BY MIKE CETERA
Ever heard of a niece who "moved in" with her aunt and uncle so she could attend a preferred school? Or how about the athlete who doesn't like the makeup of the team in his district who conveniently moves just down the road?
I suspect the idea of falsifying your address to get out of a bad school district (or to get into a good one) is more common than we think.
And now the West Aurora School District is confronting the issue.
Board members Monday reviewed the plan to scrutinize documentation of student addresses and educate administrators about residency requirements.Administrators have so far identified "more than 20 students" who do not live in the district but are enrolled in West Aurora Schools, said district spokesman Mike Chapin.
"This is a crime," said Superintendent Jim Rydland. "We are systematically and consistently going to investigate."
Some suspect the illegal students are coming from the neighboring East Aurora School District.
Of course, the issue of Illegally attending school is not unique to this area.
In January, the New York Times reported on one school district that caught 62 students trying to attend school outside their district.
Clifton is hardly the only district searching for students sneaking into its schools. While the State Department of Education does not keep statistics, administrators in suburban districts report that hundreds of tips are received and checked every year.And there are many ways to find students who don't belong. Bounties, detectives, stakeouts with cameras, and hot lines that receive tips from anonymous callers are tools that some school districts use to combat the perennial problem of illegally enrolled students.
This practice (which should rightfully make taxpayers mad) speaks as much about the quality of one district as it does the deficiencies of another. The question is, what should be done? For West Aurora, it might be prudent to mobilize its efforts in promoting the upcoming East Aurora referendum because if it fails once again, officials should prepare for even more families who try to jump to their ship.
Maybe these students want to go to a high school where the football team wins a game occasionally, or where the band looks & sounds decent.
Go and park by Kautz Road and Montgomery Road around 2:45 every day. You will see kids walking home from Waubonsie Valley High School. Some of them will cross Kautz to go home, which means they actually live in the East Aurora School District. This is a common problem everywhere, not just in this area. It may be for music, sports, better class offerings or for many other reasons. But all of that doesn't matter. You should not be in a school that your property taxes do not go to. If you are a renter, then relocate to another district if you are not happy where you are.
Maybe if some of those kids stayed at their home schools, they could work to make the experience there better for everyone. Maybe they would have a positive impact on the overall test scores at that school. There are good teachers at all schools, just as there are bad teachers at all schools. There are good students at all schools, just as there are bad ones at all schools. I feel that the main difference is the experience in education the kids have when they walk in on the first day of school, the level of priority put on their education by the family, and the attitude the student also has toward learning. A student with family support, a positive attitude, and a strong background in their previous school experiences can overcome a bad teacher and will thrive with a good teacher.
When I taught first and second grade in the East Aurora schools, I had some unique experiences. (If I ever go back to teaching, I would choose to go back to the East Aurora schools before returning to the Naperville schools I taught in.) In one year of teaching second grade I had two different students move into my class straight from Mexico. One had been in school in Mexico from the age of 5. The other had never set foot in a classroom. At the end of second grade, the first one was pretty fluent in English and was on grade level in all areas except writing. The other one made progress, but was still struggling a bit with English and was about half a year behind in everything. I felt that both were pretty bright kids with similar overall potential, the difference was their educational experience. The teacher who pulled them out for bilingual services once a day agreed at the time. I would love to know how the two of them are doing now. (They would both be in their mid 20s now.)
A parent receives a letter from the East Aurora School District stating the school their child is to attend has been on the states failing school list for the past 4 years. The letter also states that a parent has the right to to send their child to a different school in the district or to another district, unfortunately none of the other schools or districts will accept these students. What is a parent, who can not afford private education for their child, to do? Do they abide by the rules or do what is in the best interest of their child? The schools and the state have let these children down. Sham on them!
Yes, there are definitely plenty of good, dedicated teachers in East Aurora schools. The problem is with certain administrators and school board members who have made disastrous decisions in the past few years (such as the band director blunder), ignoring the wishes of parents & taxpayers who (surprise!) refuse to reward their incompetence by supporting a referendum. So sad, because it's the students who end up suffering.
Personally, if you want to look at bad decisions by the East Aurora board and admin, I would go back much farther.
When I was teaching there in 1990, there was a referendum that was being voted on. I had a 1 1/2 year old son and was about 7 months pregnant with my daughter at the time. Previous to that, the last referendum the district had passed had been the year I was born, 1963. I jokingly told everyone that they should use a pic of hugely pregnant me holding my son on all of the flyers for the referendum with the statement "the last time we passed a referendum was the year this women was born". I thought it would be a pretty strong visual though. Between 1963 and that time, very few (in fact maybe none) referendums had even been attempted, yet during that time there had been definite financial issues. There was a major staff reduction in force done around 1982 where even tenured teachers were cut. Elementary schools had no art teachers (still don't.) Around 1988 PE teachers had just been added back to the elementary schools. My first year in EA (85-86), I taught first grade and had to teach my class PE and Art as well. And yes I was expected to have that in my lesson plans. Thank goodness we at least had a music teacher at the time, since I was definitely ill equipped to teach that.
Maybe had things been done differently long ago, the district would be in a better place now.
I will still say that I was happier teaching the students I had there than I ever was in the Naperville schools. I have gone to help out with my sister's 2nd grade class in EA occasionally, and have left with a smile on my face every time. My son spent last summer volunteering with the park district kid's track program at East. He loved the kids too.
What I find interesting is that a former tenant had his daughter use his mailing address to go to West Aurora after she and her mother moved to Naperville.
I called West Aurora several times to inform them that this person not only had never lived at that address but that her father no longer lived there either. The staff at West was not at all concerned....their response was that since she had attended West freshman through junior year, they would allow her to attend her senior year. Those are my tax $s. The saddest thing is that her dad lived at my house for a year and never paid a cent of rent.
I grew up and went to school on the East Side and now am living on the West. Until the East Aurora School Board shows it is fiscally responsible, they will never pass a referendum. Just look at the poor deal the entered into regarding the piece of land on Indian Trail. I agree that the funding inequities in Illinois are ridiculous however the way to fight that is NOT by sending kids to schools which their tax dollars do not currently support. The way to fight it is to vote people into office who will make state funding more equitable. Make the main source of funding state tax dollars and not property taxes. Let more affluent districts building country club high schools build the schools they need and not the schools they want! Those of us who live on the West side made a choice to live there because of the quality of schools. Sending kids there who do not live within the boundaries only teaches those children that it's ok to just take what isn't yours; that it's ok to steal and that it's ok to right one wrong with another. All it's doing is creating a new generation of people with few ethics and morals.
JR, the staff at West may have wanted to avoid the psychological trauma of that girl having to be torn away from her classmates during her senior year of high school. Why should the girl be punished because of a decision her parents made?
Sometimes a bit of flexibility is appropriate when a student would otherwise have to make a huge sacrifice (as moving into a new high school for senior year would surely be). But I'm only siding with the girl in this particular situation--in most cases, I'd agree with you that kids should be attending schools in the district where they actually live.