IN THE NEWS
Ana Tintocalis -- KPBS
June 9, 2009
SAN DIEGO — The San Diego Unified School Board is expected to vote today in favor of overhauling the district's high school curriculum. Education advocates are praising district officials for beginning to address education inequalities at the high school level. In fact, they're planning to stage a rally in support of the trustees' vote.
Critics have long said that all high schools in San Diego Unified are not created equal. Now they have some new evidence.
New data shows San Diego Unified students who attend high school in more affluent neighborhoods -- like Scripps Ranch and Mira Mesa -- have access to more college-level work than in students in poorer communities -- like Southeast San Diego and City Heights.
As a result, more than 60 percent of teenagers do not take the sequence of rigorous classes needed to get into a college or university.
The district's Chuck Morris says that's about to change. He says his team is working on a district plan that requires teenagers at all San Diego high schools take the full-spectrum of necessary college preparatory courses.
"We have too many students who are graduating from high school who just have a diploma but it doesn't really help them to get a job in terms of a skill," says Morris, San Diego Unified's director of curriculum and instruction. "It doesn't let them go to a university if that's what they want to do. So we need to prepare our students."
That pleases the ACLU's Kevin Keenan. The ACLU is part of San Diego County's Education Consortium which is tackling issues affecting public education. The group has been working with district officials over the past year to develop the high school reform plan.
"We have an opportunity here to take a step forward, to really provide the rigor and relevance to succeed in life," Keenan said. "Here’s an achievable important step forward that we can make in giving our kids an equal educational opportunity."
Keenan says the latest data also shows students in San Dieguito and Poway have the most access the college-level work. Vista and Oceanside students have the least.
San Diego Unified will now join a handful of other large urban school districts in California ensuring all of their high schools are offering the necessary sequence of classes that satisfy University of California standards. The San Jose Unified School District was the first to implement such a reform.
SD School Board to Take Up Education Equality
Resolution Making “A-G Curriculum” the Norm to Be Proposed Tuesday
PRESS RELEASE
April 28, 2009
SAN DIEGO – The San Diego Unified School District School Board will consider a resolution
today making “A-G” the graduation requirement beginning with the graduating class of 2015.
If the school board adopts the resolution, SDUSD will become the first district in the county to adopt the rigorous preparatory course sequence as the standard.
A wide coalition of teachers, parents, students, and community groups have pressed for the A-G curriculum, which is required for admission to the University of California and the California State University systems. “The sequence teaches life readiness and core skills that prepare students not only to enter college, but to become lifelong learners in a changing economy and changing world,” said Andrea Guerrero, chair of the Education Consortium of San Diego County, and the field and policy director of the ACLU of San Diego & Imperial Counties. “Right now, approximately forty percent of high school graduates in the district complete these courses, and the rate is especially dismal in low-income communities and communities of color. If adopted, the A-G resolution would bring high school curriculum in line with workforce demands and dramatically reduce the disparity in student preparation between schools.”
A rally with scores of students, teachers, parents and community members will take place directly before the school board meets, Tuesday, April 28, 2009, beginning at 4 pm, at 4100 Normal Street, San Diego, CA 92103. Scheduled to give short speeches are two students and a teacher from Lincoln High School, Kevin Keenan from the ACLU, Kevin Mann from the Coalition of Neighborhood Councils, and Pat Washington from the Education Consortium. Students, parents, and a representative of the high tech industry will testify at the school board meeting that begins at 5 pm.
“We are particularly pleased that the San Diego Unified School District is taking this important first step,” said Dr. Isidro Ortiz, vice chair of the Education Consortium and a professor at San Diego State University. “There has been a tremendous confluence of voices from all sectors of our community, including education superintendants, leaders of the high tech community, and a solid base of educators and families clamoring for this important move forward in quality education for all.”
Jake Sticka -- La Jolla Light
Jan 28, 2009
The Preuss School was recently mentioned in a San Diego Union-Tribune education story.
Surprise, surprise: It was a positive mention. The story, appearing in the Dec. 29 edition of
the paper, was focused on the recently formed Education Consortium of San Diego County
and their efforts to institute more college-prep classes into county public school classrooms....
Despite completion of these courses being necessary for admission to a UC or CSU campus, only 40 percent of county students do so. District to district these rates differ, from San Dieguito at the high end with 74 percent of students completing the full A-G to Vista, where only 21 percent take all of the required courses, which include four years of English, three years of math, and two years of history. Collectively, San Diego County lags behind Los Angeles, Orange, Alameda, Santa Clara and San Francisco counties.
Attending Preuss, one of three county schools that have followed San Jose School District's lead in making A-G completion a graduation requirement, I can attest to the necessity of the consortium's efforts. Read the full article.
By Chris Moran -- San Diego Union-Tribune
December 29, 2008
A coalition of business and civil rights groups is pushing for all local high school students to
enroll in college-prep classes - even if they don't plan to attend college.
More rigorous high school classes are needed, college-prep boosters say, to keep up with
the needs of the local economy and to keep the county's students competitive with
their peers in Los Angeles and San Francisco counties, who have higher college-preparedness
rates.
Fewer than 4 in 10 high school graduates in San Diego County complete the courses necessary for admission to the University of California or California State University systems. That's not enough to supply the local biotech industry with trained workers, said Andrea Guerrero, an American Civil Liberties Union attorney. Guerrero leads the Education Consortium of San Diego County, a group of 30 organizations pushing for more college prep.
"We have this great industry here that most communities or regions envy, but it's not sustainable and it's under threat," Guerrero said. Local laboratories must recruit foreigners because they can't find qualified local workers, said Marisela Chevez, who does high school outreach for The Scripps Research Institute. College prep for all would steer more students into advanced high school science courses and prepare them for low-level technician jobs right after high school, Chevez said. "For some of the jobs, we could be hiring local people," Chevez said. "It's just that they don't have the necessary training."
No local district has made its graduation requirements match what is needed to get into a state university. The Preuss, Helix High and High Tech High charter schools require all their students to complete the UC courses.
Most jobs in biotech and other sectors of the modern economy will require post-high school education, according to the Public Policy Institute of California, a nonprofit think tank. By the time today's first-graders graduate from high school, more than 75 percent of jobs will require at least some college training, according to a report the institute issued this month.... Read the full article.
By Stacy Brandt -- North County Times
March 29, 2008
SAN DIEGO ---- Not all students who graduate from high school are ready for college, but a coalition of education and community groups is asking San Diego County schools to consider making everyone meet state university entrance requirements....
The Education Consortium held a symposium Saturday, aimed at encouraging school officials, parents, and community groups to push for all students to take the required classes, regardless of whether they plan on heading to a university after high school or not.
Carlsbad Unified School District Trustees Kelli Moors and Nicole Pappas said the speakers at the gathering reinforced their desire to make sure as many students as possible meet the college entrance requirements.
"A student who has met those requirements is better prepared," Pappas said. "At a minimum, it's going to help students succeed in life".... Read the full article
