SAN FRANCISCO
UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT DESEGREGATION
Paragraph 44 Independent
Review
Report No. 18
2000-2001
The Report of
the Consent Decree Monitoring Team
Submitted to the United
States District Court
for the Northern District of
California
July 30, 2001
By Stuart Biegel
Consent Decree Monitor
for the State of California
Paragraph 44 of the SFNAACP v. SFUSD Consent Decree mandates an "independent review of implementation of this Consent Decree at the close of each school year," and requires the monitoring team "to submit a report to the Court." Pursuant to that mandate, the current Consent Decree Monitoring Team filed Report No. 18 on July 30, 2001.
· Selected Highlights from Report No. 18
2. Consent Decree Balance Sheet
The district has shown that it is capable of great progress under the Consent Decree, but everyone agrees that more work still needs to be done in certain key areas. In addition, particularly in light of the anticipated transition to the end of the decree, attention must be paid to areas where gains may be dissipated and progress may be eroded.
3. Special Section – Targeting Low Performing Schools
Selected Excerpts:
b. Recent Academic Achievement Patterns
The district’s
elementary schools in general are performing very well on tests
of basic skills. By contrast, the district’s middle schools and high
schools are not doing nearly as well.
And the lowest of the low performing schools were almost all at the secondary
level. In addition, almost all of the
lowest performing schools serve large numbers of students from in and around
the Mission/Bernal Heights area. This is also the area that is experiencing the
highest levels of resegregation at the elementary, middle school, and high
school levels district-wide. However, it is unclear at this point whether and
to what extent a direct correlation between resegregation and academic
achievement can be established here.
c. Allocation of Consent Decree Funds
We have found that the entire process for the allocation of Consent Decree money needs to be reassessed. In addition to the range of inconsistencies and contradictions documented in this report, we have found that there has been little or no accountability at the local school sites once the site budget is approved and Consent Decree money has been allocated. And there has been little or no follow-up by district officials on the effects of the money that has been spent. In meetings with SFUSD officials this spring, we have seen great sensitivity to this issue among the district’s top leaders, and we look forward to significant changes in this regard over the next year.
d. Addressing the Needs of English Learners
In light of the district’s commendable efforts to
move forward with a complete reassessment of its language acquisition programs
by appointing a blue ribbon taskforce to address these issues under Excellence for All, we present an expanded, 32-page
section analyzing recent developments and unresolved questions in this
area. A major question that must be
addressed is why the district – in the most recent (99-00) "language
census" by the California Department of Education – is shown to have redesignated no
English Learners to fluent-English proficient status at 31 of its schools,
and less than 10 apiece at more than half of its schools.
e. Conclusions & Recommendations: Targeting Low Performing Schools
4. Resegregation of Incoming Classes: New Findings under Paragraph 13
The district has completed two years and three enrollment cycles during which time it has not employed race as a factor in its student assignment plan. The most significant finding in this area is that – while the total number of severely resegregated schools appears to be remaining fairly stable at 20-25, increasing only slightly in each of the past two years – the percentages of students from one racial/ethnic group at the resegregated schools appear to be rising dramatically. Thus for the first time in this era, based on current projections, we are looking at 4 schools with one or more entire grade level comprised of 80% or more of one ethnicity. Indeed, 13 schools in SFUSD are projected to have a 70% or higher resegregation rate in the fall. And 8 of those 13 schools are at 75% or higher. To its credit, the district has worked to develop a new student assignment plan that might reverse these trends, and its parameters are included in the July 2001 settlement agreement.
5. Overview of Academic Achievement & Related Issues under Paragraphs 39-41
Overall,
this is a successful district. Both the objective statewide indicators and our
424 school site visits have revealed a comprehensive picture that includes test scores and
achievement percentages above the state average, a large number of top quality
schools and programs, and exciting educational activities taking place in every
corner of the district. Yet it must
also be recognized that SFUSD school performance continues to reflect a
widening gap between the “haves” and “have-nots. For example, we document the parameters of a “reading crisis”
at more than half of the district’s 13 major high schools in 2000-2001. We also document yet another drop in the
already horrendous attendance figures at the district’s secondary schools in
general.
· The Consent Decree Monitoring Team (1997-2001)
· Previous Reports of the Consent Decree Monitoring Team (1997-2001)
Please Note: All links to sections of the report are to PDF files, which require
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download).