Item C.1 School Reorganization #1 (Student Assignment Policy and Problem Statement ) link here
To provide context, here is the topline summary borrowed from our Cheat Sheet:
In December 2020, SFUSD’s Board of Education adopted Board Policy 5101.2 for a zone-based elementary student assignment policy. This study session is the first meeting to obtain Board feedback on four policy options:
In addition to this summary, we also found these slides (31 and 32) from the presentation useful as concrete examples:
The district made their presentation, pausing a few times for discussion. The district identified four “Floor requirements” that every plan must meet:
- Lawful
- Operable by school year 2028-29
- Includes a transition path for currently enrolled students
- Capacity Match: Every resident has a seat inside their boundary or zone
The most salient discussion points were:
- Given the large percentage (13%) of families that leave from 5th to 6th grade, the District should consider addressing Middle School enrollment more directly in this round of changes, This was championed by Commissioner Huling and others commissioners.
- Changing enrollment policies without realigning resources could be problematic in a lot of ways; there were discussions around meeting and increasing the number ‘floor’ requirements for all neighborhood schools, specifically mentioning adding language pathway access as a new floor requirement.
- Staff presented that “Choice” is an important lever in protecting enrollment (e.g. access to Mandarin / Cantonese / Spanish Immersion), but there was debate between staff and some commissioners as to whether or not “Choice” should be included as a goal to drive policy design. The definition of Choice seemed to shift throughout the conversation, but in the end it may not be codified as an official goal given the confusion it created.
- Demographics projections on slide 22 not only show that the New Mission Bay school serves an expanding neighborhood, but that by 2033 it will likely be heavily oversubscribed.
- The statistic of the evening – 90% of families who get #1 choice enroll in SFUSD, while only 67% of those that don’t will. This speaks to both understanding what families want, and to delivering upon that.
- In related news, the quote of the evening came from Commissioner Fisher: “I want to know what our families think about these options / we need a lot more information from the community so we aren’t operating in a bubble and making assumptions.” This was appreciated after we heard the commissioners give a bunch of hypothetical scenarios to validate various hypotheses, so thanks to Commissioner Fisher for this!
- The Large Zone option, which was created with best intentions to maximize diversity, is basically DOA as commissioners pointed out that the size of zones (e.g. one spans from Glen Park to Bayview) are impractical for families who need to get their kids to school.
- As Commissioner Ray pointed out, once the district makes big (positive) changes, it needs to communicate them widely so families that might not have considered SFUSD previously take a closer look at the district (e.g. expanded language immersion options)
The next meeting is on September 1st, where staff and the BOE will focus on the following:
- Deep dive on each option
- Discussion about tradeoffs
We hope there is much better communication ahead of the next meeting so that families can bring their voices to the conversation.