CUSD Controversies

CUSD

CONTROVERSIES

CUSD Closures

An overview and opinions on CUSD closures

ARNAV VISHWAKARMA

news editor/podcast editor

On Oct. 14, after hours of debate, the Cupertino Union School District board voted 3-2 to close two of its schools and consolidate one of them amid declining enrollment. The decision came with controversy and was the first decision that was not unanimous among the current CUSD board, with the board meeting lasting until 1:30 a.m. and parents protesting outside of Collins throughout its duration.

Students from Regnart, Meyerholz and Muir will attend new schools in the fall of 2022, and be provided options on which schools to attend. Despite the sites being closed to schooling, they will not be sold and instead leased out in case the reopening of sites is required in the future.

Although the closure of schools was met with disagreement, this is not the first time Cupertino has had to downsize the number of campuses they have.

Said Cupertino High School teacher Wes Morse, “At one point Cupertino had 44 schools and they’re about to become 19. This isn’t new.”

Cupertino’s percentage of home-owning families with school-age children has declined over time, resulting in the need for school closures.

Said Morse “And so, if you have twice as many schools, [than] you really need, then you have twice as much cost than you need in certain things.”

The source of revenue for CUSD schools also varies from FUHSD, as schools are funded per pupil, per day. If there is low-

er demand for schools than there was previously, schools get less funding while the costs remain.

Said Morse, “If they don’t get enough money, it’s hard to maintain three extra principals, six extra custodians and six extra secretaries. I mean, the cost of school is the people. Books are cheap. Computers are cheap. People are expensive.” CUSD families are also split on the topic of closing schools. Concerns include splitting up established school communities, quality of education and information provided to families by the district. Said a Meyerholz parent, “I don’t think [the board is] taking into consideration all the voices from the community and parents. Honestly, a lot of meetings that I’ve been to, I feel like they are very firm.” The parent also added, “[It is] also a very short timeframe

“BOOKS ARE CHEAP. COMPUTERS ARE CHEAP. PEOPLE ARE EXPENSIVE.”WES MORSE

for this notification to all the parents. I feel like it’s just not giving us enough information. Why is this happening right now?” With the costs that the district is able to save with school closures, money is able to be redistributed towards the quality of education that CUSD has historically been able to provide. Said Morse, “I think not being empathetic to the kids is taking away music, art, activities and field trips. I think giving them a worse educational experience in order to keep a school open is a far greater risk than sending them to another school.” The closure of elementary schools foreshadows the future of middle schools in the district, and ultimately how the populations of those students will factor into high school enrollment numbers. Said CUSD Director of Communications Erin Lindsey, “If a middle school falls below enrollment of 700 [district staff recommends to] convene a new Citizens Advisory Committee to consider the need to close a middle school.” The decision to close the CUSD schools is a complex issue that rests on a variety of factors including population, funding and quality of education. It is one that will largely impact current students and families, but one that the board ultimately deemed necessary for the district INVESTIGATIONS | 21

CLIP Expansion Efforts

Expansion on the Cupertino Language Immersion Program and recall of Sylvia Leong

JENNY WU

print editor-in-chief

Following the decision to close schools, the CUSD board is facing a wave of backlash from families regarding the district’s budgetary issues. A group of parents formed a coalition called Recall CUSD Board to address different points of concern within the CUSD community. Amongst these concerns are efforts to expand the Cupertino Language Immersion Program, CLIP, a CUSD alternative education program that provides instruction in both Mandarin and English.

On Oct. 7 2021, Recall CUSD

Board filed a letter of intent to recall board member Sylvia Leong, former president of CLIPCO, the Parent Teacher Association for CLIP. The letter addresses that CLIP will be given more classes and its own campus despite closing neighborhood schools. Reads one passage, “Sylvia used her influence to cut a backroom deal with CUSD to prioritize CLIP. She has lost credibility and has sowed massive division among the community. We need honesty and transparency, not politicians.”

Despite the recency of Sylvia Leong’s recall efforts, CLIP’s expansion efforts have been years in the making. In a statement issued by the CLIP staff on Nov. 9, 2020, teachers called for support from parents in advocating for a separately designated campus for CLIP. The statement

“CLIP IS THE ONLY

ALTERNATIVE SCHOOL

IN THE DISTRICT THAT

DOES NOT HAVE ITS

OWN SITE. ERIN LINDSAY ”

noted that the CLIP program had been sustained in “a survival mode” for years, sharing only one campus with neighborhood schools and the Specially Designed Curriculum (SDC) for many years. Said the CLIP teachers, “To establish a strong, rigorous and effective immersion program, we should … take full advantage of having a dedicated site. The potential for more resources will boost student success.” According to CLIPCO, there is no room to expand CLIP at its current Meyerholz Elementary site. School equity policies force the program to modify curriculum and make compromises for students. Such compromises range from field trip cancelations to teacher retention issues that result from large class sizes, as well as the lack of additional salaries for Bilingual Cross-Cultural Language and Academic Development certificated teachers that neighboring districts offer. “The CUSD Board prioritized Alternative Schools having their own school site as part of the charge provided to the Citizens Advisory Committee [led by a third-party neutral facilitator]. CLIP is the only Alternative School in the district that does not have its own site,” said CUSD Director of Communications Erin Lindsay in an email to The Prospector. Faria Elementary, Murdock-Portal Elementary and McAuliffe K-8 are the other Alternative Schools in CUSD.

A survey conducted by CLIPCO in May 2021 to gather thoughts on CLIPCO’s spending priorities and other factors received 269 responses from CLIP parents. 41% of parents supported a designated campus, 30% were opposed, and 29% had a neutral stance. Said CLIP graduate Gilford Ting, “I don’t know how well CLIP would scale up to an entire campus of everyone. There were always at least two or three other classes that were just regular non-CLIP programs … CLIP was always really familial in a way, which was really nice because everyone knew each other and all our moms are friends.”

As of November 2021, the district has not decided on a CLIP dedicated site. Following Meyerholz’s closure in the fall of 2022, the K-5 CLIP program will be relocated to Muir Elementary School

Curriculum Dissatisfaction

Inequity in schools versus CA proposed Mathematics Framework, and critical race theory

RAISSA JI

opinions editor

Do politics belong in education? In an effort to minimize the racial and socioeconomic disparities in mathematics excellence and educate youth on racial justice, California proposed the 2021 Mathematics Framework and Critical Race Theory. However, parents of the Cupertino Union School District argue that these measures are unproductive.

By rejecting the practice of sorting students into different levels of math based on their natural abilities, the Framework intends to keep all students, regardless of their mathematical inclination, in the same classrooms until 11th grade. Teachers would challenge their more advanced students with more complex work. Because calculus will become a deprioritized course, students would aim for more useful courses like data science and statistics. Through this, the Framework hopes to eliminate inequity in math and, as the draft states, the “mentality that some people are ‘bad at math’” The Framework most notably emphasizes girls and Black and brown children, the groups who often “receive messages that they are not capable of high-level mathematics.”

The proposal has incited outrage across the state. Those against the Framework believe that ending the system of tracking math levels will discourage advanced students to strive for high achievement. As stated by the team behind No CRT at CUSD, “this ‘LCD’ (lowest common denominator) approach punishes and discriminates against those hard-working and gifted children […] and puts many children behind an increasingly global and competitive workforce.” At CUSD, parents have mixed opinions. While one believes that “teaching at all the same level dumbs everyone down and leaves some unsupported,” another argues in favor of the proposal, explaining that “kids need to be kids.” Furthermore, the inclusion of CRT in the academic curriculum has been a hotly contested debate. CRT is an academic movement that seeks to explain that race is a social construct and racism is, in addition to being the product of individual prejudice, embedded institutionally and systematically in America. Many believe that CRT is crucial to educate students on social justice and racial discrimination, as well as to dismantle an unequal system. Currently, CRT is not a state standard for TK-8 at CUSD but can be taught at the discretion of individual schools and teachers. However, hundreds of parents have protested this inclusion fiercely. As stated by No CRT at CUSD, “teaching controversial ideologies under the banner of CRT […] [is] really […] cherry-picking history from the perspective of race versus capitalism, and ultimately making children decide whether they are part of the oppressors or the oppressed.” Furthermore, while some parents believe that “the basic concept behind CRT is an important concept to teach,” others are passionately against the idea, stating that “[CRT] itself

PHOTO | MERCURY NEWS is racist. It needs to stop … CRT will add more racism to our schools … I, like many other parents, will pull kids out of public schools … if this B.S. is taught.” In protest of the potential integration of politics into academics, there is a common consensus among large numbers of parents: “Take the political agenda out of schools!”

The future is uncertain for the implementation of CRT into the classroom, but the State Board of Education will vote for final approval from November 2021 to May 2022 for CA’s proposed 2021 Math Framework