CONTRA COSTA COUNTRY SCHOOLS UPDATE
Joe Jaconette introduced retiring Contra Costa County Superintendent of Schools, Joe Ovick. Joe has been our county superintendent for 18 years a.jpg)
nd has spent 45 years as an educator. He has a son who also serves as a school administrator, making him a member of the MAFIA- Mothers and Fathers of Italian Administrators. Joe has deep roots in California – 4 generations of his family have lived here. They first settled in San Jose after arriving in American from Sicily under the Patron system, working in the Louisiana sugar mills to pay their debt, then homesteading in San Jose beginning in 1901. Joe was the first of his family to attend college (San Jose State). Education was his chosen field of study and he held a number of teaching and administrative positions before being elected as Country Superintendent, where he has served four terms.
The County Superintendent position goes back to 1852, when the lucky appointee was given $100 and a horse. The first elected superintendent took office in 1858 and the job became a state constitutional office in 1878.
Today, Contra Costa has 171,000 students in K-12 schools, 8,000 teachers and a $1.2 billion budget. The graduation rate is 85% compared to a statewide average of 70%. Forty percent of students are in college preparatory courses.
Many challenges exist for our schools, especially in areas of high poverty. Since 1995, the demand for ESL (English as a second language) training has increased 200%. There are 26,000 students in Contra Costa Country schools for whom English is not the primary language. Violence and sexual abuse have occurred and one of the primary objectives is to make our schools safe, with mandatory reporting on any suspected abuse and stringent rules concerning bullying and weapons at school sites.
The County Superintendent oversees the school budgets for his/her districts and works closely with each district superintend.jpg)
ent to approve and submit annual budgets to the state. A new local control funding formula is now in effect which holds districts and schools accountable for student performance. The Superintendent also maintains the power to issue a “negative certification” which overrides local school board control if fiscal mismanagement is evident in a district. This has happened only 4 times in Contra Costa – notably in Richmond and Antioch.
Additional programs overseen by the County Office of Education include those for the severely handicapped, programs in juvenile court schools, the county boys’ ranch (The Orrin Allen Youth Rehabilitation Facility), as well as education programs for adults through the County Sheriff’s Department. One of the largest programs is the Regional Occupation Program (ROP), which provides vocational training for 12,000 students and involves local businesses via apprentice programs. Chevron recently donated $500,000 to help upgrade the equipment in local high schools for these vocational classes.
As to hot-button issues, Superintendent Ovick supports the ruling made by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge, Rolf M. Treu, who determined that current teacher tenure laws deprive students of their right to an education under the State Constitution and violated their civil rights, citing substantive evidence that such laws disproportionately affect poor and minority students. He believes in longer apprenticeships for beginning teachers and more hands-on mentoring to insure that teachers get appropriate training. Likewise, he believes bad teachers need to be identified early on and weeded out. He supports the Common Core curriculum standards and notes that all 50 governors have approved its implementation. He also supports the idea of year-round schools, as the U.S. has the shortest school year among the leading nations of the world and often lags behind in subject areas such as math and science.
Dr. Ovik will be retiring in January but will continue to advocate for children through a foundation established in honor of his late wife, Ellen Ovick, with a focus on safety and providing infrastructure for at-risk children.