Minneapolis Parents Push Back Against Proposed School Cuts

Facing from the Republican dominated legislature, a small but growing number of Minneapolis parents, including some from Southwest, are working to organize a formal, parent-powered lobbying group in the district. 

"MPS has had a full-time lobbyist over the years, and we've had different, varying forms of parent legislative action," said Minneapolis Public Schools (MPS) lobbyist Jim Grathwol. "But the short answer is that parents have never organized a Legislative Action Committee (LAC)."

In Minnesota, most local education lobbying happens through these LACs, which exist in small towns like Hopkins but haven't managed to take root in Minneapolis.

South Open parent and long-time education activist Peggy Clark is trying to change that by organizing a Legislative Action Committee for MPS parents. The going has been somewhat slow, she said. Parents feel "attacked from all sides" by the state House and Senate's budget proposals. However, interest among parents is growing in this political climate that's been hostile to urban schools.

Clark said about 20 parents are committed to being part of an LAC, and perhaps 20 more are very interested in the group, although there isn't currently an LAC. For now, Clark and a growing number of activist parents have attended committee hearings at the Capitol, she said.

Typically a joint effort of school districts and local parents, Grathwol said LACs typically arise because a district doesn't have a paid lobbyist like him.

So why would Minneapolis parents want to start their own, grassroots organization? In a word, it's effectiveness.

According to long-time education watcher and activist Mary Cecconi, parent-driven organization like an LAC can “put paid lobbyists to shame.”

Cecconi helms a group called Parents United for Public Schools, which helps parents organize and lobby their senators and representatives on education issues, but doesn't itself lobby.

“Lobbyists are marginalized on a constant basis, being called paid hacks,” Cecconi said. “Parents come into the room and there’s silence. People listen to them.”

Even so, Clark said that she hopes to get some help from Grathwol, the district's lobbyist, to reach out to more parents and legislators. For his part, Grathwol said he helps any parent who contacts him wanting to lobby legislators, but that he doesn't do any grassroots organizing right now.

Other Southwest Minneapolis parents are trying to use this "parent power" to fight budget cuts. Kyle Samejima and other parents at the FAIR magnet school in Crystal are already informally lobbying Governor Mark Dayton to veto cuts to integration aid contained in the legislature’s funding proposal. FAIR is a cooperatively run by several West Metro districts, including Minneapolis, using these integration dollars, in a program called the West Metro Education Partnership, as a way to offer racially integrated schools.

“We want him to be reminded that there are real people who’d be impacted by these cuts,” Samejima said. “We also want him to see the good uses of integration funding, the positive effects for both white children and for children of color. Integration is not just students sitting down in an integrated setting, but addressing all the issues that come with [the integrated classroom].”

Cecconi said that it’s not uncommon for an LAC to start at a time when the community faces a challenge.

“The Orono, the Hopkins LAC’s, many of them begin with levies or specific events,” Cecconi said. “I assume Minneapolis’ will probably be [created] around this issue of pulling money from the urban core.”