By Jamienne S. Studley

It was a chilly, gray May afternoon in Richmond, California, but the teenager addressing the rally at her gritty high school was warm and direct. Flanked by hand-lettered cardboard posters, she compared dilapidated conditions and dangerous bathrooms at her school with the college-style campus in the wealthy district nearby. She described differences in class size and availability of books. "It's not that I want to take anything away from kids in Piedmont. It's just that we want schools where we can learn and be safe, too. Our schools tell us whether you respect us.”

We at Public Advocates share her dream of good schools and education and respect for all our kids. Education is at the heart of independence and opportunity, democracy and citizenship. Now we learn that education is also the secret to a long, healthy life. W.E.B. DuBois put it this way: "Of all the civil rights for which the world has struggled and fought for 5,000 years, the right to learn is undoubtedly the most fundamental." There is no more fertile or consequential territory than education for pursuing equitable, high quality opportunities and also for strengthening the voices of families and communities to shape public discourse and decisions.

Robert Kennedy said, “I dream things that never were and ask "why not?" In public education, we don't have to dream things that never were. We intuitively recognize "good schools," the ones that draw people with choices to suburbs and enclaves with schools that consistently give kids solid foundations and good chances. Plenty of schools successfully connect leadership, teaching talent, high standards, quality curriculum, student and family engagement, accountability, and realistic funding. We simply have to take to scale things we know how to do, and do them for everyone.

Of course it’s not simple at all. The barriers are profound, varied, and resistant: poverty; racial isolation, discrimination, and fear; distrust of public institutions; resistance to spending and change; inadequate and blunt accountability tools; mixed messages about the status of teaching. We perpetuate polarized debates between “the solution is more money" and "it has nothing to do with money" when the truth is that more money for schools is necessary but absolutely not sufficient.

Since our founding in 1971, Public Advocates has been fighting for education justice, starting with Serrano v. California which required the state to fund public schools equally. Education is central to thriving communities with real rights and powerful voices, as we challenge the systemic causes of poverty and discrimination through policy and media advocacy, impact litigation, and community partnerships.

But the road to equity is winding and slow. Today all students are officially held to the same standards, such as the California High School Exit Exam, but they are still denied comparable opportunities to learn, and adults are not held accountable for providing those opportunities. Recognizing that low-income students and students of color suffer from a lack of qualified teachers, instructional materials, and decent facilities, in Williams v. California (2004) we secured the state’s acknowledgment of its responsibility to provide basic resources and mechanisms to assure delivery.

But making those rights real goes beyond legal mandates and settlements. To fulfill even the modest dream of Williams -- decent "teachers, textbooks and toilets" for all -- we train parents and grass roots groups to file complaints to fix problems and help districts carry out their responsibilities. We are take state education policy and financing discussions to church basements and housing projects. Public Advocates believes that families who learn to navigate and influence their schools, to stand up for their children's rights to such tangible things as skilled teachers or math books, will continue to speak up, solve problems, shape budgets, and affect decisions on education and more broadly. We count on them to vote, run for office, and ultimately shape our public vision and choices.

Real national and state progress is possible in 2007. The consensus that quality education is at the heart of our national vision is clear. Reauthorization of No Child Left Behind invites scrutiny of achievement gaps, accountability, and funding levels. In many states, including California and New York, decisions will be made soon about education goals and financing. We are working with grass roots coalitions to evaluate complex research reports on the costs of educating our state populace, aiming for widespread public understanding, engagement, and mobilization of the often silent or excluded voices and voters who support serious investment in ambitious education goals.

Heroic lawyers and law students play many roles championing education equity. A day in the life of Public Advocates illustrates our multi-faceted strategies: you might find Liz in Sacramento negotiating legislative provisions about teacher training; Jenny planning coalition strategy; Michelle supervising law students researching constitutional history; Guillermo doing a Spanish radio interview; Tara critiquing teacher credentialing regulations, and John in appellate court challenging state education agency procedures. Add 8 summer interns calling 900 schools to assure the public has access to required school performance information. Elsewhere in the country, lawyers in the “school adequacy” movement seek to enforce state constitutional promises of equitable education, law professors and students are generating constitutional, policy, and budget analyses with practical significance, and lawyers serve education as legislators, school leaders, board members, and community advocates.

My grandfather, Benjamin Cosor, was one such lawyer. As president of our town’s school board for 46 years, he wanted schools for all the children as good as he expected for his children and grandchildren. Let’s make his dream and mine come true.

FOLLOW THE MONEY

Many lawyers have embraced the dream of working for justice, in education and beyond, as reflected by floods of passionate, well-prepared applicants for public interest jobs, fellowships and internships with Public Advocates and others. That’s wonderful news after years of worry about declining public interest commitment among new lawyers, but it poses a dilemma. Is it fair to urge prospective applicants and students to set their hearts on public interest work when resources are so painfully limited, sacrifices so vivid, and competition already so intense? Reality is stark: for $46,000 we have our pick of able, dedicated lawyers, many shouldering debt loads of $100,000 plus. For the salary of one corporate associate or a fair-sized law firm social event, we could put three lawyers of equal or better skill and experience usefully to work assuring that kids get the educations we promise them, legally and morally.

I have a vivid imagination. I dream that the legal profession will radically increase its support for public interest and legal services, before we convince even more lawyers to pour their hearts into applying for the tiny pool of jobs and fellowships. Our profession is failing at its responsibilities to promote justice and assure legal representation. Let us stand up for better public funding of legal services. And let us implement aggressive and broad based transfer of the wealth generated from corporate legal services to representing the poor and the cause of justice. May endowed advocacy jobs, fellowships, loan forgiveness programs, and legal services funding flourish.

Jamienne S. Studley, President of Public Advocates, Inc, San Francisco, CA, has been President of Skidmore College, general counsel of the US Department of Education, Associate Dean at Yale Law School, and executive director of NALP. She chaired the EJW E-Guide Advisory Committee and served on the ABA Commission on Loan Repayment and Forgiveness.