The Capistrano Unified School District (CUSD) school year is well underway. As I write this column the high school students are enjoying the home coming week.
The great academic news is that the CUSD has caught up and passed the Saddleback School District in academic success.
This year CUSD is the fourth ranked K-12 District in Orange County.
The academic success is drawn from the Academic Performance Index (API) score which ranges from 200 to 1000. Any school above 800 is considered exemplary.
The API of Ladera Ranch schools are high with Chaparral leading the CUSD schools at 939, Ladera Elementary 920, Ladera Middle School 909, Oso Grande 884, and San Juan High is 810.
Congratulations to the teachers, parents and especially the students. Keep it up . . . You make us proud.
Let’s all celebrate as CUSD is the only District at the top with a huge student population of over 52,000.
The bigger the District, the bigger the gap between students.
A district with a small student population can bring in a better API score.
Voting by District
The Orange County Committee on School District Organization voted 8 to 1 to let the voters decide on their Trustees by at-large or voting by district.
Voters can now decide in the June 2010 Primary Election whether or not they want to elect the Trustees by area they represent.
This is great news from my point of view. This will give the interested persons to run for the office they serve without a huge sum of money.
The deep pockets should now worry as they may not be able to have a control on the CUSD Board. And spending taxpayers’ money for a special election, that is for a later discussion.
District News
At the CAPO Board meeting in September, the Trustees said they have settled the lawsuit filed by seven families whose names appeared in the enemies list created during Flemming era. The families will be awarded $653,350 and there are other legal expenses now partly paid at $436,187 thereby totaling over one million dollar in settlement cost. What a way to spend money when the District is looking to eliminate programs to meet the budget shortfall. I do realize that all but $100,000 was paid by the CUSD insurance carrier, but we can all look forward to future insurance premium increases because of this possibly criminal behavior. I attended the October 13 Board meeting, but the overall attendance of other constituents was light. Eleven residents spoke at the meeting, almost all of whom spoke against the private citizen’s lawsuit settlement and the Board’s decision against asking for State waiver of the 2010 June special election fund. The Trustees authorized the hiring of a demographer for re-zoning the seven areas that make up the District in anticipation of a "yes" to elect the Trustees by voters in their area. The cost will be $40,000. The District Staff has unveiled a possible $9 million budget cut to offset the next budget year shortfall of $25 million. The elementary school program, sports and other extra curricular activities are being looked at for possible money savings.