Video Transcript:

JOANNE FARYON (host): Hello Everyone, I’m Joanne Faryon. Welcome to this Envision special – Education and the Million Dollar Bake Sale. Let’s begin with a quiz. How many students in your kids’ classroom? 20, 30, close to 40? It’s probably more than last year. That’s because education took a $12 billion budget cut  - the largest in years. Tonight, we’ll hear what California’s State Superintendant of Education has to say about our schools and funding. And we’ll meet a long time principal who’s hoping a new campus can help turn around his school. But first, we take a look at how public education is being influenced by private fundraising. These days, parents are raising millions of dollars for their schools - enough to pay for computers, textbooks, even teachers. Meanwhile schools in poor neighborhoods are barely getting by. 

FARYON: This probably doesn’t look like the school bake sale you remember … (chattering) 
The idea is the same – these parents are here to raise money for their kids’ schools. 

PARENT: We want to make sure that all of the students are taken care of and they have all of the advantages they possibly can, especially in the days of budget cuts.  

FARYON: But they’re not spending a few bucks on cupcakes – this event cost $45 just to get in.
Across the county, parent-run foundations are organizing and raising millions  - yes millions for their schools. We’re not sure how many there are or exactly how much money they’re raising because no one is keeping track. In fact, there are no state rules when it comes to these foundations. Tonight, we take a tour of an elementary school with a foundation

DONNA TRIPI: (Principal, La Jolla Elementary): All of this hardscape, all this concrete work, was done by the foundation, all of the planting was done by the foundation. 

FARYON: And one without.

ROBIN MCCULLOCH: (Principal, Horton Elementary): This is an area where we run around and play with balls and there’s a hole right there.

FARYON: They’re in the same school district – but look very different.

MCCULLOCH: Obviously there are schools that have and have not.

FARYON: This is not a story pitting rich against poor. In fact, as you’ll see, both principals have similar opinions about public schools.  It is a story about who’s paying for public education in California. You might be surprised to learn who paid for your child’s textbook, or even his teacher.

TRIPI: We have walls built where we can put the names of people who donated money to the projects.

FARYON: Donna Tripi has been principal at La Jolla Elementary school for 10 years. It’s a public school in the San Diego Unified School district with about 550 students. 

FARYON: On the day we were here, a few days before school was set to start, many of the buildings were being painted. The grounds newly landscaped. And the artificial turf and new playhouse ready for the new kindergarten class. But the school district didn’t pay for most of this. Parents did. There is a parent run foundation at this school. Its sole purpose is to raise money. Last year the foundation raised more than $450,000 dollars. Drive 18 miles south east and you’re here at Horton Elementary.

MCCULLOCH: There’s 15 rooms that are going to go away…15 rooms that have to be demolished…some of these down here and some on the upper playground they’re all over 40 yeas old and they can’t recertify them for occupancy.

FARYON: Same school district, same basic per pupil funding from the state government, even the same number of students.
But things couldn’t be more different.

MCCULLOCH: Apparently at one point these had trees in them but the trees died and were never replaced.

FARYON: In fact, there are three holes on the playground left by the dead trees.

FARYON: What’s the gravel area?

MCCULLOCH: The soccer field…

FARYON: That’s your soccer field? 

MCCULLOCH: Yeah.

FARYON: Even air conditioning is scarce  - just one building on site – the newest  - has it, BUT…

MCCULLOCH: We couldn’t turn it on and in fact we were never shown how to turn it on, and I went in there myself to try and turn it on. We were dying in there, on a day like this those rooms with kids in them, well over 90 degrees, but this year the board must have heard about this policy and realized that would not happen in a different part of town.

FARYON: Horton elementary has no parent run foundation. This school does get about $400,000 dollars in extra government grants each year because the kids that go to this school are poor. All the students are enrolled in the free breakfast and lunch program, and the majority are English language learners…

MCCULLOCH: We’re using our Title I money this year to pay for a parent academic liaison she works to engage parents in their children’s education full-time. We’re using it to pay for a resource teacher who’s also going to be pushing into the upper grade classrooms.

FARYON: Does your title one money give you an advantage over more affluent schools in suburban neighborhoods?

MCCULLOCH: It’s not an advantage it’s trying to fill the gap. 

FARYON: Back at La Jolla Elementary…

TRIPI: All the Macs were paid for by the foundation.

FARYON: Three hundred Mac books.
FARYON: Despite the largest statewide budget cuts to education in years, La Jolla Elementary is able to pay for special science classes, an art teacher, music teacher, computer teacher and full-time librarian. 

TRIPI: We have enjoyed what I feel is a more comprehensive education for kids, so more enriching kinds of experiences. The fact that we can have music and art every week for kids wouldn’t be provided unless we had a foundation. 

FARYON: At Horton Elementary, there is no art teacher, barely a music program and a part time library technician. There are also 300 computers, but many are so old they no longer work.

MCCULLOCH: There’s definitely a funding gap when it comes to foundations. Everyone’s asked: Shouldn’t we have a foundation, but there isn’t anywhere for me to get money that would be significant enough to contribute to a foundation.

FARYON: We promised this wouldn’t be a story pitting rich against poor. So to understand how public education got this way in California we need a history lesson. 

FARYON: Back in the 1950s, and 60’s, California’s public schools were some of the best in the country. Going into the 70’s, schools in this state were ranked fifth in terms of funding. And then this happened…

ARCHIVE NEWS FOOTAGE: Good evening, tomorrow you have the chance to vote your taxes down. Its called Proposition 13…

FARYON: Proposition 13, which was passed in 1978, rolled back taxes and put a cap on future property taxes. Property taxes were schools’ main source of revenue. As a result of Prop 13 schools in California lost billions of dollars.

FARYON: Funding for California education went from the top of the list to nearly last place. 

FARYON: As taxpayers were asked to pay less for education, a funny thing happened. Some of them, in affluent and middle class neighborhoods started writing checks, not to the government, but to their schools. Here at Torrey Pines High School in San Diego’s North County, parents built this $1.2 million football stadium.

FARYON: Bobbi Karlson is executive director of the foundation that raised the money.

FARYON: Do you ever feel like you’re letting the state off the hook by raising this money? 

KARLSON: I do, I was around in 1978 so I realize what happened with prop 13. I think everybody at the time thought somehow it would come back and it has not come back.

FARYON: The Torrey Pines Foundation raises more than 2 million each year. Two thirds goes to sports clubs.

FARYON: This dad doesn’t mind paying the suggested donation of $650 so his son can play football in this stadium.

ROY WILBURN (TPHS Father): The reason we’re here is for our children. This community here in Del Mar and Carmel Valley— we’re here paying exorbitant prices on everything for our kids and that s the price we want to pay.

FARYON: Several schools and districts across the county are taking a closer look at foundations. San Diego Unified is examining whether foundations should be allowed to pay teachers’ salaries.

FARYON: Sheila Jackson is the board chairperson. 

JACKSON: What we have to do in leadership is to convince people and communities to be willing to share - to be willing to not just invest in their school, but to invest in other areas throughout the city as well.

FARYON: Remember those two principals from those two very different schools. Turns out the principals are pretty similar on where they stand.

FARYON: Is this the new public in public education?

TRIPI: You know I hope that it isn’t because I really feel that its not equitable in all schools because there are schools that have foundations and schools like mine that have really hard working industrious very effective foundations and schools with foundations that don’t have the fundraising opportunities that we have. So its not equitable.

MCCULLOCH: I would like to think members of our community no matter where they live would like our community be healthy, would like all of our children to be educated. My family is that educating children in schools like this is an immense responsibility that we all bare and its not ok to say my kid in this neighborhood should get something better then a child in another neighborhood because that’s eventually going to come back to haunt this city.

FARYON: Inequity in schools is not only a matter of social justice. It is also a matter of law. In the past courts have ruled it unconstitutional for public schools in rich neighborhoods to be better funded then schools in poor neighborhoods.
But you’d be hard pressed to find a politician anywhere willing to tell parents they can’t give money to their child’s school. Or discourage a parent from doing what’s best for their child.