Did they really expect families, with kids, to stay in San Fran. Besides the lack of real education—they teach bigotry, racism, sex, how to “safely” use drugs—but education is not a priority. Now the lack of kids is showing.
“The San Francisco Unified School District uncovered an apparent staffing contradiction as it prepared its budget for the 2023-24 school year: SFUSD employs more teachers per student than most school districts in the state, due in part to declining enrollment.
This fact turns a long-standing narrative of severe understaffing in The City’s public schools on its head. Earlier this month, a civil grand jury found that SFUSD lacks enough credentialed teachers — and the union that represents district educators and staff has expressed a dire state of understaffing and overworked employees throughout its labor negotiations that began in March.”
Unions have over staffed the schools—now the parents are leaving. What will the unions do to when there are no children left?
SF public schools could close, merge as enrollment declines
By Allyson Aleksey, SF Examiner, 6/27/23 https://www.sfexaminer.com/news/education/sfusd-schools-could-close-merge-as-enrollment-declines/article_145fcc6e-1470-11ee-893d-9b0a96bda2ff.html?utm_source=sfexaminer.com&utm_campaign=%2Fnewsletter%2Foptimize%2Fexaminer-eedition%2F%3F-dc%3D1687951828&utm_medium=email&utm_content=headline
SFUSD Superintendent Matt Wayne: “While we have made progress in addressing our structural deficit, SFUSD is not immune to the enrollment decline experienced across the state.”
Craig Lee/The Examiner
The San Francisco Unified School District uncovered an apparent staffing contradiction as it prepared its budget for the 2023-24 school year: SFUSD employs more teachers per student than most school districts in the state, due in part to declining enrollment.
This fact turns a long-standing narrative of severe understaffing in The City’s public schools on its head. Earlier this month, a civil grand jury found that SFUSD lacks enough credentialed teachers — and the union that represents district educators and staff has expressed a dire state of understaffing and overworked employees throughout its labor negotiations that began in March.
But earlier this month, SFUSD found that it employs more certified staffers than every district in the state except for the Palo Alto USD and Sequoia Union High School District in southern San Mateo County.
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Dwindling enrollment, coupled with low student performance at several schools and a looming deficit, means site closures and class consolidations could be on the horizon.
“Compared to other districts in California, we have one of the lowest staff-to-student ratios, and we have more schools and smaller schools and more specialized programs,” Superintendent Matt Wayne said at a first-reading budget workshop.
Smaller schools with specialized offerings, such as dual-language programs or premier access to special education programming, often indicate high- achieving schools. But Wayne noted that SFUSD “does not have the highest student achievement” compared to other districts.
A move to consolidate schools could centralize special offerings to a broader student body, though it would mean more students per instructor. Consolidation and closures would also mean less spending per student for the district.
According to the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, a nonprofit that researches and advocates for sustainable community development, state and local policymakers prefer large schools because they are less expensive to operate on an annual per-pupil basis. Nearly half of the nation’s secondary schools now enroll more than 1,000 students, a trend primarily driven by public policy.
By contrast, almost half of San Francisco’s public elementary schools have an enrollment of less than 350. According to the analysis cited by Wayne, the districts with the smallest schools tend to be large urban districts with shrinking student enrollment — and SFUSD fits the bill.
“While we have made progress in addressing our structural deficit, SFUSD is not immune to the enrollment decline experienced across the state,” Wayne said in a statement.
Public-school enrollment is down statewide due to several factors, including California’s “baby bust,” parents’ growing interest in private and alternative schooling, and statewide population declines. Still, SFUSD has a high number of individual elementary, middle and high schools for its population when compared with other districts.
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Wayne did not signal how many schools or what specific sites could face closure. Schools with enrollment of fewere than 200 students include George Washington Carver, Malcolm X and Charles Drew College Preparatory Academy — all elementary schools in the Bayview.
El Dorado Elementary School in Visitacion Valley has an enrollment of 180 and is already seeing the consequences of a shrinking student population. The school combined two first and second grade classes and two fourth-fifth grade classes.
Bessie Carmichael in SOMA was also in danger of consolidation due to shrinking enrollment, but the school was able to reallocate funds to support the Filipino language program, parent Ruby Turalba told The Examiner — which will preserve standalone grade 4 and 5 Filipino classes versus consolidated for the next academic year.
“Had it not been for parents’ organizing efforts, (including) petition, letter writing, a campaign, public comments at Board of Education meetings, and rally at the district office, the Filipino (language) program would have been compromised,” Turalba said.
She said the school and district have agreed to partner with families and community members to work on outreach, enrollment, funding and program structure to ensure the program is maintained beyond the 2023-2024 school year.
Schools in the Mission and Excelsior districts, which also tend to be smaller, are already facing steep cuts. In March, a John O’Connell Technical High School educator disclosed to Mission Local that staff has “already been told to expect larger classes for next year.”
Wayne said no major decision would be made without involving the affected school communities’ input.
“We need to recognize that we need to go through that process over the next several months to organize ourselves in a way that we meet our student outcome goals and support our staff,” he said. “We’ve been able to identify funding to follow through on commitments…but ultimately, the commitments that people want are greater than we can afford, and we are going to need to reconcile that in the next year.”
Beginning in August, the board of education will host workshops to examine the staff-to-student ratio. In September, the board will present recommendations to district staff, which could include school closures or consolidations to respond to declining enrollment.
SFUSD adopted its 2023-24 operating budget last week, totaling $1.28 billion. It is projected to face another structural deficit next year. The district must send its approved budget to the California Department of Education by July 1.
