My daughter is a senior at ASTI or Alameda Science and Technology Institute. Previously, she has been at a private Montessori school, a parent co-op, a public school, a charter school and now is a student at a public magnet school. I have tried everything and seen it all. There are pluses and minuses for every school you can name, public, private, charter or magnet. This is my story about a public school option that is worth emulation everywhere, but will likely be dismantled due to massive budget cuts. Another victim of the 1%.
ASTI is about to lose it's ability to fulfill it's mission statement due to lack of funds. When ASTI started in 2004, their goal was to create a true early college high school for advanced students, but who were economically challenged or of a minority. Over 80% of ASTI students identify as other than white. Over 50% qualify for free lunch. Many of ASTI students will be the first people in their family to go to college. and over 60% speak something other than English at home.
Alameda, California is a great district (just across from the Bay from San Francisco), yet it is a very diverse district. Most of the really rich kids go to private schools. I live in the Oakland School District (just next door), but I petitioned to change districts and was able to get my daughter into the school. Today, they are taking very few, if any, kids from Oakland. I was lucky the school was still looking for students when we requested admission 3.5 years ago.
ASTI is different from other early college high school programs in that ASTI students take all of their classes at the community college beginning in 11th grade. As a result, students were able to obtain AA degrees in tandem with their high school diplomas. Most early college schools allow for a course or two each semester, but at ASTI, the students took 3-5 per semester (around 15 credits).
ASTI got its first funding through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. The Gates Foundation grant paid for some basic start-up costs like portable classrooms, and then funded all the college textbooks for 5 years. The grant ended in 2009. We've since been begging, pleading, and proving that the school works.
Well, we all know where this is going to go. Alameda County is broke. There is no money. The School Board is doing it's best to keep the school. The Community College system is trying to keep the school. Everyone acknowledges that this is one of the coolest, most awesome programs the Alameda School District is doing, but without the cash, the school will have to change it's curriculum.
So this is what my daughter was able to experience. A very unique and empowering educational experience that believed she could do better and could learn more taking real college classes. It gave her the skills and the confidence to go to University and be what she wants to be. My daughter will be graduating this May from the Alameda Science and Technology Institute with a high school diploma. She will also be graduating from the College of Alameda with a basic liberal arts AA with a specialty in Natural Science. She will also be graduating from Laney College with an AA in Asian American Studies. I kid you not, she will receive two AA degrees and a high school diploma. (No, I will not give her three graduation parties!) Sadly, she will be in the last class that will be able to accomplish this due to budget cuts, unless the kid can pay for two extra years of college classes.
You see, the Community College system can no longer afford to offer classes to high school kids for free. They cannot even serve the high school grads that want to attend. The saving grace is that they will continue to allow high school kids to take up to 11.5 units (about 2.5 classes). This means that while ASTI students will not be able to obtain an AA degree, nor will they be able to meet other UC requirements for transfer of credits, they will be able to take 2.5 classes per semester (please note that any kid who takes more than 11.5 credits pays for all, not just that above 11.5), so all is not lost. For the record, my kid has taken 15 credits or more per semester and took summer, winter and spring break classes. Winter and Spring break classes were canceled last year thanks to budget cuts.
This was a long way about of saying that budget cuts are getting ridiculous. We have already seen that schools are no longer funding basic things like textbooks and art classes, but even the proven programs that work are being cut to the point of absurdity in order to provide even a hint of education to those who can't afford something else. This just has to stop. Seriously. This just needs to stop. We need to fund education. Rich people aren't the only ones who can contribute to our world and shit, we really don't want to live in a world that only the rich have a voice. This is a great example of a public school program gone right. One that worked with the local educational community to offer a small school alternative to huge, rich high schools with their AP classes and other opportunities.
I also wanted to show that there are many different ways to educate our children. I am a huge fan of public schools, but not everyone needs to be huge and impersonal. There are good alternatives.