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  • Early literacy grants work, but three years is not enough

    Early literacy grants work, but three years is not enough


    A student holds a flash card with the sight word ‘friend’ during a class at Nystrom Elementary in the West Contra Costa Unified School District in 2022.

    Credit: Andrew Reed / EdSource

    I once believed that improving reading at a failing school could be a finite job. I thought it meant bringing in a new curriculum, showing teachers how to use it and then lingering long enough to ensure that students receive consecutive years of high-quality instruction.

    I was terribly wrong, but my misbelief brought me to work on California’s Early Literacy Support Block (ELSB) grant, and for that I’m grateful.

    The early literacy grant resulted from a class-action lawsuit. Students sued California for lacking a plan to address low reading achievement. The result was a $53 million settlement to provide the state’s lowest-performing schools with supplemental funding and guidance. A recent evaluation by researchers at Stanford University found the focus on early literacy turned out to be worth more than the grant’s dollar amount — the program was 13 times more effective than general increases in school spending.

    During an EdSource Roundtable on literacy, Mark Rosenbaum, lead attorney in the lawsuit noted, “If this is a pilot program, it has succeeded. We don’t need a task force; we don’t need more studies; we just need a commitment to expand it to every kid, every teacher and every school.”

    Improving reading instruction requires a literacy plan backed by strong leadership. It means coordinating resources, monitoring progress, and changing course when needed. It demands making decisions based on evidence, not adult preferences, and prioritizing early literacy so that every child gets off to a good start reading.

     I was on a team that helped eligible schools draft literacy action plans for the grant funding. I’d hoped this work would inform statewide planning, but despite the program’s success, California is no closer to a literacy plan.

    And worse, in a few months, schools like mine will lose the funding and support that made us briefly successful.

    When the program launched, I joined Nystrom Elementary, in West Contra Costa Unified, as a literacy coach. At the time, 91% of our second-graders needed to learn kindergarten phonics, as did 65% of upper graders. Working fast, we created a “walk-to-read” block in which grade level bands (e.g., first and second grades) pooled their students and sorted them into groups according to assessment data. Each teacher taught two of the groups. Our plan required collaboration and created peer accountability for teaching a new curriculum.

    In the second year, teachers led. They facilitated professional development, refined instruction and analyzed student data. We began to pick up momentum. By the middle of the year, the need for second grade intensive intervention was cut almost in half (from 86% to 46%). By the year’s end, according to the district’s reading comprehension assessment, Nystrom Elementary had the highest growth.

    This year, we turned our attention to improving writing and language instruction. We’ve forged a partnership with SAiL Literacy Lab to bridge the divide between what researchers know about language development and how we teach our students.

    Each year, we’ve adjusted our literacy action plan, incorporating what we’ve learned from research, practice and our student data. We’ve spent our literacy block grant funds on curriculum, coaching and intervention to strengthen classroom instruction, but our staff’s commitment to the plan is what improved achievement. 

    Good literacy plans in California are rare, and wasted opportunities abound. Walk into any school and you are likely to see curriculum (some of it brand new) collecting dust. Our literacy coaches often say they are kept busy with subbing, yard duty and other tasks that don’t improve classroom teaching. Reading interventionists often feel isolated in their work, unsure how much they are contributing to their school’s overall success. Most rare in California are strong literacy plans that are backed by secure funding.

    The money from the Early Literacy Support Block Grant is drying up, but my school’s work is not done. It never will be.

    More than 95% of our students are from low-income households and our non-stability rate (students who enroll and disenroll, often due to unstable housing) is over 26%. Our school will always have intervention needs, teachers requiring support and data demanding analysis and action. These needs are not problems, as long as they are met with a plan and funding.

    As Rosenbaum noted in the EdSource Roundtable: “This grant is only for three years. … That was the best we could get in the settlement, but that makes no sense if you care about kids. I wouldn’t say about my kids, ‘I will do what you need for three years, and then we’ll do the best we can afterwards.’ These schools, these educators, need what they need forever.”

    This year, California spent over $225 million on coaching and intervention, but a literacy plan was not a condition for schools receiving the funds. Another $248 million was recently added to bring in a new cohort of schools, but those with expiring literacy plans were not prioritized.

    Because California lacks a strategic plan to improve literacy (the very reason for the lawsuit years ago), effective literacy plans may soon become dreams deferred. The irony of this cuts deep.

    •••

    Margaret Goldberg is a literacy coach in West Contra Costa Unified School District and co-founder of The Right to Read Project, a group of teachers, researchers and activists committed to the pursuit of equity through literacy.

    The opinions in this commentary are those of the author. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.





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  • Ask Me Anything: Join EdSource live on Reddit to discuss arts education

    Ask Me Anything: Join EdSource live on Reddit to discuss arts education


    EdSource reporter Karen D’Souza

    There’s a strong body of research that suggests arts education can boost everything from test scores to social-emotional learning, but when budgets get tight, the arts are often the first thing on the chopping block.

    In California though, that’s about to change following the passage of Proposition 28, which guarantees a new annual funding stream for arts education equal to 1% of the state’s general fund. In 2023, that’s about $1 billion for schools to hire teachers in the arts and fund arts education initiatives.

    Join EdSource reporter Karen D’Souza on Thursday, Dec. 14, at 12:30 p.m. for a Reddit Ask Me Anything (AMA) session. D’Souza will answer your questions about the rollout of Proposition 28 and how California’s groundbreaking arts education initiative compares with how states across the country fund and implement arts education programs. Click here to ask a question.

    EdSource readers are encouraged to submit their questions during the online event.

    • Not a Reddit user? Create an account here.

    What is a Reddit AMA?

    An AMA, which stands for “Ask Me Anything” is a crowdsourced interview. The interviewee begins the process by starting a post describing who they are and what they do. Then commenters from across the internet leave questions and can vote on other questions according to which they would like to see answered.

    The interviewee can go through and reply to the questions they find interesting and easily see those questions the internet is dying to have the answer to. Because the internet is asking the questions, they’re going to be a mix of serious and lighthearted, and interviewees will end up sharing all sorts of things you won’t find in a normal interview.





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  • One Temecula Valley PAC submits signatures for Joseph Komrosky recall 

    One Temecula Valley PAC submits signatures for Joseph Komrosky recall 


    Temecula Valley Unified School District board member Joseph Komrosky.

    Credit: Temecula Valley Unified

    One Temecula Valley PAC has submitted 5,236 signatures to initiate a recall election against Temecula Valley Unified School District’s school board president, Joseph Komrosky — surpassing the requirement of 4,280 two days before Friday’s deadline. 

    The Registrar of Voters in Riverside County will now formally count and verify the legitimacy of the signatures to determine if the recall campaign will lead to an election. Jeff Pack, co-founder of One Temecula Valley political action committee — which aims to combat “a very real and dangerous threat to local governance posed by political and religious extremist views” — anticipates that the process will take a couple of months. 

    “We’re looking … forward to being this organization that demands good governance, and I think this is a great start,” Pack said. “I’m really proud.” 

    In its initial stages, the recall campaign was also gathering signatures for board members Jennifer Wiersma and Danny Gonzalez, who, with Komrosky, make up the board’s conservative majority. 

    Since their election in November 2022, the three have together banned critical race theory in the classroom, temporarily barred the Social Studies Alive! curriculum because its supplemental material mentioned LGBTQ+ activist Harvey Milk, fired former Superintendent Jodi McClay without cause and passed policies mandating that school officials notify parents if their child indicates they are transgender. 

    However, Pack said the campaign eventually decided to focus on Komrosky because his recall seemed to be the most likely, based on the number of signatures gathered for his recall. And flipping his seat alone would be enough to tip the board’s current majority. 

    Meanwhile, some community members have speculated that Gonzalez plans to leave the state altogether, noting that his house is currently on the market for sale. 

    Neither Komrosky nor Gonzalez responded to EdSource’s request for comment. Wiersma, who stated she may be able to respond, did not provide a comment by EdSource’s deadline. 

    The road to recall

    The effort to recall Komrosky, Wiersma and Gonzalez began early in June when Pack met a group of moms at a local duck pond. 

    The moms, who eventually formed the organization EnACT Temecula-Equity in Action, wanted to initiate a recall against Wiersma.  

    “Well, why don’t we just do all three? he told them “We’ll back you. We have money. We can get all this stuff together, get all the paperwork together and let’s do it.”

    The moms questioned his idea to start a recall for all three. 

    “Which one deserves to stay? Which one do you want to leave there?” Pack said he responded. “And nobody can answer that question.” 

    The recall effort began to gain steam, he said. And in one day, they had gathered the 35 signatures needed to file a notice of intent to recall for each board member. 

    In the months that followed, teachers and community members went door to door, gathering more signatures. They also stationed themselves at the duck pond during weekends. 

    Eventually, the recall effort also garnered support from organizations including the Temecula Valley Educators Association, the League of United Latin American Citizens Inland Empire chapter and the NAACP’s Southwest Riverside branch 1034. 

    “As educators, we’re all just hoping that the focus of the district can return to student performance, supporting learning environments to maximize how teachers can do their jobs,” said Edgar Diaz, the president of the Temecula Valley Educators Association. 

    He added that he’s “glad the community came out and supported” the recall, showing “that this is actually a community issue, not a teacher- or a union-driven issue.” 

    Reactions to the recall

    The recall effort has been met with mixed reactions from members of the community and beyond. 

    While Pack said there has been enthusiastic support for Komrosky’s recall, they were unable to gather the 3,987 signatures needed to get Wiersma’s on the ballot. 

    Pastor Tim Thompson of Evangelical 412 Church Temecula Valley — who has consistently stood by the board’s majority — has said he doubts a recall election will take place. 

    “If they get their way and this goes to an election, what we’re going to find is the same thing we found in the election cycle last period, is that the vast majority of people in the Temecula Valley support these three,” Thompson said. “They’re happy that they’re in there. They’re happy for the changes that they’re making.”

    Thompson also commended the current board for fulfilling their duty to “protect the youth in our community.” 

    Temecula Valley district board member Steven Schwartz, however, disagrees, saying most board decisions have been “political and not educational.” 

    As a member of the board minority, Schwartz said he has received mostly positive feedback from parents and community members who he said feel the same way as he does. 

    Meanwhile, he said many of the speakers who have voiced their support for the conservative majority at meetings do not come from the community. 

    “When you have people coming from outside disrupting meetings … calling people names, what is that supposed to prove?” Schwartz said. “What is that supposed to do for our children and for schools?” 

    Regardless of the outcome, Pack said he is proud of the effort and that the recall’s advocates were able to make history in Temecula. 

    “This is entirely volunteers that are local, and it’s really, really something that I don’t think this community has ever seen,” Pack said. “It’s a big growing-up moment, I think, for the city of Temecula.”

    Editors’ note: This story has been updated to correct a name’s spelling and revise the number of signatures needed to file the notice of intent to recall.





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  • Why five superintendents decided to walk away from their jobs

    Why five superintendents decided to walk away from their jobs


    Credit: Julie Leopo / EdSource

    California school superintendents have been leaving their jobs in large numbers this year. Many reached retirement age; others, tired of dealing with the aftermath of pandemic school closures, are retiring early or leaving for other jobs or business opportunities. Some are just looking for a change.

    Then there are the superintendents who, having put off plans for retirement to help districts through pandemic closures, now finally feel comfortable enough to leave.

    The result: a turnover of superintendents, with older, more experienced veterans being replaced by new, less experienced leaders.

    EdSource interviewed five California superintendents who either recently left or are leaving their jobs, to better understand what compelled them to step down.

    Covid, threats push Chris Evans to early retirement

    Chris Evans retired as the superintendent of Natomas Unified after the 2022-23 school year.
    Credit: Jeff McPhee

    Former Natomas Unified Superintendent Chris Evans has been the target of multiple personal threats in recent years, but in September 2021, the hateful rhetoric grew so intense that the school board agreed to pay for security for his home.

    A school board meeting in September 2021 was abruptly canceled during public comment because of the raucous behavior of some in the audience.

    Parents and members of the Sacramento community were upset about comments made by an Inderkum High School teacher who was secretly recorded claiming he kept an antifa flag in his classroom and encouraged his students to protest, according to media reports. 

    Evans announced at the meeting that the teacher had been put on paid leave pending an investigation.

    “Following the Sept. 1 meeting, each trustee and Chris received numerous — 150-plus — disturbing emails that were forwarded, I believe, to local and federal law enforcement agencies,” said Susan Heredia, Natomas Unified board president.

    “People would show up in front of my house, take pictures, speak to my children,” Evans said. “They would call the district and say they were headed to my house and would be intercepted going to my house.”

    Last June, Evans stepped down from his position as superintendent at age 52, after 11 years leading the district. He had planned to retire at 55. He blames his early departure on the Covid-19 pandemic.

    “For me, Covid did it,” Evans said. “Covid and everything that came from that — the politics of it. It was exhausting. That took two years off my career.”

    Evans is still working in the district temporarily, helping first-time Superintendent Robyn Castillo transition to her new role. After that, he will focus on his new endeavor at Action-Oriented Leaders, an education consulting firm that focuses on helping superintendents and school boards problem-solve and troubleshoot, he said. 

    Brett McFadden opted for a quieter job closer to home

    Brett McFadden left his job as superintendent of Nevada Joint Union High School District after the 2021-22 school year.
    Courtesy of the Monterey County Office of Education

    Brett McFadden, 55, left his job as superintendent of Nevada Joint Union High School District in Grass Valley after the 2021-22 school year, primarily to be closer to his home in Aptos with his wife, an administrator at Monterey Peninsula Unified School District. 

    He was superintendent at Nevada Joint Union for four years before accepting a job as a deputy superintendent at the Monterey County Office of Education.

    It was difficult being a school superintendent during the Covid-19 pandemic, McFadden said. Nevada Joint Union High School District, like others in the state, had contentious school board meetings that centered on issues like masking, vaccines and the teaching of critical race theory. 

    “We went from board meetings that were not that well attended to board meetings that would have 300-plus people because of one particular contentious issue,” he said. 

    The community had a long history of treating everyone respectfully before the pandemic, but that changed within months, McFadden said. 

    “We lost empathy and grace,” McFadden said.

    There also was a sharp increase in vitriolic comments from the community, he said.

    “You know you can take those with a grain of salt, but when you hear 30 or 40 of them, and then you’re accused of not caring about kids, or destroying the education of kids or destroying kids’ lives after you’ve committed your entire career and your entire sense of being as a human being, as a professional, to fostering students’ lives and opportunities, that takes a toll on people,” McFadden said.

    Despite the difficulties of the last few years, McFadden misses working at a school district. He expects he’ll return to one in some capacity someday, although he isn’t sure when.

    Normalcy and ‘the sweet spot’ entice Brian Dolan to retire

    Brian Dolan will retire as superintendent of Dixon Unified School District after this school year.
    Credit: Stewart Savage, Abaton Consulting

    Dixon Unified Superintendent Brian Dolan, 62, has reached the “sweet spot” —  the age where superintendents begin to reap the best retirement benefits. He’ll retire after this school year.

    Although Covid-19 took the fun out of the job for a while, Dolan is glad he stayed long enough to see things almost return to normal.

    “If I were at retirement age, just coming out of Covid, I would’ve needed to work another year just to put a little shine back on the apple,” he said. 

    Three of the six districts in Solano County had their superintendents retire in the last three years, Dolan said. 

    “None of us are going out early, but all of us are going out as early as we can,” he said.

    Other than some discontent during Covid-19 school closures, Dixon’s school board meetings haven’t had the drama seen in many other districts, Dolan said. They haven’t been contentious and Dolan hasn’t been threatened. But he acknowledges the jobs of all school employees have become harder.

    Dolan has spent a quarter-century of his 35-year career at Dixon Unified School District — 13 as its superintendent. He still finds delight in talking to students who recognize him on the street or when he answers his door on Halloween. The youngest ones pronounce his name Mr. Donut.

    “Wow. I wouldn’t change a thing for myself, because there are so many good things to come out of this as well, but it’s hard work,” Dolan said.

    He doesn’t plan to sit out for too long — probably just the six months required by the state. Dolan sees himself doing administrative coaching or support, or working with student teachers in the future.

    Cathy Nichols-Washer pushed back retirement until things got better

    Cathy Nichols-Washer was the superintendent of Lodi Unified for 15 years.
    Credit: Ken Sato

    Cathy Nichols-Washer, 60, stayed at the helm of Lodi Unified School District in northern San Joaquin County longer than she thought she would. After 15 years, she was the longest-serving superintendent in the district’s history when she retired at the end of last school year.

    Like many superintendents, Nichols-Washer didn’t have the heart to follow through with plans to retire two years earlier, because the Covid-19 pandemic changed her plans. 

    “I just didn’t feel right leaving the district in the midst of all that,” she said. … “So I stayed, and then, after Covid was over and we kind of got things — I’m not going to say back to normal, but back to a place that felt good and comfortable — you know, on a good track again, then I felt comfortable leaving.” 

    During the pandemic, superintendents had to manage the district and get their job done, while dealing with the negativity directed at them at board meetings, on social media and through emails. Nichols-Washer found it particularly difficult to explain to the community why state Covid regulations were changing weekly, if not daily.

    To make matters worse, everyone had a different opinion about the dangers of Covid, she said. Some staff members were afraid to come to work and some parents were afraid to send their children. Others were fighting every regulation, refusing to wear masks, choosing not to be vaccinated, said Nichols-Washer.

    “And then there was anger, because people felt so strongly about the issue that it came out, in many cases, in a very aggressive manner,” she said. “And so board meetings got very contentious, packed board meetings, people yelling and screaming, unruly.”

    Nichols-Washer understands why so many superintendents leave as soon as they reach retirement age. “You can’t blame them,” she said.

    Gregory Franklin moved from Tustin Unified to professor post at USC

    Gregory Franklin retired as superintendent of Tustin Unified in the middle of the 2021-22 school year.
    Credit: Courtesy of Gregory Franklin

    Gregory Franklin, 61, retired as superintendent of Tustin Unified School District in Orange County in the middle of the 2021-22 school year to be a professor of education at the University of Southern California, a position he says doesn’t come around often. 

    Franklin said he could have started working at the university at the beginning of the school year, but he wanted to allow the school board to find a replacement without having to get an interim superintendent.

    He has nothing but good things to say about the Tustin Unified school board, which he says puts the education of children first. He was superintendent of the school district for 10 years.

    “There was a position that came open, and I applied for it,” Franklin said. “I was pretty close to retirement anyway, so I probably left maybe a year or two earlier than I would have otherwise.”

    Being a superintendent has always been a hard job, but it became much harder after the pandemic school closures and the “really brutal politics at the district level” that followed, he said.

    Anger at school closures morphed into anger at masking and other Covid regulations.

    After the 2020 murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, school districts took a look at what they were doing to contribute to the inequity, Franklin said. Schools started to diversify the range of novels and authors available in school so that students could see characters in stories that had similar backgrounds and family structures as their own, but that also made some people angry, he said.

    Then LGBTQ+ rights and students’ right to privacy about their gender decisions bumped up against parental rights, making more people angry, he said.

    “And so we had one thing after another, really starting in May 2020, that has spun things up,” Franklin said. “The number of irate speakers who come to school board meetings now to berate the superintendent, the school board, and school leaders — it’s hard for people. “





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  • Legislative Analyst’s Office forecasts $19 billion state budget deficit for schools and community colleges

    Legislative Analyst’s Office forecasts $19 billion state budget deficit for schools and community colleges


    California State Capitol

    Credit: Christopher Schodt for EdSource

    Schools and community colleges likely will face a $19 billion, three-year state funding deficit, the Legislative Analyst’s Office reported Thursday. The funding for TK-12 this year is $108 billion.

    The LAO’s annual projection is a forecast of what to expect from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s first pass next month on the 2024-25 state budget. It reflects a decline in funding in Proposition 98, the 35-year-old constitutional amendment that determines the portion of the state’s general fund that must go to schools and community colleges. Complicating the picture is that about half of the education deficit covers money that schools and community colleges spent in 2022-23.

    The overall projected state general fund budget deficit of $68 billion could also jeopardize 5% annual increases for the University of California and California State University systems that Gov. Gavin Newsom had agreed to, as well as children’s services not covered by Proposition 98.

    The projected shortfall is the largest financial challenge schools and community colleges will face since the Great Recession budget of 2009. However, the LAO said that schools are better positioned now because of an education rainy-day fund that the Legislature was required to sock away in the record-high revenue years of the past half-decade.  

    Edgar Zazueta, executive director of the Association of California School Administrators, cautioned that state leaders must avoid the sort of harsh cuts made during the Great Recession. They included forcing districts to borrow billions of dollars with the expectation they would be repaid later.

    “Fortunately, we have tools, including the Proposition 98 reserve, that we can leverage to protect Proposition 98 funding levels,” he said. “Even during fiscal times like these, public education must be prioritized and protected. We must continue to build on our state’s great momentum and investments that have been made these past few years.”

    The LAO report lays out several options to balance school spending, some of them jarring for schools and community colleges.

    One option is for the Legislature to preserve TK-14 funding approved last June and find the full $68 billion in cuts in the general fund. That would spare schools, but other programs for children outside of Proposition 98 funding would more likely be hit, including support and subsidized costs for child care.

    The opposite approach — the most painful to schools and community colleges and politically risky for legislators — would be to revise the 2022-23 and the current 2023-24 Proposition 98 funding downward to meet the minimum required by law. That would slash funding by $9 billion from 2022-23 and $6.3 billion for the current year, with a ripple effect of lowering the minimum guarantee for 2024-25 by $3.5 billion.

    The Legislature could ease the burden by draining the $8.1 billion rainy day fund. That would still leave about $10 billion in cuts. Billions of dollars in one-time funding, whether unspent so far this year, or allotted by the Legislature for the next several years, could be targets. These could include $1 billion as yet unallocated for developing community schools or money set aside for learning recovery and for after-school extended learning time. It could be politically unpopular for legislators to make significant school cuts in an election year. And they would have to approve a resolution that there is a fiscal emergency to reduce the Proposition 98 appropriation.

    The third alternative is somewhere in the middle — cuts to K-14 and cuts from other general fund programs.

    The Legislature had an inkling that economic conditions were worsening but no hard numbers when they passed the 2023-24 budget in June: The deadline for paying state and federal income taxes had been extended from April 15 to Oct. 16. So they didn’t know the impact on state revenues in 2022-23 and 2023-24 from slowing home sales, a drop in new startups in Silicon Valley, and from declining income of the top 1% of earners, who contribute 50% of the personal income tax receipts.

    The LAO’s forecast for state revenues for the general fund shows a big drop in 2022-23, a flat line in 2023-24 and a slight uptick in the next fiscal year. But the gray area shows the possibility of an additional decline or a quick recovery.
    Source: The Legislative Analyst’s Office.

    The LAO cautioned that economic conditions are volatile, and revenues will remain unpredictable. A graph of its revenue outlook shows slow growth in 2024-25, with a large gray penumbra of uncertainty above and below that line.

    Kevin Gordon, president of Capitol Advisors Group, an education consulting company based in Sacramento, said he was pleased that the LAO listed several options and did not recommend resetting funding to meet the Proposition 98 minimum, with “devastating cuts.”

    “The numbers are worrisome, but the approaches laid out are significant efforts to demonstrate how lawmakers might work to protect basic investment in education funding,” he said.





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  • Advanced algebra, data science and more: UC rethinks contested issues of high school math

    Advanced algebra, data science and more: UC rethinks contested issues of high school math


    Credit: JeswinThomas / Pexels

    Next month, a panel of University of California professors in the sciences and math will give their recommendations on the contentious issue of how much math high school students should know before taking a college-qualifying course in data science. Its answer could influence future course offerings and admissions requirements in math for UC and CSU.

    “There’s a tension between the interest in adhering to math standards and ensuring students learn math and also recognizing the changes that are happening in the uses of math in industry and the world in general,” said Pamela Burdman, executive director of Just Equations, a nonprofit that promotes policies that prepare students with quantitative skills to succeed in college. 

    “How UC resolves this issue will have a bearing on that, and the signals that UC sends to high schools about what is and isn’t approved will have a big impact on what this next generation of students learns.”

    The issue has embroiled California’s higher education decision-makers, and it mired proponents and opponents of California’s new TK-12 math framework in an acrimonious debate earlier this year.

    Advocates have cited the appeal of introductory data science as a way to broaden the boundaries of math to students who were turned off by it.  Traditionalists – STEM professors and professionals – countered that courses like introductory data science that include little advanced math content create the illusion that students are prepared for college-level quantitative work while discouraging them from pursuing STEM majors.

    Separate from this immediate question, a second group of UC, CSU and community college math professors is revisiting a more fundamental question: How much math knowledge is essential for any high school graduate with college aspirations, and separately for those interested in pursuing STEM, the social sciences or majors needing few quantitative skills?

    For the past two decades, the answer was cut-and-dried — and uniform. The CSU and UC defined foundational high school math as the topics and concepts covered by the three math courses – Algebra I, Geometry, and Advanced Algebra, which is Algebra II — that both systems require students to pass for admission. 

    With the state’s adoption of the Common Core math standards for K-12 in 2010, the options expanded to include Integrated I, II and III, which cover the same Common Core topics in a different order. Both UC and CSU encourage students to take a fourth year of math, and most do.

    The debate has centered on Algebra II. For future science, engineering and math majors, Algebra II is the gateway to the path from trigonometry and Pre-calculus to Calculus, which they must eventually take. But for the majority of non-STEM-bound students, Algebra II can be a slog: difficult, abstract and irrelevant to the college plans.

    Despite a general agreement that high school math should be more relatable and relevant, there is intense disagreement on the fix.

    New course offerings in the burgeoning fields of data science and statistics “present new ways to engage students. At the same time, they can foster the quantitative literacy — or competency with numerical data — that math courses are intended to provide,” Burdman wrote in a commentary in EdSource. “They have the potential to improve equity and ensure that quantitative literacy is a right, not a privilege.”  

    But with 17% of Black children, 23% of Hispanic children and 23% of low-income children scoring proficient in the latest Smarter Balanced tests, the need for effective and engaging math instruction must begin long before high school. The new TK-12 math framework, approved in July after multiple revisions and four years of debate, forcefully calls for fundamental changes in math instruction. 

    “Arguments about what content should be included in high school mathematics fail to acknowledge the elephant in the room: We haven’t yet figured out how to teach the concepts of algebra well to most students,” wrote psychology professors Ji Song of CSU Los Angeles and James Stigler of UCLA in an Edsource commentary.

    Committees of faculty senates of both UC and CSU have restated that Algebra II, along with geometry and Algebra I, provide the skills and quantitative reasoning needed for college work, in whatever paths students eventually choose.  

    “College and career readiness expectations include completion of these sequences or their equivalent that cover all of the Common Core standards,” the CSU Math Council wrote in a January resolution.

    But in 2020, the influential UC academic senate, which is authorized to oversee course content for admissions, sent a critical mixed message. In a statement, the Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools or BOARS invited proposals for a broader range of math courses for consideration that would enable students to “complete certain mathematics courses other than Algebra II or Mathematics III in their junior year of high school to fulfill the minimum admissions requirement.” BOARS said it saw the expanded options “as both a college preparation and equity issue.”

    Proponents of data science seized the opportunity, launching an end-run around what they perceived to be the inflexibility of math professors to change.

    New courses

    BOARS oversees policy, but the High School Articulation Unit, a small office in the UC President’s Office, does the evaluating and vetting of the tens of thousands of courses that course developers and high school teachers submit annually for approval. The office began authorizing new data science courses as meeting or “validating” the content requirements of Algebra II and Integrated III. The validation exemption presumed that the new course would build upon concepts and standards that students had covered in previous courses — in this case, Algebra II — or would be covered in the new course.

    Subsequently, 368 data science and related courses received approval for 2022-23 and 435 for 2023-24. Nearly all use one of a half-dozen or so data science curricula developed for high schools.

    There had been a precedent. As early as 2014, the UC had questionably validated statistics courses as satisfying Algebra II because they cover statistics standards that many Algebra II teachers frequently don’t get to, while not teaching other Algebra II content. However, extending validation to data science is more problematic since California has not established standards for the subject. As a result, there are no guidelines for what standards the courses should be teaching.

    A flaw in implementation or policy?

    In a detailed Nov. 12 letter to UC regents, Jelani Nelson, a professor of electrical engineering and computer sciences at UC Berkeley and a leading critic of weakening math requirements through course substitution, put the blame not on policy changes but on the course-approval process. An Articulation Unit with a small staff, none of whom had a background in STEM, was overwhelmed, he wrote.

    Others agree. Rick Ford, professor emeritus and former chair of the department of mathematics at CSU Chico, said that what once was a rigorous process for course approval had become a “horrendous” pro-forma exercise, “primarily reliant on the fidelity of submitters” to follow BOARS guidelines.

    The oldest and most popular course, Introduction to Data Science, developed by UCLA statistics professor Robert Gould through funding from the National Science Foundation and used throughout Los Angeles Unified, covered only the statistics standards, not other content in Algebra II. The same was the case with another popular course validated for Algebra II, “Explorations in Data Science,” developed by YouCubed, a Stanford University research center.

    Most students who had taken Introduction to Data Science so far had taken Algebra II, so that was not a problem. But those who took it as juniors in lieu of Algebra II might find the course shut doors instead of opening them. Those who might later decide they want to major in biology, computer science, chemistry, neurology or statistics, all of which require passing Calculus, would find themselves struggling for lack of Algebra II; the CSU, meanwhile, no longer offers remediation courses in math.

    “You’re asking a 14- or 15-year-old kid to make a lifelong decision in the spring of sophomore year,” said Ford, who chaired the influential Academic Preparation and Education Programs Committee of the CSU academic senate. “Watering down content is creating a multitrack system instead of giving all students the greatest chance of success.”

    A backlash followed

    News that UC was approving the substitution of data science for third-year Common Core math frustrated the faculty of CSU, which has relied on BOARS and the UC faculty for policy decisions since the two systems agreed to common course requirements, known as A-G, in 2003. Approving coursework that does not meet Common Core standards “brought to light the complete lack of control that the CSU has over the A-G high school requirements that are used for admission to our system,” the CSU senate stated in a January resolution. It called for the academic senates of both systems “to explore establishing joint decision-making” over new courses and changes to the A-G standards.

    In July, during the lead-up to the anticipated approval of the final version of the updated California Math Framework by the State Board of Education, tensions came to a head. Thousands of STEM professionals and UC and CSU faculty had signed petitions sharply criticizing earlier drafts of the math guidelines. The proposed framework had discouraged districts from offering Algebra I in eighth grade, compounding the challenge of taking Calculus before high school graduation, while encouraging students to take data science over STEM professions that were described as less interesting and collaborative. One of the five authors of the drafts was Jo Boaler, a prominent professor of mathematics education at the Stanford Graduate School of Education and co-founder of YouCubed.

    In the framework it adopted in July, the State Board of Education left it to districts to decide who should take Algebra in the eighth grade. The final version revised language conflating courses in data literacy, which all 21st-century students need, with math-intensive data science courses that, together with Calculus, would prepare students for a data science major in college. It also dropped a new third pathway for data science next to the traditional pathway leading to Calculus. 

    But the final framework hasn’t fully mollified critics, including Elizabeth Statmore, a math teacher at Lowell High in San Francisco and former software executive.

    “By encouraging students to abandon algebra before they’ve solidified their understanding, the (framework) makes it even more difficult for them to get back on that track — even more so now that our community colleges and CSUs have done away with remedial courses,” she wrote in an email. 

    “The only way we’re going to diversify STEM fields is to keep historically excluded young students on the algebraic thinking pathway just a little bit longer. That will give them the mathematical competencies they will need to make their own decisions about whether or not they want to pursue rigorous quantitative majors and careers.”

    Feeling the heat, BOARS hastily reversed positions on July 7 — days before the State Board meeting — revoking validation for meeting Algebra II requirements for all data science courses. And, in a letter to the State Board, BOARS Chair Barbara Knowlton requested wording changes to the proposed framework, which the board did, including deleting a diagram that showed data science as an option to sub for Algebra II.   

    “The data science courses that have to date been approved by UCOP’s high school articulation team appear not to have been designed as third- or fourth-year mathematics courses,” wrote Knowlton, a professor of psychology at UCLA.

    Ten days later, BOARS met again and clarified that there might be some exceptions for granting validation to those data science courses with “a prerequisite mastery of Algebra II content.” It also reiterated that the revocation of A-G credit would exempt students who are currently taking data science courses, with credit for Algebra II, or who had taken data science courses in past years.  

    “It’s been unfortunate that UC’s process of determining the rules has caused far more confusion than was needed,” said Burdman, the executive director of Just Equations.

    The minutes of the meeting revealed that BOARS members professed they didn’t know how the articulation unit in the President’s Office determined if courses could be substituted. Nor could they determine how many data science courses were designated as advanced math. The President’s Office said about 400 data science courses were being taught in California high schools.

    The minutes said that BOARS would appoint a working group, including professors of computer science, neuroscience, statistics and math, to clarify how to enforce the July 7 revocation vote, incorporate Algebra II as a course prerequisite, and determine the criteria for course validation.

    BOARS, whose meetings are not public,  hasn’t disclosed who’s in the group, although it includes no CSU faculty. The group has been meeting ahead of a December deadline so that BOARS can review and take action in January; only then will its recommendations be made public, Knowlton said in an interview. 

    There’s pressure to complete work in time for the next course cycle for the fall of 2024, starting in February, so that applicants know the new rules. “There is a concern among some people that if we don’t send this message quickly, there will be a proliferation of these courses,” she said.

    Knowlton hopes the work group will identify elements of algebra that are critical for student success and evaluate courses to see which ones don’t cover them. 

    “Some validated courses may leave out really very important foundational aspects of math, and we want to reiterate what those are,” she said. Course developers could choose to add concepts to qualify for validation for Algebra II; that’s what the developers of financial math have done. Or instead, they could offer courses like data science as advanced math in the fourth year of high school, with a prerequisite of Algebra II.

    Knowlton said BOARS is committed to equity in college admissions. But the challenge is balancing access and preparation, she said. “We want as much access as possible, yet it has to mean that students are prepared.”

    But Aly Martinez, the former math coordinator for San Diego Unified, is worried that efforts to create innovative and rigorous courses in data science and statistics will be swept aside if BOARS applies restrictions too broadly.

    After surveying students about their math interests, the district worked with the creators of CourseKata to turn its college statistics and data science course into two-year high school courses incorporating Algebra II standards and college and career pathway requirements. The courses can lead to Calculus for STEM majors; others can apply the knowledge to social science and other majors. The first-year course is popular and should be validated as satisfying Algebra II, she said.

    “There is momentum and excitement about this work,” said Martinez, who is now the director of math for the nonprofit Student Achievement Partners. “Those who are innovative should not be the ones getting hurt.”

    A fresh look at standards

    The second committee commissioned will take a broader and longer view of math content. Its members will include math professors from the CSU and community colleges, as well as UC, as a math subcommittee of a joint faculty body, the Intersegmental Committee of Academic Senates.

    Kate Stevenson, a math professor at CSU Northridge and member of the new workgroup, said, “It’s not our goal to rewrite the standards, but to emphasize what parts of the standards are really critical to all students’ success and which are critical to life sciences as opposed to engineers, physicists and chemists.”

    The committee will probably not recommend dropping math standards but could look at reorganizing or de-emphasizing them, she said.

    Few Algebra II teachers find time for statistics standards, she said. “So what would a third year look like with a better balance between statistics and algebraic skills? Could we repeat less of Algebra I if we did the integrated pathway?”  she asked. “Or what parts of the algebra curriculum could really belong in Pre-calculus rather than in Algebra II?”

    Although it is not the role of the committee, Stevenson said she thinks the Common Core standards deserve revisiting. “It’s not that I don’t like the standards. But it’s very unlikely the mathematics that we agreed to in 2013 is the mathematics that we think students should have in 2030.”

    Clarification: The article was updated Dec. 15 with the exact number of data science courses that the Articulation Unit of the UC Office of the President approved for 2022 and 2023; they were fewer than the article had implied.





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  • Community college faculty call for union to take stance against accused professor

    Community college faculty call for union to take stance against accused professor


    Fresno City College campus.

    Credit: Ashleigh Panoo / EdSource

    The post has been updated to correct the position held by one of the union leaders mentioned in the story and to say that 50% of senators must be present and 75% must vote to remove the president.

    Some professors in the State Center Community College District are calling for their union leaders to be transparent about their knowledge of the 2020 sexual misconduct findings against a colleague at Fresno City College who formerly taught at California State University, Fresno. 

    “Shocked” by EdSource’s report of the “alarming” allegations involving Tom Boroujeni, Laurie Taylor, an anthropology professor at Clovis Community College, which is also part of State Center, said she questioned union leadership and called for leaders to resign during a Dec. 1 meeting. Two professors at the meeting confirmed Taylor demanded union leadership resignations. Boroujeni is a Fresno City College communication instructor and also president of the school’s academic senate.

    Union president Keith Ford forwarded EdSource’s interview request to the union’s executive vice president Ria Williams; Williams has not yet responded.  Lacy Barnes, the union’s immediate past president and the Secretary Treasurer of the California Federation of Teachers, declined to comment. 

    “We, as union members, demand to know what our union leadership knew and when they knew it,” Taylor said in an interview with EdSource. 

    Boroujeni was found to have committed an “act of sexual violence” against a professor and colleague at nearby Fresno State in 2015 when he was a graduate student and adjunct instructor. The alleged victim is also a professor and Boroujeni’s colleague at Fresno City College. The State Center Community College District, parent agency to City College, learned of the “sexual misconduct investigation” when the alleged victim requested a no-contact order against Boroujeni, which was granted in the spring 2022 semester.

    Boroujeni has taught at Fresno City College since 2015, the same year he began his academic career at Fresno State while still a graduate student. Fresno State couldn’t discipline him because he was a graduate student when the alleged violence occurred, Debbie Adishian-Astone, the school’s vice president for administration, told EdSource. Boroujeni resigned from Fresno State last year after officials said the act-of-sexual-violence report would be placed in his personnel file. 

    In his resignation, he agreed not to seek or accept work in the California State University system again.  

    But the matter had no immediate impact on his teaching career at Fresno City College, where the alleged victim teaches part-time in addition to her tenured position at Fresno State. State Center Community College District granted Boroujeni tenure in March. He assumed the academic senate presidency in May, after a two-year term as president-elect. 

    But the district put Boroujeni on paid leave on Nov. 30, a day after EdSource’s report. 

    This week, State Center officials remained tight-lipped over Boroujeni’s administrative leave because of “personnel matters subject to legal considerations related to privacy and to protect the integrity of any ongoing investigations,” a district spokesperson, Jill Wagner, wrote in an email. 

    A person familiar with the matter said the decision to put Boroujeni on administrative leave was because his presence on campus was disruptive and impacted the college’s ability to serve students, following EdSource’s report on the alleged sexual violence. Three instructors canceled class in response to the report.

    Union response 

    The State Center Federation of Teachers represents faculty in the community college district. According to a statement obtained by EdSource, union officers would not comment on the sexual misconduct allegations publicly but could talk with members individually. 

    “We cannot comment specifically on this case or any other,” according to the union’s formal statement. “In no way does the Federation endorse or condone acts of harassment or violence in any circumstance.” 

    The union’s statement, Taylor said, seemed “dismissive and placating,” and “more could have been said.” 

    And Liz Romero, an early childhood education instructor at Clovis Community College, said she is also angry with the union over their response. She said she expected the union to take a position on the allegation of sexual violence against Boroujeni. Romero said it was “disheartening” that the union, through its statement, said their responsibility was to “defend the contract” and “defend the faculty’s rights to due process.” 

    “It seems like a disparity in power structure with a full-time faculty versus a part-time faculty,” Romero said about the union’s statement, “a man versus a woman, a person in leadership versus a person not in leadership. It feels very unbalanced.” 

    Academic Senate response

    Professors who spoke to EdSource also directed their frustration at the Fresno City College Academic Senate, which Boroujeni leads.

    In May 2023, Boroujeni started a two-year term as Fresno City College’s academic senate president, a role requiring that he works with the college’s administration in setting academic policy among other responsibilities. He became president-elect in May 2021 for a two-year term before ascending to the senate presidency seven months ago.

    Romero, who has previously served as academic senate president at Clovis Community College, said the academic senate should remove Boroujeni as the president and hold a new election for the next president-elect. According to the bylaws of the Fresno City College academic senate, removing an officer requires a written petition detailing the rationale for the removal, with signatures from 25% of the academic senators; 50% of the senators must be present and 75% must vote to remove the president. 

    While Boroujeni is on administrative leave, the senate’s executive committee is using an acting president. 

    Past president Michael Takeda is the acting president while current president-elect Jackie Williams is on a sabbatical leave.  Williams will become acting president in January if Boroujeni remains on leave. 

    The executive committee did not discuss Boroujeni during its Wednesday meeting.

    “For now, there’s nothing really to discuss,” Takeda said.

    Boroujeni did not respond to EdSource’s questions on Thursday.

    As some faculty members expect more from the union, the college’s academic senate as well as the college and district, professors are finding ways to show solidarity with the alleged victim and to demand action. 

    For example, Romero said she won’t stay a union member if the union doesn’t take a stance on the matter. 

    “I don’t want my money to fund an organization that’s going to protect abusers,” she said. “That’s my only power in this situation. Everyone needs to do what they think is best for them, and I hope it’s always supporting victims of sexual assault and standing up for those with less power.”





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  • Salaries, benefits increase as school superintendents become harder to find

    Salaries, benefits increase as school superintendents become harder to find


    LAUSD Superintendent Alberto Carvalho is among the highest paid superintendents in the state.

    Credit: Credit: Julie Leopo / EdSource

    Superintendent candidates are in the driver’s seat in California, where openings are plenty and fewer veteran candidates are interested. The result is higher salaries, better perks and less experience required.

    Superintendent pay in California has skyrocketed in the last decade, with salaries in some districts growing more than 60%, according to an EdSource analysis of 53 California superintendent contracts.

    Contracts show salaries that range from $130,000 in rural McKinleyville in Humboldt County, where Julie Giannini-Previde leads a district of 928 students, to $441,092 in suburban Elk Grove, near Sacramento, where Christopher Hoffman is at the helm of a district of 63,000 students.

    Districts must pay a good salary to attract and retain qualified superintendents, said Nancy Chaires Espinoza, Elk Grove Unified school board president. Even with good salaries, some qualified people aren’t interested in applying for superintendent positions, she said.

    “It’s really hard to recruit and retain superintendents because the job has changed, and the job of superintendent has become much more difficult, given the political environment,” she said.

    A survey of 2,443 superintendents nationwide by the School Superintendents Association showed a median annual salary of $156,468 last school year, with pay increasing at districts with higher enrollment. No comparative salary data is available for California, although the California Department of Education has salary information for 2021-22. That year, superintendents in unified districts with 10,000 to 20,000 students earned an average yearly salary of $278,268 and superintendents in districts with 20,000 or more students averaged $319,443 a year. 

    “If the district really wants somebody, and they’re holding out for a higher salary, they’re probably going to get it because it is hard to find people,” said Cathy Nichols-Washer, who retired as superintendent of Lodi Unified School District last school year. 

    Superintendent contract highlights

    Alberto Carvalho, Los Angeles Unified: Car, driver, security, $1.5 million life insurance policy, $50,000 moving allowance, $50,000 for tax-sheltered annuity, can ask to cash out unused vacation days.

    James Hammond, Ontario-Montclair School District: Lifetime health benefits for himself and family, can cash out vacation days, $66,000 annual contribution to tax-deferred annuity.

    Donald Austin, Palo Alto Unified: Can choose to rent a house from the district for $1,800 a month or take an annual salary increase of $25,000.

    Samuel Buenrostro, Corona Norco Unified: He can’t take employees with him when he leaves the district.

    Bryon Schaefer, Kern High School District: Contract allows him to work as a consultant for the district up to 30 days a year for up to five years after retirement at the same daily rate he made as superintendent, with requisite raises.

    Kayla Johnson-Trammel, Oakland Unified:  Three-month paid sabbatical included in 2022 contract.

    Superintendent of fifth-largest district, one of highest paid

    Elk Grove’s Hoffman makes $1,000 more a year in salary than Alberto Carvalho, the superintendent of Los Angeles Unified, the state’s largest school district, according to the most recent employment contracts available to EdSource. Carvalho, who leads a district of 538,000 students, earns a $440,000 base salary, with no promise of annual raises.

    Hoffman’s current salary is a 63% increase over the $270,000 salary he received when he was hired in 2014. He also earned 2% bonuses this school year and last, as well as retroactive pay raises, according to his contract. Hoffman’s salary is higher because his car and expense allowances have been folded into his pay, said Chaires Espinoza. Last year Hoffman’s benefit package was worth $133,780, she said.

    Carvalho’s benefit package more than makes up for the difference in salary. It includes a $1.5 million district-paid life insurance policy, use of a car, a $50,000 annual contribution to a retirement account, the ability to cash out some vacation days, and the use of security and a driver if needed. He was also paid $50,000 in 2022 to relocate from Florida to Los Angeles. 

    Chaires Espinoza says Hoffman earns his salary. She credits his relationship with the district’s unions with enabling Elk Grove Unified to be the first district to close schools in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. She also cited Hoffman’s longevity as superintendent — nine years — and his knowledge of the district, as other reasons he is worth the paycheck. 

    “I can tell you unequivocally that he is the best superintendent in the state,” she said.

    Superintendents of large school districts aren’t the only ones making big salaries. Some superintendents in smaller districts out-earned colleagues overseeing much larger districts. Bay Area superintendents Donald Austin of Palo Alto Unified and Michael Gallagher at Sunnyvale School District, who earn $378,000 and $374,000 respectively, make more than superintendents in much larger districts in the state, including San Francisco Unified. 

    Pay increasingly tied to employee pay raises

    Superintendents are increasingly asking for “me too clauses” in their contracts that give them the same raises as the employees whose contracts they help negotiate. Almost a fifth of the superintendent contracts reviewed by EdSource contained these clauses.

    “That is more standard than not,”  said Dennis Smith, managing search partner for Leadership Associates, a recruitment agency that does many of the superintendent searches in California. “The superintendent will get the same increases as credentialed staff and administrators. That’s common. People don’t want to see the superintendent get a bigger increase than others.”

    Smith doesn’t think that this impacts superintendents’ decisions when negotiating with their unions. “The superintendent is going to negotiate the best package possible for the district,” he said. “I’ve never seen any self-interest involved in it.”

    Chaires Espinoza says there is no conflict because the school board approves all raises.

    But others disagree.

    “This is a textbook example of a conflict,” said David Kline, spokesman for the California Taxpayers Association, a nonprofit tax advocacy association. “It’s definitely a conflict. You essentially have one person sitting on both sides of the bargaining table. We would like to see the end to that sort of contract. The superintendent should be paid based on performance.”

    Benefits add cost, value to contracts

    There is a lot more to a superintendent’s contract than salary. It spells out how many days the superintendent will work, how much the district will contribute to health and retirement benefits, how the manager will be reimbursed for expenses and whether the superintendent can accept outside jobs, earn overtime pay, or cash out sick leave and vacation time. It even spells out the number of months that a superintendent will be paid if he or she is fired without cause.

    A healthy benefit package can more than make up for a lower salary. Some superintendents receive life insurance policies, stipends for advanced degrees, housing allowances, expense accounts, extra pay for advanced degrees, deferred compensation and annuities, longevity bonuses, lifetime health benefits and district-paid security.

    Less common are things like the option for Palo Alto Superintendent Austin to live in a district-provided house or boost his salary by $25,000 or the three-month sabbatical that was part of Oakland Unified Superintendent Kayla Johnson-Trammel’s 2022 contract.

    “We have noticed in news stories on superintendents throughout the state, it does seem they are being paid very generously from taxpayer funds with many perks the private sector couldn’t dream of receiving,” Kline said.

    Going Deeper

    The salaries of school staff, including superintendents, are public information, according to California state law, but not all school districts make the information easy to find. Even if districts post the initial contract on their website, most do not post the addendums that show superintendent pay increases approved over the years.  

    The California Controller’s Office collects salary data for all state jobs and makes it available on its Government Compensation in California website, but only 22% of school  districts reported salary data for 2022 – the most recent year data is available on the site. Unlike other state agencies, K-12 school districts are voluntary reporters. Senate Bill 924, meant to close a loophole that allows districts to avoid reporting employee income, failed in the state legislature last year.

    Without publicly posted salary and benefit information, the public must ask school districts for the information, often with a California Public Records Act request. Los Angeles Unified was one of the few school districts who have not yet fulfilled a request for public records filed by EdSource in October for this story. EdSource obtained Alberto Carvalho’s contract from another source.

    Superintendent benefits put district in the spotlight

    One case in particular has put superintendent pay and perks in the spotlight. In 2021, Ontario-Montclair Superintendent James Hammond earned $542,988 in wages and $200,608 in retirement and health contributions, according to the State Controller’s website. His wages grew because he was able to cash out 85 days of sick time and 25 vacation days, according to media reports. The district has 18,471 students.

    In 2022 the school board capped Hammond’s annual sick days at 85 and required that he wait to cash out his accrued sick days until he leaves the district, instead of annually, according to the Daily Bulletin. The move reduced his total compensation by $100,000 that year, according to the State Controller’s website.

    The Ontario-Montclair school board continues to be generous to Hammond. In July, the district increased his base salary to $368,547. The contract continues to allow the superintendent to cash out any of his 25 vacation days annually, or to accrue them and cash them out when he leaves the district. 

    Hammond also receives $2,500 a month from the district to pay for a life insurance policy and $66,000 — the maximum contribution allowed — to a tax-sheltered annuity. He and eligible members of his family also receive lifetime medical insurance benefits.

    “I can confidently attest that Dr. Hammond has instrumentally helped to positively transform the Ontario-Montclair School District over the last 14 years,” said board President Sonia Alvarado.  “As one of the most senior superintendents in San Bernardino County, students and families have benefited from his strategic vision and shared leadership style.”

    The amount of compensation is meant to retain Hammond, who could leave for a similar compensation package in a large school district, at a university or in the private sector, Alvarado said.

    “It is a very competitive market, particularly for large, urban school systems where there is usually a high turnover in the superintendent positions that often results in severance packages and settlements that are both costly and disruptive,” Alvarado said. “Recruiting and retaining effective leadership is one of the primary responsibilities a school board should prioritize.”

    CSBA advises against ‘compensation schemes’

    A California School Boards Association template for superintendent contracts offers advice for school boards that are thinking about keeping salaries low and offering bigger perks to superintendents to stay under the radar. 

    “Even when faced with such pressures, boards should avoid using ‘creative’ compensation schemes that tend to erode public trust, such as low salary but exorbitant benefits,” according to the CSBA.

    Instead, the CSBA suggested that the district offer a competitive salary and reasonable benefits that are comparable to what other districts are paying. 

    Legislators try to regulate pay, benefits

    Some states’ legislative bodies are considering capping the amount school districts can pay their school superintendents. California hasn’t taken that step, although state lawmakers passed a bill in 2013 to limit the maximum cash settlement to a district superintendent who is fired without cause to the amount of time left on his or her contract, or 12 months, whichever is less. Before that decision, superintendent contracts could include a payout of up to 18 months.

     Almost every employment contract reviewed by EdSource required that the superintendent be paid if they are fired or, in some cases, if there is a mutual agreement that they resign.

    Rachel S. White, an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, who runs a research lab that collects data about school superintendents, said, “They (superintendents) are saying they want that protection because they know elections can happen, and the board turns over, and they’re out the next month.” 





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  • ‘Bug’ professionals for better opportunities

    ‘Bug’ professionals for better opportunities


    “Double texting” and “spamming” are perhaps two of the most dreaded phrases in Gen Z lingo.

    It’s intimidating to send a friend or partner multiple messages without a response, but it can be even more terrifying to come across as overbearing to a professional.

    This fear, while coming from a good place of not trying to inundate recruiters, professors and professionals with messages, holds students back from advancing their careers.

    It’s better to be persistent than to be absent and miss out on valuable opportunities.

    If I hadn’t pushed back against my trepidation of being overbearing, I wouldn’t be writing this story for this publication.

    I saw a listing for EdSource’s California Student Journalism Corps in April and quickly assembled a cover letter, resume and list of bylines. Over two days, I completed everything and went back to the website — but the post was gone.

    Unbeknownst to my scrambled, midterms-focused brain, the application deadline had passed and the opportunity seemingly vanished.

    While I worried that a last-minute email would fall into an abyss of similar messages, my friend Brittany pushed me to send my application regardless.

    I was pleasantly surprised to see a response less than 24 hours later informing me that although the cohort was mostly full, I still had a chance. After quickly submitting my documents and having a good phone interview with the internship coordinator, I was offered a position.

    Now in my second semester as a Student Corps member, the experience has been invaluable. And it never would have happened if I let my intrusive thoughts win.

    A quick survey through my emails reveals that I’ve sent the phrase “follow up” in some capacity to professionals or my co-workers 34 times. I should probably vary my rampant use of “follow up,” but the sentiment stands.

    Not once did I receive a response saying “stop emailing me” or “you’re bothering me.” Most of my emails yielded responses thanking me for following up and apologizing for the delay.

    Some of the most fulfilling experiences I’ve had as a journalist came from spur-of-the-moment messages I sent. There were plenty of unread emails, but the ones that did receive responses helped me tremendously.

    I was able to attend and produce content at the 2023 Online News Association conference in Philadelphia because I applied for a scholarship opportunity I never thought I would win. At the conference, I connected with writers, editors and leaders from newsrooms I had long admired.

    Less than a year prior, I applied to cover the hip-hop festival Rolling Loud for San Diego State University’s publication The Daily Aztec. Walking through the campgrounds filled with eager fans and thrilling performances, I couldn’t help but think what would have happened if I never sent that application.

    Daniel Newell, executive director of San Diego State’s career center, works to connect students with jobs and internships during and after college. In his experience with recruiters, and previously working as one, he noted that persistence is a key quality for applicants.

    “Every recruiter likes to see genuine interest and passion,” Newell said. “I’ve met so many people where they didn’t have all the requirements for the job, but man, they were persistent and they were dedicated and they were passionate. I would take a passionate person who wants to learn and get the job done any day over someone who has the experience but isn’t really gung-ho about the position.”

    While these attributes are important for building connections, Newell said it’s also essential to maintain a respectable tone and demeanor when interacting with professionals.

    “When you’re talking to a professional or a recruiter, you’re always going to be professional,” Newell said. “Even if you don’t think they’re sort of assessing you or judging you, they are. Every interaction is important.”

    Instead of deliberating whether to send the follow-up message, students and budding professionals should focus more on how to deliver their messages. Being pushy and unprofessional can be a significant turn-off, but being persistent and professional can help you land a job.

    Students aren’t alone in their endeavors to network and reach out to professionals. And you don’t have to take advice exclusively from a 22-year-old like me. The New York Times published a guide on how to get email responses by being truthful, quick and direct. The Wall Street Journal also detailed tips and tricks for sending thank-you messages after a job interview.

    It’s perfectly normal to feel nervous when reaching out to people you admire or want to work with. I feel imposter syndrome all the time. But you never know what will happen when you reach out, and there’s only so much you can accomplish if you don’t ask.

    •••

    Noah Lyons is a fourth-year journalism major at San Diego State University and a member of EdSource’s California Student Journalism Corps.

    The opinions in this commentary are those of the author. If you would like to submit a commentary, please review our guidelines and contact us.





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  • Faculty, staff urge California colleges to make backup plans in case DACA ends

    Faculty, staff urge California colleges to make backup plans in case DACA ends


    Madeleine Villanueva, higher education manager of Immigrants Rising and Maria Barragan, director of undocumented student support services at Loyola Marymount University.

    Credit: Courtesy of Immigrants Rising

    Iveth Díaz has spent much of her career helping immigrant students living in the U.S. without permanent legal status navigate college. But when her own application to renew her work permit and temporary protection from deportation was delayed because of backlogs, she had to resign from her job for three months.

    “It was extremely stressful. It was a time when I suffered from anxiety and depression, which is unfortunately very common within our community,” Díaz said. 

    Díaz and other college and university employees with work permits and protection under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program are calling on universities to do more to help them prepare for alternative employment plans in case the program ends. Some proposals include helping employees become independent consultants, preparing a severance package or sponsoring work visas.

    DACA offers temporary protection from deportation and permission to work for about 579,000 young people who were brought to the U.S. as children and graduated from high school, completed a GED or are veterans of the U.S. military. Every two years, recipients must apply for renewal. But the program could end at any time. It was found to be illegal by a federal judge in Texas, and that case will likely end up in the Supreme Court.

    The program, launched during the Obama administration, has long been associated with high school and college students, but most recipients are now working adults. The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has not accepted new applications since 2017, making the youngest DACA recipients currently 21 years old, and the oldest, now 42.

    “The DACA generation are not kids anymore,” said Madeleine Villanueva, higher education manager of Immigrants Rising, an organization based in San Francisco that helps undocumented people achieve career and educational goals and published a guide for colleges and universities to support undocumented employees. “A lot of us are in our 30s and 40s. We’re doing this work so that the future generation of undocumented students doesn’t have such a hard time like we did when we were going to school.”

    Hundreds of faculty and staff at California colleges and universities are DACA recipients, although the exact total is unclear. According to the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration’s Higher Ed Immigration Portal,  there are about 9,211 recipients working in education in California, from elementary school to college. The University of California estimates it has more than 400 employee recipients, some of them students. Spokespersons for the California State University and California Community Colleges said they did not have data on how many employees are temporarily protected from deportation.

    Díaz worked for more than eight years at CSU San Bernardino as an administrative support coordinator for graduate researchers and as an admissions counselor. She now leads a program for students at Cerritos College who do not have permanent legal immigration status. As a fellow at Immigrants Rising, she conducted a survey of about 65 employees of California colleges and universities who at one time were living in the U.S. without permission, most of whom now have DACA protections. The employees included faculty, counselors, researchers and financial aid and admissions workers.

    She said most respondents said their colleges and universities have not prepared for what to do for their employees if the program ends.

    “Are we waiting until the program is canceled altogether, or are institutions being proactive in creating ways to retain their employees?” Díaz said. “I found that 70% of respondents stated that their institutions have not even brought it up, have not even had a conversation to their knowledge about what a response plan would be, which is really worrisome.”

    Laura Bohórquez García, the director of the AB 540 and Undocumented Student Center at UC Davis, decided to start her own business, Inner Work Collective Freedom, to employ herself if the program ends and she loses her work permit.

    “I’m like, OK, how do I prepare? Because I don’t feel like the university would be ready to jump in,” Bohórquez García said.

    In addition to plans in case DACA ends, concerned university employees and advocates recommended that universities offer more mental health benefits and that supervisors check in on their employees’ mental health. 

    “You have to check in with the students, but sometimes no one is checking in with you. How can we help others if we can’t even advocate for ourselves?”

    Eric Yang

    Many recipients working in colleges and universities are employed in positions dedicated to supporting immigrant students on their campuses, helping them get legal services or mental health counseling. But many of these positions are part-time and don’t offer health benefits, which are crucial when living with the uncertainty of losing temporary protection from deportation, advocates said.

    “So much of what they’re doing and the fires they’re turning off when it comes to students, it impacts them as well,” said Luz Bertadillo Rodríguez, director of campus engagement at the Presidents’ Alliance on Higher Education and Immigration, a group of college and university leaders dedicated to increasing public understanding of how immigration policies and practices impact students. “The constant word or feeling I hear when there’s a new DACA update is, ‘I’m exhausted.’ They’re just like, ‘I’m tired of living my life two years at a time and then even that not being certain.’”

    Whenever a new court decision comes out about the program, employees in the immigrant resource centers often find themselves holding workshops or trainings to help explain the decision to students, yet they are also processing the decision themselves. 

    “You have to check in with the students, but sometimes no one is checking in with you,” said Eric Yang, a recipient who has worked with immigrant students at two different California universities. “How can we help others if we can’t even advocate for ourselves?”

    University of California officials are currently examining ways to support employees if the temporary deportation protections are terminated, according to UC Office of the President spokesperson Stett Holbrook. He added that the UC Immigrant Legal Services Center offered immigration consultation workshops for recipient employees last summer, “many of which identified eligibility for employment, family or humanitarian relief.”

    RESOURCES FOR UNDOCUMENTED COLLEGE EMPLOYEES

    “The University of California has a long record of support for DACA recipients, and we will continue to support our students, staff and faculty regardless of their immigration status,” Holbrook said.

    The University of California is also currently considering a proposal to allow the university to hire students who do not have work permits under DACA. A coalition of immigrant students and allies, including legal scholars at UCLA and elsewhere, have argued that a federal law barring the hiring of immigrants living in the country without permission doesn’t apply to state entities.

    California State University and California Community Colleges both offer free legal services to employees who have temporary work permits. However, advocates said many faculty and staff are unaware that these services are not just for students.

    Melissa Villarin, spokesperson for the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office, said the community colleges have also recently included resources for staff and faculty during the annual Undocumented Student Action Week.

    Díaz also recommended more training for university staff about DACA recipients. She said survey respondents said there was a lack of awareness or understanding among other staff and faculty about their colleagues who have temporary protection under the program.

    “There was just no knowledge by institutions of higher ed about even having undocumented staff and faculty on campus,” Díaz said.

    She said lack of awareness can lead to insensitivity. At one point, for example, she said a human resources director asked her why she didn’t just fix her status or apply for a green card, not understanding that Díaz, like most immigrants who entered or stayed in the U.S. without permission, didn’t have a way to apply for a green card without leaving the country and possibly having to stay out for up to 10 years.

    Yang said universities should do more to highlight the stories of staff who are covered by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program “so that people in the public know that there are professional staff who are also potentially without any protection or support.”

    Despite the challenges these immigrants face, Bertadillo Rodríguez said they should be commended for their work. “They’re very involved in the students’ lives because they’re able to create such strong bonds with the students,” she said. “They’re some of the most exceptional and brilliant practitioners that I’ve come across in higher education.”





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