3 | sandratloh
September 29, 2008 at 11:18 pm

Dear Katie,

I posited your question to our galpal Dorit at Micheltorena, whom I personally think of as my rock ‘n’ roll Echo Park Burning Mom girlfriend. Dorit throws down and calls the shots the way she sees them, which I think–quite untouched by any nervous politically correct “editors”–is what gives our free wild and woolly weblog its raggedy charm. Dorit admitted she was a little flummoxed by our website-with-an-endless-impossible-to-remember name, so I’ve cut and pasted her response for you.

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From Dorit:

As they say, be careful what you wish for.

You will never be an Ivanhoe, nor would you want to be. (Friends of Ivanhoe had to raise over $100,000.00 last year from parents, because the school has so few low income students; Glenfeliz received $141,200 because of the 400 or so low income students who go there. This money is used for the benefit of ALL students. And that does not even count the funds given to the school for the kids who come from bilingual families.)

Ivanhoe is a great school, but so is Glenfleliz. May I ask; Have you visited the school yet? Visited their amazing Wonder of Reading Library? Met with the principal (Carol Rosenblum)? (I went to a school budget workshop Carol ran last April and I learned a great deal. She really knows how to work the system to get what her school needs). The new group of parents; do any of them have school aged children enrolled in Glenfeliz?

With my work with Local District 4 (were Glenfeliz is located), I have met some very active Glenfeliz parents. You are very lucky to have them on your side.

I suggest you join the School Site Council, as a community member (I did this at our local school, Micheltorena, when my daughter was 3 years old). You will know EVERYTHING worth knowing before your daughter is even enrolled.

During the going on 4 years my daughter has been going to Micheltorena, I have meet many parents of preschool age children who wanted to get to know the school, who had heard all the rumors about how bad the school was, and who after getting to know the school, were pleasantly surprised by how lovely the school is and how great our teachers are. Regrettably, all of them were white and were just unable to get over the idea of sending their blond and/or fair skinned child to a school with so many brown kids.

Sorry to be so blunt (but that is me) is part of your fear have anything to do with the fact 93.7% of the students body of Glenfeliz are labeled “non-white”? (and if it is, that does not make you a racist
- heck I have no idea if you are “non-white” or not). Micheltorena is considered 98.8% “non-white” (I use the “ “ because parents pick which race their child is; no one follows up on this. And because as an offspring of a hillbilly and a Celt, I am as white-skinned as they come) and I am often the only white parent on the campus (the second week of this school year, I was turning the corner to go into the school and around the corner was a little redhead girl – a new kindergartner- and her very Viking looking dad. When I spotted them, I was so surprised that I blurted out “My god, another white parent” Luckily for me, with happy children noisily playing, Viking dad did not hear me). One drawback as the sometime only English speaking parent, it can be very lonely; most of the active parents are mono lingual Spanish speaking. I know that turns off some other English only parents, many who are looking for camaraderie with other parents. And languages is only one of the barriers; cultural, life style and simple outlook differences (like I am the ONLY parent who listens to NPR/ KPCC) can lead to a lack of closeness with other parents. (Many of the teachers are NPR/ KPCC fans; during the summer, many of them emailed me after they heard me comment on the morning call in show).

Glenfeliz has so many great things going for it, if I lived in that community, I would be happy to send my daughter there.