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ilbegone
01-04-2010, 05:32 PM
Gil Navarro asks public to pay for conference trip


Stephen Wall, Staff Writer

01/03/2010

San Bernardino County schoolboard member Gil Navarro wants taxpayers to foot the bill for his trip to a conference focusing on the needs of black students.

The money would come out of a $5,000 discretionary fund each board member is given annually to spend on travel and expenses for events sponsored by organizations approved by the board.

But the organizations putting on the February conference are not on the list of approved groups, so Navarro's request requires a board vote.

"I'm alarmed with the high number of African-American students that are dropping out, being kicked out and not receiving the opportunity of completing courses that meet the requirements to attend universities," Navarro said.

In December 2008, the county school board denied Navarro's request to pay a $100 membership fee for him to attend a conference sponsored by the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, a nonprofit organization that works to strengthen Latino leadership and political participation.

Board member David Stine said at the time that public money should not be used to pay for membership in any organization that has a special interest, whether it's for "gender or ethnicity or religion."

The county Board of Education today will consider approving Navarro's request to participate in the Feb. 17 conference in Sacramento. Registration is $125 per person.

The seminar is called "Closing the Achievement Gap for African-American Students: Best Practices for Student Success."

It is sponsored by Total School Solutions, an Irvine-based educational consulting firm, in partnership with the Association of California School Administrators and the California Association of African-American Superintendents and Administrators.

Blacks make up about 10 percent of the county's nearly 430,000 kindergarten through 12th-grade students. But the high school dropout rate for blacks is nearly 32 percent - the highest of any group and nearly 10 percentage points above the county average.

If the board approves the request to attend the seminar, Navarro's airfare, hotel, meals, transportation and other expenses would be deducted from his $5,000 budget.

Jeanfromfillmore
01-04-2010, 08:26 PM
Boy I've seen this done before. A city council member here in Fillmore did somewhat the same thing, but took a trip to Central America and stayed at a luxury resort claiming to be attending a convention to discuss obesity among Latino children. At the time there weren't any rules governing the $5,000 stipend for travel, but within weeks of the Hispanic city council members jet setting plans the city made sure there were rules put on the books. What you want to bet this school board member isn't staying at a Motel 6 and isn't eating at Denny's.

ilbegone
01-04-2010, 08:55 PM
Maybe Navarro ought to just settle on spending forty nine of his own dollars (plus shipping, handling, and sales tax) on this book:

Closing the African American Achievement Gap in Higher Education

Closing the African American Achievement Gap in Higher Education
Alfred P. Rovai, Louis B. Gallien, Jr., & Helen R. Stiff- Williams, Editors
Teachers College Press (New York) 2007
$49, 212 pages, hardcover

Reviewed by Denise Clay
Ph.D. Candidate
The University of Oklahoma

Review: (right up his alley)

http://www.nacacnet.org/PUBLICATIONSRESOURCES/BOOKREVIEWS/REVIEWS/Pages/ClosingGap.aspx

And he could do it all within the cozy cloister of his own domicile.