make decisions that they know are wrong. skipping schools and creating high-breaking rules that allow it is wrong. it is immoral. it is divisive. it will not be forgotten. it will not be forgiven. thank you. >> are you out there? good evening. my name is robert michel. it is a good thing to go last. the one thing i want to say that i did not hear is basically who i am in the classroom. i am occur professional who at the beginning of the year had 7.5 hours. then it was a loss of hours. i had to go to the actual work,

physically go there, to keep the rent and all that. anyway, the 4.5 hours i am there, i am telling you i am worth every goddamn panic. my students come around in three ways. the lead teacher takes a group. i take a group. another parent takes a group. -- another para takes a group. we switch them around. then noon comes, and i go away. they looked at me like "why are you leaving early"? i want to say something i did not hear. it is actually a tactic that sounds like made whitman -- meg whitman. more from less? stop that.

president yee: are you speaking, or not? otherwise, i'm going to end this part. >> good evening. executive board, united educators of san francisco. i wanted to point out some data. since we are no longer teaching from a creative bag of tricks, we are not pursuing the art of education anymore. i do have some data for you. here, there are 63% economically disadvantaged students. it is part of the zone. at sanchez, it is 92.6% disadvantaged students. where is the data-driven policy

here that this administration seems to be so enamored of? malcolm x -- at muir, there is 689 -- they scored 689 on the api. not an ex is 790, in the zone. -- malcolm x is 790, in the zone. muir is 689, in the zone. webster is not in the zone at 672. o'connell in the zone, 594. jordan, which unfortunately falls out of the zone -- i guess those students are not part of the data. somehow, they are less human and less eligible for the special consideration of the superintendent's zone.

president yee: thank you for your testimony is. board members? any questions or comments? ok. commissioner? >> thank you for the public testimony. ok, so this is a hard issue. the issue of skipping is a hard issue to address, and it is a very hard issue to stomach. i recognize that labour in this country sets the standard for a living wage and working conditions. nobody needs to tell me that.

i know that because i belong to a union, local 2, my husband, 35 years, san francisco policemen, part of the police officers association, and my daughter is a labor organizer. so i know the power of seniority. but it is -- it is a hard decision for me to make, too. i think it is hard for anyone to appear to make this decision. personally, i resent that every year i have had to make this vote, ugly as it is. it is a direct result of what happens when the state under funds education. and it is true, it pits people against people, program against program. and today it pits at labor

against board members and also the district, and it is the wrong way to work. as mr. kelly says, it is wrong, and there are many, many things that are wrong, but there are some things i cannot ignore. one is that before i became a board member i was a community organizer, and i worked for komen advocates. a year after year, we saw a broken promise after broken promise to the students. we have cut the red ribbon i don't know how many times. i was there when arlene said, private education for public school children, who would not want that? promise after promise after promise. yes, mr. kelly, there are many

things wrong with this, but i believe the in my heart broken promise after broken promise i can no longer be part of it. i cannot be part of it. i stood at that podium and i wrap rate -- reprimanded the school board for broken promises to all of those children in the bayview. i sat in their living room and i spoke to their parents and grandparents. i know there are other schools in need. it was up to me, i would spend millions and millions of dollars and give every single teacher in this district that training and professional courtesy. we are at the point where we have millions of dollars invested in this resource, and i cannot in good conscience allow that resource to leave the zone and move to even another

district. i just cannot do it. and i know this is a hard choice for everybody here. i think the process is flawed, personally. i think that ideally, we would have an equitable teaching staff work group to develop a proposal from parents, students, and teachers impacted that keeps achievement of the students -- there are always left behind -- a top priority, while seeking to protect the rights of our union workers. i am voting for this resolution , and do i think that it is fair? do i think that it is a wholly right to do? i am trying in the best way that i know how to change for decades

what has happened to the schools. do i think we should expand the zone to include eldorado? absolutely. should we expand it for mlk? absolutely. should we would for the middle school? hell yes. because every teacher should get this kind of professional development and training. every school, every teacher, every school. >> if you don't do it for all, don't do with for one! >> this is where we disagree. it is not just money, it is how we have used this money and professional development, which every teacher in this district i think agrees we need more of. i will not argue here, because you have had your two minutes and now it is my turn to speak. as we make this vote, when you to know i will also have to answer to a higher authority.

and, mr. kelly, you may think it is you. >> commissioner -- >> when i left home today, my husband said to me, don't do it. he is a union man, too. my daughter is the one i am really afraid of. i am asking my fellow board members today to join me. i am terrified to do this. it but i know in my heart that i cannot look myself in the mirror and not make this vote. i have an opportunity here to do something that i beg board members for decades to do, and that is to help the schools. and this is the best way i know how. [applause] president yee: commisioner

maugus? commisioner maufas: i thought you were going to say something. president yee: i was, but that has passed, so let's move on. commissioner maufas: i want to thank commissioner fewer, because i know her and i know her heart and i know her intellect. it is not easy. i will not be joining her. i take this vote so incredibly seriously. and i will just tell you now i am voting no, period. no to the layoffs, period,

because we are struggling. i know it, you know it. and to think that or imagined that we can find the money elsewhere -- we can. but to imagine or think that is not attached to another person? that is a fantasy. but i wore my button today and i have worn it every day in the past year about the funding to placer. they say, are you a teacher? i say, i am not. i am a school board member. the house, the omega, the baiale beginning and the end begins the classroom. that means a note to layoffs and finding money elsewhere. it is no to the layoffs and find the money elsewhere.

it does not make it any easier. it does not make it easier. it just is that i am about defending the classroom. we have more commissioners that you will hear from, hopefully, but you know where commissioner fewer stands. and i cannot blame her. but you also know where i stand. president yee: any other comments? norton? commissioner norton: commissioner fewer, i want to thank you for the courage you have displayed here. i came into the office today looking for any way that i could vote against this resolution. and justify a vote that i know will be deeply painful to the

people that i consider supporters and friends. . and i was not able to find that justification today. first i thought that perhaps we could compromise by drawing the line around at a smaller number of schools, a set of schools that i feel as clear justification for taking the steps we're being asked to take. to say that schools as clearly defined, you know the schools, many of us are aware of the amount of money that has been given to us by the federal government to work on the schools, to improve the schools. we only have that money for three years, significant money, invested and professional development in the schools. i thought that would be a more reasonable compromise.

and then i looked more closely at the list of schools and realized that by cutting down the number of schools, i would be cutting out many schools in the bayview, which is an area of the school that, as commissioner fewer, said, we have many years broken promises. at the end of the day, i could not find a way to justify that in my own mind. i think why i have struggled so much with this is i thank the data that you gave us shows there is an arbitrariness to where we have drawn blinds, -- drawn blinds, the superintendent's zone. why isn't alvarado a superintendent zone? it should be.

i ask that question to the superintended today. i ask that question to the deputy superintendent, that question, and the answer was, we cannot do all of the schools that once. given what i know what our budget looks like, given i know what has happened every year but does happen to the budget since i sat on this board, i know they are right, we cannot do everything that we should do, that we rightly should do for the students, that they deserve. i, too, and terrified to take this vote. i did not like taking it. i know that is deeply painful and will be seen as a vote against our partners in the schools, our partners in labor. i think that this is a stat. we must take at this time -- i think this is a step that we must take at this time come to

realize the efforts we have made in schools that have generally silly bent -- that have generational the benen not havig what they need for their students. we are seeing progress and i am grateful for that. while this is very scary and that an unhappy vote, i am going to support the resolution. president yee: anybody else? go ahead, commissioner mendoza? commissioner mendoza: thank you. this is a board meeting that none of us like to come to. i could have stayed home. i have been excused last three days because i have been sick, and i have been lying in bed reading this resolution over and over and over again.

i actually was not sure if i was going to come in, because this is a tough vote, but it is an important vote. i came in today because, like sandy, i have seen challenges in the district year after year after year. and the reason i sit on this school board and sacrifice my time with my family and do the things that we do is because we have opportunities like this. and i don't say opportunities lightly. these are the types of conversations we have to have, like we did with the schools in the bayview last year, talking about turning them around. we fought parents about what they felt was a good school. they're now saying -- seeing that there is a better way of

looking at our schools and that there are true improvements that can happen. as a parent who has gone to two schools where turnover was just part of what we do, and where we have seen arcade's challenged -- where we have seen our kids challenged every day because of the instability,. leaders have not to this day been able to ask for stability in schools that have been meeting at the most for so long. -- that have been needing it the most for us so long. we talk about functional justice for some, but social justice for some has been going on already four years and years and years. and the schools that we're talking about, these handful of schools we are talking about,

have not had the voice to aske for what we are hoping to be able to give them tonight. many of our schools are not organized to be able to talk to the right people. many of our families do not speak english. many of our families did not even know where to go, except to and from school. we don't see the same families in these schools in this border. we only see them because many of us go out and talk to them on a regular basis. i live in the bayview. i see our kids on the street every day. i see what has happened in the bayview and in our schools and in the mission. we have been applying for money left and right, and i will be the first to be on board and a place we can get money.

you guys know that. you come to me to ask, where is the money? and we have been successful securing dollars for communities that need it the most. those are investments. those are investments in our children. so tonight for me is not about whether or not this is the right thing or the wrong thing for the teachers. i respect seniority. i respect our union. but this is a question about whether this is the right thing for our kids. and that is what i was elected to do. i was put on this board to speak on behalf of our kids. and my own kids have been in the schools that we're talking about. they have seen what turnover can do. this is -- and i said this to you earlier, mr. kelly -- a small gesture for something that will have a huge impact.

and quite frankly, if we push this down, i don't think we will even hit the pro teachers. we are not even talking about our most senior teachers being affected by this. so i am actually hoping that as a district, we are excited about this big move. that people will go home and talk about how old we are to do something like this, because this is really about our kids. and that this is not wrong if what we are protecting are our kids. and when we did prop a together, we talked about 25 hard to staff schools we would want to support. and if we could do all 25

schools, which would include eldorado, that would be my preference. but we're not talking about all 25 schools, but we're supporting them the best weekend. -- the best we can. i know this is wrong in your mind, and in my heart, it is not wrong. and, you know, it is one of those votes that mr. kelly and the union, i hope that this does not break up what we have built over the years, because that has been why we as a district have been able to move forward. and we have all had to give up some things. but i don't look at this as giving up something. i look at this as really wanting to do something that is right for our kids. so i want to continue to invest

in our improvements and out onto in our improvements and out onto continue to give our kids in the >> truthfully, i was counting votes. i was thinking, do i have to do this? can i let somebody else do the heavy lifting for once? but i cannot. thougi know what it feels like o have people take the easy vote because they know that others will make the hard votes, and i will not do that. so i have thought a lot about this. i understand the principles of seniority. the principles of seniority i believe then. and i have looked at all of the data. i am persuaded, for instance, by the fact that the schools that

we are proposing to skip here have average scores times, the turnovers of other schools in the district. i think that even if we do this, the length of service of the teachers in those schools will still be much shorter than in other schools. the schools that have been the most successful have had extraordinary stability in their staff, and actually, i have discussed that with leadership for decades. we have worked together on ideas and programs to try to effect these kinds of things. one of the schools in the zone, one of the schools in the bayview that is really an extraordinary example of showing improvement in recent years, malcolm x, is a school that we have worked together on. and one of the main problems we

identified, that we wanted to see if what to do something about, was about stability and the staff. we talked with the staff about that, and also everything i know, all of the research i have looked at, over time tells me this is one of the things we were always finding in the well intentioned the other attempts we have made to effect change and the trajectory of improvement in these very schools and other schools. like commissioner norton, it needs to be said here tonight that the people who chose the six schools were not bus. out -- were not us. i have done a lot of public condemnation of how that was done. actually, i did not report that we should have applied for this, because i think some of -- and we see all of the other schools

around the nation that have taken, as is the direction of the federal administration, a far more punitive, strategic posture around transformation and we have. i think we are right, that the way that people want us to do it is the way that we have tried to do it before, very punitively, but it has not worked well. i am happy that we have looked for compromises, that we have tried to be as supportive as we can, but i know from all of that work that staff stability is key, and gaining subtraction in the multiple initiatives we have had for these very schools is important. what i was going to say is the six schools have been arbitrary selected for us. we chose, and in the end, i supported that in order to be with my colleagues.

i did not want to be the lone person voting against that effort. but someone else chose those schools, and the ones they chose happen to be in and underserved community of san francisco, but not the most underserved community of san francisco, and that is why the bayview zone is important to us. not only is it the next generation of the deceit -- of the desegregation efforts that many of us have been focused on for decades, but also -- actually, and i think we all are quite unhappy that the resources of the program are not focused on the bayview zone, the bayview neighborhoods and communities. even though it is as hard as everybody has explained it to be, this is one of those decisions where we are all

torn, and after all of these considerations, particularly the idea that this is something that is about equity, not that i have come to the conclusion that i am going to support this the way it is. thank you. president yee: so let me wrap this up. like my colleagues, this is a tough decision. i had to think about what the rationale of all of this is, and had to go back into whenever it started, the school board, which this is my eighth year. some of the years that we spoke about when i first got yeahere n year one