Parent Engagement Plummets At HUSD
In Which: HUSD's self-assessment points to stubborn issues, HEA tells the Board to not micro-manage Staff, and HUSD Staff don't use the financial system they've always had.
Even Self-Assessment Shows Issues
At the last HUSD Board meeting, the District presented their Local Indicators which are required by the State. The Local Indicators are a self-assessment with a focus on district-level conditions and practices. They’re a way to demonstrate to the State that the District is doing things to support student success—beyond what the teachers themselves are doing.
The downside is that the District grades itself, “making them more subjective,” Staff said. There are five different indicators that the District looks at, and we’ll go through them one by one. One important thing to remember is that the numbers seem to be lagging—this data only covers the 23/24 school year.
Basic Services and Conditions: This looks at whether teachers are appropriately assigned—like credentialed for the right grades and content, the access to instructional materials, and condition of facilities. Mis-assigned teachers make up only .31% of the total, and only 1.23% of the teaching positions are vacant. Thankfully, 100% of students have access to appropriate instructional material, but only 9 of the total facilities are in “Good Repair” condition.
Implementation of State Standards: The District just added a new TK-6 Language Arts curriculum, and is still working on rolling out the Secondary Language Arts materials (presumably for 7-12, but it was unclear). This is despite the materials being purchased back in 2022, and it’s unclear if they’ve been fully implemented by now. Changes are coming for High School History/Social Studies, Elementary Science, and everyone’s Math curriculum.
Parent and Family Engagement: This is assessed with a parent survey, and this year the District got almost 1,000 more than last year. The things that have improved are: parents feeling welcome (44%), parents feeling like schools seek their opinion before making important decisions (41%), and parents encouraged to be active partners with their child’s education (35%). Those are still… not great, but it is improvement.
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Unfortunately, parents attending school meetings and volunteering took a massive plunge. The number of parents attending school meetings dropped over 60% and the number of parents volunteering dropped over 50%. The District is looking to find ways to improve communication, but one bullet point hints that there is uneven data gathering practices across the district. They also plan to use Parent Ambassadors to advocate for public education funding.
School Climate: School climate is difficult to change since it’s affected by a number of things, but HUSD tries to measure perception of safety and connectedness. This is one of them that actually does compare the 23/24 school year with 24/25. Feelings of safety and connectedness increased slightly for 5th and 7th graders, but either dropped or stayed flat for 9th and 12th graders.
The data also keeps the regular trend of students feeling more safe and connected in elementary school, and then dropping off at Middle School, and then continuing to drop throughout High School. These numbers changed despite investment in staff training, like Anti-Bias/Anti-Racism (ABAR) training.
Access To A Broad Course Of Study: This aims to make sure students have access to both the required courses and additional electives and Career Technical Education (CTE) opportunities. With the State’s new Ethnic Studies Requirement, the District added three courses that meet the requirement which are available at all high schools. Three other courses, AP English Lit and Comp, AP Human Geography, and English 11 P African American Literature, are only available at Hayward High. Puente also meets this requirement.
There are also a number of CTE pathways for students, which vary depending on the site. These range from Engineering to Entrepreneurship to Peer Advocacy to Farm to Fork to Wood Technology. Staff hinted that this is heavily marketed to English Language Learners, which gave the impression that they aren’t encouraged to pursue higher education as much as find a job. However, Staff did say that the CTE programs help to improve graduation rates.
Board Still Has Concerns
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo wanted to know whether long-term subs are tracked in the data around mis-assigned teachers. “With all respect to our long-term subs,” he said, “often there’s a body in the room, but they are not an educator in the same way as our teachers.” Staff said that they report data like that to the State, but not the Board right now.
But they did recognize that long-term subs are not ideal for student learning. “In terms of the learning plan, that’s a challenge that we have, that it isn’t the same as instruction from a credentialed teacher.”
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo then turned his attention to the difficulties parents face volunteering at schools. “There was a great deal of time talking about barriers that exist for families to volunteer in our classrooms,” he said. To be a parent volunteer requires proof of a negative TB test and a form delivered to the school site. Then a different form has to be taken to the HUB on Soto Road where the parents needs to pay $60 for a LiveScan.
Staff said that there is no District-wide plan to help lower the barriers, but that individual school sites can decide to help with the cost—though this doesn’t make the paperwork any easier. “I would really just encourage us to [do] anything that we can do to support—to help cover the cost for families,” Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo said. He said that many parents want to help, but can’t because the process is too onerous.
Trustee Prada focused on the School Climate data. “I haven’t seen the impact in sense of belonging that we want to see,” she said, “which will help improve everything else.” She pressed for details on a plan to move the data in a good direction, specifically focusing on a sense of safety. “I feel like it’s been very general,” she said. “It just feels like we’re having these conversations… but there’s no true plan.”
Superintendent Chen Wu-Fernandez said that she would follow-up with the Board regarding a detailed plan. She cited the ABAR training and highlighted that it’s a multi-faceted issue. “It’s not a linear indicator,” she said. A lot of research points to the importance of feeling connected to and safe in schools, but there is much less research on how to improve those feelings. The research that does exist highlights factors beyond the District’s control, including National, State, and Local policies and climates.
Teacher’s Union Claps Back
Mary Walsh, Vice President of the Hayward Education Association (HEA), took to public comment to remind the Board of Trustees that micromanagement doesn’t help anyone. “I feel compelled to remind the board of their role, which is setting policy,” she said, “and letting the administrative staff do their job. Your job is not to reach in and try to do the job of your administration… your job is mainly policy-setting.”
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Ms. Walsh further alleged that, in a previous meeting, some comments from Board Members may have interfered with an internal investigation and constituted attacks on specific site staff. “Bullying and intimidation is not a mechanism for change,” Ms. Walsh said.
Not Many Changes For LCAP…
The Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP), which we covered a few weeks back (check out the story below), doesn’t seem to have changed a huge amount. The Staff Presentation was very short and basically just confirmed that the Alameda County Office of Education (ACOE) gave it the all-clear.
Collin Thormoto
The adjustments that were made were small, including changing metrics for change up if they had been met already—the African American Graduation Rate metric had been met, so it was time to move the goalposts. Staff also confirmed with ACOE that all the different parts were filled out completely, and removed contracts that weren’t going to be carried into the next year.
…But The Comments Kept Coming
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo, who has been the most vocal critic of the LCAP, asked if the ACOE had any specific feedback for the District this year, citing issues with clarity and coherence. Staff responded that a lot of things needed to be changed and moved around due to the budget cuts and recommended moving metrics up that had been met. “[ACOE] did work side by side with us,” Staff said.
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo then asked, “What can we expect will be different in the next version of the LCAP?” He then, again, said that different districts had LCAP reports that looked different and continued to frame that as a problem. Staff said they will look at other districts. “We did hear the feedback from the Board very loudly and very clearly,” they said. Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo then requested that ACOE sign off on the Districts that Staff chooses as comparisons.
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Trustee Bufete then asked, for clarity, if the ACOE has to approve the LCAP after the District does and that they have approved all previous versions of the LCAP. Staff said yes to both.
During the vote to approve the LCAP, Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo made a small comment before voting to approve it. “I believe I’ve thoroughly exhausted my concerns associated with our LCAP,” he said.
Budget Outlook Clearer And Still Not Good
The 25/26 budget also hadn’t changed much since the last time the Board saw it, so there wasn’t a full presentation on the matter. The good news is that the State Budget is looking a lot more positive, though it hadn’t been fully approved at the time of the meeting. The District could see a cash injection of up to $900,000 per year and several one-time grants if all goes well.
Unfortunately, the District is still spending more than it’s taking in—so much that even the extra money won’t make a big dent. “Even with the potential new revenues, we are continuing to deficit spend,” Ms. Amy Nichols said. She also said that many positions are still being funded with one-time funding—meaning it will run out at some point.
Ms. Nichols said that the Board will revisit the budget in September and in February will need to look at more “budget solutions” to keep from winding up where they were this February.
ACOE Advisor To Keep Helping HUSD
As a result of the massive fiscal hardship HUSD faced this year, ACOE assigned a Financial Advisor to the District. President Bufete wanted to know what the situation will be like since the Fiscal Advisor’s time is up at the end of June. Superintendent Wu-Fernandez said that although the District doesn’t technically need a Fiscal Advisor anymore, the ACOE is still paying for them to help HUSD. The only difference is that they’ll technically be a consultant now.
President Bufete then asked if, given the state of the reserves, the same person will transition back into an Advisor role next year—which would, to be clear, be bad. Superintendent Wu-Fernandez said it would depend on the certification in Fall, but Ms. Nichols said that she is going to make sure that doesn’t happen. “I am very much hoping that we do not come to this Board in December with a negative certification,” she said.
Well… You Know
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo highlighted the further cuts that will be necessary next year and tied them to contracts. “[We are looking at] devastating cuts potentially, especially if we don’t prioritize reductions that are not people,” he said, “and things that are not people are contracts.”
He asked what progress had been made on contract reductions. Staff said that they were still implementing the cuts that had been identified in February and are looking at different contracts as they come up and identifying them for removal.
Using The System That They Have
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo highlighted the issues that could arise with the upcoming staffing shifts. He gave an example of one school site that uses an Excel spreadsheet for tracking expenses moving to a different site that uses a different spreadsheet and the problems that could cause. He then asked what progress had been made on training on the system that the District already has.
Ms. Nichols insisted that using their internal system has always been the established procedure. However, she admitted, “[it’s] gotten a little bit lost over time.” She said that the district will do trainings and provide incentives to attend. It is unclear why training on the financial system would not be mandatory for all staff who should be using it.
Trustee Rawdon asked if the new system is completely mandatory. “Are there situations where you have to pay for something before the service is rendered to us?” he asked. He highlighted an issue where students were unable to attend an event because the tickets needed to be paid for in advance and some believed that wasn’t possible. “There are accommodations in the system,” Ms. Nichols said. She insisted it was possible if you do things properly.
However, Ms. Nichols implied that the issue wasn’t with the system, but not knowing how to use it properly. “They’re not having a new procedure,” she said. “It’s just sequencing the timing of it.” Part of the reason for the budget surprises in the past was that some administrative staff weren’t using the financial system, which won’t approve expenses that exceed the budget, and were instead going around it and maintaining their own—perhaps flawed—budget spreadsheets.
Trustee Rawdon did not seem to be convinced. “Is this how it’s actually done in other school districts?” he asked. “It is the best practice that is recommended,” Ms. Nichols said. She said she is developing an aggressive communications plan that will hopefully get everyone on board.
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo pushed for training, as well, but framed it as a burden on Staff and something that may cost the District money. “We put an unfair burden, if we don’t solve this, on our site staff,” he said. “And what we see is cheaper providers walking away because we’re difficult to work with.”
A Moment On Cell Phones
During public comment, AEOTE President Deisy Bates highlighted an issue around cell phones. She said that some staff were not able to keep their cell phones—being forced instead to use their personal phone or apps on their personal phone—while others are being allowed to keep them. She framed this as an equity issue and something the District should look into, with an eye to negotiating a cheaper contract that allows all staff who need them to keep their phones.
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo sided with AEOTE, but not without first taking a pot shot at former Superintendent Reimann. He said that some cut items were “not thought out… I think it was not thought out by our former Superintendent.” He continued, “I think we need to be flexible about small things like cell phones.”
Trustee Bruckner-Carrillo then said that he had foregone attending the National School Boards Association Conference this year. “That feels like we funded the cell phones right there,” he said. All information that can be found places the cost of a ticket at less than $1,000. It is unclear what a district-wide cell phone contract costs, however.
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