CDE: Deny Ross Valley Charter Appeal

The children in RVSD have been negatively affected for many years from the existence of the MAP program in our district. Our district has spent over $100,000 in legal fees in the last year alone and countless hours of board time on the MAP program which consists of approximately 5 % of the total children in RVSD. The current leaders of RVC are the same people that are the leaders of MAP including former RVSD trustees, all the MAP teachers, and the MAP leadership committee. A third party investigator found that MAP program (during its 19 years run by the current RVC leaders) had policies which created the effects of discrimination on protected classes of children. They have had virtually no ELL in MAP and have not translated the petition into Spanish. The existing leaders have known about the inequities with the protected classes of children as far back as 2005 and have done nothing to recruit these children into MAP. Documents exist from 2005 that identify MAP was responsible to translate their materials into Spanish. Now after 19 years of discrimination, these same people are claiming they want to become a charter to reach these children. The ACLU in a letter written to MCOE dated October 9th, 2015 stated that "it appears that the leaders of MAP wish to export the exact program (and its students and teachers) that an independent investigator found was operating in a discriminatory manner into a Charter School which will necessarily have greater autonomy from District oversight (their emphasis)." We will be sending a separate detailed letter to support many more reasons for denial that the people who signed this petition read and support. (http://www.saverossvalleyschools.com/letter-to-state/). Please deny the appeal and support high quality education for ALL the children in RVSD.