STEAM rolled

So back to Ruby Bridges’ STEAM program. To recap, even though the District went through the process of discussing other magnet and innovative programs back in January/February, Ruby Bridges’ Innovative program was kept off the list for 2023-24 cuts, now we’re all getting. different message from the District that the intent was to “keep” the program but just not have a coordinator for the program which is, in fact, cutting the program. Both Maya Lin and Earhart are able to keep their coordinators for their innovative program through 2023-24 while they decide if they want to retain that position using other funding. It appears that RB is not getting that option unless the School Board makes a decision contrary to the staff recommendation.

The Principal’s messaging around this cut/not a cut is to frame it around what STEAM has not been able to accomplish. Now I realize that RB has had a lot of leadership change since STEAM was first founded and funded until today but I’m here to tell you that improving student achievement for Black and low-income students at RB was not the goal of STEAM. The STEAM program (with the Wellness portion) was designed to help (1) retain and attract families to RB who had been sending their students to other AUSD school because the program improvement status of RB made it very easy for families to opt out of RB and (2) give existing students additional tools to help them further engage in the regular school day curriculum. The fact that STEAM is being pitted against student achievement for specific subgroups is, frankly, insulting.

From the principal letter:

I would like to emphasize that the current STEAM instructor has a guaranteed teaching position at Ruby Bridges (i.e., she is not losing her job). Students and teachers will also continue to have access to the STEAM lab. This was the original intention of Ruby’s innovative program: to support the teaching staff in implementing New Generation Science Standards. Now that the STEAM lab has been up and running for five years and student outcomes have not improved, it’s time to release STEAM implementation back to the classroom teachers.

While it’s gratifying to hear the the STEAM instruction (and past teach of the year for AUSD) will still have a job, that’s not why parents (and staff at RB) are upset over what’s happening. If the leadership of the school knew based on conversations with the District that this was going to be the outcome then the school leadership should have engaged staff and families earlier that a discovery literally a few weeks before the budget is going to be adopted. I haven’t had time to pull data from other schools (I’ll try to do this for tomorrow but no promises) but, my guess is, that we’ll find outcomes the same at other schools for their Black and low income students or the numbers of students at those schools are SO low they can’t even display a result. Basically RB is being punished because it has too many Black student and too many low income students compared to other Alameda schools and rather than offer RB the same deal they’re giving to other schools with innovative programs (aka a year to determine the values of the school community and what they feel should be funded to improve outcomes for students) the community (including teachers) are being told what will happen to them.

Here’s the reality, there is a state mandate to the District to do better for Black and low income students. Rather than use unallocated money to address this mandate, the District is taking away something from a school with a high population of students that they have identified as struggling in order to satisfy the state mandate. I don’t think this was the intent of the mandate to address historically underperforming subgroups: to strip a school of a program serving all students to be diverted to a state mandate because the district has not adequately addressed the issue in the past.

Equity would call for the District to fund the innovative program out of General Fund for the 2023-24 school year, as it is doing for non Title 1 schools like Earhart, and allow the discussion to develop during the 2023-24 of how the innovative program at RB will be funded or wound down.

Also this is insufficient outreach given that, anecdotally, it would seem that the most engaged families and staff (particularly teachers) were all blindsided by the information which wasn’t formally announced until the rumor mill picked up:

Throughout this spring, AUSD staff and I have collaborated with the instructional leadership team to: a) review and analyze data from the last decade; and b) identify actions to support their struggling students. Performance data has also been shared with staff and African-American/Black families.

Based on feedback, the resulting consensus is that: 

• Literacy instruction should be prioritized at Ruby Bridges 
• Additional targeted interventions are needed 

But, here’s the thing, if I were a family that was shown data and asked what should be done, I would have said the same thing. RB should have prioritized literacy instruction and there should be additional targeted interventions. But, what it sounds like, no one was told that it would be at the expense of the STEAM program. That would have generated less consensus-y feedback and a question about why the District is, seemingly, being given an unfunded mandate from the State to target and improve outcomes without the money to actually do it.