Anonymous
By the Santa Barbara Education Foundation
Speaking to a full house at the Carrillo Recreation Center, Santa Barbara Unified School District Superintendent Dr. Hilda Maldonado addressed the community during the Santa Barbara Education Foundation’s annual State of Our Schools presentation.
Following an introduction by SBEF Executive Director, Dr. Pedro Paz, Maldonado started with a demonstration of ChatGPT to show how technological advances are drastically changing how students access and present ideas with the aid of artificial intelligence. In conjunction with changes in the classroom due to the pandemic, the landscape in public education has been altered significantly in just a few short years.
What Maldonado said has not changed is the need for schools to produce critical thinkers.
SB Unified serves over 12,000 students in 19 schools. Of these students, 61% are socioeconomically disadvantaged, nearly 10% are unhoused, 13.1% are students with disabilities, and 15.1% are Emergent Multilingual Learners. And despite all these challenges, the district has a 95.5% graduation rate.
Superintendent Maldonado outlined many ways in which District resources are organized to ensure student success, including the addition of Family Engagement Liaisons, crisis counselors, youth outreach workers, and licensed clinicians.
To help give a more complete picture of what is happening in the schools, the Superintendent invited San Marcos High School junior Kavya Suresh to share the stage and give the student perspective on today’s local schools.
The Superintendent spoke of SB Unified’s role in developing a strong local workforce through investment in existing facilities to provide opportunities for students to explore career pathways. With an improved Wellness Center at San Marcos High School, more students can explore health careers. The creation of an innovation center at Dos Pueblos High School will provide STEAM teacher training and curriculum development while also providing elementary school field trips.
For the first time since 2007, all elementary teachers will have a common set of materials to teach reading with the recently adopted Wit & Wisdom/Fundations curriculum.
Maldonado outlined a three-year implementation plan for teacher learning, with training starting as soon as next month.
Although the Superintendent gave details on the changes that will be made inside the classroom regarding literacy, she envisions a broader community effort to make literacy part of the local culture. “What if we held a literacy week in the cities of Goleta and Santa Barbara, where we celebrate reading and writing to help motivate kids to read, bring the joys of reading to students of all ages, and make all children feel safe, valued, and welcome?” Maldonado shared, “I imagine book fairs, writing contests, reading gardens where students can curl up with a book under a tree, celebrity guest readers in classrooms, and a multicultural festival that celebrates reading and opens windows on the world.”
SBEF also wishes to recognize and thank State of Our Schools sponsors, including the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians, Atkinson, Andelson, Loya, Ruud & Romo, McGillivray Construction, Chevron, KBZ Architects, Santa Barbara City College Foundation, Montecito Bank & Trust, AE Group Mechanical Engineers, and American Riviera Bank.
Santa Barbara Education Foundation promotes private support of Santa Barbara’s public education system in 19 schools. For more information, visit www.santabarbaraeducation.org.
“ 48% of students met or exceeded standards in English language arts and 36% did so in math.”
Maldonado states 95% graduate. What she failed to say is that SBUSD gives out “fake” graduation papers that will not get the student into our local city college or any other college.
Bet you did t know that there are levels of graduation. Go ask her yourself.
https://www.noozhawk.com/santa_barbara_schools_standardized_test_scores_show_big_drops_20221030/
It’s not fake graduation papers, it’s fake grades. But you are correct.
SBLETS – To eliminate having to go through the hoops with the District, please describe the “fake” graduation papers. What are the “levels of graduation” you are aware of; and do you know of students denied entry into CC with their diploma?
SBLETS – The article you cited has absolutely nothing to do with “fake” diplomas or “levels of graduation.” Can you please provide some actual proof? I’ve never heard of a senior graduating with “fake” papers. Please enlighten us.
How can 95% graduate when 52% FAIL English language arts and 64% FAIL Math… That makes our SBUSD a FAIL. But hey, it’s an “Equality” insitution… they produce sub standard gradutes regardless of a students race, religion or sex.
8:34 – Looks like a fail for you in the English language category, too. Therefore, you should know at least a partial answer to your question.
Maldonado sucks at doing her job!
When it quickly became very clear that Maldanado was unqualified for the key role of superintendent she should’ve been dismissed. Now it seems more about the school board members wanting to defend their horrible decision to hire this person. No way is Maldanado competent for this role. Probably same is true for most of the school board members. Maldonado is wrecking our schools.
Do the math. 11th graders who can not read, write or complete math don’t magically jump many grade levels by 12th. . But they all “pass” and graduate. What’s the way to make that happen? Free grades! A’s for all! Parents happy, school, principal and superintendent look good. Only loser is the kid who can do nothing, gets into college and drops out freshman year. But no one is looking at those stats.
OHYEAH – where is that happening? If you can’t read or write by high school, you don’t make it to graduation, or even high school for that matter. Where are these “free grades?” Never seen an easy A handed out for anyone (except jr high PE) in classes needed to graduate.
Where are these “stats” no one is looking at?
Been awhile since you were in school? Current common practices at SBUSD= 50% for turning nothing in; parent, teacher, admin meetings for HOURS where teacher reprimanded if kid or parent doesn’t get higher grade; last minute demands for “extra work” to boost scores of students who were truant most of the course or were watching soccer in the back of the room on their phone; endless discussions on how the teacher will create a way to pass the student in the final week before final grades; parent emails in summer after school has ended asking for assignments and re-do’s to boost grade or to pass. It has become such an ordeal to give a real grade based on assessment of mastering the actual skill taught, that MOST teachers I know just change the grade or pass the kid. The time, hassle, unpleasant interactions are born daily by the teachers. One of the reasons they are leaving in droves. There is no longer a CA exit exam -so passing/graduating is based on whatever the school/district claims to be true.
I think Maldonado’s “pat on the back” might be a little premature. Why were 12th grade students, those about to graduate, not included in the spring testing? Their results would have confirmed they were eligible to graduate. If many of the 11th grade students did not meet the basic English/math standard how is it known this requirement was met before graduation? What proof is there 10% of the student population is “unhoused?” The National percentage for high school students that graduate is in the 80’s leading me to question the 95% rate reported for the district.
MM1970 – How is anyone to know if an 11th grade student that did not meet standard requirements in English/math met or exceeded the standard in their 12th/senior year. Is the senior student tested again before graduation to confirm they met minimum graduation requirements?
The CAASPP standards and the graduation requirements are not the same. In fact, CAASPP test is optional (parents can opt out), and a straight run of D’s are acceptable for high school graduation. Haven’t you heard “D is for Diploma”? D & F would fall into the category of “below standard”.
California graduation requirements:
https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/gs/hs/hsgrmin.asp
The CAASPP test is not administered to 12th graders – it stops at 11th grade.
Every year, families of every student have to submit their proof of address to the district. The proof of address form includes questions that determine if the students are “unhoused”, which includes being homeless, being in a temporary shelter, living in a car, or living in a home/ apartment with mulitiple families. (Several years ago, when my older kid was in 4th grade, fully 40% of his classmates were unhoused).
https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/hs/homelessdef.asp
I attended the State of our Schools, it is interesting how much was not said and how misleading a lot of what was said is. Regarding graduation rates… we really are doing deplorably when it comes to our most vulnerable students. In order to be eligible to apply to a UC or CSU one has to take a set of courses in high school called the A-G’s. Sadly many students never take these and they can only get into SBCC. Many struggle there because SBCC no longer remediates students .. give extra help to those behind so that they can handle college level work. One thing Maldonado conveniently leaves out which I find disingenuous at best is that only 9% of our emergent multilingual students and only 13 % of our students with differences took the A-G;s. 71% of whites took them. What is clear is that our system is working for people who have parents of means who can pay for outside tutors to make up the difference in the lack of support and remediation for students who get behind. If you are a different learner or if english is not your primary language you will most likely get stuck with a mediocre diploma that only gets you into SBCC. And you may not be able to do the work there without cutting back on the amount of classes. SBUSD motto of every child , every chance, every day is a myth. And Maldonado misleads the public. Parents and community need to demand more for all students. Everyone deserves a diploma that will allow them to be eligible to apply to a UC or CSU. And right now thousands of students need remediation and summer intensives to attempt to catch up. But that’s another thing Maldonado will deflect. She is great at not answering questions truthfully and misleading the public and having dismal outcomes for students who count on the public school system to offer opportunity and a way out of poverty. Not on her watch sadly…
So much wrong with these comments. Check the A-G completion rates for DPHS compared to the rest of the state. Check the percentage of white, hispanic, and asian students who meet or exceed standards on English Language arts at DPHS compared to the rest of the state. The list of schools DPHS seniors are heading to- Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Northwestern, U Chicago on and on. Check the list of accolades both local and across the state DPHS students have won – mock trial, robotics, architecture awards, you name it. In short- find a school with similar demographics outperforming DPHS and then let’s have a conversation.
According to a local publication dated August 17, 2022 the District hired an “Executive Coach to Boost Leadership Skills” of Maldonado at the cost of $13,000. It appears this was at Maldonado’s request. Why pay to teach a person (at this level) skills they should already have, especially for a Superintendent’s position? Maldonado, according to the article, was “under fire from teachers and staff” because many administrative leaders quit since she was hired. Due to growing dissatisfaction with Maldonado, the District hired a firm to “conduct exit interviews of fifteen executive employees who recently left the organization.” When was the last time the District hired anyone to conduct an exit interview of any person that quit their District job?
GDP: Certainly there are wonderful things happening at DP and other campuses , like Franklin and Peabody Charter. But when you look at the subgroups, even at DP, on their own webpage you see that only 17.5 % of students were at grade level and for english language learners it was worse, only 6.7% were at grade level. The A- G completion rates by subgroup was not listed. 83% of asians and 87% of whites were at grade level. So what that tells me is that struggling students do not get the support they need and many never catch up. So many of our vulnerable students scores are years behind their peers. They do not typically complete the A-G’s. Our public school system needs to work well for more than whites and asians who many times have the means to support outside tutoring and have more resources and knowledge to navigate the system. Students with learning differences simply do not get enough help and remediation in time to make a meaningful difference. Many of our most vulnerable students are counting on public education system and sadly it is letting many of them down.. even at DP, despite many great programs, teachers and electives many student with differences and english language learners are left behind. The data I am referencing is right on the website. We need to do better so all students succeed.
GDP: That’s 17.5% of students with learning differences were at grade level for literacy. and only 2.5% met the math requirements. For english language learners no one met the math requirements and only 6.67% met the english … and this is at DP. Check the website. Sadly it’s true and surprising to some.