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While Pleasanton School District officials are optimistic they’ve turned the corner on their biggest worry, school funding, there are a number of issues that present challenges for the current school year and beyond.
Among those are gearing up for the Common Core State Standards, meeting the need for new technology across the district and school safety.
“I think we’ve had a wonderful start of school. We already started work on Common Core last year, and this year, we’re in the thick of it,” Superintendent Parvin Ahmadi said.
Funding
The state has changed its funding model for school districts, allowing them more choice in deciding where to spend their money.
The new model, known as the Local Control Funding Formula, will also send about $2.4 million in additional cash here, according to Deputy Superintendent Luz Cazares.
LCFF comes with some strings attached, but Cazares said what those strings are remains an unknown.
“The rules for LCFF are still being written,” she said. “Sometime this year they’ll tell us how to spend the money they’re giving us this year.”
The state is also allocating additional money to reduce class sizes in grades one through five, although it won’t fully fund those reductions until the 2020-21 school year. This year, thanks to $213,000 donated by Pleasanton Partnerships in Education and $112,000 from the district, class sizes for first-graders were reduced from 30 students per classroom to 25.
Pleasanton can also anticipate some additional cash thanks to a 15% increase in lottery ticket sales. The district also is expecting an extra $3 million in state funding for Common Core.
“There are essentially three possible ways to spend it — instructional materials, technology and professional development,” Cazares said.
Ahmadi said teachers are working on decisions on how to spend the money.
“We should be going to the board with a plan to discuss in November and approve in December,” she said. Most districts statewide are using the majority of this Common Core money for professional development.
The district is also unlikely to have any mid-year financial surprises, thanks to healthier state revenues.
“We can feel a little more secure that we’re not going to be cut in the middle of the year,” Cazares said.
Common Core
Common Core is probably the single toughest item the school district will address this year, although it’s already done much to get teachers ready for the new methodology.
The standards were designed to get students on a clear pathway to college. Graduating seniors will have all the skills they need for college courses, 11th graders will learn what they need to know to enter their senior year, all the way down to kindergarten. Because Common Core is nationwide (or nearly so: forty-five states and the District of Columbia have adopted them), a student in ninth grade from Georgia or Wisconsin should be able to transfer to the same grade in California having acquired the same level of knowledge as her or his new peers.
Students will be expected to think more deeply and less broadly about problems. For example, they might be asked to read a passage and interpolate answers to several questions. There will be fewer multiple choice and true or false questions on tests in general, and intuitive programs will be used in testing to tell teachers if a student is falling behind in an area.
Implementing Common Core will take money, equipment, training and time.
Odie Douglas, the district’s assistant superintendent of educational services, said teachers and administrators got a jump on Common Core over the summer in two training sessions.
“We want to make sure that all of our teachers know what the Common Core standards are,” Douglas said. “It’s going well. We have teacher leaders involved in the work. We have our instructional coaches taking leads in various areas and helping with them as well as our department chairs and other leaders at the sites.”
He said the district is currently working to make sure that what teachers are teaching meets the levels of learning that will be required under Common Core.
“We’re looking at our existing curricula and seeing what areas need to be aligned more closely to that subject area or grade level,” he said.
But, as is the case with school districts across California, Pleasanton is awaiting word from the state about whether it will have to use computer-based testing required by Common Core or, for this year at least, can still use the pencil-and-paper STAR (Standardized Testing and Reporting) program that’s been in place for years.
There also may be new SAT tests in the not-too-distant future.
David Coleman is the architect of Common Core and president of the national nonprofit College Board, which represents 6,000 colleges and universities. Coleman is reportedly working with other board members to rewrite the SATs.
Technology
For the last several years, the Pleasanton school district has been allocating most of its money to maintaining programs. It’s put off large purchases of new textbooks, for example.
It’s also spent little on technology upgrades, but that’s changing now, according to Technology Services Director Chris Hobbs, thanks in part to Common Core.
“The new exams are going to be online, and to do that we’re going to need new computers than we have in our computer labs,” he said. “We began this summer with replacing three of those labs.”
Hobbs said more upgrades will be done next summer. The district will also add mobile computer labs.
“When we go to test, we’re going to be taking those physical labs out of circulation and back fill them with mobile labs,” Hobbs said. “Ultimately, they’re going to be carts with laptops on them. They’ll be rolled into a classroom on an as-needed basis, so instead of (students) going to the computer lab, the lab will go to them.”
Safety
Given the school shootings across the country, it’s a fair assumption that every district has reviewed its intruder alert procedures.
That’s true in Pleasanton as well, although for obvious reasons district officials don’t want to discuss the specifics.
Without going into details, Kevin Johnson, senior director of pupil services, said the district has been working with the Pleasanton Police Department to make the protocols the same for every school.
“We’ve come up with specific intruder emergency response procedures,” Johnson said. “This is a systemic approach that will apply at all schools. Police shared the instructions and procedures with site leaders last year.”
There are specific instructions for teachers, and for lunchtime, physical education and office staff members that tell exactly what to do in an intruder alert.
Schools will still have their own emergency plans for fires, earthquakes and other dangers, but, Johnson noted, “the intruder emergency response and lock down procedure will be the same” at every school.
One new method for intruder emergencies that’s gained popularity is known as HRF — hide, run, fight.
Last year, the Department of Homeland Security put out a video and instructions for situations like an office shooting: hide if you can, run if you can’t hide, fight if you can’t run.
Some schools in California, such as south Orange County, have adopted HRF as a standard for teachers and students alike. Other California schools call for HRF to be used by teachers and not by students.
In other safety-related matters, the district is continuing its push to curb bullying. Johnson said data has been shared with administrators at every school about the four types of bullying — verbal, psychological, physical and cyberbullying — as well as the effects each can have.
Schools have been asked to come up with goals for handling bullying and the district is providing them with examples to consider.
Drugs and alcohol also continue to be a focus, but Johnson said the recent use of drug sniffing dogs has been effective.
While alcohol and drug use are an issue, he said, “what happens outside of school and on the weekends is an even bigger issue.”
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Students and parents gather for the start of the school day during the first week of school at Hearst Elementary School. Photo by Mike Sedlak. -
Two youngsters seem hesitant to enter Hearst Elementary School during the first week of school, while the district looks to new elementary schools, new teaching standards and more. Photo by Mike Sedlak.
Dear Glenn/PUSD,
How is it that money isn’t a problem if our district can’t get back to K-3 and Grade 9 CSR until the next decade? Plenty of other “good school districts” have maintained it or reinstated it. Have we changed the set of school districts with whom we compare ourselves? Is our community simply accepting these class sizes as a new normal for PUSD?
“The state is also allocating additional money to reduce class sizes in grades one through five, although it won’t fully fund those reductions until the 2020-21 school year”
Well, well. Guess we did not need Measure E after all. We now have money to implement Common Core. How about saving that money and bringing back reading, writing and arithmetic.
Chemist
Not enuf $$$$$ can be utilized to educate America’s children. They all deserve the highest quality education possible.
Reading, writing, and arithmetic…YES! Candy + sugar for all fourth graders…NOT!
VIVA AMERICA! VIVA!
I agree with all 3 comments above-
Especially (reduce class sizes now) wait till 2020? No get it done NOW- I see the schools allocating the money towards pay increases instead of reduced class sizes. School district needs to regain focus on what matters… students education- Kids are falling through the cracks and larger class sizes makes it difficult on both the students and the teacher (needing to take care of 30 +)
re: measure E- I suggest they do limited measure(s) in the future. To tell residents that they will need to pay higher prop tax and not have an end date is never good. 2-3 years would get more of an positive feedback. Considering the state gov has a windfall of cash (due to inreased sales tax) hopefully more money will funnel towards educating our students, and less time will be wasted asking people to pay more.
Another thing- I heard measure e cost several hundred K to sponsor? where did that money ome from and who got it?
The cost to run the election, two times, was paid for by the school district. That money came out of operations (programs). I think it was over $300K for each election so a total around $600K.
As for another election, I believe the district administration needs to build trust first. Saying they are broke and then giving pay raises and enhanced benefit to the finance director, plus keeping cell phone stipends for administrators, does not build trust.
Also, the district is currently planning for another bond to pay for more facilities so they will not want to take on a parcel tax at the same time. The bonds they are looking at will be real expensive to Pleasanton residents and are mostly needed because the district is allowing the new development that is going on now to be done without them having to pay the necessary mitigation fees. The district has also done some very poor financial planning and all of the developer fees that have been collected are going to pay off “short-medium term” debt that the district took on. Even after the district did the illegal cash-out financing which brought in millions of dollars without asking for voter approval, they want to come back to us for more bonds.
Thanks for the detailed article!
“How about saving that money and bringing back reading, writing and arithmetic.”
I have no idea how to make sense of this comment. I read the information on Common Core, and it is all about “reading, writing and arithmetic.”
What are you talking about?
New homes are being approved by the thousands in Pleasanton. Both the City Council and School Board acknowledge all Pleasanton school campuses are already over capacity and there is NO ability to build new schools, No plans and No money!
Class size reduction requires more space for more classrooms. It can not happen when the campuses are already overcrowded and need space for thousands of new growth students.
Pleasanton schools will soon be a mess and Pleasanton taxpayers will be asked to pay, again, for the impact of new growth in the form of another bond. PUSD will be forever chasing it’s tail with no way of catching up.
New growth should pay it’s own impacts but it does not!! So STOP approving new housing!!!!
@ local from Birdland
I don’t think the School Board gets to decide to allow developers to build without paying the school impact/mitigation fees – and if they did, I don’t think they’d vote to give developers a break or pass. The city council may be a different story – since most members are financed by developers and unions regardless of their perceived conservative/liberal ideology.
Unfortunately, under California law high-density housing developers get a break on school impact fees as part of the state’s social engineering to encourage the building of more high-density housing. The (flawed) argument has been that high density housing won’t have as many people with kids (or people with cars), although the reality in California is quite the opposite.
Since it looks like more high-density housing is inevitable in the Tri-Valley, we should at least fight to change the school impact/mitigation fee law and have school impact fees that are based on the number of units and paid at the same rate as developers of single-family homes. Maybe one of the politicians vying for state office in the next election would want to author/carry such a bill? We can ask them and make our vote conditional.
I do have to give props to the teachers at PUSD – they are doing a great job with the large class sizes we have – I’m sure they’d prefer smaller class sizes too – but they are really doing a tremendous job especially with the pressure of limited resources.
Frank, the school board can work with the city to help mitigate the fees (there are ways it can be done). In the past, the school district worked closely with the city but the current administration has not been involved or gone to the city council meetings to discuss the impacts of the new development on the schools. I believe the school district is chomping at the bit to get a new bond so they want the growth to force the issue. Because of mismanagement of development fees they are running out of capital fund money and a new bond will allow the district to hide their mistakes.
@ local – I hate to believe the school board would actually do such a thing – but when members go unchallenged in elections, I could see them acting against the will of the voters – because there’s no competition to force them to be accountable.
By school bond, you’re talking about a parcel tax, right? The last one failed, so you think the school board is willing to gamble (or rather play “chicken) with Pleasanton voters?
Fighting for higher impact fees means fighting the building lobby, the same battle as fighting housing mandates. The School district has proven they should not be trusted with the capital dollars. Separate curriculum from Capital project oversight. The City should be required to provide the schools before they can approve housing.
The City Council and School Board should join with Pleasanton citizens to push back on the housing until schools are built!!
Parents will have a nightmare of overcrowded schools and taxpayers will be asked to pay for the mess.
Frank you are new to the discussion if you do not understand the history of PUSD misuse of capital dollars. Bond requires a lower voter approval than a Parcel tax and they feel they could get the needed 55%. They are planning it now, even though Ptown taxpayers are still paying off the $155 million that we have given them in the past. I agree with Local on the motive to cover past misuse of funds.
Cholo is right in saying that our students deserve the highest quality education possible. However, Common Core is about insuring that the Federal Government dictates what our students learn and how they learn it. Anyone who thinks that Common Core will lead to uncommon excellence is sadly mistaken. I am greatly troubled to see that Pleasanton schools are gearing up for Common Core. When I say bring back reading, writing and arithmetic, I mean bring back local control of education where parents and teachers prepare students to function in the real world and to think for themselves. In other words, Pleasanton needs to pursue the uncommon, not the common.
Chemist,
You might want to take a closer look.
http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2013/09/jeb-bush-pushes-back-against-common-core-critics-comfortable-with-mediocrity.html
“There are a lot of people that believe that somehow this is a national takeover of what is the domain of local and state governments … but in fact these are 45 states that have voluntarily come together to create fewer, higher, deeper standards that, when you benchmark them to the best of the world, they are world class. I’m for that. I’m not for the politics of education. I tire from the politics of education.”
Read more here: http://miamiherald.typepad.com/nakedpolitics/2013/09/jeb-bush-pushes-back-against-common-core-critics-comfortable-with-mediocrity.html#storylink=cpy
“The fight about Common Core is political. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we have huge swaths of the next generation of Americans that can’t calculate math.”
I see how the csr affects our children first hand. My son is now in 1st grade after having 30 children in his kindergarten class he now has 20. The reduction is huge but most of the children in his class cannot read and do not know how to write sentences. These things should have been taught in Kindergarten, but with the class size being so big it did not happen. This is huge because now these kids are behind and will probably stay behind going forward. I cannot stress enough the importance of csr and reading specialists in our schools.
John,
I don’t consider Jeb Bush an expert on education. On the other hand, many education experts from all over the country are coming out against Common Core. Perhaps it is political, but from what I have read, it is justified. I have seen the way that math is approached in the Common Core curriculum, and it is certainly not the way I would want math taught to my children. Have you actually seen the way that they try to teach addition and subtraction? They skip over borrowing from the next left column and try to get the kids to latch on to sophisticated concepts like breaking the numbers into hundreds, tens and ones, then regrouping and rearranging. This approach to addition and subtraction requires an understanding of numbers that comes AFTER you learn how to add and subtract, and it does not come to all people ever. Trust me, Common Core is a disaster. It reminds me of the “whole language” nonsense back in the late eighties and early nineties when the schools were intent on dropping phonics out of the curriculum in favor of a “new” approach. Whole language quietly failed and is now proven to be useless; however, a lot of children whose parents did not take the time to teach them phonics now are now functionally illiterate adults who cannot read or write. Children are not supposed to be the Guinea Pigs of the educational system.
The new model, known as the Local Control Funding Formula, will also send about $2.4 million in additional cash here, according to Deputy Superintendent Luz Cazares. http://www.brightskylending.com/guaranteed-payday-loans.html Students will be expected to think more deeply and less broadly about problems. For example, they might be asked to read a passage and interpolate answers to several questions.
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