The Honorable Toni Cook is a legend in the education landscape of Oakland from the cradle to college. I had no idea who Ms. Toni was — the Honorable Toni Cook, School Board member from District 6, the school board member who made the equity-minded appeal for adequate and additional resources for students who spoke…
State of Black Education
Homeless Youth Build Transitional Housing; A Model and Opportunity For OUSD
While OUSD sits on empty land and empty buildings, and the streets fill with Oakland families, Youth Spirit Artworks is providing a glimmer of hope, and an example we, and OUSD should learn from. These folks worked with homeless youth and volunteers to design and build 24 tiny houses, that should soon house these burgeoning…
BART Builds Housing on Its Land While OUSD Builds Debt on Theirs
While OUSD sits on empty land, and empty and half empty buildings it was encouraging to see BART actually do something with its property for the community, putting forward plans to build 525 units of market rate housing and 242 units of affordable housing in West Oakland. This is a lesson that OUSD could learn…
Avoiding False Choices in Enrollment Reform; Yes on Sequoia, Chabot and Brewer
OUSD has incredibly segregated schools, and in gentrifying neighborhoods, it is getting worse. So I was encouraged to see some school communities taking up the challenge of looking at their enrollment rules and how they either furthered segregation or interrupted it. Unfortunately, after months of meetings and debate across these school communities, their enthusiasm for…
OUSD’s Opportunity on Housing, Public Lands for Public Uses
Oakland Unified is one of the cities largest landowners. They own over 500 acres, have 6 sites that are completely unoccupied, 49 acres of totally undeveloped land and hundreds of acres of outdoor space that is used as parking, playgrounds, and gardens. They also have 11-12,000 empty seats in buildings they use, but have suffered…