Socal Mom by Donna Schwartz Mills

One Drama Ends, Another Begins

(Are you hitting the road this summer? Don't leave home without entering SoCal Mom's Summer Travel Getaway Contest...)

I just got back from dropping Megan off for her last day of school.

Boy, do I feel relieved.

For someone with an aversion to drama, I cannot seem to escape it. In previous years (when I was embroiled in all the politics of her elementary school PTA), this day meant getting a three-month break from petty arguments over fundraising and organizing and brouhahas other people made over how the teachers were teaching. (I was always very happy with my daughter's teachers, which I suppose makes me lucky. We just didn't perceive any problems for us there.)

I've managed to avoid all of that since she started middle school (mainly by steering as far away as possible from the PTA). The only school-related drama this year was our struggle with the homework load, which dissipated after I had my conference with Megan's teachers. Next year, I resolve to be more pro-active and will set up a teacher conference earlier in the semester.

But just as I'm feeling good about how easy a school year we had, I am finding it harder and harder to avoid craziness at Megan's gym.

I guess that makes sense: Running for a position on the gym's board was a stupid move. I don't know; I had this weird idea that by working on the inside, I could affect improvements to the problems I saw.

It hasn't worked out that way.

If anything, I now have too much information. I was much happier living in trusting ignorance. Plus, as a board member, I am now a target for any gym parent who wants to see conspiracies in how his/her child is being treated (and there are lots of gym parents who would rather blame gym politics for a child's poor score than objectively evaluate the child's performance).

The result is that I have limited my time watching my daughter at gym, because I do not want to be accosted by parents who are angry about coaches, safety, equipment, judging, the cleaning crew, the adults who come in at night for workouts, the food at the snack bar, other parents, other kids, uniforms, meets, etc., etc., etc.

But we live in an age when you can run, but you cannot hide -- especially if people have your email address. Over the weekend, I found myself in the center of yet another gym drama, thanks to a message that was sent to all the parents of Megan's team, asserting that the girls are not being protected well enough while they learn new tricks on the balance beam. I might also add that the parent who sent this email has been at the center of nearly every gym controversy that has sprung up over the last three years.

I replied to all that I, for one, was not unhappy and did not see any reason to be alarmed by the way the girls are being coached. But I am not an expert on gymnastics coaching, and in case there really was an issue that had to be explored (and this parent raised safety issues), I felt this should be on the record, so I cc'd the president of the Board.

That's when all hell broke loose.

The parent who started the email chain retorted back (to all - except the Board president) that I had no right to put what was essentially a private message onto the agenda of the gym's management. When I pointed out that as a board member, it was actually my duty to alert the board when a question has been raised about our kids' safety, I received a particularly nasty and accusatory email back, asking me if I wanted to take responsibility from any flack the child might receive from the head coach.

I was upset. I knew in my heart I had done the right thing, but I knew I had gone about it in a passive-aggressive way, which I'm afraid is how I learned to survive a childhood that was fraught with all kinds of unneccessary drama. I am not capable of being confrontational. But at least, I felt I'd done something right by being transparent. Which means that I ended up being confronted.

The whole thing made me angry, but since I don't do anger well, I internalized it until it formed a knot in my stomach. I wanted to throw up. Instead, I drove Megan to gym and (confident that the parent in question would not be there, because they always skip the Saturday trainings - yes, I am a coward) talked it out with a mom I knew would be sympathetic to me.

But the stomach ache did not dissipate until another parent sent an email to the group in support of my action, agreeing with what I'd said -- that as a member of the gym board, I was duty-bound to report the allegations... and pointing out that a group email to six people is NOT a private conversation. If you don't want something to get out, you don't send it by email...

Monday rolled around and I dropped Megan off at gym and skedaddled to the nearest Starbucks, because I did not want to run into the parent who had sent the email. (Coward, remember?) I need not have bothered, because they did not show up at all.

I returned to gym about 15 minutes before Megan's workout had ended. The girls were finishing up with conditioning exercises. Megan was doing handstands on the beam... and you can guess what happened...

...she lost her grip on her dismount and kicked her foot under the beam - really hard...

... and was injured. The pain was so bad that I suspected she'd broken her toe.

And I could not help but think of the email brouhaha about safety on the beam.

Of course, that email was not about routine dismounts that the girls have done for years. And, as far as possible gymnastics injuries go, a broken toe is NOTHING. Gymnastics can be a dangerous sport. Megan's friends have broken wrists, arms, feet... there have been back injuries, and hip displacements.

But guess what? Kids get hurt playing sports. Hell, I once broke my toe by bumping into a cabinet in my bedroom. This is our first injury after four years of competition -- I figured we were ahead of the game.

And, as it turned out, her toe wasn't broken- just badly bruised. So we are WAY ahead of the game.

Too bad I can't say the same about gym drama. Our June board meeting is tonight...

Dreams of a Mother

Happy Mother's Day to all my readers (and their mothers)!

I'm excited, because this afternoon we're going to go on our annual Mother's Day visit to L.A.'s Farmer's Market, where we will shop, watch the pretty people, and enjoy French food and wine at Monsieur Marcel's lovely little outdoor cafe. And I get to be a surrogate mom to my beautiful 20-year-old niece, who isn't able to spend the day with my sister up in Sacramento.

For those of you who came here looking for something interesting to read, I'm going to have to direct you over to the MOMocrats, where we are celebrating the day with a special meme: Dreams of a Mother:

Each of the MOMocrats is writing about our own dreams as mothers and we encourage all of you to join us over the next week.  In true MOMocrats style, each MOMocrat will be sharing a political or social issue close to her heart.  We'd love it if you did too, but your own special non-political dreams are important as well.  We want the world to hear them.

I'd like to encourage you to blog about your own dreams for the world and your children and then leave a comment with your link on this post. I can't wait to read what you all have to say!

(And after you visit MOMocrats, you can read my latest post over at 50-Something Moms Blog.)

Parent-Teacher Conference: The Recap

First of all, I want to thank all my friends and Twitter peeps who generously offered me such great advice on preparing for this conference.

I spent much of yesterday plowing through The Case Against Homework. That's what I was doing around 2:30, parked across the street from my daughter's school (anticipating her 3:05 p.m. dismissal), when a funny thing happened: my Blackberry buzzed with a comment from Sara Bennett, one of the book's authors. She wanted to thank me for linking to her StopHomework site in this post. So I dashed off a quick email reply, telling her I was reading her book AT THAT VERY MOMENT to prepare for the conference this morning.

And do you know what she did? She emailed me back -- with suggestions and links to documentation that could help me in our meeting today.

Don't you just love the InterWeb?

The facts and figures in Sara's book (co-written with Nancy Kalish) are staggering, especially the chapter linking our children's huge homework load (up 51% since 1980) to obesity (because kids who spend three or four hours a night doing homework are expending the same energy as kids watching TV for that period -- and chances are, it's not the TV that is keeping your kids sitting still every evening), which touts the educational benefits for physically active kids. A sampling (paraphrased from the book):

Homework is the number one reason overweight kids say they have no time to exercise.

A 2004 study of middle schoolers published in the Journal of Orthopedics reported that some subjects were carrying backpacks that equaled 43 percent of their body weight... and that 64% of the kids suffered from back pain.

A child's brain can't handle multitasking until late teens or early 20s. So why do we make them juggle assignments from multiple classes each evening?

Even more eye-opening were the stats correlating physical activity and brain development in children:

A huge 2002 California of Education study found that students who scored higher on state physical fitness tests ALSO scored higher on stadardized reading and math tests.

The journal Adolescence published a study in 2001 which found that high school students who exercised achieved better grades than those who didn't, plus they were less depressed, had less drug use and enjoyed better relationships with their parents.

Here's my favorite:

Decreasing time spent on academics so that physical activity could be increased had no negative effects on academic achievement, according to a CDC review.

So what did I do after reading the book (which includes practical strategies and resources for changing the homework culture in a school and/or school district), the author's emailed advice, and the wise words of my friends?

I came to the conclusion that coming into this meeting all fired up about how outrageous the homework load is would be of little help. That is a fight that needs more than 24 hours preparation, and would be more effective done by a coalition of parents.

This meeting had to be about my daughter, her two teachers (who team-teach four academic subjects plus one elective) and my husband and me. We needed to establish a relationship, let them know we appreciate them, and ask them to be our partners in helping Megan feel less stressed about her school work. If we went in all pissed off and demanding, we would get nowhere. They are veteran teachers, and I think they are good teachers.

We laid out the problem. We all agreed that Megan has limited time to do the work. We all could see that something has to give. No solutions there.

But we were successful in one area: Just by looking at her scores, these teachers were unaware that our daughter even HAS a problem. "She's at the top of the class," one of them said. "She has very good grades," the other one concurred.

Her teachers now know the price our daughter pays for those good grades and how hard she pushes herself. "You need to help her to learn how to step back and relax a little," one of the teachers advised us. "If she expects to be perfect in everything all the time, that could cause her problems later on."

Bingo. He's absolutely right. We need to work on this. And perhaps, knowing this about her, they will take that into account? One can hope.

Other little successes: They told us if she had to turn something in late once in a while, we could write them a note explaining. (I didn't follow up to ask if she would then receive a 0 on it, which is what has been happening and is then factored into her grade. If that does happen, Sara Bennett emailed me the link to an interesting article. And now that I've begun a relationship with the teacher, I might feel more comfortable sending that link to her.)

Another little success: They LOVED the idea of trying to get PE waived. After all, a gymnast training 16 hours a week doesn't need another hour a day of PE. She needs a study hall. The teachers know of kids who successfully petitioned for this accommodation in the past. But they were unaware of a new state law (or is it a District policy? I honestly don't know!) that not only makes this harder to do, but undesirable, because if you are successful in getting a PE waiver, the student must replace it with another course for CREDIT. And this defeats the purpose.

At any rate, that's my next mini-battle. The teachers suggested that I skip talking to the Principal and go directly to our local District (LAUSD is so huge that it's divided into eight distinct local districts!). I've asked Megan's coach to give us a copy of a letter he's used successfully in the past, describing why taking PE on top of their gymnastics training could actually harm kids. I've set up Megan's annual pediatric checkup on Tuesday, and I'm hoping to get her doctor to write us another letter. Then, I call the District.

As for the continuing issue of homework: The little cluster of moms I hang with each afternoon outside the school all have their own gripes. I'm laying the groundwork now for the bigger fight to come.

I Scheduled a Conference -- NOW What?

I desperately need to get back to the PTA project, but I'm having some trouble focusing on it, for a couple of reasons.

First: After hovering around the 47-48-49 pound mark for a couple of weeks, I finally crossed over.

As of today’s weigh-in, it’s official: I have lost over 50 pounds.

I find this mind-boggling. I mean, that’s a significant amount of weight. It’s kind of like giving birth to an 8-year-old child.

But I don't feel particularly celebratory. That's because just prior to my weigh-in, my daughter and I had another homework-related drama.

Her English teacher assigned her a project, which was originally due last Friday. It was a relief when the deadline was extended to tomorrow. Great, right? Now she had the weekend to get it done.

Of course, her Saturdays are kind of shot, because she trains from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Still, she had Sunday to work on it. I even told her she could skip Hebrew school.

Sunday morning came, and she wanted to relax and watch a little TV. I reminded her of the project. She promised she would do it.

But then, she wanted to try out the new Endless Ocean game that arrived last week for our Wii. Again, I reminded her of the project. She promised she would do it.

After lunch, she went to her room to work on the project.

And she fell asleep. She took a two-hour nap on Sunday afternoon, because she was tired.

You have to remember that this is a kid who trains from 4:00 to 8:00 Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, plus goes to Hebrew school from 4:00 to 6:30 on Thursdays (and 10:30 to 1:00 on most Sundays).

By the time we drive home and have dinner, there isn't a lot of time for homework. Most of her teammates stay up until 10 or 11 to do theirs, but my daughter is like me in that her brain shuts down at night. We're both a lot fresher in the moning. So on most school days, she spends her breaks trying to get a head start and then gets up around 5:00 a.m. to finish her assignments.

She never started the project. She concluded that she would be able to get it done today. (Tuesdays are the one day of the week when she doesn't have to do anything after school. It is also the day that school ends an hour early, so she gets a lot more time. Also, her teachers have been assigning very light work on Tuesdays.)

I reminded her that this was a gamble. She felt confident about taking it.

I know. It's a horrible schedule. When she was little, I was considered the overprotective mom, because I was the only one in our group that deliberately limited her child's extracurricular activities to one afterschool class per week -- because I didn't want her to get overextended.

Then we tried gymnastics, and the rest is history.

It started out as one hour per week, then 90 minutes per week, then two 2-hour classes per week. And then, she was selected to be on the pre-team. It snuck up on me. And yes, I could have said no, but what would you do if you discovered that your child had a real talent for something -- and the passion to pursue it? Would you discourage it? Or would you vow to give her as much support as she needed to take it as far as she wanted to go?

When she was in elementary school, it was easy. I had a relationship with her teachers, who also had more time to get to know her. They knew her to be a hard worker and a perfectionist (good qualities in a gymnast). They would cut her a little slack, either by giving us the weeks' assignments ahead of time so we could manage her time, or by allowing her to turn them in late if she was a little bit behind.

Middle school is a whole different animal. Her teachers (who I like and respect and think are really good teachers) do not tolerate late assignments. It doesn't matter how she does them, she gets a 0 for the assignment if it's turned in late. In one of her classes, they gave her TWO textbooks, and she once completed an assignment from the WRONG book. She got a 0. And a grade that might have been an A was marked down to a B, with a remark on her report card that she has trouble completing her homework.

So when she took that nap on Sunday, I didn't really want to disturb her. She was obviously tired. She NEEDED to sleep more than she needed to work on the project.

Yesterday, she reported that her homework load "wasn't bad." She awoke at 5:00 a.m. and finished at 6:15. And then, she crawled back into bed. "I'm tired," she sighed.

I tried to rouse her at 6:45. Then again at 7:00. I cajoled her. I stuck the pet cats on her. I told her sternly that she needed to get up NOW or we would be late.

I asked her if she was feeling sick. (No, just tired.)

At 7:15, I lost my temper and started to scream, GET OUT OF BED, NOW!!!

Which made her cry. Which made me feel terrible. I took her in my arms and apologized for yelling at her. She continued to cry.

"The project is due tomorrow."

Uh, yeah. We know that.

"There's a lot more work than I thought. I need to write pages and pages of definitions."

I was frustrated now. This was one of the few instances when she was given ample time to do a project. The fact that she's not ready is her fault. I also don't think it's that big a deal. If she turns it in late, or it's not perfect, what's the worst thing that could happen?

"I'll get a yellow slip!" she cried. OK. So what does that mean?

It means she gets a 0 for the project. The next time she doesn't turn something in, she gets a blue slip. The time after that, she gets paper pick-up duty and a trip to the school office.

"I only have a B in that class. If I don't turn this in, I'll have a C," she cried.

I told her that if she got a C because of this one missed assignment, I wouldn't be upset with her. I told her that her middle school grades didn't really count; that high school is the one we need to worry about. She just shook her little tear-stained head.

"I can't get a C," she cried.

Now my temporary reasonableness turned back to frustration. We can't keep having this conversation, I told her. Something has to give, I said. We either quit gymnastics (the look of horror on her face told me that this wasn't an option) or look into a charter school that might be willing to allow her a study period instead of her unneccessary PE class. This is something many people have told me is a possibility at a charter -- but again, she shook her head. She has friends at this school and overall, is happy there.

Or we homeschool, I told her. That last one is a bluff. My husband and daughter are both adamant against it, even though I see it as the only way we can have our gymnastics cake and eat it, too.

Then, I'm going to have to have a conference with your teachers, I told her. This is something I've talked about for a long time, but she keeps begging me NOT to schedule one. Besides, I wanted to finish reading the Stop Homework book I ordered a couple of weeks ago, so I might have some good strategies to use with them. "They'll make me come in for it," she cried. "I don't want to be there when you talk to them."

Well, we have to do something, I sighed.

At 7:30, she got out of bed and ten minutes later, we were out the door. And after I dropped her at school, I made an appointment to conference with her teachers. She only has to be in the conference if I request it.

The conference is Thursday morning, and now that I've scheduled it, I'm at a loss. I'm not a confrontational person. I'm almost as horrified at having to do this as my daughter.

For one thing, I'm not hopeful that it will do much good. We've been with LAUSD for seven years now, and I even worked for them for a couple of years (part time at Megan's old school). It is about as rigid a bureaucracy as they come, and the pressures put on the District by NCLB and state testing standards gives them even less flexibility. I mean, what are they going to say? They will tell me that they have standards, that the school is trying to instill excellence in all their students, and that the real problem is her extracurricular activities. Get rid of those and we have no problem.

If my child had a disability, they would be legally bound to make some accomomodations for her. But instead, my child has a gift for a sport, and the school has no interest in acommodating that. I have been tempted to wheedle our doctor into writing a note stating that as a training gymnast, she shouldn't take PE because running a mile a day on asphalt is doing harm to her joints. I don't want to make light of children who need accommodations, but I dream of getting her an IEP, because dammit, she also has special needs and that might be my only legal way to get them to cut her some slack.

I really am very frustrated. As it is, we've been cutting her workouts short so she can do homework, which means she's been missing training on the event she most needs to work on (bars), which head coach keeps scheduling for her group last. I'm frustrated with him for being as rigid as the school district. I'm frustrated because I see my daughter being so stressed that she doesn't want to go to school. I'm frustrated because I see ways to improve the situation and everyone around me tells me that they shouldn't be considered as options. I'm frustrated because all I get from the other members of my family is complaints about this situation but no help in trying to find a solution.

And now I have to go into this teacher's conference on Thursday morning. I guess I'd better finish that book.

Stop Homework Now

For years, while Megan was attending elementary school, I had a pretty set routine: After dropping her off, I'd immediately stop at the Starbucks around the corner and get a latte. Most days, I'd drive back home and go to work – unless I was stuck on something. Then, I found it helpful to just stay at Starbucks and use the HotSpot there (something about a change of scenery and getting away from the tyranny of nagging household chores, which can be a tempting way to avoid writing).

Of course, working at Starbucks has its own temptations, in the form of all the other moms who do the same thing in the morning. There were plenty of days when I ended up just gabbing with them. Then again, those impromptu kaffeeklatsches often provided new fodder for my blogs, so I like to think of them as research (and therapy).

But my life has been less orderly since we began the middle school chapter of our lives, back in September. For one thing, Megan's magnet school is six miles from home, and there are no nearby coffee joints with wi-fi. Another complication has been the lifestyle changes I began implementing over the summer (and am still trying to make permanent, with varying success). I'm talking about the horrible, restrictive weight loss diet and the clinic I must visit daily for weight counseling, as well as my thrice-weekly sessions at a local gym. I no longer have the luxury of working straight through Megan's 8:00 – 3:00 school day. On top of that, the round trip to any of those destinations and back to my house is about 20 minutes. Three or four of those in the course of a day would mean spending an hour or more just driving.

I try to minimize the driving time by combining these trips. And for two or three days in the course of the week, I simply don't go home, staying in the vicinity of the school/clinic/gym. I'm HotSpotting at Starbucks more than ever now, just not at the one where everybody knows my name.

And so that's where I wrote Tuesday's post, lamenting about the tough start we had this week. And just moments after I finished it, my husband called.

Hubs likes to get to work really early in the morning. That's when he's most productive, because he can work in peace before everyone else arrives at his office. So our alarm goes off at 5:00 and he's kissing me goodbye by 6:00, so we don't actually get to talk until around lunchtime, when he usually calls me (unless he's having a particularly busy day).

The first topic of conversation is usually our daughter.

"I hate that she has to get up so early in the morning," he said.

I hate it, too. But for the time being, I don't see any way out of it. As long as our daughter is involved in a demanding sport like gymnastics, which requires her to train for four hours a day after school and get home after 8:00 p.m., which barely gives her enough time to eat and chill out a little before going to bed, managing her homework is going to be an issue.

I pointed out that all of Megan's teammates are in the same boat, but that most of them just stay up until the homework is done (sometimes at 11:00 p.m., which is way too late for a sixth grader). In this respect, our daughter takes after me: after a certain time of day, our brains are no longer capable of focusing on anything more involved than watching something mindless on television. But after a good night's sleep, we're fresh and energetic and can tackle the work in half the time.

At the end of the phone call, the woman sitting beside me introduced herself. "I'm sorry for listening in on your conversation," she said.

She told me she's a teacher on sabbatical, working on a Master's thesis that will prove that the kind of homework routinely assigned to young children today are beyond the abilities of kids under the age of 14.

She also told me that Mondays are the WORST day of the week to give kids a lot of work, especially the first day after a long winter break. "They need some time to get their minds back in gear," she said, adding that in her classes, she NEVER assigned Monday homework.

We chatted more about the homework issue, and how it's changed so much from when we were young. She said that it's not just anecdotal that kids are loaded down with more work today; it's a fact. It doesn't just get in the way of children's extracurricular activities, the homework load interferes with important family time as well.

She told me that her sister is a retired middle school teacher, and would often assign essays just to meet weekly grading quotas, even though she would end up having little time to actually read them. So the kids would just be graded on whether or not the work was done. "Kids can tell when an assignment is just bulls**t," she said.

And she directed to me to this site, which advocates reducing the ridiculous amount of extra work our kids are being assigned; work which is being proved IS NOT HELPING our kids learn better or more efficiently. Oddly enough, I'd seen it before. Another teacher who stops by here regularly also directed me there.

I immediately ordered Sara Bennett's book, The Case Against Homework: How Homework Is Hurting Our Children and What We Can Do About It. I am looking forward to reading it, because I'm getting tired of how much stress the homework is putting on my daughter and our entire family.

As it's been the last several weeks, the homework load on the subsequent days has been minimal. Although Megan did report to me on Wednesday that she had homework for PE.

P-E.

It was a two-sided sheet with a diagram of the major muscles in the human body. Megan was supposed to label them. Fair enough.

But then she was supposed to COLOR each muscle according to a key on the sheet.

With her limited time, she's expected to do a coloring project?

I don't believe in doing your kids' homework, but I figured this was a time when I could step in and help. I spent a half hour Wednesday night coloring.

Homework Hell

For the last three weeks, my daughter's teachers have picked Mondays as their day to pile on the homework.

Monday is one of the days my girl is supposed to train from 4:00 to 7:30. She is already in the doghouse ith Head Coach for missing a lot due to illness. She went home early Friday night and missed Saturday, too.

But looking at her assignments for the evening (three pages of math, plus English, History and Science) -- we both agreed that even if she showed up for workout today, we should get her home early. Megan decided that 6:30 would be an appropriate time -- allowing her to do most of the training she's supposed to do, and still give her time to get the homework done.

It hasn't turned out that way. Because it was the hardest (and her science/math oriented father is home), she decided to start with the math. She's been working on it for two hours and she's still not finished.

The problem, of course, is that she simply doesn't get it, and no matter how many times her dad has tried to explain it to her, it's not registering. It doesn't help that she's tired.

But now it's after 9:00, she's still trying to finish the math, and she hasn't even started on the rest of it. She's tired, so it's not likely any of this information is going to sink in. She's also being extremely whiny. We've suggested she go to bed and try again in the morning, but she doesn't think she'll have time to finish and she's afraid of walking into class with incomplete assignments. And I don't blame her, because the teachers penalize them a lot for not turning in completed work. I understand that. But at this rate, she is going to be up all night and will have to miss school completely, because she'll be too tired to go.

One of the attractions of this school was that they are "team teaching," and so we parents were told that they would coordinate the homework assignments and tests so that the kids wouldn't be overwhelmed . So Megan only has two teachers for all of these classes -- one teacher alone gave her four of the assignments. WHY??

And why do they pile on the work on Mondays only? Especially when Tuesdays are short days and the kids all have an extra hour to do the work?

Some of the other gym parents and I were talking about this yesterday. I mentioned that I had been worried about this transition to middle school and that I'd seriously considered home schooling Megan -- but both she and my husband basically told me that was a crazy idea.

The other gym parents don't think so. One of them -- who is a teacher -- sees how it would be beneficial. "The reason they have to give so much homework is that most of the time in class is spent working with the 20 kids who AREN'T motivated to learn. There isn't enough time to get all 30 students to do the exercises, so they have to assign it as homework."

Home schooling -- working one on one -- can be much more efficient. My daughter could learn the same lessons in half the time and not have this homework burden.

The teacher sighed. She said her daughters would love to be home schooled, but she won't do it. She has enough trouble getting them to do as she says - she's not confident that she'd be successful teaching them at home. Better to leave that to a third party.

So many of the girls at gym are talented but quit when they get to middle school, and now I know why. They simply cannot keep up with the work while engaging in this demanding sport.

I see the writing on the wall. Megan will probably have to quit, which is OK as long as it's what she wants to do. But I hate the idea of her being forced to give it up before she's ready, because of an inflexible school system that won't allow her to waive Physical Education (which is redundant for her) in favor of a study period.

I know. I should just be happy with the fact that I have a happy, healthy, intelligent, athletic child. So she gives up her sport and finds something else to do. There's no tragedy in that.

I just think it sucks.

PTA Convention Notes: "Thank God for Mississippi"

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was a no-show, but I won the big door prize in the exhibit hall (an 80-gig iPod!). Here are some highlights of my four days as a delegate to our state PTA convention last week.

It felt weird to be at a convention where I was not only NOT live blogging, but where finding time (and electrical outlets) to add to my blog was difficult.

Had I not forgotten to bring my stupid AC adapter, I would have posted breathless little briefs about the nightmare of conference registration, the tame PTA swag (no BlogHer pasties or weirdly named water for this group!!), the nominations revolt on the convention hall floor that resulted in the association's first contested election in years, and the endless four-hour general sessions where passionate people argued over stuff like the parsing of the word "encroachment" in an amendment to an amendment of a resolution in favor of lobbying the government to actually follow through on funding for special education programs that was enacted in the 1970's -- but somehow never was enforced.

If my computer and Internet access had been readily available, I would have commented on "Hot Topics in Sacramento," which was the title of the first workshop I attended, where we learned of a "Getting Down to Facts" education finance study commissioned by our Governor, Superintendent of Public Instruction, and legislative leaders. Actually, it was over 20 studies by different institutions, costing over $1.5 million (underwritten by a consortium of groups dedicated to improving public education: The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, The James Irvine Foundation, and The Stuart Foundation).

The upshot of the study is that now, for the first time, we have empirical proof (not anecdotal evidence) that California schools are underfinanced. The panel first presented us with good news, showing dramatic improvements in our children's test scores -- across the board. But that was followed by the unrelenting bad news: that while the standards we have set for our students go way above the national average, the money we allocate for our schools is pitiably low, and our API ratings are still second to last in the nation. (Hence the quote that titles this post). The way we finance education in our state is complex and (my description:) nutty, and we are the only state in the nation that hogties our communities when it comes to raising revenue for education (thanks to Proposition 13, the passage of which is usually marked as the beginning of the end of first-class public schools here in California). We are also the most populous state in the US, and have the largest proportion of immigrant, special needs and low income students, all of whom require additional services.

The conclusion of the study is that fixing the system would require both reforming the system and and raising the education budget by an estimated additional 40%. As we already spend $66 billion per year on education, you can imagine how tough a struggle this is going to be. But the reports pointed out that how far below the national average California's education spending actually is. "After adjusting for regional cost differences, the research finds that Texas spends 12 percent more per pupil than California; Florida, 18 percent; New York, 75 percent, and the rest of the country, 30 percent." (Quote from project press release.)

This would bring our students up to par in language arts and math -- but it would not address improving their performance in science, social studies or the arts.

If I had been able to live blog, I would have commented on workshops like "Raising Media Savvy Kids in a Digital Age," presented by Rebecca Randall of Common Sense Media. Their site offers sensible ratings of all kinds of media: TV, movies, video games, music and websites -- reviewed by people who "believe in media sanity, not censorship." Randall gave a balanced, powerful presentation, acknowledging the dangers of our electronically stimulated culture, as well as its benefits. This is a resource that I will be frequenting quite a bit.

If I'd been able to use my computer for anything other than email, I would have taken and uploaded a lot more photos of the people I met, in workshops and networking events. Our local district dinner was held aboard the Spirit of Sacramento, an refurbished paddleboat that cruises along the Sacramento River (and gave me the opportunity to enjoy a tourist attraction I'd not previously encountered on my many visits to the city).

I would have reported back on the disappointment -- and frustration -- in the hall when the Governor backed out of his appearance at the last minute -- again. "I guess he's too busy to walk across the street," state PTA President Brenda Davis remarked. (The Convention Center is located just down the street from the Capitol Building and is adjacent to the Sacramento Hyatt Regency, where Schwarzenegger famously lives as he commutes there from his home here in SoCal.) In his place, we did get the State Secretary of Education -- and actress Carol Channing, who has spent the last several years putting in her time -- and money -- to try to get arts programs reintroduced into our schools.

I would have written about the state winners of PTA's Reflections arts program, which at many of our schools, is just about the only art exposure California kids get. We viewed the works of talented kids in visual arts, photography, choreography, and musical composition. WOW. I would love to see what our students could do if their schools were able to give them some instruction.

Most of all, I would have told you how much I admire the people who devote so much of their lives to this un-sexy, non-trendy organization. Most of the ones who have risen to leadership levels no longer have children in the system. I sarcastically categorized them to my roommate as "lifers," but secretly wished that I had enough passion -- and energy -- to follow their lead. These people truly, deeply care about advocating for our children. I may not always agree with their priorities or methods, but I do believe they should be admired for trying to be part of the solution.

Viva la PTA!