $700 million infusion of state money in the past decade, along with a healthy dose of federal money. Total revenue per student was $8,729 last year, compared with $4,315 in 1994, according to the Texas Education Agency.
The money brought progress in the 1990s; more certified teachers appeared in classrooms, new programs were implemented and schools upgraded.
But Edgewood continues to suffer from a divided board, near-constant changes in leadership, parent distrust and a host of problems common to historically poor schools.
As the overall population of the district has aged and dwindled, enrollment also has declined, setting off a round of controversial school closings and consolidations. Student performance, though improving, continues to lag.
Legislators are working to meet a court-mandated Oct. 1 deadline to once again design a better way to fund the state's poorest schools. As they debate, the San Antonio Express-News visits the district where it all began and asks: Can equity solve Edgewood's problems?
Progress slow
Bad news, no stranger to the Edgewood schools, remains in abundance.
Last year, the district's two high schools — Memorial and Kennedy — landed on the list of schools labeled "needs improvement," along with 15 other Bexar County schools in seven districts.
The federal government applies that label to schools that fail to make sufficient progress for two consecutive years as required by President Bush's public school overhaul.
Over the past decade, Edgewood's enrollment dipped from 14,547 to 12,617, a 13 percent decline that has translated into a loss of millions in state funding.
At the same time, school choice proponents have swooped in with voucher programs such as the CEO Foundation's Horizon program, created in 1998. The program targets the Edgewood district and so far has given 5,414 students up to $4,700 each to attend a private school at one time or another.
Last year, 94 percent of Edgewood students qualified for free or reduced lunch. The district's enrollment is 97 percent Hispanic.
"Many of my students don't have the luxury of being full-time students," said Daniel Piña, who teaches social studies and economics at his alma mater, Kennedy High School. "Many of them work to help their parents and others work because they are parents themselves."
Linda Bononcini, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, echoes Piña's lament.
"In Edgewood, you can't just teach, you have to do so much more," she said. "Our students have developmental, financial and social challenges."
Improvement has come, but not overnight.
Last week, the Texas Education Agency notified Edgewood that it had won its appeal of the "needs improvement" designation. The victory removes Kennedy and Memorial from the list and from the risk of sanctions under the No Child Left Behind federal school reform law. Thirteen of the other 15 Bexar County districts on the list also won their appeals.
Ten years ago, 36 percent of Edgewood's 10th-graders could pass the math portion of the Texas Assessment of Academic Skills, while 57 percent of third-graders passed the reading and math portion of the test, according to the Texas Education Agency.
Last year, 41 percent of 10th-graders passed the math portion of the Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills, the more rigorous required exam adopted two years ago. Eighty-one percent of third-graders passed both the math and reading portions of the test.
And after years of being rated "acceptable" — essentially, average — under the state's system, Edgewood won "recognized" status in 1999, second only to "exemplary" in the rankings.
Muñoz, the superintendent during that time, didn't stay around to enjoy her success. Bruised by fights with a newly elected school board majority, she left in 1999, waving goodbye to the two years left on her contract.
She took a job as superintendent of Point Isabel schools in Port Isabel, and now is retired.
"Muñoz had a vision and a plan," said Lucy Hall, a retired teacher and administrator.
Tina Morales, a former board member, said Muñoz's only weakness was that she was fair. "And politics, being the animal that it is, pushed her out."
Extended familia
Edgewood parents and educators say they have been betrayed too many times to trust outsiders. But Edgewood has betrayed itself, too. Turned inward, the district's fighting spirit has, at times, become corrosive.
In 2001, Sauceda shocked the community when he left after nine months. Luis Gonzalez's leadership style clashed with the board's majority and the union representing school workers such as janitors. He left in 2003 after 21/2 years.
"People come here with the attitude that they know what's best for us," said Demetrio Rodriguez, for whom the 1968 school equity lawsuit is named. "Every time we get a new superintendent, they bring their compadres. They really think that we are a bunch of Mexicans who don't know any better."
The near-constant leadership changes have hampered progress, even those who believe strongly in Edgewood's potential say.
"It was horrible," administrator Bononcini said of the revolving door of superintendents. "It is disheartening when they come and change the rules on us."
After Gonzalez's departure, trustees decided it was time for stability. A divided board selected Bocanegra — its first homegrown superintendent — to lead the district 38 years after he graduated from Edgewood High School.
"We needed someone who knew the district, but we also needed someone to unite the district," board President Ramiro Nava said.
That decision left some school board members bitter.
"I have nothing against Bocanegra," said Jesus Calvillo, who resigned in protest in 2003. "But you don't place a man who is a freshman in curanderísmo (witch-doctor medicine) to cure cancer."
That year, hoping to mend their turbulent relationships, trustees traveled 45 miles to the Flying L Guest Ranch, a Hill Country resort, where they spent three days with a facilitator named Mary Rauch.
The final bill was $8,449 — $2,699 for the meals, entertainment and lodging package in addition to the fee for a facilitator, according to a bill provided by the district.
The district paid Rauch, of Mary Rauch Communications, $5,750. Rauch, whose Web page describes her as a professional communicator who has taught communication skills, writing and public speaking for 22 years, was hired two months later to conduct a team-building session for the superintendent's cabinet.
The final tab for that session was $2,500.
Trustee Jesse Alcalá said board members, who were known for fistfights behind closed doors, enjoyed a short honeymoon period after the retreat.
"It worked out for a while," Alcalá said.
But critics question why the district spent thousands on a resort and consultant.
"Are we really underfunded or are we crying wolf?" longtime resident Teri Kilmer asked. "We are spending money that should be going to educate our children."
Fewer students, schools
Fifth-grade teacher Debbi Verstuyft uses her creativity to give hands-on science lessons at Hoelscher Elementary School. Like most older schools, her elementary doesn't have a science lab and her classroom doesn't have a sink.
"We are lucky that we have the bathroom across the hall," she said. "It is a challenge and we have missed some things, but we've found ways to improvise."
Built in 1961, Hoelscher can't meet the demands of 473 students, not to mention the added pressure that a new state-mandated science test for fifth-graders has put on teachers and kids.
Some classrooms are too warm, others too cold. Pre-kindergarten and kindergarten students — about 110 of them — share a small bathroom down the hall.
Computers sit crammed next to each other, and wire dangles from the desks in the school's computer laboratory. When the room gets too warm, the computers crash, said Pam Reece, Hoelscher's principal.
Next year, Hoelscher will close and most students will transfer to newly renovated Roosevelt Elementary, scheduled to open in the fall with Reece as principal.
It's a sign of Edgewood's family spirit that the thought of losing the aging school fills many with sadness. In this district, it is not uncommon for three or four generations to attend the same schools.
"It's pretty sad because I like this school," said James Ventura, a fifth-grader and third-generation student.
But dwindling enrollment and a $3.6 million budget shortfall have forced tough decisions. In December, officials announced they would shutter Hoelscher, H.K. Williams, Emma Frey and Burleson elementary schools, sparking outrage and a petition drive among parents asking the board to reconsider.
Anger was exacerbated by a $56.6 million bond package trustees placed before voters last June. The money was going to pay to tear down and rebuild two aging schools and make other improvements. As they campaigned for the bond, board members said nothing about a plan to shutter schools.
Edgewood voters approved the bond only to learn later that four schools would close for good, intensifying the feeling of betrayal.
"We understand that there's been a decline in enrollment and that we are a poor district," said Rudy Lara, whose children attend L.B. Johnson Elementary School. "I don't think people are against new schools, but they can't justify closing four schools at the same time."
Those who support the school consolidations have pleaded with parents to face facts: Edgewood is shrinking.
"People said that we deceived them, but we've known this for a long time," Nava, the board president, said, dismissing opponents' argument that closing schools means shutting down communities. "I said we are making it bigger by consolidating our schools."
Whatever their concerns, parents are slowly coping with the changes, said Frances Madrigal, a parent facilitator at Hoelscher.
"Parents are starting to also understand that this is a reality and they are encouraging their kids."
Little jewel
Edgewood's many boosters, among them ninth-graders Nicolette Muñiz and Sarah Ríos, like to show off the Edgewood Academy of Communications and Fine Arts.
"We are so blessed to have this equipment on this side of town," Muñiz said as she escorted a visitor through television and radio studios.
Opened in 1998 and intended to one day be a magnet, the school boasts a state-of-the-art building and courses in dance, sculpture and music for the seventh-through 12th-graders who attend. Last year, the academy received three gold performance awards from the TEA for attendance, advanced academic courses and writing.
District officials converted Edgewood High School, which has suffered from declining enrollment, into the academy. The decision to close the old high school angered residents who felt loyal to it.
The $13.6 million face-lift included an auditorium that was closed several years ago because of problems with leaks and mold. Newly elected board members also rejected a plan that had been carefully crafted by a committee to open the academy to district high school students first and then, after two years, to students throughout San Antonio.
Today, the school, which has a 700-student capacity, remains just over half-full and still is open only to students in Edgewood.
"We had a beautiful plan," former board member Morales said, but it never was carried out.
The board painted the academy red and white — Edgewood High's colors — and restored the old high school's emblem.
When the academy opened, no dedication ceremony took place.
Catching up?
Edgewood educators say equity funding has made a clear and positive impact on their district. They point to last year's improved TAKS scores and an increased number of elementary schools winning the state's exemplary and recognized ratings in recent years as proof.
But the challenges never seem to stop coming.
"Equity has helped tremendously," retired teacher Diana Herrera said. "But every time we make some strides, the government comes and throws another hurdle at us."
Jimmy Vasquez, superintendent when the equity lawsuit started, has seen Edgewood through its journey from poster child for school equity to a shrinking urban district fighting demons both internal and external.
A staunch advocate for Edgewood's students, Vasquez taught math and government and was a vice principal and principal at Kennedy. He rose through the administration ranks and was named superintendent in 1978. He left the district in 1991 and is now executive director of the Region 19 Education Service Center in El Paso.
"Every year it was a battle to survive," he says.
It still is.
"Edgewood is not a community that ignores education, but they have to overcome decades of racism and neglect," Vasquez says. "How can you undo 100 years of neglect and underfunding? We had a flawed and unfair system that denied the most basic right to colored children and this is a deep, deep wound that would take time to overcome."