LACCD update on Master Plan and the expenditure of Proposition AA money: The Daily News article, February 10, 2005 "College Efforts 'Satisfactory'" explains that the auditing firm KMPG rated 6 of 13 categories as "needs to improve". These areas to-be-improved were described in the article as covering the broad areas of "internal communication and accounting".

These findings of KMPG seem to acknowledge the Board's tendency to plan and act in an autocratic and cloistered fashion. True, the Citizen's oversight commission is convened, but, regrettably they meet only 4 times a year which, I contend, is not enough to provide "oversight". A committee that meets 4 times a year is a "rubber stamp". The choices and the plans of the board must be made in a manner that better involve the opinions and ideas of the taxpayers.


Are College Trustees meant to be Real Estate Agents and Land Developers? Or is their job to improve education?
Click here to see the latest property deals.

Want to download the LA City College Master Plan? CLICK HERE
Find the LA Trade Tech Master Plan HERE!
Find the Valley College Master Plan HERE!
Find the East LA College Master Plan HERE!
Find the Mission College Master Plan HERE!
Find the Harbor College Master Plan HERE!
Find the Pierce College Master Plan HERE!
Find the Southwest College Master Plan HERE!
Find the West LA CollegeMaster Plan HERE!

Elect GW Perttula Committee
PO Box 3042
Granada Hills, CA, 91394-3042
Campaign ID number: 1273952

To find a catalog of web-based classes offered by California public colleges please click HERE


Gerald Wayne Perttula is the candidate for seat #6
LOS ANGELES COMMUNITY COLLEGES

East L.A. College 213-265-8650 http://www.elac.cc.ca.us
Los Angeles City College Los Angeles 213-953-4340 www.lacc.cc.ca.us
Los Angeles Harbor College Wilmington 310-522-8200 http://www.lahc.cc.ca.us
Los Angeles Mission College Sylmar 818-364-7600 http://www.lamission.cc.ca.us
Los Angeles Pierce College Woodland Hills 818-347-0551 http://www.lapc.cc.ca.us
Los Angeles Southwest College Los Angeles 213-241-5225 http://www.lasc.cc.ca.us
L.A. Trade-Tech College Los Angeles 213-744-9058 http://www.lattc.cc.ca.us
Los Angeles Valley College Van Nuys 818-947-1200 http://www.lavc.cc.ca.us
West Los Angeles College Culver City 310-287-4200 http://www.wlac.edu

To pull in thousands of more students, I propose that each California Community College become a portal to American citizenship. The colleges would offer a certificated program to "naturalize" immigrants (legal and illegal). This would be a contractual 2-year program partnering with the Immigration and Naturaliztion Service (INS) . The classes would be typical of the naturalization process: the Justice system, American History, English language, and the Constitution. Undocumented applicants who breached this "Naturalization Contract", and left the program without appropriate explanation, would be subject to arrest and deportation. This plan addresses many social issues, and would be a natural complement to the "Dream Act" (AB 504). Foreign nationals who love the freedom of AMERICA must be encouraged to become American citizens, and streamlining the process will make America safer.

Gerald Wayne Perttula soaks in sunshine on "Sugar Loaf" mountain in Rio de Janeiro (circa 1/2/05). Gerald continues to wonder if those granite plugs in the background are from extinct volcano lava tubes. Do armchair geologists make better candidates? 

Election Issues 2005

What are the Issues in this Election for LACCD Board Trustee?

Access to Higher Education.

California has a tradition of subsidizing qualified (but indigent) Community College students with generous grants, scholarships, stipends, and loans. This booklet, published by the Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees, offers some strategies to this end.

Community Colleges and Business Partnerships

The Community College League of California has some suggestions for their members creating business enterprises through property deals. The first suggestion is "golf driving range". (Very familiar to LA City College devotees). The number-three suggestion is "sports stadium", which is, ironically, what they are tearing down at LA City College. Note this prescient line from the document: "Meeting with local neighborhood groups prior to making final arrangements can sometimes prevent political problems that could sidetrack even the best plans." Too bad the trustees did not heed the advice.

Trustee Community College Handbook

This is the handbook trustees are obligated to read and follow. Emphasis is placed on communicating with the community to ensure that proposed policies are understood and accepted but not undermined.

Does California's "Centralized" K-16 Master Plan for Education Threaten the Autonomy of CC Trustees?

Arnold Appoints New Members to Community College Board

Excerpt From the California Master Plan ACCESS TO QUALITY EDUCATION

"While California’s commitment to educating its people encompasses all levels of education, a crucial distinction exists between the State’s obligations regarding elementary and secondary, as distinct from preschool, adult, and postsecondary education. The California State Supreme Court has ruled, in its decisions on Serrano (1976) and Butt(1990), that the California State Constitution provides a fundamental right to an elementary and secondary education. This fundamental right (also referred to as a fundamental interest of citizens of the state) derives from several provisions of California’s constitution and statutes, taken together: Article IX of the Constitution, Sections 1 and 5, which obligate the State to provide a system of free common schools; the Constitution’s equal protection provisions, Article I, Section 7, and Article IV, Section 16; and Education Code Section 48200, imposing compulsory attendance. As a corollary of Californians’ fundamental right, the State incurs a fundamental obligation to sustain that right, which receives the highest order of legal protections.

"The State and its schools are required to equitably provide appropriate educational opportunities to all students. Postsecondary education, though not constitutionally guaranteed to Californians, is nevertheless provided universally to our people. Californians clearly regard postsecondary education as a vital interest, essential to sustaining economic vitality, and throughout our history have demonstrated this deep commitment by supporting a set of affordable public colleges and universities as ultimately defined in the 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education.

"Participation in postsecondary education is voluntary, however, and not constitutionally guaranteed to be free of charge. As a result of these differences, postsecondary education does not incur the same order of legal obligations for the State as does K-12 education. Correspondingly, postsecondary education also is not subject to many of the strictures that apply to the K-12 system. These distinctions will require that, even in a cohesive Master Plan for Education, certain components be treated differently among the sectors of California’s education system.

"Although no constitutional guarantee or statutory commitment has previously existed for California’s preschool-age children, our state has a profound interest in making available to all families who desire them the early education opportunities that support a child’s emotional, social, physical, linguistic, and cognitive development. A critical element of the learning process is a child’s readiness to learn. Just as experiences at each earlier grade have an impact on a child’s preparedness for success at the next level of education, there are factors that promote children’s readiness to succeed in their first experiences in school. Early childhood education and development in pre-kindergarten settings can provide the socialization and coping skills, and the developing literacy and numeracy skills, that lead to these successes."

Read About California's Master Plan for Education (2002)

Resources

This is a relevant Handbook for High School Students who are thinking about going to college

http://www.lausd.k12.ca.us/Palisades_Charter_HS/pdfs/college_handbook_0902.pdf.

Notice how tense and anxiety-ridden candidate Gerald Perttula looks before his Rio de Janeiro vacation. What is it with those glasses? Only thoughts of a laissez-faire market economy fortify him. Aren't we all free-willed rational agents making thoughtful economic decisions in a world of scarce resources?

Dare I say it? Let's put a 300-foot "Christ the Redeemer" on top of LA CITY HALL. It may inspire others to renounce litigation, and our lives would improve. Rio wins the non-secular award for "Theological Brashness": sensitive America needs more of it!  

Fighting City Hall was never like this: 300,000 gallons of water per minute cascading at the base of Iguazu Falls. (Candidate Perttula with wife enjoys 100% humidity.) Note the jutting crags. 

Los Angeles Community College Trustee Candidate Gerald Perttula watches the clouds accumulate over Christ the Redeemer from his perch on Sugarlof mountain in Rio de Janeiro. 

Here Gerald Perttula introduces himself to Gaia. 

Publicity for non incumbents

Getting "conventional" Publicity (if you are not an incumbent) requires cash. The next best way to get publicity is to use Blogs. And why not, since the price is right?

I am assuming that contemporary information-age news junkies, reporters (and voters) will use search engines to research the prospective candidates.

In this way, my candidacy is an experiment, attempting to spend near zero dollars on a campaign for the Los Angeles Community College Board Trustee seat # 6.

Victory is possible, especially when the incumbents have offered so many advantages to the challengers.

More to come...

March 8th 2005

Vote for Gerald Wayne Perttula on March 8th, 2005, date of the BIG LA City Municipal Election.

The candidates for Seat # 6 for the LACommunity College Board are:

Nancy Pearlman (incumbent)

Maria Grunwald-Agazaryan (education activist)

Gerald Wayne Perttula (Curriculum Specialist)


Why Vote for Gerald Perttula? The present LACC Board needs to be "reigned-in" from their unaccountable spending spree that has gutted a Bond measure AA (passed by voters in 2003), spending money meant for existing campuses, into an unnecessary facility at 770 Wilshire Blvd, draining needed funds away from student instruction.

The waste does not end there: the LACC Board sold the 4050 Wilshire Building for a $6 million loss, to help pay for 770 Wilshire.

The waste continues: The LACCD Board pursued the 35-year lease on a downtown Golf Course...and for what purpose?

And why does the LACC Board spend its time passing socially-activist resolutions? (e.g., asserting their stance AGAINST the recall of Gray Davis?)

Gerald Perttula will look for the "smart cuts" necessary to meet Governor Schwarzeneggar's latest Budget Reforms.

Gerald Perttula agrees with Governor Schwarzeneggar that teachers should be compensated on the basis of measurable student performance. Educational Excellence is possible in California!

Let's spend Bond AA money on the students of the LA Community Colleges, as stipulated.

Quality Education (with more vocational classes) can be delivered at the Community Colleges!

It can be done!