Ocean View needs board’s guidance on state fund request

Marissa Espino

HUNTINGTON BEACH -- Ocean View School District officials say they will

apply for state funds to participate in a new accountability program if

the school board favors the move.

Sun View and Oak View were identified last week as among the 430 school

that scored in the bottom half of the Stanford 9 statewide test results

in 1998 and 1999. That designation makes them eligible for Immediate

Intervention Underperforming School Program, designed by the California

Department of Education.

“We have not talked with our school board yet,” said Karen Colby, the

district’s director of curriculum and instruction. “We really need

direction and permission from them. We don’t know what is required or

entailed in volunteering [for the program]. At this point we are just

exploring the possibility.”

If the district chooses to apply, the schools will receive a $50,000

grant to develop a plan to improve student achievement.

The schools will then be evaluated by district and state committees

that could have the authority to intervene if improvements do not result.

If the state does intervene, the superintendent of instruction would

take over and the principal would be reassigned, according to a

department report.

“This program is designed to give local districts and local schools an

opportunity to improve on their own,” said Pat McCabe, an administrator

in the state’s Office of Policy and Evaluation. “This program allows them

to have one year of planning and then funding for what they have planned.

If they don’t change in three years, then the district has had its

chance. In fact, they do lose control at that point.”

McCabe said that if enough schools haven’t applied by today’s deadline,

the state will choose schools to participate.

Within the past year, Colby said the district has designed an

instructional program to increase student achievement, but will still

look into the accountability program.

Colby also said the program’s intervention conditions appear extreme.

“It seems drastic,” she said, “and that is one of the reasons we need

to understand it better.”