Source:  Re:  Fresh

April 9, 2020 (El Cajon) - Loaning ventilators, aiding stranded cruise ship passengers, and stitching home-made face masks are ways that Grossmont-Cuyamaca Community College District employees are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Source: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)

April 2, 2020 (Washington D.C.) -- Due to school closings as a result of COVID-19, children will potentially have an increased online presence and/or be in a position that puts them at an inadvertent risk. Due to this newly developing environment, the FBI is seeking to warn parents, educators, caregivers, and children about the dangers of online sexual exploitation and signs of child abuse.

By Nicole Freeling, UC Newsroom  

April 1, 2020 (San Diego) -- Across California and the nation, students have been forced to adapt as measures to combat COVID-19 have closed schools, cancelled standardized tests and upended every aspect of their education. And many have faced a nagging concern: how will this affect my college prospects?

By Miriam Raftery

March 30, 2020 (San Diego) – Cox Communications recently announced steps to keep people and communities connected  during the COVID-19 pandemic, when many are working at home, educating children at home, or facing financial stress.  Those steps include increasing customer bandwidth free, suspending data usage overage fees, not cutting off phone or internet services for people who can’t pay bills due to the pandemic, and waiving late fees. Cox is also offering low-cost fees for new customers including families with children, opening outdoor WiFi hotspots, and more.

Cox assures that its network has capacity to handle a surge in usage trends from business to residential areas, allow quick emergency repairs, and protect employees and customers through social distance.

Below is Cox’s statement on keeping communities connected and helping those who most need connectivity:

By Miriam Raftery

March 24, 2020 (San Diego) – Students who want to take the Advanced Placement (AP) exams and be prepared, despite school closures, can now take free AP review classes online.  The AP College Board is giving students free live and on-demand.  They are also developing a new at-home testing option.

AP  tests are college-level exams on specific subjects and are normally administered in May upon completion of an AP course at a student's high school. At many colleges and universities, a high enough score will earn the student college credit. In some instances, earning college credit can mean an overall lower college tuition bill.

You can learn more or sign up at https://apstudents.collegeboard.org/coronavirus-updates.

A message on the AP College Board website states, “We surveyed 18,000 AP students to see if they still wanted the opportunity to test this year. Their answer: a resounding yes.”

By Paul Kruze, Contributing Editor

Photo: creative commons-sa-nc

East County school districts will be providing food services for its students during the mandated school closures over the Coronavirus pandemic.

Below is the distribution schedule for several local districts.

If you know of others, please post the information or links in the comments section below, or email editor@eastcountymagazine.org.

By Miriam Raftery

March 14, 2020 (San Diego’s East County) – An employee at the Covenant Living retirement and continuing care community in Spring Valley has tested positive for the COVID-19 coronavirus, Fox 5 reports. So has a student at San Diego State University, according to Patch.com. 

East County News Service

March 10, 2020 (Sacramento) - The California Department of Education (CDE) has received a special waiver called CA COVID19 from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) that will enable a school district that had previously been approved to operate the Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) or Seamless Summer Option (SSO) to provide meals to students during a coronavirus-related closure. 

By Miriam Raftery

March 10, 2020 (San Diego) – The University of California, San Diego has announced that starting with the spring quarter, all lecture and discussion courses will be conducted online due to concerns over COVID-19, the new coronavirus strain spreading rapidly around the world.  Lab and studio courses for which remote instruction is not possible will continue meet in person.

The campus is also restricting fans from attending most sporting events and urging cancellation or postponement of large events through at least May 10.

By Paul Kruze, Contributing Editor

Photo: Creative Commons NC-ND via Bing

March 4, 2020 (San Diego’s East County) -- El Cajon and Lakeside voters gave solid thumbs down on Tuesday night to school bond measures put on the ballot by the Cajon Valley Union School District (CVUSD) and by the Lakeside Union School District.

Cajon Valley

Cajon Valley’s ballot measure, which would have issued $220 million dollars in school bonds went down in a major defeat with 100 percent of precinct votes counted and only late mail-in ballots remaining. 12,301 votes were cast against the bond measure (55.65%) with 9,803 (44.35%) votes cast for it. The bond measure required 55% in favor to pass, but throughout the evening, never came close to gaining traction needed for passage.

The district said that the new bond issue was necessary to finance basic infrastructure improvements and to implement installation of advanced security technology at its schools as recommended last year by a County of San Diego Grand Jury report.

By Miriam Raftery

Photo: Barto's bruised and swollen hand after the alleged door-slamming incident

February 26, 2020 (El Cajon) – Cajon Valley Union School District trustee Jill Barto has filed a police report alleging that executive coordinator Naomie Rodrigues intentionally slammed a door on Barto’s hand at the district office on Dec. 19, causing pain, distress and injury.  ECM journalist Paul Kruze has told police that he witnessed the alleged injury.

The district calls the allegations of the door-slamming and injury to Barto “false.” The district’s law firm, Artiano Shinoff, has sent a letter threatening ECM with legal action after learning that ECM intended to publish a news report on the alleged physical attack.

The alleged door-slamming injury occurred just two weeks after Barto filed a federal lawsuit against the district alleging violations of her civil rights and First Amendment free speech rights, as ECM reported. The district then filed a countersuit against Barto. The legal threat to ECM, moreover, came just two days after journalist Kruze filed his own claim against the district alleging  "false and harmful" defamatory statements..

Debbie Beyer, Literacy First Director, faults planning group for not allowing rebuttal testimony. “They got it so wrong,” she says.

By Paul Kruze, Contributing Editor

January 31, 2020 (El Cajon) -- Initial plans to build a charter high school on an empty lot near Chase Avenue and Jamacha Road hit a major stumbling block when the Valle de Oro Planning Group unanimously voted to reject a mitigated negative declaration for the project proposed by Literacy First Charter Schools. 

With the January vote, the next step for Literacy First will be a vote by the Valle De Oro Planning Group on Feb. 4 at 7 p.m. at the Otay Water District Headquarters meeting room. After this vote, the proposal goes on to the San Diego County Planning Commission on a future determined date, and then on to the San Diego Board of Supervisors.

By Paul Kruze, Contributing Editor

"I've heard that it's been communicated that Grossmont High School District was fully aware of this charter petition. I need to say this is simply not true. That communication never took place until yesterday.  In fact, quite the opposite.” --GUHSD Superintendent TIm Glover (photo, left)

January 18, 2020 (El Cajon) -- Observers of the political hijinks which have become customary at meetings of the Cajon Valley Union School District (CVUSD) board of trustees were not disappointed at the last regular meeting for the year on December 17^th. 

The meeting started with school board President Tamara Otero advising her fellow board members “to be careful in any contact” with Board Trustee Jill Barto in light of Barto’s recently filed federal lawsuit against the district, which alleges violations of her civil rights and First Amendment freedoms.

Then the spotlight shifted to Grossmont Union High School District Superintendent Dr. Tim Glover. Glover visibly caught the board off guard when he addressed the trustees, raising objections to Cajon Valley’s preliminary plan to expand and start a new charter high school (grades 9 to 12) at the site of the district’s Bostonia Language Academy, which encompasses kindergarten to eighth grade. The new charter school would be called the “Bostonia Global Charter School.”

By Paul Kruze, Contributing Editor

ECM Editor Miriam Raftery also contributed to this report

January 3, 2020 (El Cajon) -- The Cajon Valley Union School District (CVUSD) has filed a suit in state court against Trustee Jill Barto. The suit was filed after Barto’s federal lawsuit alleging violations of her civil rights and First Amendment rights. Barto filed her complaint in late November against the District, the other four trustees and Superintendent David Miyashiro, as ECM reported.

Barto’s suit accused the district, Superintendent and trustees of retaliating against her after she pursued an outspoken agenda of questioning questioning fellow board members and the Superintendent over hefty expenditures, including global travel by the Superintendent and promotional videos.  In her campaign materials she said, “My belief is that a school board should be answerable to taxpayers. The board should not simply be a rubber stamp committee, which it often times is.”

The district’s suit alleges that in 2019, the District received a complaint from an employee alleging that Barto was harassing her and “created a hostile work environment.” It also states that the Board of Trustees formed an Ad Hoc Committee to investigate the employee’s complaint. The suit does not directly identify any district employees by name and does not directly the names of the ad hoc committee.