building a better bay area moving forward solutions, this is abc 7 news. hi there. i'm kristen z. you're watching getting answers live on. ab7 every day we talk with experts about issues important to the bay area. answers for you in real time today as the indian diaspora celebrates diwali rishi. sunak is named britain's new prime minister from london to the white house where president biden is holding a diwali celebration at the moment why this is the minute on the global stage for people of indian heritage. also, san francisco restaurant week is underway if you've ever lamented that restaurant prices are too high. well, this may be the week to snag a tasty special offer, but first the eagerly awaited results of california's first standardized test scores since the pandemic they came out today

and they show big drops in both. and english skills first math in 2019 40% of california students tested proficient or bob this year only 33% are proficient a drop of 7 percent english in 2019 51% were proficient this year only 47% were a smaller drop of four percent joining us live to discuss these scores in our interview with us state superintendent of public instruction. tony thurman superintendent thurman. thanks so much for coming on the show always great to have you on thank you. how are you today? i'm doing just fine, but i'd like to know how you're feeling because i was looking at the headlines about these scores and heartbreaking appalling a gut punch or some of the terms used in headlines to describe the scores. do you feel that's fair. do you feel any of those things? i think anytime you see a drop in scores. it's okay and understandable that people would be upset.

you know, i would only ask people think about two things one the context in which this happened that we were dealing with a worldwide pandemic and then think about that fact that california has put together major resources to help students bounce back and that's where we are most focused on how students are going to bounce back academically going forward. i definitely want to talk about your plans for bouncing back but in terms of context are these declines bigger or smaller than you had expected and how do they compare to the picture nationwide? will nationwide you know, california, you know has suffered less than many states and in some cases most states, but i don't think there's anything to celebrate here. there's loss for everyone and you know no matter how california schools were situated. it seems that students all across the country experience some learning gaps. and so we've got work to do to

accelerate learning. there are a few bright spots that i think that we can study and see how we replicate that but california is putting more money into tutoring into professional learning into great, you know resources for our schools to balance back. and so i think that's where the focus has to be. and take a closer look at our local numbers in the bay area with me if you will local number san francisco outperforms the state average. it looks like about half our meeting the standards right oakland tested below state average though math 2019-27% proficient and this year 26% proficient english went up a little bit from 33% in 2019 to 35% improvement, but definitely lower than the state average. what kind of support do you think students and teachers their need? you know some school districts are having the conversation about whether or not to have more days in the school year or longer school year. we're giving schools as we speak four billion dollars they can

use to expand the school day expand it learning after school programs. giving school districts another million dollars to use to use flexibly for all kinds of learning recovery programs to support our students the tutoring programs that i mentioned and we're also thinking about students who have had mental health challenges. and so literally we've just secured the funding to help us recruit 10,000 new counselors as we move forward. we have to be thinking about all these factors learning recovery as well as addressing emotional social needs of many of our students who are impacted by all the things that happen during the pandemic. now in terms of these solutions do you think it's a one size fits most because when you look more specifically at certain communities, the numbers are even more concerning for black and latino students right in math 2019 black students meeting standards 21% this year's 16% that's only one in six meeting standards latino students meeting standards in 2019-28 percent this year only 21% it

was 28% in 2019. so 21% is about one in five. what do these results suggest to you about the path for those communities? you know, they tell us that the same achievement gaps that we were working to close our critical as more than ever and they tell us that during the pandemic of these gaps, you know in some cases were sustaining, you know, if you think about where we were when the pandemic began and all of our schools went into distance learning, you know million students were without a computer or access to the internet many of those students were african-american and latinos students in lower economic nor okay, economically challenged students. and so it's not a surprise who was impacted the most independent, but you know, we've got to make sure that we focus on how we help those students younger students have experience heavier impacts and so the fact that california is now able to offer preschool to every four

year old in the state in universal meals the hungry students. we've got some important resources to work with but you know, these are serious concerns, but students can overcome that what's equally important to looking at these test scores are looking at the data that teachers are getting when the school year begin as you pointed out 2022 test scores. this is the first year. we've had a full set of data these tests were taking last spring already. our teachers are making adjustments with our students to see where they enter into their classrooms this year and we've got to figure out what are the right approaches to support those students going forward. you wish more schools in california were reopen earlier than they were as you know, a lot of schools, especially in the urban areas were closed for all of the 2020-21 school year. well if you look at the data for california schools in terms of distance learning and states that didn't have distance learning. there's still widespread, you

know learning gaps for students all across the nation so that says it's more than whether or not a school was in person or not. so it seems to me when you think about in our state 95,000 people lost their lives to pandemic we gave out 800 million meals to hungry families. there was major disruption and the million students without a computer that was matched by students all across the country who also didn't have access to the internet and so it seems to me unfortunately the difficulties and the challenges are spread all across the nation, california has fared better than most but again, that's not a reason to celebrate. we should be focus on how we do things to support. our students learning acceleration is the way we put on a brand new webinar series to help support school districts and the things that are going to work to help our students to be able to recover academically and then in the future to be able to thrive and that's where we're headed now in terms of investments in teachers. i know you talk a lot about

that. there's a new survey done by the california teachers association that shows low job satisfaction many more describing their jobs as exhausting or stressful than fulfilling or enjoyable. how do you plan to change that? well, we're asking each of our thousand districts to invest more in wellness programs for our teachers. we're putting on a new wellness webinar series to support teachers more mental health programs in our state. we're providing schools with four billion dollars with wrap-around supports for health mental health and social service programs to support students. they can also support the school community another eight billion dollars in discretionary grants for our schools, and i haven't even mentioned one of the key programs that i think is going to be a huge driver and student success reading programs. we're providing 250 million dollars to schools to have reading coaches and specialists that we think you're going to see a lot of schools using reading programs is a kind of a balanced back program. and again, we're gonna have to

provide wellness and support for our teachers. ultimately teachers need better pay to support them. they work in difficult working conditions. we've known this since the pandemic and so the state's giving all of our school districts more money to give them some ways to address some of these challenges in the assuming in the school community real quickly in that survey some teachers complain that they don't get the respect needed from parents and students. to push for a stronger discipline policy statewide well, i think you know at this time it said that we're seeing teachers just bearing a brunt of blame rather than a recognition that the teaching profession is a noble profession and our educators do such a great deal our classroom teachers our classified staff administrators, you know, they've all shouldered the load during these difficult times and they deserve our respect. this is an incredible profession, you know, obviously we work on ways to address any kind of student behaviors. we've seen those spike and depression for many of our students. we've got to address that i

think the idea is to get past blame and be focused on solutions how to help our teachers get better pay and better working conditions and for students who experience challenges get them the supports that they need so educators can focus on on teaching, you know on the things that our students need to learn for the future. superintendent tony thurman. we should just mention that you are up for re-election in two weeks. and should you win just real quickly? what is the bright spot that you would like to build on you mentioned? there were a few bright spots in these test scores not a lot but something to build on what would that be? well, i'm proudest most that you know, we were able to tackle the million students without computers. now. we have six billion dollars for broadband all across the state that we now have these programs that i think are going to help us get to reading by third grade and that's the 250 million dollars for reading coaches and specialists. i'm proud of those things, but i don't think we need to be spending any time celebrating the entire nation has been

through incredible challenges. our job is to help our students to to get well, and i'm very proud that we secure funding to get 10,000 more counselors in our schools universal preschool for every four year old universal meals for a hungry kids. we have to now put all these things together to build a better education system than we had even before the pandemic support the wellness of our students and their learning and then help them thrive going forward in the future. i'd like to spend the next four years focus on that and i'm proud and honored to have the chance to lead our schools in trying to help our students as we go forward superintendent for public instruction tony thurman. thank you so much for your time today. thank you. coming up next how actually now is the moment for people of indian heritage on the world stage a look at some of the leaders paving the way and how they're having an impact next on getting answer

i am robert strickler. i've been involved in communications in the media for 45 years. i've been taking prevagen on a regular basis for at least eight years. for me, the greatest benefit over the years has been that prevagen seems to help me recall things and also think more clearly. and i enthusiastically recommend prevagen. it has helped me an awful lot. prevagen. healthier brain. better life.

it has helped me an awful lot. celebrated in the indian culture begins today, and there is extra reason for celebration rishi. sunak will become britain's next prime minister the first person of color to hold that position after his final rivals dropped out of the running the political jockeying began after the sudden resignation of liz truss who lasted only 44 days after a disastrous economic policy meanwhile in washington dc right now president biden is holding a diwali reception at the white house silicon valley investor who founded an organization call. india spora is attending i spoke with mr. ranga swami today about the ascent of sunak and others of indian heritage. am our happy diwali to you. happy diwali. oh before we talk about the next prime minister. let's explain why you are in dc president. biden is about to host leaders

of indian descent. but yesterday you attended a diwali party thrown by someone of indian descent. that's vice president kamala harris, right? how was that? yeah, it was fantastic. again. this is shows volumes of how the indian community is getting more influential and more recognized in the united states. this whole week is full of diwali parties obviously starting with the vice president's event on friday at her official residence. it was fantastic. we had the best indian food great indian music great indian drinks and best of all, you know, diwali is a festival of lights and we lit up sparklers and that was fabulous and then to see little indian american kids running around her lawn was the ultimate yeah, we have some of the video that you shared with us. we do see a lot of kids we see you and some of the shots. we saw also sergeant general of evac murthy just a lot of indian american leaders, and i wonder how well you think this

administration includes or values indian americans? the indian americans have become prominent in politics for quite a while. so from administration administration the number of people has been increasing but you know with president biden it's three new heights at this point. there are over 130 indian americans in the biden

administration all the way from the vice president on so it's been fantastic and in diaspora, our organization has created a list of all the people in the biden administration. you can just go to our website at indianapolis where you'll see those lists. so this is a proud moment where you know, there's a new record of indian americans in the

administration. yeah. in fact, we're gonna show folks india spora, which is the group you founded to highlight and really harness the power of indian americans and i want to show specifically well, this is government but also in terms of business, right? we have a lot of well-known names. we have microsoft ceo ceo satya

nadella alphabet ceo sundar i what do you think has abled enabled? i should say success in this area for indian immigrants and children of immigrants. yeah, so the the thing about the indian community is where one percent of the us population but that 1% came from the top 1% in india 32 million of us living across the world, but we're connected so, you know in such a way that it's a small world. for example rishi is at stanford, you know, so many people here that goes back now to him being in the uk, so we're well connected and in diaspers playing that role of being a connector that's great. i looked at the population real quickly in the uk. i think you correct me if i'm wrong, but i think only two or three percent of the british population is indian heritage, and i wonder for folks who are not sure about how their political system is different from ours. why is this possible right for him to be elected under their system because when i look at our system, i look at the numbers and i think wow that

might be really almost impossible. yeah, so the british system is a little different because india was a colony a lot of the initial people who came to the us were brought in as laborers and servants, and that was their first wave of immigration from india to the uk, but over time it's resulted in more professionals more business people all finding a home in the uk. so the uk indian community is very different in his demographics. and so it's even more heartening to see that there's a indian prime minister in the uk as well. i think in the us it could be even faster. well, like even as you highlight the success of indian americans and those are the highest quarters of power vice president kamala harris, and we should soon act now in britain and of course in canada, you have jameet singh who leads the third party there you do all that work to also send the message that there are a lot of people who are not the ones that people know the faces that people know who are at the top who also need

a lot of help and support talk about how your group focuses on that. so again, it's very easy to focus on our successes, but in diaspora really also wants to shine a spotlight on the less privileged over 8% of the indian american community lives below the poverty line. we in fact release the report called the invisible indian ican to hig next toicty inans are the second largest undocumented group in the united states. so we also want to shine a light on the challenges of our community not to just brush it away. so i think you know like any other community. there's a lot of good but there's a lot of challenges and we want to highlight that and do something for the less privileged in our community. well mr. congratulations on your work and india spora, of course you being at the president's reception speaks to that, please let president biden know if you will that we'd love to have him on abc 7 news sometimes okay.

absolutely. thank you kristen. thank you. happy diwali. happy diwali if you're looking

for some good eats, you're in luck. san francisco's fall restaurant. week is underway joining us live now. tell us all about it is amy cleary director of public policy and media relations with the golden gate restaurant association. amy. thanks for your time. thank you. so restaurant week started last friday. how was participation this first weekend? it's great. you know, we have almost 200 restaurants registered this time from a price point of $10 at lunch all the way to 75 dollars at dinner and we've had a lot of excitement, you know all across the range. that is so awesome. yeah, so just to let folks know. yep 180 plus restaurants and i think they're all neighborhoods of san francisco right in chinatown. you've got a few this year too. yeah. we have this year with a group in chinatown to really hope the

participation in our neighborhood. so i think we have about 26 in total now in chinatown which is which is really exciting for us because it's not just sort of the well known places but a lot of the smaller neighborhood bakeries and cafes as well. which explains that price range too? you've got the whole, you know spectrum, which is great. do you have to dine in at these restaurants? you do not if you go onto our website, you can sort by all sorts of things including, you know cuisine, but also you can sort if you were interested in delivery or take out or dine in whatever works best for you. okay? oh just to let folks know that's kind of how it looks and you can choose and it shows how much for lunch and dinner the prefix. that's really interesting to me. a lot of these are offering special prefix menus, right? they are and a lot of them are offering, you know, some dishes that they don't do during the rest of the year. so they're kind of special for restaurant week. so it's really a chance to try some dishes that the restaurants really want to use to show off their food, excellent and to keep the prices, you know affordable too right a lot of newcomers who don't normally go

to restaurants, but other two upcoming eat drink sf events, i think tell us about those sure, so we do we used to do a big. gets a festival and now we do it currently with restaurant week. we have a fun cocktail party coming up at the beacon lounge in union square on wednesday. and then next sunday. we have our closing brunch, which is at china live. it's going to be a dim sum branch, which i'm really excited about. oh my gosh. i've been to china live. let me just tell you the food is to die for the noodles are amazing the dumplings. though. okay, so restaurant week runs through sunday. i'm going to put up the website folks. you can check it out and where can people go they can get all information there, right? yeah, sf restaurant week.com has has everything and it has you know again a great sort features. so look for the neighborhood you're looking for the cuisine or the price point whichever is

best for you. all right. so folks miss it, which they shouldn't but if they did you're back in the spring right you do back in the spring right you do this twice okay care coalition, alaska airlines is still frontrunner for most caring airline. funshine bear, you did some of your own research, right? i sure did. ♪ according to the web, their program's number one, ♪ ♪ earning alaska miles is quicker and more fun! ♪ cute! ooh, that was wonderful, sweetie! oh, oh, oh, i have a song about their cheese plates. ♪ cheese please! cheese please! cheese please! cheese please! ♪ uh- it's time for lunch. aw... ♪ ♪

aw... for getting answers. we'll be here every weekday at 3:00 answering questions from experts around bay area a reminder you can get our live newscast breaking news weather and more with our abc 7 bay area streaming tv app. it's available on apple tv google tv fire tv and roku to search abc 7 bay area and download it now world news tonight with david muir is coming up next and i'll see you back here at 4 o'clock.

tonight, breaking news. the deadly school shooting. the student livestreaming on her phone as police reach the classroom door. hundreds of students and teachers rushing for the exits, their hands in the air. a student describing coming face-to-face with the shooter. what he asked her. the gunman getting into the locked school. alex perez in st. louis with news on the suspect just coming in tonight. also this evening, the u.s. responding to russia tonight. after this new claim from russia that ukraine is now planning to detonate a so-called dirty bomb. the u.s. now warning of consequences if russia does this instead. and ian pannell's exclusive interview tonight with ukraine's top military commanders. here at home tonight, the spike in children in the hospital across this country. covid, the flu, and t