program. and the next diagram, the diagram shows the current system , 65 schools. 65 schools with sixth grade. >> good evening, i just wanted to say a few brief words about the language passways. there is in the power point an appendix that talks about some of the observations about the language passway cannot least of which is the fact that 38 elementary schools with language passways cannot fit into six middle schools with language passways. so we recognize that in order to support these feeder patterns, we are going to have to create

more language programs at the middle school, which we would have to do anyway. it's not just because we're doing feeder programs. we need to do it because of multiple other reasons and other board policies. and so we figured that rather than focus too much tonight on the language passways, we would put it in the appendix, acknowledge the fact that we are going to need to create them, that the current configuration of elementary cannot fit into middle. there is a table that says in the appendix what the new passways at the middle school level would need to be. in other words, where we would need to add programs. for example, in some areas we would need to add cantonese and spanish. in other schools, cantonese and mandarin. if the board would like to talk further about language passways, we can do that. i'm happy to share some information tonight, or it might be that there's another conversation we would want to have with the language passways.

>> so here is the map. i don't know who has been changing that. that's great. thank you. this is the set of draft middle school feeder pattern. you'll notice that some middle schools have more elementaries feeding into them than others. this has to do with a couple of things. one thing is that some middle schools have much greater capacity than others. another reason that some middle schools have fewer feeders than others has to do with the language program passways. some of the patterns that you see, especially where children

are not assigned to be a nearby middle school have to do with capacity also. because there may not be a middle school anywhere close to where the children live. the southeastern part of the city, for example. there isn't middle school capacity for children who live there. so some of them are assigned to fairly distant middle schools. so i think one important thing to note about the middle school feeder pattern is they're not about where a student lives. they're about where a student goes to elementary school, and you will notice that in the model, the elementary schools for the most part that are assigned to the middle school and proximity is definitely something that is factored into it. you can see that with the patterns that are there. in some cases, it's not possible either due to capacity or program. so i'll give an example with

i.s.a. we've applied for a grant for an i.b. program. and muir and flynn are also part of that grant. so being optimistic and hoping that we're going to get that magna grant, we would obviously want that program to be a k-12 so it would make sense to support that model to have muir and flynn feed into i.s.a., so it's a k-12 i.b. program, >> another area where you might notice it is in the bayview. in the meantime, we would look to open that up as a magnet school that would not have peter patterns, and the schools that are located near brown right now would be part of this plan and part of the feeder pattern, so we look to see -- where do the children who live in these areas currently go to school? what other choice patterns?

what are their enrollment patterns? these proposals actually support that, when we look to see where the children request and where they go to school, so it is in line with some of the desire currently expressed by families through their choice patterns and enrollment patterns. there is transportation available, and we would obviously need to consider maintaining that, and it is a later start school, so that is another factor that makes it more palatable through the early start. it would be difficult to think of that kind of distance. this particular recommendation does take into account the history, looking over three years, average request, and then enrollment patterns. so i thought that was worth sharing as well. thank you.

and the to the best of my ability to estimate the possible effects of this new feeder pattern, there would be greater academic diversity at each middle school. current range between the school with the highest average, the test score, and the lowest one, is 81 percentage points. it is a huge difference, a huge spread between the average test scores of students enrolled last fall at the middle school. the projected range would be 46%, would reduce the range by

quite a bit. and there would be significantly fewer racially isolated schools. there are tables that i believe you have that support all of this so you can study them at your leisure or for now, ask questions if you wish. >> we thought if we kept flopping around, it would be a good thing, right? >> there are some potential cost implications. we believe this proposal will reduce transportation costs, and we recognize that it will require us to commit to building the language pathways at the middle school level, and so we recognize, too, that the special-education programs and services are being redesigned, and that works well with this,

so working together to support those pathways through that process. we have also spent some time talking about transportation, so what i propose to do is keep going for the presentation and then take questions, but please interrupt me at any time if you want to and if you have questions. what i'm about to share is what we're proposing in terms of developing a new transportation policy. the transportation policy that we have is 30 years old. our transportation infrastructure has evolved over time in different ways in response to different things, so what we're proposing to do it is first create a policy framework. it is going to be very difficult. it is a very complicated issue and coming up with a transportation infrastructure, so we would like to start with a policy framework presenting to the board for first reading on

the 24th of august a policy framework for transportation. our hope is we would have discussion and get feedback from the community and join conversations about the attendance areas and transportation at the same time because there is a connection to the whole picture about children being able to go to school, and have a second reading on the policy framework for transportation at the end of september. that policy framework will then allow staff to develop administrative regulations that would get a lot more specific, so our hope is that we would have the administrative regulations ready on time and that we could share them with the board at that point, which means by the time there is a kindergarten fair, we would at least have more details to share with families. we would at least have more details than the policy framework. it is kind of starting at a high level and getting more granular moving forward. then, by january, we would have route information so that the four families have to submit their application for 2011-2012,

they would have more information about the transportation infrastructure for 2010-2011. we want to make sure there's an opportunity for discussion about this, and here's where we are proposing the framework would be. also, i want to know that we're talking about general education students. the transportation for special education would be part of the special-education redesign process. it would obviously be designed to comply withntlb or any similar state or federal laws regarding our obligation for

transportation. the framework includes -- the draft we are proposing is to provide limited strategic transportation, and this is for general education elementary students, and it would be from designated areas of the city, designated neighborhoods to support affordable access and the use of choice as a tactic for creating integrated learning environments because our kindergarten enrollment process, while we're having attendance areas, and there will be in attendance area tie breaker, so it is a much stronger connection that in the past, it is still a choice system, so we would want to make sure that whatever transportation we provide is designed to support the goals of the student assignment system. so in cases where -- webster is

a mass of attendance area because of its location, and it goes all the way to market street. it is at the southern tip of the attendance area because there's no other school between it and market street because there are a number of elementary schools that are relatively close to it. we would be looking at things like that, or there are situations where attendance is unusually large, and we would need to contemplate providing reasonable access to those attended -- attendance area schools. it is not contemplated that we would provide general education or high school students, and that would only be considered as a suit -- if the superintendent determines it's necessary, and in the framework that i was just outlining a moment ago, we are

anticipating that in order to meet the goal of equity and access, we would need to think about the goals of the city that have the lowest average test scores and providing access to students in certain areas of the city, and that is what we meant by designated areas, so what we have now would be transportation all over the city going to all kinds of schools, and that is what i mean about we anticipate that this new policy would create a significant change to our structure, and we want to make sure we have enough time to deliberate back and share it with the community before we get details. so the next step i was just going to talk about, the community engagement phase because what i just shared is a lot of information. we shared information about new attendance areas, about peter

patterns. >> let me ask the board members -- do you -- i actually like to go through this because there are going to be a lot of questions from the public about the continued engagement, i think, and then have clarifying questions. is that ok? even though you will have to skip back to the content. is that okay with everybody? ok, go ahead. >> that is great. thank you, commissioners. what you are about to see is a new web page we are hoping to launch tomorrow, and it would be available with the west address ofwww.sfusd/enroll. the --web address of www.sfusd .gov/enroll. we did not print it out because we wanted to showcase, so this

is the home page, but anyone going forward will get to a page here that basically has a box that says review proposed changes, so they can click on, and that is where they will see the draft recommendations, so they can click to the elementary attendance area boundaries, and we know that -- and that it will take a while to load because it is that -- it is a .pdf file, but if you just are patient, it will show. >> the point i want to make is that when parents or community members open it up, they can zoom to 800 or 200 or 400 and go into a particular area of the city and be able to see street names because with the print map, it is really hard to be able to do that, and that is why -- we have blown up these three

large ones that we were going to take to all the community meetings, so community members will be able to look at them, and we will have one in the lobbies of people can see it over the next few weeks as well, but we are encouraging people to think about going on line to be able to get into more detail. we also have the maps for the middle school feeder patterns, and we also have the middle school feeder patterns. >> note on the website that it tells you it is going to take a while to load. >> and actually does not to take a while to appear on computers because i have tried a few times. and all the information we have we want to make sure people know this is here. we're working to demonstrate all

the key materials, and we're working to teach that on august 25, and then there is another feature of want to share with you that is on here. there is lots of different formation on here, but we have this new tool that we developed that is called discover your school options. if i'm looking for a school and i want one that starts at a specific time -- like, between 8:00 and 8:30 -- i can do that, and it will give me a list of schools that have that start time, and you can click here and get more information about the schools. there is a map of where it is located and a description of the different things. it is also going to be great for parents that have children with special education, the programs

that they are in, language programs that just do an example here. if i want to go to a school that has spanish, i can just do this and submit it, and it will tell me these are all the schools that have spanish, and i can explore those further. this is part of our strategy which we will be talking about in october with you. we're working to revamp our out reach an improvement efforts, so this is one piece of it. that will be live, hopefully, tomorrow. another part of this that i want to take a moment to show you is we actually have a survey on here that parents will be able to tell us what they think about the attendance areas and the boundaries, so while we're having community meetings and drop in sessions, we are also going to be capturing information via this survey online, and if you are talking to anyone about this and they are doing it, please encourage

them to be really specific because as we are reviewing this, we will be searching for keyword like street names, school names, and if it is just a lot of text that does not get to a specific suggestion or specific question or concern, it will be very difficult for us to incorporate that feedback into the process. the question that are on the survey are the same questions we will be using at the community conversations that we are having. so that is to let yeah the that part of a plan for getting feedback, so we are having those community meetings, starting august 25. we intentionally wanted to start august 25 so the material could be out there for a while and folks could look at it and come and ask questions and give us their feedback. we will be in a listening mode. we are really ready to hear what people have to say.

there may be questions and suggestions we will not have answers to. we will write them down and bring back to the board and let the board know that these are questions and comments that have come up so we can incorporate it into modifications that unnecessary. on september 13, there is another add hoc committee meeting, and we're hoping at that time the board will be able to give us specific feedback, and we would then be able to incorporate that into the second reading in action on september 28. we are very eager for this to be finalized because a lot of tours start at the beginning of october. it is going to be one of the key questions that parents have -- what elementary school, what middle school is the elementary school feeding into, or what is the attendance area boundary? that is why we want to make sure there is lots of conversation in the next six weeks and that we can arrive at a decision on time for the families that are going on taurus. so our goal is by the end of

september -- the subject tonight is attendance area boundaries, but there is a lot more involved in rolling out this new policy, and we want to create the boundaries by the end of september, and in october, share with you recruiting strategies and administrative regulations, and in november, have a discussion about monitoring and evaluation. we are already exploring putting together a team of experts and starting to think about what are those specific goals, how those are evaluated, and on november 13, that is when the applications will be available. we are having a kindergarten fare instead of a k-12 fair, but we will have information about all our schools, and we will probably foster all of the elementary schools that feed into the middle schools together so that there can be shared information. october 13, we will tell you more about what we're going to do for the middle school and high-school students. we want to focus more on the

middle school students and use tools and strategies that they use t likeexting. there is a different way that -- use like texting. there is a different way that students going into high school communicate than fares. we want to provide more direct support to them, and we will have more about that on october 13, and that concludes the staff presentation for tonight. the rest of the presentation is an appendix year pattern. >> thank you. as i said, we have just a huge amount of work. we want to express our gratitude to the staff and our consultants with the staff. i think we need to have some time for clarifying questions. we want to try really hard to make sure they are really

clarifying questions, to know if you can refrain from opinions, and unless we want to use it as one example, maybe, since we have available to us the same of is that everyone else has. in addition we all have available to us the possibility to have an individual meeting with staff, which i recommend you avail yourself of. do not know if you have gotten this just this evening or a couple hours ago. does anybody have clarifying questions that they want to ask? we could spend the rest of this meeting, the bulk of it, taking community response. >> by clarifying question -- my

clarifying question really quick. i have two maps showing estimated capacity surplus and deficit. what is the difference between the two? >> i noticed they were not in the powerpoint. >> no, they are not. this was part of the kind of evaluation of the areas to see, and we're going to have them. we are getting them blown up, and we will bring into the community meetings, but without saying what they are, it is going to be hard to have been circulating, we are trying to evaluate any potential surplus -- any potential tension between the number of children who are living in a school-attendance area and the number of seats in an area -- the number of seats available. one of the models takes out all of the children who attend city-

wide schools or programs and all of the citywide schools and programs. for example, if you look at clarendon, -- yes. that is because in one, we said take out 50% of the seats. instead of saying it has a capacity of 100, we say it has a capacity of 50. and then, take out all of the children who live in that area going to a citywide school. we basically said one is every child who lives in the attendance area, regardless of where they go to schools, what does that look like? the other one says skim off the top, all of the children going to city-wide schools and all of the seats that are city-wide schools. >> did you take an equal percentage from each area? >> we actually look at where they are currently going, and we

look at the number of seats in kindergarten that are reserved for city-wide programs. for example, instead of saying how many kids are at the japanese program, we just said kindergarten, how many of all of the seats that are available in kindergarten are for the japanese program? >> do you mind if i rephrase that because i did not understand it the way you set it? >> share. >> s --ure. -- sure. >> so clarendon has a deficit in one and is fairly even in another, and the one where it is fairly even, -- >> green is a surplus, so it actually is loss of extra space. on one of the maps, you are estimating that a certain number of families are going to be going to see white schools, and the other map, you see that there are no city-wide schools.

>> we needed to find a way to simplify that. >> can i ask a similar question? can you explain then in terms of this surplus capacity, for instance -- if there is a surplus -- when you say surplus, do you mean that for that particular boundary, you only have so many kids, and that there's fewer kids than the capacity of the school -- if that is true, could you have drawn the boundaries differently? like expand that and so it would not be a capacity of 200

compared to a deficit of 200? i just cannot understand why there's such a big variation. >> first of all, if you look at either one of these maps, you would notice there is a whole south central and southeastern part of the city that is pink and red, and generally, the northwestern part of the city and southwestern are green, shades of green. whenever possible, i shifted territory to balance the capacity with potential enrollments, but because there is the domino effect, you just cannot grab enough children out of areas that do not have enough seats in them and send them to a nearby school and keep the schools in their own attendance area. this map reflects doing that when possible, but just as

schools cannot be in the middle of the areas they serve, we cannot create capacity where there are lots of students just because we need it there. terribly expensive, of course, and some schools have plenty of capacity and not many students passed for historical reasons, but i am looking at demand patterns, past choice patterns, we find that there are good reasons in some cases to have surplus capacity because this is a high demand school. it is not necessarily a bad thing to have surplus capacity and lots of people have wanted to go there in the past. but the bottom line really is the kids are not living with the faces are in schools, and we cannot change the distribution of students or the