Education California | The official newspaper of the Association of California School Administrators
Volume 49 | Number 31 | June 17, 2019
Carter enjoys
changing lives Ishibashi leads to
promote equity
Award: Adult Education
Administrator of the Year
Name: Dana Carter
Title: Principal, Yucaipa Adult
School
District: Yucaipa-Calimesa Joint
Unified School District
Region: 12
Carter
ACSA Highlights: Member
since 2007; ACSA State nomi-
nating committee member for State ACSA Vice
President 2017-2018, State Leadership Assembly
voting member 2017-present; has held YMT Charter
Offices including Charter President.
•••
As the Principal of Yucaipa Adult School, Dana
Carter’s leadership has been instrumental in creating Award: Secondary Principal of
the Year
Name: Andrew Ishibashi
Title: Principal, Lowell High
School
District: San Francisco USD
Region: 5
ACSA Highlights: Member
Ishibashi
since 1998; Region 5 presi-
dent-elect, 2012-13, and president,
2013-14; State Board Representative for Region 5,
2014-17; State Secondary Education Council, 2015-
17; currently the state delegate for ACSA Region 5.
•••
In his 12-year tenure as principal of Lowell High
School in San Francisco, Andrew Ishibashi has prov-
en himself to be a passionate believer in implement-
See CARTER, page 6
Editor’s note:
EdCal is
featuring ACSA’s
Administrators
of the Year in a
series of Q&A
interviews with
the winners, who
will be honored
at the Leadership
Summit State
Awards Banquet
Nov. 8 in San
Francisco.
See ISHIBASHI, page 6
Star quarterback never gave up
Keannu battled brain cancer
to reach his goal: graduation
Editor’s note: This is the first in a series
of articles profiling the Every Student
Succeeding award winners, which will be
honored at the Leadership Summit ESS
Luncheon in November.
Keannu Linnell was Mr. All-American.
A three-sport athlete at Lathrop High,
Keannu excelled at everything. But for all
of his battles on the football field, wrestling
mat and baseball diamond, his biggest bat-
tle came in a hospital room.
“You don’t know what you’re going to
do or how you’re going to handle it until
you are faced with it,” Keannu’s father, Alec
Linnell, said. “There’s no script. There’s no
book. There’s nobody that can tell you how
to be or how to act. It’s something that
goes deep inside your soul.”
During Keannu’s sophomore year, the
junior-varsity quarterback started com-
plaining of blurry vision. Doctors initially
thought he suffered a concussion. But as
the symptoms worsened, Keannu’s parents
pushed for answers. On Dec. 3, 2016, a CT
scan confirmed the family’s worst fears: a
brain tumor.
“My worst nightmare was coming true,”
Alec Linnell said. “And I knew at that time
we had to knuckle down and take care of
business.”
Three days later, Keannu underwent
surgery to relieve hydrocephalus, or fluid
in the brain, which can cause severe
ECC presenters. ACSA’s Every
Child Counts Symposium, held Feb.
5-7, 2020 in Palm Desert, is seeking
presenters to share the latest devel-
opments in the field of student ser-
vices and special education. The 2020
symposium theme is “Transforming
Schools into an Oasis of Hope.”
Proposals are due by 8 a.m. Monday,
July 29, 2019. Chosen presenters will
receive a discounted registration rate.
For more information and to view
symposium strands, visit
bit.ly/2020ECCProposals.
CALSA Summer Institute. The
California Association of Latino Su-
perintendents and Administrators will
host its annual Summer Institute July
7-10 in San Diego’s historic Gaslamp
Quarter. With the theme, “Charting
the Path to Excellence Through Advo-
cacy: Learn Lead Legacy,” Summer
Institute provides a venue for educa-
tional leaders to access solutions and
strategies necessary to address the
needs of all students, but with special
emphasis on Latino/a students. The
keynote speaker is Richard Carranza,
chancellor of the New York City De-
partment of Education. Registration is
$575 for CALSA members, $675 for
non-members. Visit sites.google.com/
calsasi2019.org/calsasi2019/home for
more information.
Seminar Series. Registration is
Keannu Linnell graduated from Lathrop High School in May following a health battle that almost took his life.
headaches. Keannu
suffered a stroke on
the operating table,
leading to a medical-
ly-induced coma.
“It was heart-
breaking,” Keannu’s
teammate Frankie Guzman said. “It didn’t
feel real. It felt like it was made up. It
didn’t hit me until I went to go see him
with my own eyes, because I had to see it
to believe it. And when I saw it with my
own eyes, it broke me down. It tore me
down because that’s my quarterback.”
Doctors performed a second surgery
to successfully remove the tumor, but the
all-American was now a shell of his former
self. Keannu was non-verbal and partially
paralyzed with short-term memory loss.
After six months in the hospital, Keannu
moved to a rehabilitation center with the
goal of returning to school at Lathrop
High.
now open for ACSA’s New Superin-
tendents Seminar Series. The pro-
gram provides first- and second-year
superintendents with a cohort of
colleagues in a yearlong program
of five, two-day workshops. NSSS
allows new superintendents to tackle
current issues in a confidential and
supportive setting with the guidance
of experienced superintendents. Reg-
istration is $1,900 for ACSA members
and $2,900 for non-members, with
discounts available for second-year
participants and those who register
before Sept. 1. Visit www.acsa.org/
NewSuperintendentsSeminarSeries
for more information and to register.
See ESS, page 7
Task force: Authorizers should weigh
community impacts of new charters
Periodicals
Dated Material
Gov. Gavin Newsom’s think tank on
charter schools presented its findings June
6, reaching consensus on four recommen-
dations that it believes will help charters
and traditional public schools co-exist in
the golden state.
The California Charter School Policy
Task Force is comprised of members
representing ACSA, California Charter
Schools Association, California Teachers
Association, California School Employees
Association, charter school operators, dis-
tricts and others.
“ACSA representation played a very
important role on the task force,” said
Senior Director of Governmental Relations
Edgar Zazueta, who represented ACSA
on the task force. “I tried hard to be a very
independent voice on the task force and
tried really hard to play the role of helping
the group find common ground. I believe
that was the intent of putting such a
diverse group in the same room.”
Zazueta said the task force was suc-
cessful on some important issues, reaching
unanimous consensus on four recommen-
dations that were presented to the gover-
See CHARTER, page 3