The use of the terms, “edge case,” “border kids,” “they are here,” “they are part of us” and references to student living in both the US and MX simultaneously (which is impossible, btw, unless they’re living out of their backpacks) are nothing more than attempts at “PC obfuscations” of the real issue which is that thousands of foreign students who reside in another country are stealing classroom seats from US citizen residents who actually reside in the attendance area of said school. This has been going on for decades in broad daylight with multiple “professional” witnesses every day. This results in a multitude of problems, nearly all which are profound and cost US and state taxpayers a fortune.
a) a student moving into the attendance area of a particular school being denied a seat at that school due to overcrowding. Their parents may or may not be paying exorbitant Mello Roos which was used to build and fund improvements at their neighborhood schools;
b) a US citizen, RESIDENT English-speaking elementary school student is placed at their grade level in their neighborhood school where 3.5 out of 4 classes offered at their grade level are comprised of ESL students, effectively holding back the progress of the 10-12 native English speakers at that grade level in that school;
c) the presence of a majority of ESL students at a particular elementary or middle school effectively lowers the test scores and ratings of that school, often so profoundly that the school is eventually placed on the NCLB “watch list” making it possible for nearly ALL its native English-speaking RESIDENT students to flee that school for a more distant, better performing school in the district; and,
d) The districts’ budgets have been so compromised in past decades (since about the mid-nineties) that art, music and PE has all but been eliminated in elementary and middle schools. The few teachers the districts employ in these subjects must travel from school to school and teach these classes 2-4x month to the students. This contributes to the childhood obesity epidemic, IMO. Mello Roos bonds can be used to pay for gym equipment, etc, but instead has been deployed to pay for (expensive) ESL materials for the masses.
Allowing daily border-crossing students (mostly non-English speaking in the lower grades) to use our schools is simply facilitating a race to the bottom for nearly all the residents of the district and moreso as the years go on. Homes in areas where the public schools are overrun with ESL students do not maintain their values as well or appreciate as well as other parts of the county where this problem isn’t as pronounced (or is nonexistent).
And a large portion of teachers in South County can retire today with 30 years service and get pensions equivalent to full pay, yet they are still working, ESPecially in CVESD. (So it would be fine if we had to shut down 4-6 elementary schools due to disenrollment of a huge portion of the student population due to lack of proof of bona-fide residency.) Another large group trails them with 25+ years of service. These teachers are very good at what they do … getting these thousands of ESL students English literate before entering middle school. It is very challenging and they are very patient and skilled in their jobs. And I could see South County closing 2-3 middle schools and possibly 2 high schools if stricter rules at the border were enforced, along with stricter rules for proving residency.
Currently, no identification is asked for or required of an adult who comes into a school or the district office to register a student for school and prove their residency. The adult doing this (1) does not have to prove who they are; (2) does not have to prove it is their name of the utility bills, leases, deed, closing docs, guardianship affidavit, etc, which they are presenting to establish their student’s residency; (3) does not have to prove they are related to the student in any way; and (4) does not have to prove that it was they who actually executed a “guardianship affidavit” used to establish the student’s residency. They could be using someone else’s documents and as long as the name of the guardian on the guardianship affidavit matches the name on ONE utility bill and that affidavit lists their “charge” with the name of the student they are attempting to register, they’re golden! Essentially, the registering adult could be anyone! There are so many holes in the procedure and almost no guardians have the same last name as the student they are registering. It is a red flag that so many “guardianship affidavits” are accepted by the school/district relative to the general student population but the administration doesn’t care. In addition, some schools actually use student workers in the office to verify residency!
I personally have gone into my kids’ HS numerous times to “prove residency” for my student to student workers and/or 20-something school office workers with their dad’s utility bills and residency verification form HE filled out and signed because he had a very demanding job. He is a male and I am a female. They don’t know me and never asked me my name. The bills weren’t for my address and they could care less. They just compare the documents with a list of acceptable documents taped to the counter and accept them. My student kid was never with me (they were usually in class at the time) and there was no one there to call me “mom.”
