This press release was created by Echo Park Moms 4 Education, and is endorsed by Echo Parque/Historic Filipinotown members of Coalition for Educational Justice. If your organization would like to endorse contact this CEJ representative and the endorsement will forwarded to Echo Park Moms 4 Education and included here.

Please pass this on right away. We only have till Tuesday May 10th to try and stop something bad:

For Immediate Release:

URGENT - Parent Wake-Up Call on Tuesday May 10th!!!

On TUESDAY MAY 10TH at 1 PM, (at 333 Beaudry Avenue, LA 90017), school board members from LAUSD are going to vote to REPEAL the Parent Advisory Vote in Los Angeles!! This Parent Advisory Vote, (part of the Public School Choice motion), is the primary way parents get to voice their preference for which school they want for their children, in their neighborhood, and to get that parental preference into the legal record.

If the Parent Advisory Vote is taken away from us, the board members will no longer be obligated to listen to what kind of school we want, and there will be no formal record that we ever wanted anything different than what THEY decide to give us. So in essence, they are taking away our voice so they can privatize without challenge and give away our local public schools to professional charter organizations backed by hedge fund investors — not educators.

Once a professional charter is in place in your neighborhood, a sneaky waiver allows them to take over your "Attendance Boundary" school and your child is ASSIGNED to this school. This new charter entity now becomes your "neighborhood school" but with none of the legal accountability to parents that public schools provide . Ultimately, this means it's the one option you get for a neighborhood school, but with no say in how funds are allocated at the school, the way you have with public schools. Then your only other option is private school, or finding another LAUSD school with space that you can get in — and this will probably mean enduring costly transportation to a more distant location, if you choose to look for a public school elsewhere, and IF you can get in.

If this school board decision to eliminate the Parent Advisory Vote deeply troubles you as much as it does me, PLEASE COME DOWNTOWN on TUESDAY MAY 10TH at 1 PM, and let the LAUSD board members know that they CANNOT eliminate the rights of parents to choose the neighborhood schools for their children. These schools are for our kids! NOT for board members to advance their career agendas as they move on to charter-associated jobs when they leave. Please come even if you live in a different district, because this change is spreading through the country.

But if you cannot make it, there are two other things you can do:

1) Send a note expressing your unhappiness with this plan to the following links.

LOS ANGELES CITY COUNCIL: http://lacity.org/YourGovernment/CityCouncil/index.htm
LAUSD BOARD MEMBERS: http://www.lausd.net/lausd/board/secretary/index2.html
MAYOR VILLARAIGOSA: http://mayor.lacity.org/MeettheMayor/AsktheMayor/index.htm

Here is a sample note, but of course write whatever you feel:

To Whom It May Concern:

I am writing to say I consider it UNACCEPTABLE that the school board is attempting to eliminate the Parent Advisory Vote. The Parent Advisory Vote is my right as a parent and community member to express my preference for which school is chosen for my children in the neighborhood I live in.

I will hold everyone who allows this to happen responsible when it comes time for me to vote, should this decision go through.

Sincerely,

2) Vote in the runoff election for Bennet Kayser on TUESDAY MAY 17TH

He's willing to listen to the parents versus just falling in line with the corporate-backed charters.

• Echo Park Moms 4 Education
• Coalition for Educational Justice Echo Parque/Historic Filipinotown