CSD Cracking Down on Non-Resident Students
Decatur Metro | May 5, 2009 | 2:57 pmLooks like reconfiguration has finally forced CSD to get serious about families who lie about their addresses – sometimes even falsifying documents – to get their children into Decatur’s school system.
Here’s a letter by Dr. Edwards that was sent out to select parents on March 30th. The meatiest paragraphs follow…
For several years now, under my tenure, we have made efforts to implement residency procedures. Try as we might, we still have people that have resorted to lying about their address, falsifying documents or asking others to do so for them. You may have seen in the newspapers where some systems are actually taking legal action against people who perpetrate fraud of this type.
Right after spring break, your child’s school principal will be sending out communication asking for verification of residency. If you receive this type of letter, we ask you to understand why we have to ask you again to provide proof of residence. We will also be auditing the records randomly to see if we have missed some pertinent information.
Finally, there are some individuals whose residency has been in question for some time. I am directing the principals to send out notification to these families with the intent that the children be withdrawn and sent to their home schools. We will be providing enough time so that families can withdraw their children and get them settled into their new school for the next school year. We will be asking our attorneys to look closely at affidavits and leases provided in questionable circumstances.
While this certainly sucks for the kids caught in the middle, that’s not the school system’s fault or problem. Parents should lead by example and play by the rules.
Special note to the AJC: Since this is something I could see you following up on, I’d just like to go on the record and point out that it was reported here first. Thanks.
Just because you mentioned some minor issue on this site at this time doesn’t mean you were first. Have you checked every other publication, website, or broadcast of any kind?
And again, even if that were true, that doesn’t mean that someone else hasn’t heard the same thing and may report the same thing at a later time.
Credit is reserved for some original reporting that others can’t reproduce. If they can – any media outlet can just report the same story without credit. It’s no different than the shooting that makes the 6 pm news on ch 2 and the 10 pm news on Fox. Fox isn’t required to credit 2 with the story unless they can’t report it themselves. If they are going to simply quote the competitor, then they should give credit. Otherwise, they just report the same story. Happens every day, over and over.
When you put extensive work into some investigation that changes Decatur school or government and someone else reports your work, then complain.
Until then, move on.
“Credit is reserved for some original reporting that others can’t reproduce.”
As I’ve stated before, that’s an old rule of journalism, not of blogging. And why is it too much to ask that if you want to play in my sandbox, I’d like you to play by my rules? Why does any blogger care so much about credit? Because its my form of payment.
Why is the journalism model for credit superior to the blog model? Some of your other old models don’t work all that well in comparison so I’m not sure we should accept these things without question. For example, while no one would argue that investigative journalism is still key when it comes to uncovering hidden or complex stories, the “newspaper as overlord” model doesn’t seem to work as well if you want a good variety of sources.
Is it also a rule of journalism to continuously pull from a source but to never mention it to your readers?
And I’d rather you convince me to move on, as opposed to having it forced upon me thanks.
DM, just ignore Hack. Their pseudonym is appropo, however.
Kudos to Dr. Edwards and the school board for this action, which is way overdue in my opinion. When I lived in Decatur, I knew of several families JUST ON MY STREET who blatantly veered around the law on this issue. It is fraud, pure and simple.
This is not a new issue they are dealing with. It is constantly ongoing, and one they continually attempt to tackle. I hope they find them all, and stop the moochers from increasing our tax base by not paying their fair share. If they want their out of district kids to come to our schools, then pay the tuition. Imagine the burden of the child who has to lie about where they live? Unreal. Guess it is a compliment to our school system, though.
On our street we have a couple of grandparents who are the base the kids use for their address – i’m conflicted because while the kids do not live there the gparents are paying taxes, right? I’m curious as to how they will handle such cases.
Decatur Mom is correct.
According to City Schools of Decatur School Board Policy JBCA:
“To classify as a resident student, a student shall be required to reside with his/her parent or legal guardian within the city limits.”
So if I understand the scenario above, kids use grandparent’s Decatur address, but physically live with parent/guardian outside of city. If that is the case, the students should not attend CSD.
By the way, this is the most common scenario I’ve faced in the past and continue to investigate this year.
Greg Wiseman
Principal, Winnona Park
It is more complicated than many of you make it out to be with statements like “moochers” and “fraud”. CSD needs to be deligent in making sure families live in the district, but I believe they need to be responsible when asking a family to leave the district. Often families have to leave Decatur under dire circumstances. I am aware of famlies that have become homeless or had to move due to dire circumstances that the children do not ask for. Does CSD wash their hands of them and say, sorrry, you do not live in the district, go enroll in your where your guardians are living, which is often temporary and in the worse school districts . These are children with potential and I believe in these rare cases, there should be exceptions to retain the children. Yes CSD is responsible to educate the children of the City of Decatur, but there also exists a larger responsibility to do the right thing in special circumstances.
I agree that Decatur’s public schools should be for Decatur’s residents.
However, if a child is abandoned or neglected by the legal guardian, but cared for (housed, fed, clothed, nurtured) by a Decatur resident, I would not object to counting the child as a resident and allowing the child to attend CSD.
Well all you folks who, while understandably sympathetic to the children involved, wish for them to stay even if their guardian/grandparent may be receiving substantial tax deductions already need to understand this is “double dipping”, or placing an unfair burden on fellow tax paying citizens who DO follow the rules.
Perhaps you would like to volunteer to pay THEIR way from YOUR personal funds? My funds are strapped already, and I don’t even HAVE KIDS using the schools.
DM,
I’ll return to my original statements. Can you ever know if you
are first for any basic news event?
It’s not like you are creating news through original effort.
You are simply noting a happening.
And, even if you were first, that
doesn’t mean anyone else who reports it later got it from you
nor that they even know you reported it first.
It only means they reported it later.
If Ch. 5 reports that same story mentioned above later or one of the Decatur papers, do they
credit you? And why would they?
My move on comments were related to the fact that this
is a fine blog and the constant carping only brings it down.
I think Decatur Metro has the highest “Information-to-Carping” ratio of any popular local news blog (and that includes the one I contribute to).
Let’s remember this letter went out March 30, so all of us CSD parents have known about it for over a month! But thanks anyway, Metro.
I think for the most part CSD parents appreciate the effort by the school system. Personally, I recently came very close to getting my hands on my little nephew because his family situation has gone from bad to worse. But I would have sought legal guardianship immediately and knew that I would not have been able to enroll him in CSD without it. It’s hard enough for CSD to get the enrollment guesses even CLOSE to correct; adding the temporary stays of hardship kids just makes it that much harder.
OK, now we’re talking.
hack, you ask the question about “how can you ever know if you’re first?” like its impossible to determine. Sure there are millions of news sources out there, but only a select few (smaller today than even a year ago) write anything about it. Perhaps instead of “first” we should think about it in terms of “how the AJC learns about the story. This leads to the question, “But how can you ever know that the AJC read the story on your blog?” And the answer is, I can’t provide concrete proof, but I’ve been writing this blog for over a year and a half, and after a while it became sorta obvious, like the time when I posted about a certain author and then the AJC contacted her for an interview within minutes of posting, or the Crescent Moon drama which played out entirely on this site and was the basis of an AJC article, but this site was never mentioned as a source for the writer. There are dozens of other examples, but I’ll stop there.
Then again to the second part of your argument, which again goes back to “so what if the AJC read about it here?” and that AGAIN is the journalism vs. blog model. The AJC has shown it has taken an extreme position when it comes to blogs. Take a look at the NY Times. They write about blogs all the time. They question the future of media and cite specific local bloggers.
For reasons I can guess but don’t know for sure, the AJC chooses to use local blogs as a source to compile stories, but has NEVER to my knowledge chosen to enlighten their viewers to the blogs they so obviously enjoy. Why do you think that is? This is left completely up to the other papers and mags, like Creative Loafing and Atlanta Magazine.
CSD Mom’s comment, even if its snarky, brings up another great point. “Blogs” take up a huge amount of space between neighborhood gossip and professional journalism. Blogs fall all along that line. Personally, I enjoy jumping around on that spectrum, partly because its fun and partly because I think that people want both real journalism and to know the latest junk on their neighbors. That said, the blog v. newspaper model isn’t an easy one to reconcile…what constitutes “news” and what sort of respect do you show those counterparts?
But the AJC seems to have determined that this isn’t even a conversation worth having. In print, the paper continues to present a world in which local blogs, which they compete with for stories, does not exist. (I’m well aware of the journalistic urge to “get the story first”…even if the reader doesn’t give a flip) In real life, they troll the blogs for great story ideas, since they no longer have the time the time or funds.
And the old argument of “that’s how this game works” just doesn’t fly anymore. No one would argue (I hope) that the world of news and info hasn’t changed in the past decade or so. To hold tight to the “this is how its always worked” mantra, seems short-sighted in an industry in flux. As stated before, blogs thrive on hattips, not cash, so its not the same as the AJC vs. Fox 5. We thrive on recognition from each other, its a form of justification for what we do, since there isn’t a paycheck.
I know when I’m carping, but don’t think that I’m only doing it for self-esteem reasons (that’s only part). As the largest community blog in the Atlanta area, I feel that I have a responsibility to continue to bring this issue up with the AJC. To take your advice and just accept the status quo isn’t healthy for Atlanta journalism. The AJC should be more community-minded. And it will never achieve its goal of being more “community-focused” paper, that’s soul goal is “beating the competition.” I WANT a paper that is community first. The reason I bring up the “First of DM” thing is to speak the AJC’s language, so they (you?) perk up and notice. Then we can have these conversations.
There is a happy medium out there, and some newspapers have done a great job getting closer to finding a good marriage between blogs and themselves. The AJC has never showed an interest in doing that.
That’s why I carp.
Thanks Andisheh.
treesrock: as if children attending school outside CSD have no potential? Attending school elsewhere isn’t a death sentence to the brain power of any student. That is a little dramatic.
Don’t need a lecture about social responsiblity. If I want that I can check into the many Obama TV networks.
Just need tax relief. Feel free to pay my share for your sense of “do-gooderness.” I have had it up to my empty pockets.
bottom line……live in the city of decatur w/ an adult who has legal custody or guardianship of you, then you get to go to csd. live outside, cheat, or lie to go to school here, you get the boot. it is the adults fault yes, not the children’s but why should the decatur taxpayers pay for someone else’s lie. it’s true it is sad that the innocent child gets hurt, but children are disrupted when parents have to move for a job change and it is against their will. as a taxpayer, i do not want to pay for someone else’s child who doesn’t live here and plays fairly by the rules to use our excellent schools.
Thanks John. My point exactly.
And Nancy, don’t worry. AFter a while you will get the hang of blog etiquette and won’t need your comments edited. It takes time to grow into it.
and by the by: if playing by the rules with regards to life, schools, taxes, etc. and expecting my fellow tax-paying ( or not) Decaturites to pay their fair share makes me narrow minded and selfish, then something is way off kilter.
Grumble, good point, going to schools outside of Decatur is not a death sentence. That said, I hate to see kids moved from school to school because of an unstable family situation. It is especially sad when you see the kids making so much progress, often due to the continuity of being in one districtv and the formation of community of teachers, parents, and friends. Given that their situation is unstable at home, that community is even more important. That said, I realize that if the guardians/parents are not living within the City over a period of more than one school year, eventually they will probably have to move on, especially if the guardians/parents have been able to set stablize their situation, albeit somewhere else.
John is correct. Residency has been a major focus of Dr Edwards and the school board ever since Dr Edwards started at CSD. It can be a very time consuming, difficult, and heart-wrenching process to challenge, and prove folks don’t reside where they claim. Sometimes it an honest mistake where the family thought they were in the city limits, but many times there’s an elaborate deception plan involved.
Trust me when I say we truly understand the importance of this issue and that we are really working hard to resolve it.
Greg Wiseman
Principal, Winnona Park
It’s my understanding that it depends on whether or not the grandparents have actual legal custody. I don’t think the parents can just have the kids stay with the grandparents and send them to city schools, unless the grandparents are the legal guardians.
Grandparents are eligible for significant property tax exemptions if they are seniors (since I guess it’s assumed they do not have school-age children). http://www.decaturga.com/cgs_citysvcs_atr_taxesandfees.aspx
Actually I believe the exemptions were the result of explosive rise in property taxes a few years back and its impact on seniors with fixed incomes. It had nothing to do with children in schools.
If elaborate deception is involved I wouldn’t find it heart wrenching at all. The cheaters are getting off easy since we haven’t prosecuted anyone (yet). While it is sad to see kids caught up in the middle of all this, the kids are getting a good lesson in the value of honesty and the reality of consequences for cheating – a lesson that apparently their parents don’t find very important b/c they certainly aren’t teaching by example. The taxpayers here in Decatur who are forking out insane sums in property taxes are being protected. CSD is coming out ahead b/c they no longer have to teach some kids who aren’t paying their fair share.
Homeless children can attend school in any district.
Looking at that as “double-dipping” is really narrow-minded and just plain wrong, especially as you place it in context of guardians. As a community, we have chosen, because recent development was raising taxes to levels that was actually unfair for long-term homeowners/residents on fixed incomes, some of whom were in danger of losing homes they owned outright and had for decades because of tax burden, to offer freezes and exemptions for seniors. Because of the extended nature of family, many of those seniors do have adult children and grandchildren who live with them, or serve as the primary caregiver/guardian for minor relatives. Those children have every right to be in our schools. Those tax exemptions are what we, in the interest of social justice as members of a civil society, chose to do. Other communities may tax long-term residents out in the interest of developers and higher income newcomers, but thankfully Decatur is more evolved than that.
The relative caregiver phenomenon is growing nationwide, and relative caregivers can establish legal relationships with children. Atlanta Legal Aid Society and two of its projects, the Georgia Senior Legal Hotline and the Grandparent/Relative Caregiver Project, provide free legal services for seniors and relatives who are caring for grandchildren, nieces, nephews, etc. Kinship care adoption gives the relative caregiver legal rights, including the right to enroll a child in a school near their home, and financial assistance. If any of your neighbors are in a position where they may benefit from establishing this legal relationship, please let them know about Atlanta Legal Aid.
Hi, Nellie. I’m curious about this statement:
“…because recent development was raising taxes to levels that was actually unfair for long-term homeowners/residents on fixed incomes…”
I think you’re leaving out some steps here. The “recent development” amounts to investment, which has had the effect of increasing value. Our tax rate has been fairly consistent. If we’re paying more, it’s because we’re benefiting from greater home value.
Clearly you’re not suggesting that we serve the poor and disadvantaged better through disinvestment and abandonment. But that is the flip-side to what has happened in Decatur. As I see it, it’s the increased value and revenues created by all this investment which has allowed us to offer tax-relief programs for the needy.
I know you’re an advocate and am sure it’s unintentional, but I periodically pick up a hint of aggression towards affluence in your posts. I would suggest that a truly rich community (not just financially but in all realms of humanity) needs — yes, *needs* — both rich and poor, working things out together for the benefit of all. Monocultures of any kind, rich or poor, are each obnoxious in their own ways.
I’m not saying our work is done here in Decatur but, in my opinion, the disadvantaged are in a better position overall now than they were two decades ago when the city was disproportionately poor. So I see investment (in the form of development and otherwise) as a net positive. I get the feeling you don’t. Can you elaborate?
No, I don’t mean that, but I do admit I do get really irritated when people make obnoxious statements about who deserves what based on the property taxes they pay or how long they have lived here (which I admit to being guilty of), or any of those types of elitist, anti-community statements. I have lived in Decatur pretty much since I was 18 (a loooong time ago in a decade far far away) so I have seen a lot of positive changes and some negative ones (I am sorry but those plans for Trinity Triangle are UGLY). I also see first hand the impact those changes have had emotionally and financially on my neighbors.
I think as I have gotten older I have become more of a socialist, and I am not afraid to admit it. My husband is from a quasi-socialist country and the disparities here blow his mind. It’s not affluence that offends me, but the use of affluence to oppress or offend, whether intentionally or not. I clearly see statements like this:
“Perhaps you would like to volunteer to pay THEIR way from YOUR personal funds? My funds are strapped already, and I don’t even HAVE KIDS using the schools.” as elitist, divisive and counterproductive, though the statement was probably also made out of some sort of frustration with systems that I did not recognize in my original rant.
I feel society has a duty to assure that everyone has as level a playing field as possible. I think we have to be measured in how we address poverty and economic disparity and the language we choose is powerful and important. We also have to be very honest about our prejudices and problems. Statements like the one above just get me worked up, no true offense meant to SAAC Jack, btw.
Oh boy … [edited: no personal attacks].
Not necessarily. He probably just got a pretty little multipage tax bill. I have to admit it makes me long for the days when I first bought my house in the 1990s, had boarded up windows, customers still stopping by for the crack the previous tenants used to sell, and no central heat and air or insulation. And bullet holes in the windows and walls. My tax bill then was less than $1000 a year!
Geez, Nancy, I was just trying to add some levity. And by the way, the difference now is more like $6,000 for me. And the schools were good way back then in the olden days. That’s one of the reasons people started moving here to begin with.
Oh, yeah, those were great times. Well worth saving $2,000 a year to live in a crappy neighborhood with failing schools.
Uh, really? I’ll take today’s version of Decatur, even if it means higher taxes (and better services). Surely we all need to be aware of how our leaders spend our tax dollars. But for the life of me I can’t understand people’s total and fanatical aversion to taxes. Does selfishness completely overwhelm the idea that there are plently of things that we need to contribute our resources toward in order to maintain a higher quality of life?
Oh, and GAK, I actually agree with with you. As I noted above, I was just being a little snarky.
Missed it, sorry. I get a little on edge having to defend my “socialism” sometimes.
I caught the sarcasm Nellie. Best comment today IMHO.