But let’s review the array of irritants.
Remote learning: Against every other issue I’m about to name, some of which were on a slow boil before the pandemic, you need to understand that SF schools stayed closed until the fall of 2021, longer than most districts in America. Now: SF takes the pandemic damn seriously. Because of the AIDS crisis, because we have a truly multiracial city, because we have a lot of Asian American residents who mask up even in non-pandemic times (thanks to SARS, etc.), we took collective measures early and often to safeguard each other. And we did so across racial and class lines. So, it’s not just that the “schools were closed.” It’s that the board and the district didn’t do much planning back in the summer of 2020 to reopen them or distribute laptops or make substantive contingency plans, and they didn’t make much progress even a year into the pandemic. Parents started freaking out because there was seemingly little effort to even talk about scenario planning. Instead, in interminable Zoom meetings, the board focused on…
School names: The board pushed a risible process to rename 44 schools. Should some schools be renamed to strip enslavers and other terrible people from the walls where our kids are taught? Sure, most San Francisco voters are cool with that, and many are eager for that. But the process was a crowd-sourced embarrassment that placed Dianne Feinstein, Abraham Lincoln, and Paul Revere among the names to be stricken and got many basic facts and even full identities wrong. Nevertheless, the board stood defiant in its defense of this shambolic process, which basically made a mockery out of scholarship. Along the way, it also violated the open meetings law (this will become a theme), triggering a potential lawsuit (ditto).
The murals: For years, there’s been debate about murals in George Washington High School, some of which show Washington standing over Black and Native peoples who are being subjugated. Students protested that the murals were racist. At least at the onset of this debate, most students were probably unaware that the heretofore obscure WPA-era painter Victor Arnautoff, who depicted Washington overseeing these horrors, did so as a way to critique racism and colonialism—a very progressive take for the 1930s. Again, rather than use this as a teaching opportunity, maybe even something to build a curriculum around, the board voted to paint over the murals, then backtracked, then decided maybe they should be covered—at a cost of $815,000. This alienated art historians, the local NAACP, actor Danny Glover, and even Matt Gonzalez, the uber-progressive who ran against Gavin Newsom for mayor in 2003. “Don’t whitewash history,” he warned in an op-ed.
Lowell admissions: Lowell is one of the highest-rated public high schools in the country. Admission was determined by “merit,” i.e., GPA. Lowell was also overwhelmingly Asian American (the biggest group) and white. Many people inside and outside the Lowell community had for decades been advocating various ways to make the school more representative of Black and Brown students. This was always going to be a touchy subject because there’s a proud alumni base, and because some kids—particularly Asian American and/or immigrant kids—had been working their asses off for their whole lives to get in, and all that work was for naught when the board decided to assign spots by lottery. More broadly: Is SF school inequity best solved by rearranging one high school? Or would resources and time be better spent on intervention in elementary and middle schools? And does getting rid of “academic merit” admissions for Lowell mean that we should also get rid of audition-based admissions for the Ruth Asawa School of the Arts(a.k.a. SF’s “Fame” school), where Collins’ kids attend? Tl;dr: Reform was always going to be contentious and messy but needed to be public and transparent. Instead the board rammed through a change without allowing for public input, apparently violating state sunshine provisions and triggering more lawsuits.
Mandates, closed schools and Dane County Madison Public Health.
The data clearly indicate that being able to read is not a requirement for graduation at (Madison) East, especially if you are black or Hispanic”
2017: West High Reading Interventionist Teacher’s Remarks to the School Board on Madison’s Disastrous Reading Results
Madison’s taxpayer supported K-12 school district, despite spending far more than most, has long tolerated disastrous reading results.
My Question to Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers on Teacher Mulligans and our Disastrous Reading Results
“An emphasis on adult employment”
Wisconsin Public Policy Forum Madison School District Report[PDF]
WEAC: $1.57 million for Four Wisconsin Senators
Friday Afternoon Veto: Governor Evers Rejects AB446/SB454; an effort to address our long term, disastrous reading results
Booked, but can’t read (Madison): functional literacy, National citizenship and the new face of Dred Scott in the age of mass incarceration.
When A Stands for Average: Students at the UW-Madison School of Education Receive Sky-High Grades. How Smart is That?