SFUSD BOE Meeting Cheat Sheet – 6/24/2025

Public commenting is an important opportunity to make your powerful voice heard. 

Let the S.F. Board of Education and SFUSD Leadership know how parents and caregivers feel, how the district can do better for our city’s kids, our teachers, our schools!   Learn more about how to attend a meeting or make a public comment here.

Please note that as SF Parents is focused on our core issues, we only do
the summary/takes on the most pertinent agenda items related to our advocacy campaigns.
If you see that something on the BOE agenda is omitted, it is likely for this reason.

6/24/2025 Regular Meeting at 6:30pm:

• Full meeting agenda on BoardDocs here. 
• Agenda summary from SF Parent Coalition follows below.

SF PARENT’S SUMMARY: 

The Board will hear the Second Reading of SFUSD’s proposed FY 2025-26 budget, which still has a $99 million deficit even after $113.8 million in cuts. These reductions come at a time when SFUSD LCAP (Local Control Accountability Plan) and reading and math goals are “partially off track.” SF Parents urges the district to be more transparent about tradeoffs and ensure new curriculum initiatives are supported despite financial constraints.

BUDGET-RELATED AGENDA ITEMS

Item F.1.  Public hearing on SFUSD 2025-26 Budget, Second Reading (presentation link, Budget 2nd Reading link, Frontline ERP & Red Rover HCM Update link)

• SFUSD’s 2025-26 recommended budget includes $1.2 billion in expected revenue and $1.3 billion in planned expenditures.
• SFUSD’s Unrestricted General Fund (UGF):
  • Even with Fiscal Stabilization Plan cuts implemented in 2025-26, SFUSD will have a $49 million deficit in its UGF due to reduced LCFF (“Local Control Funding Formula”)  revenue resulting from State budget updates and lower Average Daily Attendance than predicted
  • SFUSD is contributing a growing share of its UGF to Special Education: $184 million for 2025-26
  • Over the next 3 fiscal years, the UGF is projected to have a deficit of about $49 million per year; however, this does not include potential salary increases to be negotiated with labor partners
  • The Fiscal Stabilization Plan calls for $59 million in cuts to the UGF for 2026-27, which is associated with reducing 160 full time equivalent (FTE) staff: 85.1 Certificated FTE (teachers) and 75 Classified FTE
• SFUSD’s Restricted General Fund (RGF):
  • Over the next 3 fiscal years, one-time restricted funds will be expiring and the RGF will have lower expenditures. In 2025-26, $13 million in RGF will be expiring, which will result in the need to find alternative funding sources or eliminate 139 FTE from the RGF: 93 Certificated FTE and 75 Classified FTE.
• Position reductions are complicated by the fact that the Red Rover Human Capital Management (HCM) system is behind schedule.  
• Progress we’ve seen towards greater transparency, accessibility, and clear vision for our students:
  • SFUSD is presenting a stronger vision for students + focused on student success
  • The district is sharing steps towards the goal of budget stabilization, which helps with transparency
• Why we’re still concerned:
  • Though necessary, these budget cuts will affect teaching and learning by:
    • Reducing professional development for teachers
    • Reducing non-classroom personnel in schools
    • Reducing high school student internship and work-based learning opportunities
    • “Pausing” the Shared Schoolyard and Environmental Science Center programs
    • Other potential impacts TBD (we don’t have access to full details yet) 
  • As restricted revenue from grants and one-time funds are depleted, budget transfers from the Unrestricted General Fund will increasingly be used to pay for programs like Special Education
  • SFUSD is not meeting CDE’s budget Reserve for Economic Uncertainties requirement, which is 3% of expenditures 
  • Multiyear projections continue to show Combined General Fund deficits of $99 million in 2025-26, $68 million in 2026-27 and $56 million in 2027-28. These projections do not account for salary increases from upcoming negotiations with labor partners.

Item F.3.  Update to the Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP) (Plan link; presentation link; SFUSD response to LCAP Advisory Committee Recommendations link)

• The LCAP details how SFUSD plans to spend the State’s Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) revenues. The annual update to the LCAP must provide updates on how SFUSD’s activities are meeting its LCAP goals. The materials provided raise concerns::
  • SFUSD has not updated its LCAP as required (“updates pending” are listed for Goals 3-6)
  • In 2024-25 $82 million was specified in the LCAP budget for high-needs students but $8 million of it was not spent; no explanation was provided
  • In the Superintendent’s response to the LCAP Advisory Committee’s Recommendations, it appears that combined classrooms will increasingly be the norm unless enrollment and budget trends “align”

Item F.4.  Public Education Enrichment Fund (PEEF) Expenditure Plan for SY 2025-26 (presentation link)

• Nearly $95 million will be available from PEEF next year, but 27% of the funding will be spent on the Special Education program rather than sports, libraries, arts, and music
• PEEF funds are increasingly used for Special Education programs, from $9.96 million in 2024-25 to $25 million in 2025-26

Our Take on SFUSD’s 2025-26 Budget: SFUSD should address how it will address the classroom impacts of the 2025-26 budget cuts, and where else the district will find non-priority items to eliminate from the budget to address deficits in the next two fiscal years. Questions we’re asking:

• Superintendent Su in her response to the LCAP Advisory Committee recommendations states that “transitions to single-grade classrooms and broader protections for small schools will depend on enrollment and budget trends.” How will combined classrooms affect teaching and learning when new English Language Arts and math curriculum are being implemented, and when school sites are still struggling with elimination of ARTIF positions to implement multi-tiered systems of supports?
• After reducing nearly 450 FTE to cut $113.8 million in 2025-26, SFUSD has to eliminate 160 FTE from the Unrestricted General Fund and 139 FTE in the Restricted General Fund in 2026-27. How will these future reductions affect student outcomes?
• How does SFUSD plan to address the increasing need to transfer funds from the Unrestricted General Fund to the Restricted General Fund to cover the growing costs of Special Education programs?

STUDENT OUTCOMES-RELATED AGENDA ITEMS

Item G.1   2025-26 Goal 1 – Early Literacy in K-2nd Grade Progress Monitoring (presentation link)

• PARTIALLY OFF-TRACK on this Goal
  • Goal 1.1: Grade K African American/Pacific Islander students are at 52.8% proficient on Star Early Literacy Spring 2024-25 (target 60%)
  • Goal 1.2: Grade 1 students are at 59.1% proficient on Star Reading 2024-25 (target 62%)
  • Goal 1.3: Grade 3 English Learners are at 13.6% proficient on Star Reading Winter 2024-25 (target 23%)
• School sites are responsible for designing and implementing “robust” multi-tiered system of supports (MTSS) for high-quality Tier 1 literacy instruction and Tier 2 and Tier 3 interventions, with the support of instructional coaches and central office professional development

Item F.2   2025-26 Goal 2 – Algebra 1 in Middle Grades Progress Monitoring (presentation link)

• PARTIALLY OFF-TRACK on this Goal
  • Goal 2: The percentage of 8th grade students performing math at grade level as measured by SBAC Math will increase from 42% proficiency in October 2022 to 65% proficiency by October 2027
• SFUSD and Stanford researchers are evaluating the results of curriculum pilots in Math 8 and Algebra I prototypes: Algebra I for All, Math 8/Algebra I Compression; Algebra I as an Elective; Online Algebra I during the School Year; Summer Algebra I.
• Of the pilots, only students who took both Math 8 and Algebra I as an Elective showed math proficiency gains from Fall to Winter. Algebra I as an Elective also facilitated the highest growth among students who had a weak performance in the previous year. This aligns with expectation that more instructional time in math leads to improved student outcomes. 
• By February 2026, the Stanford researchers will finalize a recommended Secondary Math Placement Policy for SFUSD BOE approval

Our Take: SFUSD must ensure that new English Language Arts and Math curricula, risk screeners, and middle school math course options are implemented successfully, especially with additional budget and staffing cuts looming.. Questions we’re asking:

• What project management best practices will SFUSD use to successfully implement the various literacy and math initiatives (new curriculum, risk screeners, pathways)? 
• How is SFUSD ensuring that the proposed 2025-26 budget contains sufficient funding to ensure successful student outcomes for Goals 1 and 2?

As a reminder – SF Parents’ community continues to demand from SFUSD:

• AN INCREASED, DEMONSTRATED FOCUS ON STUDENTS: 
  • We want to see the district’s clear plan and commitment to a baseline of excellence and equity across every SFUSD school. Without this clarity and vision, or analysis of how these decisions align with our student outcomes goals, it is impossible to know if this is a truly student-centered plan that will maximize success for our students even despite budget cuts.

• GREATER TRANSPARENCY AND COMMUNITY ACCESSIBILITY: 
  • SFUSD plans need greater detail and transparency. Without an analysis of school site impacts, it’s unclear if SFUSD is prioritizing student success. The Board should not approve budgets or plans without confidence in their accuracy and impacts on teaching and learning. We urge SFUSD to provide more thorough impact analyses to increase transparency on decision-making and build trust with the community.

SFUSD needs to be more open and honest about the budget. SFUSD committed to updating the Fiscal and Operational Health Dashboard last summer, and then abruptly abandoned that commitment in the fall. Fiscal topics from the short-lived Ad Hoc Committee should be included in all regular Board meetings, and the dashboard should be updated monthly until the budget is solvent.