When are residents of Thousand Oaks going to wake up and realize that the (Superintendent Mario) "Contini group" isn't working?

As our schools lose their Distinguished certification, the finger pointing comes out.

Failing to properly address the needs of what Kim Hanks, lead consultant for the California Department of Education's School Recognition program, deems a "subgroup" is only deteriorating the quality of education in our schools. How much money was spent on legal fees to fight the Meadows Arts and Technology Elementary School (MATES) charter?

We need to take a stance and strive to make education in Thousand Oaks desirable for children and to regain control of CVUSD's "bully pulpit." If we're going to make education available to everyone, it needs to be an education people desire.

Children in these "subgroups" do not benefit from integrating successful children into a failing system; instead they will thrive in a successfully organized environment. How far will the Contini group take this? How long will we accept the actions of the Contini group?

Of course the information for certification was incomplete because we like to think that everything is great, accommodating and fair. When it comes down to it, the demographics and dynamics of our education system have changed and have been changing for years.

This reality shouldn't have eluded our administrators. Are they pinning the hopes of our children on "stimulus" money and taking funds away from programs that our children desperately need? Why all of a sudden is the certification process not "fair"?

The process has always been a standard to achieve.

But now that the Contini group is incapable of realizing the situation they're in, they think it isn't fair. Let's lower the standard to accommodate the "subgroup" instead of maintaining the integrity of our education.

The people we entrust to administer the commodity we value, "education," should wake up and either take a stance to maintain a respected level of education or resign. We need a group of forwardthinking administrators to revive our children's hopes and dreams. Tim Perry Thousand Oaks