EL RRUN RRUN
http://rrunrrun.blogspot.com/
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PACE PRINCIPAL GETS "LETTER OF CONCERN" FOR HANDLING SECURE TEST RESULTS IN VIOLATION OF SECURITY PROTOCOLS
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By <b>Juan Montoya</b><br />Three months after denying that a high school principal and her assistant had gone over 10th and 11th TAKS grade answer sheets and may have erased or changed answers on them in violation of Texas and Brownsville Independent School District testing security protocols, the district says it has issued her a "letter of concern" for her actions.<br />BISD and the Texas Education Agency conducted an investigation into the actions of Pace High School Rose Longoria and her Asst. Principal Carla Gonzales after an incident at the school March 8 where at least 14 teachers and academic staff reported that both women had entered the secure test room (A-151) and asked to examine each answer bundle for each 10th-grade student. The reports indicate that they told those present â€" including Testing Coordinator Irma Medrano â€" that they wanted to make sure the score coding and demographics were correct and asked for a pencil and eraser and on several occasions erased or darkened the answer bubbles on the front sheets of the packets.<br />In their statements, Longoria and Gonzales claim that they had gone in the secure room â€" which is against the Texas and BISD protocol for testing security â€" to make sure the demographic and scoring coding were correctly filled out n the tests. They deny they had changed any of the scoring results or answers in the exam answer sheets themselves.<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeuCV8vyGVsXl66-3WzBn-_Mek0vXiX0gkmHK0vmvJPwpfhIjMcEyyEbl2pjWVTZTpkp-KWUXWqEzTGKknMRl0JubCMbWuZ4N6LoaeCMAuv0ZUSZ7tvMN6l8zgaOwndPE91Gm7zJiMito/s1600/erase.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeuCV8vyGVsXl66-3WzBn-_Mek0vXiX0gkmHK0vmvJPwpfhIjMcEyyEbl2pjWVTZTpkp-KWUXWqEzTGKknMRl0JubCMbWuZ4N6LoaeCMAuv0ZUSZ7tvMN6l8zgaOwndPE91Gm7zJiMito/s320/erase.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>According to a timeline issued by Pam Van Ravenwaay, BISD Student Assessment Coordinator, on the afternoon of Match 8, Medrano told her when she was handing in her 10th- and 11th-grade answer documents that the reason she was late was because "Longoria had inspected every answer document.<br />Ravenwaay said Medrano reported that the principal had "checked the demographics of every 10th grade test booklet and had proceeded to look at the pages where students had bubbled answers.<br />"She stated that (Longoria)...at one point asked for a pencil and an eraser, but that (Medrano) had told her that she could not have (it)..."<br />In the report to the TEA, Ravenwaay said Longoria had been reported "looking at the pages where students had indicated their answers and had written their essays."<br />The next day, on March 9, Raul Vasquez, administrator for Assessment, Research and Evaluation, collected a14 statements from witnesses and asked Longoria to write a statement detailing her actions March 8.<br />On March 19, the AR&E Department provided BISD Superintendent Carl Montoya, Asst. Superintendent Bertha Peña in charge of the Pace cluster, and Dr. Sylvia Atkinson, Asst. Superintendent for Human resources with a summary of the findings that included the following:<br />â€" that no answer documents had been tampered with<br />â€" and that no student answers had been compromised<br />â€" that there was unauthorized viewing of the student answers against state and BISD testing protocols<br />â€" that Longoria would be given a chance to address the AR&E findings<br />In short, the AR&E staff determined that Longoria did not tamper with the answers but that there was unauthorized viewing of the answers in a secure testing room by the principal and her assistant and that she used a phone to call from the site, an activity specifically prohibited for test security.<br />In a letter to the Texas Education Agency's Security Division in Austin, Montoya on March 20 issued a report on the "testing incident at Pace High School" and cited several "procedural errors" that needed to be improved. He suggested that:<br />â€" Additional training for all testing personnel at the campus will be provided to reiterate the proper protocol regarding handling secure testing materials<br />â€" An assistant will be trained and appointed to assist the campus testing coordinator with testing<br />â€" A letter of concern will be issued to the campus principal <i>and </i>testing coordinator<br />â€" Additional training will be provided for all campus principals about handling secure testing materials.<br />However, Longoria's casual explanation for her presence in a secure area where test answer records are kept and her insistence on changing demographic and scoring coding is at odds with some of the people who gave their statements.<br />While Longoria states that no one asked her to sing in as is required for anyone who enters the secure area, others said that when she asked Longoria to sing in, "she waved her hand in dismissal of the request. The signing in to the secure room obviously did not apply to her."<br />One said that in spite of the fact that Medrano told her that it was illegal for her to be in the secure room and making changes on the test answer sheets, Longoria continued perusing the documents and at one point asked for a pencil and erase and "bubbled something on an answer document."<br />In the course of reviewing the tests, Longoria told those present that she was doing it because:<br />â€" one year she had to pay out of her own pocket because the demographic information on some answer booklets were wrong<br />â€" she did that "every year to insure that there are no discrepancies, because if there are, this makes me look bad."<br />â€" told Medrano "<i>Ay, Ida!</i>," in response to the testing coordinator's protests that she not erase or change anything on the answer sheet because it was illegal<br />â€" she said she was checking them because "she needed to know if she had to write up someone if they did not tell the kids to check their answers."<br />â€" Longoria said she was checking them because "she said aloud that she had to look though all the documents or else she could not sleep...she did ask for a pencil"<br />â€" that she needed to check all the answers because of another incident that had happened previous(ly) at another campus<br />â€" she never allowed teachers to bubble in answers on the answer documents..(but that she) herself would bubble in information on the front page, because she couldn't afford mistakes (and) asked about several bubble marks stating that they were too light or that she couldn't tell if they were darkened or erased."<br />â€" told the testing coordinator that she did the same thing on her former campus "because she didn't trust her test administrators to bubble (front page scoring and demographics bubbles) correctly. At one point, another witness told Medrano that she saw "Ms. Longorai erase and slide off the eraser shavings off a test document. She didn't know what she had erased or in what section."<br />The documents indicate that even though all staff who enter the secure test materials room are required to sign a "no cell phone oath" at the beginning of each day, Longoria asked that one be brought to her but Medrano vetoed the idea. Longoria then used a portable IP school phone to call from inside the secure room, a prohibited activity, and dismissed protests from the staff with a wave of her hand.<br />Why is this so important as it relates to principal Longoria?<br />According to a majority of the statements, Longoria and Gonzales said they had done the same thing in the precious (Lucio Middle School) school where they were together.<br /><br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-eVgyKzxbHROuFMk37T0nHpyvom6UkLVViQOf4kLUnK5W7lnAuAzpcEAjl1RIM4FeDimPk7KdJlz0a_KA7VbQzfG3q0vLW-q5CxkfvctKIeIA3AU4kMPCP283SunFar1VqjeRbv4lYF4/s1600/lucio+middle+school.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg-eVgyKzxbHROuFMk37T0nHpyvom6UkLVViQOf4kLUnK5W7lnAuAzpcEAjl1RIM4FeDimPk7KdJlz0a_KA7VbQzfG3q0vLW-q5CxkfvctKIeIA3AU4kMPCP283SunFar1VqjeRbv4lYF4/s1600/lucio+middle+school.jpg" /></a>Longoria, a rising star in the district after her meteoric rise as the former principal at Lucio, took over Pace â€" a low-performing high school â€" in the 2011 school year.<br />At the time, she said that with the state-mandating new testing, she had no doubts the students would "be up to the task."<br />“I inherited a school that was already in forward motion,†Longoria said at the beginning of the school year. “We want to continue that momentum. ... Everyone wants to see Pace as an exemplary campus and they’re not going to rest until we get it back up there.â€<br /><div></div></div><div>Longoria's performance at Lucio caught the attention of the BISD administration and resulted in her promotion to Pace. While at Lucio, the school's ranking rose from the 48.3 percentile among middle schools in the state in 2008 to the 79.7 percentile in 2009. The school, also placed in the 72.0 percentile in 2010, the last year she was there.</div><div><span style="font-size: 16px;">After Longoria departure, Lucio's state ranking has fallen ever since.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 16px;"><i>(El Rrun-Rrun asked for the statements and reports given to the TEA at the time of the incident, but the BISD info machine opted to ask for an Texas Attorney General's Opinion that was issued June 8. In its opinion the AG denied the district's justifications for keeping the documents out of the public's eye and the BISD counsel released the information today.) </i></span></div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/6016803033174468094-7123941623205724408?l=rrunrrun.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
LINK: http://rrunrrun.blogspot.com/2012/06/pace-principal-gets-letter-of-concern.html
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THE CHAIRMAN SPEAKS: IT'S "US" AGAINST "THEM"
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<br /><blockquote style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.917969); font-family: arial, sans-serif;" type="cite"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOkeyfdaxyHzh2ZzhNzQPgCJ4xO4Qg6vL0j5niHl-0Tq0xu-xX0aF8dFwBF7TBNIw3SERsT8jcN3j1VrusFG5HjJaeR4aN9u4F58NYxcxSKk4_aMIoQawNdHcJd_IjR1akJ4rCBwwaxPE/s1600/hinojosa.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="115" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOkeyfdaxyHzh2ZzhNzQPgCJ4xO4Qg6vL0j5niHl-0Tq0xu-xX0aF8dFwBF7TBNIw3SERsT8jcN3j1VrusFG5HjJaeR4aN9u4F58NYxcxSKk4_aMIoQawNdHcJd_IjR1akJ4rCBwwaxPE/s400/hinojosa.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi33VJjc4dojEtt5K7im-FUsabPp6vmM0JTxj90bULOh0Xbhe1u4oIH7g56eoJtPLGu-wIa7OBkhqY6Be9RCXoL97fdJrvOQjaVrmgPC96aXFXKbK-5Y2Cjox_DpXMQFh314LfDxjsuydU/s1600/hinojosa1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="60" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi33VJjc4dojEtt5K7im-FUsabPp6vmM0JTxj90bULOh0Xbhe1u4oIH7g56eoJtPLGu-wIa7OBkhqY6Be9RCXoL97fdJrvOQjaVrmgPC96aXFXKbK-5Y2Cjox_DpXMQFh314LfDxjsuydU/s400/hinojosa1.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><blockquote type="cite"><br /></blockquote></blockquote><div>By <b>Gilberto Hinojosa</b></div><i>Chair of the Texas Democratic Party Fellow Texas Democrats:</i><br />I am so honored to have been chosen by you as your Chair of our Great Texas Democratic Party. The overwhelming support from our Party rank and file was humbling. Thank you so much!<br />I would like to thank Rachel Barrios Van Os and Fidel "Ace" Acevedo for their sacrifice in their race for Chair. I know that their love of our Democratic Party is what drove them in this back breaking pace of a statewide campaign. To both of you, congratulations for your commitment to our Party and know that we welcome your continued leadership and work in our Party.<br />The real work now begins. Much remains to be done. But knowing that, not only is our cause just and right, it is a cause that comes with Hope. As I have stressed to you throughout this campaign for a year and a half, there are more of "Us" than "Them".<br /><div>Our challenge is to assemble strategies that will ensure that Our Base is engaged, energized and involved in the electoral process. This is doable my friends - but not without a lot of hard work and smart thinking. But, if there is one thing that I am sure of it is that we are smarter than they are and the Republican assault on our families in Texas drives us to want to work harder than ever. Texas families are depending on us to succeed. We cannot fail - WE MUST NOT FAIL!!!<br />So let's get to work. Let's turn this thing around. And, let's bring the visionary, strong and compassionate leadership to our Great State that our families deserve.<br />And let's have some fun doing it, my friends!</div><div><br /></div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/6016803033174468094-4008195363759936498?l=rrunrrun.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
LINK: http://rrunrrun.blogspot.com/2012/06/chariman-speaks-its-us-against-them.html
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TRADEMARK HERNANDEZ CAMPAIGNING: STEAL YOUR OPPONENTS' SIGNS, INSULT THEM, FEIGN INNOCENCE
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<div><i>"The wicked flee when no man pursueth."</i></div><div>Proverbs 28:1</div><div>By Juan Montoya<br /><div>It started out even before the primary elections.</div></div><div>Numerous campaign sings of Yolanda Begum, candidate for the Justice of the Peace 2-2 position, were slashed with box cutters or other sharp instruments. Interestingly, only Begum's and no no other candidates', signs were vandalized. In some case, another candidate's sign (Erin Hernandez Garcia's) was next to hers and was not touched. At the Valley International County Club, the vandals actually went on private property and slashed them.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpN8RGcB24SDaSMkNpi7kcPE13jtGtks2rytqCVz2afE0rXa_7t-YNaohfz4awdm2yr-ESor_hqpXWIHp9V1ofVuI6g9uJXNQYn4dGLoV9yW0rU6PCIIIa7fYmGF2n_XR9TgwTgUaUGUY/s1600/yoli.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpN8RGcB24SDaSMkNpi7kcPE13jtGtks2rytqCVz2afE0rXa_7t-YNaohfz4awdm2yr-ESor_hqpXWIHp9V1ofVuI6g9uJXNQYn4dGLoV9yW0rU6PCIIIa7fYmGF2n_XR9TgwTgUaUGUY/s320/yoli.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div>Now, with only one opponent against Begum in the runoff (Erin Hernnadez Garcia), the fun and games has started all over again. In a report filed with the Brownsville Police Department, Begum has said that someone has been removing her sings (metal posts and all) from various locations around the city and leaving other (Erin Hernandez Garcia's) signs untouched.</div><div>"Jut mine are disappearing," said the exasperated candidate. "There's a gap where mine were, but others (like Erin Hernandez Garcia's) are still there."</div><div>The tactic from her opponents camp (and logically, who else would care about Begum's signs?) seems to be: If we couldn't beat her outright in the primary, let's make her spend her money and divert her from campaigning for the runoff."</div><div>Signs, as most candidates will tel you, are not cheap. Begum says her 150 elaborate campaign 4x4 and 4x8 signs set her back some $12,000. Although she told police she does not know the identity of the sign thieves and vandals, she said her mother had spotted a white pickup truck (Ernie Hernandez, Erin Hernandez Garcia's father, owns a white pickup truck, among other vehicles) loaded with her daughter signs along FM 802, where some have disappeared.</div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjAvfgso_s6hwYWr_xsVY9d3jry4h7egmS7fR1-OBxhzae97_YcknKTHjM68WbW1AMckeAzh7ed1GTB0tBtFmluf0GLcqM5yst1SrWAT7EkDR5O-jVJEG1SwnUv9BiA4BRj611S-wGV0U/s1600/ernie2.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjAvfgso_s6hwYWr_xsVY9d3jry4h7egmS7fR1-OBxhzae97_YcknKTHjM68WbW1AMckeAzh7ed1GTB0tBtFmluf0GLcqM5yst1SrWAT7EkDR5O-jVJEG1SwnUv9BiA4BRj611S-wGV0U/s400/ernie2.gif" width="400" /></a></div>"She called me up and asked me if I was still placing signs and I told her I wasn't," Begum said. "She didn't think anything of it when she saw the truck passing by and didn't follow it."</div><div>Meanwhile, when a Harlingen television station queried Begum's lone opponent (Erin Hernandez Garcia) about the stolen signs, she struck an arrogant pose and called her opponents, among other things, a "crybaby," "insecure," and "unqualified" to be a justice of the peace.</div><div>Whaaaaat?</div><div>Even a famous local politiquera called this blog to "protest too much" and sought to remove the blame from Erin Hernandez Garcia (Ernie Hernandez's daughter) for the missing signs and vandalism.<br />"It's just that people place signs without permission and the owners sometimes call to complain about them," she said. "Erin (Hernandez Garcia) had nothing to do with it, believe me."</div><div>As the Bible states: <i>"The wicked flee..."</i></div><div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/6016803033174468094-6346074367740411376?l=rrunrrun.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
LINK: http://rrunrrun.blogspot.com/2012/06/trademark-hernandez-campaigning-steal.html
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FAT LADY STILL SINGING; LAWYERS, JUDGES RUN FOR COVER
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9o1sm9PYbbamlS2UqFdnhZmA4YmCBwShJZRrBIkU64HnO8kzh3Sn8sN3TPeoWiZPhHsxh40Rd2ifwC9pe1iAAjUWtU3WwgeiVbMoParFatgKvoEi0Vux6r2TXbQEIewy71I82IwuaB3s/s1600/limasong.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="265" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9o1sm9PYbbamlS2UqFdnhZmA4YmCBwShJZRrBIkU64HnO8kzh3Sn8sN3TPeoWiZPhHsxh40Rd2ifwC9pe1iAAjUWtU3WwgeiVbMoParFatgKvoEi0Vux6r2TXbQEIewy71I82IwuaB3s/s400/limasong.gif" width="400" /></a></div>By<b> Juan Montoya</b><br />We have long held the opinion that the weakest link in the U.S. Government's case in the Abel Limas scandal is none other than their star witness: Abel Limas himself.<br />So far, our pinion has not changed. In fact, it has found fertile ground in local public opinion. No one believes what Limas is saying now.<br />Meanwhile, the government did itself no favors to elicit the charge from Limas that Cameron County District Attorney Armando Villalobos offered him money to dissuade him from launching a judicial inquiry into the disappearance of convicted murderer Amit Livingston who failed to turn himself in to prison after Lima granted his defense a motion to allow him 60 days to get his affairs in order before serving his 20-plus year sentence.<br />Come again?<br />Limas granted the motion to allow Livingston to walk out of the courthouse after a murder conviction knowing full well that a $500,000 cash bond posted by the convicted man's family would be split in a parallel civil lawsuit the victim's family filed against the defendant. Villalobos and Charles Mattingly (now a GOP candidate for DA) say they protested against letting Livingston go in Limas' chambers, pitting their word against Limas and the man's defense attorney.<br />Now Limas, claiming he knew nothing about the way the $500,000 was going to be split between the family and the defense attorneys (Eddie Lucio, Villalobos' former law partner) is saying that Villalobos gave him money to stop him from launching the inquiry.<br />Now, given the testimony Limas gave where he remembers even a $100 gambling chip local attorney Michael Young "loaned" him in a trip to Las Vegas, how believable is it that he didn't know about the $500,000? Or how much Villalobos is supposed to have given him to purchase his silence and not launch an inquiry?<br />This much we now know. Limas lied to the government until confronted with so much evidence to the contrary that he switched stories until he satisfied his interrogators. He lied about acts he said he took that he never did. So where does the lies end and the truth begin in his recollection of events?<br />We already know that he was a liar and a cheat on the bench. We already know that he has struck a plea agreement with the government to snitch on all and any individual that they might be interested in in order to protect his wife (which the defense can't locate) and his son.<br />And this is the guy we're supposed to believe?<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/6016803033174468094-987070798383510317?l=rrunrrun.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>
LINK: http://rrunrrun.blogspot.com/2012/06/fat-lady-still-singing-lawyers-run-for.html
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