"Our schools need this tax support"
Reposted here with the permission of The Davis Enterprise - http://www.davisenterprise.com/opinion/opinion-columns/our-schools-need-this-tax-support/
As a parent of two Davis elementary students, I strongly support Measure C.
My husband and I both volunteer in my kids' first- and third-grade classes at North Davis Elementary. It gives us an up-close look at what is going on in our school.
The class, 25 children strong, seems really full. It's difficult to imagine the size ballooning up to 30 kids per class for next year, which is where it will go if Measure C fails.
Two children have "severe emotional problems." They are sweet kids with problems ranging from autism to ADD/ADHD to psychological issues. They can be loud and disrupt the class with their behavior. I intercept one first-grade boy who threatens to hurl a bean bag chair at a little girl.
Two students enter school with zero English skills. They are children of visiting faculty at UC Davis. They come from a range of countries, including France, Brazil, China and South Korea. The kids look scared; we volunteers bustle around to make them feel welcome and get them up and running with their language skills. I write out the Pledge of Allegiance for two boys to say with the class.'
At least seven kids are English learners. English is not their native language; in fact, at least 50 different languages are spoken in the homes of our North Davis Elementary families.
"My friend talks all the time!" my first-grader tells me of one little boy. "He never talked in kindergarten; I guess he was just shy."
I realize the little boy spoke no English last year; he sat in silence for almost a year until his spoken skills caught up.
These are the children in my kids' classes. Our local public school catches them all, integrates them and prepares them for jobs in our society. One-quarter of the kids are on the free and reduced-price lunch program. That number shocks me somehow, since Davis seems like such a wealthy community.
Almost one-third of the kids get "pull-outs." These are at-risk kids who need extra attention with our reading specialists. They are pulled out during the day for extra tutoring in reading. Children who fall behind in reading during grade school are at high risk for long-term educational failure; our school is determined not to let them fail.
Some of the kids pulled out come from non-English-speaking families, others from lower-income parents and some are upper-income but just need more attention.
I can't imagine how these kids will succeed in school if Measure C fails since our reading specialists are paid from that pot of money. The pace of the class feels slow when we have too many poor readers since the teacher must teach to the middle or lower-level children. The higher-achieving children are stuck covering ground they already know. Everyone loses without the reading specialists.
As a physician and former science major, it is the loss of the elementary science teachers if Measure C fails that bothers me the most. Science doesn't feel like a "frill" that we should eliminate from our curriculum. With nations like Germany, China, Singapore, India, and the like heavily investing in a technology-based economy, how can we afford to delete science from our grade schools?
At North Davis, the K-3 students get science teaching occasionally. They receive it daily in the fourth through sixth grades. Science is a mandated topic on the almighty yearly STAR achievement tests.
We are lucky at North Davis since our science teachers are in the 10 percent nationally of elementary science teachers who actually have specialized training in teaching science. They are like a magical Mary Poppins, unlocking the mysteries of science and sharing their excitement. Science integrates basic skills like math and reading, again reinforcing the fundamentals.
My third-grader participates in a weekly, after-school Nature Bowl organized by one of the science teachers. Last week, she got a volunteer from the California Raptor Center at UC Davis to visit the kids with an injured barn owl and hawk. This week, my son dissected owl pellets and learned what owls eat. (I thought they ate grass but apparently they eat other animals.) He learns about ecology, nature conservation, and the ecosystem through the Nature Bowl.
All of that will be gone along with the science teacher if Measure C fails. If we do not teach our children in our grade schools about protecting the environment, how can we expect them to grow up as adults to be good stewards of the Earth and preserve our natural resources?
Like you, I'm tired of fundraising and paying taxes and having every imaginable group ask me for money. The continued weak economic situation has forced our schools into a bare-bones survival mode. Our PTA participates in an auction, golf tournament and recycles garbage, all to make a buck for the school.
Please join me in voting yes on Measure C. The children of Davis need your support.
— Kathy Glatter, M.D., is a Davis resident, a cardiologist at Woodland Healthcare and the mother of two boys.
