QUESTION FAKE GRASS in LGUSD.

Posted with his permission, here is the message of an 11/9/21 letter to the LGUSD school board from a Daves Avenue parent... Dear Terese, Mrs. Mittleman, and all others concerned, Thank you for hosting the town hall session last night. I know a lot of work has gone into this by you and your team. Here are the thoughts I left the meeting with – first, 2 general notes about the process, and then 2 specific notes about the plans for Daves Avenue… [For those that don’t know me, I’m a designer (and licensed architect in 5 states) and a dad of 3 girls – one at Daves now and 2 more to follow in the years ahead.] General Notes Transparency - It would be great if the district’s designs could be posted at each of the schools for review by current parents, students, and even community members that may have future students. As is, the plans are hard to read and visualize (even for someone working in the architecture industry). Sadly, combining these issues with the lack of transparent communicatio...

What started out like this in September 2018... was transformed by March 2020 into this... THIS. IS. An outdoor classroom. There is no mention in the presentation materials about Van Meter's Full STEAM Ahead Project. What's the plan for this courtyard space outside of Van Meter's STEAM lab?? Hopefully, what was there pre-Covid is being preserved or at the very least its spirit and benefits are preserved by intentionally reproducing them elsewhere on campus. While a Life Lab space is in the Van Meter design plans, I'm not sure it fully accomplishes the same thing all on its own. Background: Mrs. Hill was awarded a grant by CTA's Institute for Teaching and invested massive amounts of her personal time building out that courtyard into a beautiful and lively space for our kids featuring a garden, a nasturtium tipi, blueberry bushes, a cozy seating area with a whiteboard, wildflowers, a root viewing box, and more. And she had exciting plans to incoporate a mural...