The Oakland Education Week in Review: 10/19-10/25

Last week, great conversations on equity and segregation in Oakland, schools as polling places, too many student haven’t been showing up virtually and one district has been so bold as to threaten parents, some powerful homegrown work from the Black Literary Collective, a coup at the Reach Institute?, student homelessness is rising, and we continue to struggle with the digital divide, all that and more, please read, share and get involved

Oakland:

California:

Other Stories:

How You Can Help:

Oakland:

  • Perspective of a School Leader
    • We speak with Leroy Gaines, a successful long-time principal, and current Executive Director for New Leaders for New Schools, about his perspective on how to promote more equity in our education system, and what role leaders can play.
  • Four Schools Four Miles Apart in Oakland, And the Chasms of Opportunity
    • Babies born less than a miles apart here have radically different chances.  You can go to public school A in Oakland, which is 90% free and reduced lunch, where not a single child was proficient in Math, and not a single White child attends.  Or, not far down the block, less than a half mile drive, a 3 block walk, there is public school B, that is 12% free and reduced, and 80% of kids can read and 78% are proficient in math.
  • Beyond ‘Nice White Parents’ A Conversation on Privilege, Power and School Equity
    • The Serial podcast “Nice White Parents,” laid bare many of the challenges that privileged White families can pose for equitable schools systems and how their pursuit of the best for them can undermine opportunities for others.  It was a somewhat pessimistic story, even according to the host, until she met civil right attorney and equity advocate, Miriam Nunberg.
  • OUSD is Proudly Supporting the November 3 Election with Eleven Schools Serving as Polling Locations*Schools are NOT Ballot Drop-Off Locations
    • With the November 3 election now just 15 days away, people across Oakland are already casting their votes for everything from ballot measures to political offices all the way up to the President and Vice President of the United States. To help Oaklanders exercise their constitutional right to vote, OUSD is providing ten District-run schools and one charter school as polling locations.
  • Alarming percentage of students missing from virtual classrooms in Oakland, West Contra Costa County
    • Deep into the pandemic, some school districts are finding an alarming percentage of students are missing from the virtual classroom – with the worst absentee rates occurring among homeless students, foster youth, English learners, Black students and high school seniors.
  • Oakland’s Black Literary Collective is reshaping classroom conversations on race
    • Although rhyme, reason, rhythm, poetry, hip-hop, rap and all manner of wordplay are involved in the Black Literary Collective, there are no riddles or questions to its purposes. The Oakland-based initiative—led by 10 Black authors in the Bay Area—has spent the last two years bringing a more robust curriculum to public school districts, charter school systems, literacy organizations, community colleges and other educational institutions. Its primary objective is to provide students with new perspectives that have not been part of the traditional education model in the U.S., which has historically relied on a white, colonialist approach to history.
  • Secret (and Illegal?) Meetings, No Instructors, A Forced Conversion? and No Answers—What the F is Happening at Oakland’s Reach Institute
    • The Reach Institute is one of Oakland’s most effective leadership development programs, cultivating and providing some of the most important educators the region.  It is a local resource, with local leadership and catering to local talent.  Or at least it was.
  • OUSD Issues Apology for Problem with Community Survey Sent out on Thursday
    • Today, we released a survey in which a historically racist term for people of Asian descent somehow found its way into one of the questions about demographics. As soon as we became aware of it, we immediately removed the term and replaced it with appropriate language. The word was NOT in the final document that I saw before we sent it out. In fact, at a different point in time, an entire demographic category was removed from the survey. Because we have yet to determine how those two things happened, we are closing the survey for the time being. We are working with our information technology staff to find the cause, whether it was because of a flaw in the system we use or there is some other explanation.

California:

  • Connectivity gap persists for at least 300K California students
    • California school districts are required to provide both devices and high-speed internet connection to any student learning from home, but between 300,000 and 1 million remain disconnected, EdSource reports. A backlog of computer orders and weak broadband infrastructure in remote areas are contributing factors.
  • S.F. school board is right to expand access to Lowell High
    • The dispute over admission to Lowell High School is based on a false premise that harms education for all students. The No. 1 predictor of academic achievement is family income, not grades or test scores. Families with means can afford tutors, camps and lessons to aid and support their children’s learning. Wealth translates into higher academic achievement. Which is why residential housing segregation has such a pernicious effect on low-income children of color.
  • California’s conflicted history on slavery is central to reparations push for Black people
    • To understand the quest for reparations for African Americans in California, supporters say, it’s necessary to take a hard look at the prevalence of slavery in the early days of the “free” state.
  • California’s Education Funding Crisis Explained in 12 Charts
    • California is the fifth largest economy in the world and the wealthiest state in the nation. The Golden State is home to countless tech giants, an enormous entertainment industry, major agricultural regions, and many other successful industries. California households earn a median income of $71,000 per year, more than $10,000 above the national average. However, California school funding—even before COVID-19—was insufficient to meet educational goals and address the needs of students, particularly given the state’s high cost of living. How can that be true? Why is education funding so low in California, despite its wealth and comparatively high tax revenues?
  • UCLA study reports staggering rise in student homelessness in California
    • Almost 270,000 K-12 students in California experienced homelessness during the 2018-2019 academic year, an increase of nearly 50 percent in the past decade, according to new report from the UCLA Center for the Transformation of Schools, which analyzed data from the California Department of Education.
  • Lafayette middle-schooler threatened with arrest over missed Zoom sessions
    • For a 12-year-old Stanley Middle School student, that could be the consequence, according to a letter the boy’s father received from the school principal.

Other Stories:

How You Can Help:

  • Reach Board of Directors: Save the Reach Institute
    • We demand a stop to the dismantling of the Reach Institute Instructional Leadership and Masters (ILA/MA) program. We demand the removal of Mallory Dwinal-Palisch from the leadership of the organization and the reinstatement of the ILA/MA faculty. Finally, we demand answers to our repeated concerns that, to date, have been met with deafening silence.
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