Heather Thompson, a parent at Hesby Oaks Leadership Charter in Encino and acting spokeswoman for last night’s Rally the Valley, said she became concerned back in November when the LAUSD board failed to pass Tamar Galatzan’s resolution to lower the Title I threshold from 50 percent to 40 percent, a policy that denies support to many Valley schools with large populations of low-income students but not quite half. Thompson says she’s worried the same type of thinking will be reflected in the District’s LCFF.

“Our goal is to see the funding follow the child,” Thompson told LA School Report, noting that the Education Service Center North, which represents the San Fernando Valley, has the second largest population of foster youth in LA Unified.

Though the new funding formula provides additional money for low-income students, English learners, and foster youth, it remains unclear if money from the LCFF will flow to areas with high concentrations of poverty or follow low-income students to their respective schools.

What is clear is that districts, for the first time, are required to give parents a voice.

“We’re trying to build a network of one parent per Valley school, so that anytime there’s an action or discussion we can mobilize our collective influence,” Thomson said.

Previous Posts: Kayser Abstention Dooms Effort to Spread Out Title 1 Money; Survey finds CA parents unaware they have a voice in school funding; Board, not Schools, Gets Final Say on Spending New CA Money

Carpenter Community Charter

In early October, LAUSD board member Tamar Galatzan told us about “middle-class schools that don’t qualify for Title I anti-poverty dollars,” and that a lot of them “are becoming affiliated charters in order to get access to additional funds.”  (See: Board Member Galatzan Tells (Almost) All.)

There are 42 “affiliated charters”, schools which operate within the UTLA contract, but have more freedom as to how they spend their operating budget. LAUSD Charter Director Jose Cole-Gutierrez says that affiliated charters don’t necessarily get more money per pupil than district schools, but that they have greater flexibility on how the money they get is spent.

The lion’s share of the affiliated charters are in Galatzan’s San Fernando Valley district. Galatzan’s chief of staff Hilary MacGregor, says her office is getting a lot of calls about converting to affiliated charters: “The schools that are nervous are trying to move the process faster.”

The recommended date for a school to apply for affiliated charter conversion is March 15. For more on affiliated charters, see this page from the California Charter Schools Association. See also our explainer on the different types of public schools.