and i still struggle when i see the behavior that is just... it is so auful and it is so racist, and it the fact that the people don't understand the damage that gets done. and i just hope to continue this work in other ways to help to support san francisco, because this is my home and this is the school district that i believe in and hopefully, we really move forward with an understanding about sending young people out in the world, and out into the world, fully prepared. fully prepared, to do anything that they would like to do. and those are my personal comments. and i want to thank the superintendent, because i definitely agree with you as well. and i know that while i have been here, i have seen the people change. still struggle with the folks that have not changed but i am here to work with that.

i am. and that is what i am committed to working with the folks and that is part of the process as well. and i have a few questions and, if i may, and i appreciate my colleagues patience. one of the questions that i have immediately was, can you or do you have any information on the decrease in the on track students that are white and instead do you have any indication on what that was? >> i don't have it right here. >> sorry tha, is on the slide five. >> yeah. i don't have it right here, but it is something that i can follow up and get on the reasons are, because we actually wanted to do these by course. >> okay, thank you. >> and the next question that i had, so, again, i have to, and my information and my experience is long. and i want to know because i

look for pockets of change and i am talking about counseling services. and counselors are so critical in this process how do we know and what you have said is happening? >> how do we know that how do you know? that what you have told us is happening with counselors and how do we know that? what is the proof? >> i can tell you how i know because you know i work closely with all of the high school counselors and we meet with all of the counselors on a monthly basis and we are in touch with them via e-mail and i go out to the sites and i up until this year i have been doing the work myself at mission high school and so i have a strong relationship, or a rapport with the counselors there and i know their commitment and really the counselors going to counseling because they care about the students and student out come and working with the families and seeing the whole child and

seeing the whole student, so i can tell you that it can happen, or that it is happening in terms of data that might be collected, and it is something that we are looking at as a department, and it is very much in line with the american school counseling standards in terms of the work that counselors need to be doing, and our district needs to be doing in collecting how counseling services can be quantified. >> i

specifically with off track students and there is a process and she has received those logs and that data has been shared if not, she has it. >> we can check from this semester we followed up with the data from last semester and miss norman and maybe it was not highlighted enough and you can follow up with that, okay? >> thank you. >> and when you share, and could you speak to some of the professional development that you have had to provide for counselors to be able to take on this sort of task, these are hundreds of students per counselor, i know the ratios are great. and so maybe we can talk and i can hear and you do have information now that would be wonderful to hear. >> well, in terms of professional development, we do have the both semesters but the

following spring, a full day, and the opportunity for the counselors to come together and i can say that this year, the main focus to some extent has the challenging and the counselors getting up to speed and, some of it happening in conjunction with the graduation requirements but we do work with them to offer them ways to collaborate with the existing services at their school and we are looking at collaborative ricing for the excel for the programs and the wellness center and of course, through the faculty and teacher relationships. and a lot of we also have a full counseling manual which i mraoefsh that you all have gotten a copy of and so you have seen the size of that binder and the wealth of information that is in there and we act as the resources and includes the partnerships with, cte and with the csu and the ufc and in addition, to the professional development that

we have offered, through our department, we have encouraged counselors to partake of the csu and the uc counselor conference and an organization, and we have encouraged our counselors to learn how to more effectively work with the undocumented students and have reimbursed the counselors for taking part of some of these fees at some of these conferences and i think that we could probably offer you more detailed information and that is just a few examples. >> thank you very much and i appreciate that. >> and so on slide 13, where we are talking about the kc, and in that second, just before the last column where it says that the 12th grade, the total, there is a number of not taken and that not taken does that also, that 40 and so the first column is the english language, and is that 44, a part of the

174? and is the 43, a part of the in the math, a part of the 134? >> they are actually different groups of people, so no they are not if they have not taken it, they are not included in the students. >> i don't understand why i asked that question. i am sorry. sorry that happens. >> okay. and actually i think that those are all of the questions that i had, thank you. >> sorry. >> and i appreciate all of the work that you have been doing. >> okay, and i have a comment or two. >> so i just want to say that when i got this data, at the curriculum committee, i mean that i think that it was some what shocking because i thought that we were closer, and so i think that and i understand the speakers comments and i understand the superintendent's, because i went only after i saw this data and i we want and my husband said what is the matter?

i don't know, i feel like i true some kids under the bus and i think that this is what happened and i think that the folks kind of need to know where this a, to g, requirement came from it was sort of it was born in out of a campaign, and advocates said that they had many of their students in their youth group and also the parpts of the students and their students were getting integrated science and integrated math, and we would go and advocate for their students to get biology, and the counselor would say no. and the counselor would look directly at them and say i don't think that you will be successful in that class and then they would get for example, at washington high school, they only had an honors biology class and they did not have a regular class, and when a parent advocated, for his son

to be in a biology class they say no because it is only honors and he is not honors, and so he must take integrated science. and so we knew that integrated science would not prepare him for college. and in fact, as you know now, uc, and csus will not accept that and that father today was here by the way he was part of the qta, advisory group and he was told no, because your son will not be successful in that class. and so, we were seeing that in a, through g requirement was really the only way to give all and we do it very well, and we do two things for students. and we give them access to a, to g, classes and which we never allowed them to take before. and then the majority of the students who got integrated science and integrated math, and then some districts and

they get things like household math, or they get you know, all of this other stuff, right? the only way was to, i mean, if these students the majority of them were black and brown and when we looked at our graduation rate of who graduated a, through, g qualified, we saw that there was a huge disparity and a gap between black and brown students and our asian and white students, and now, we also firmly believe us on the board that we are students, and that our students are the foundation for the democracy and the livelihood of san francisco. and that we have a greater responsibilities than maybe some other schools do, because we educate everyone. and we educate quite frankly the future of san francisco. and so, we know in order to compete in san francisco you have to have the really higher skills. we have those of us who have gone out to the charter schools at the county jail, and

commissioner maufas and i, we know, that those men, 60 percent of them went to our schools. and we know that 85 percent of them had less than a fifth grade education and we know that that is wrong and so, at kol man, we had this campaign, and first, to identify the racial achievement gaps and then it was an a, through g, education requirement and so i would like the other employees the kol man, we feel, i guess, were extra hard on the district i have to say myself too. and because we feel such a personal responsibility to those students and those parents. and we told them help was coming. and we told them that we asked them to dreams for their children and every one of those dreams are to college education. and so when you see these numbers, i appreciate that we have the data now and it is so... and i think that we have to remember too, that we, our budget was cut, and our budget was cut, and i guess an

equivalent now, and what were you telling me, $200 million from when we first passed it but this is also the same that not everyone on this, and if decided to cut summer school and it was a community effort, that kol man actually went to the mayor and asked the mayor, we need summer school and we are going to have all of these 9th graders and that funded the first summer school and we didn't, and we captured so many students in that first summer school and so this has not always been an effort of us and but it has always been a community effort and when we look at this data i think that the most upsetting thing is, is that it does not look like we closed the gap. i mean, that i am just going to say that i feel like we have not closed the gap and the gap is huge, still. and i think that that is one of those upsetting things because, we also thought that the implemented an a, to g,

requirement and i am just going to say that i spoke to people who are said to me, the standards are too high already, and that those kids can't meet those standards but the asian and white kids are meeting them and we believe that the black and latino could meet them too and should have the opportunity too, and i understand the anger and the frustration, but i am angry and i am frustrated too. but i want to know how to do it better. and i want to look at this data and look at it in a very different way, and i want to go deeper with this and i want to look at subgroups and i would also like an accounting of all that the 2 million dollars, recovery went and how it was spent and what program and an evaluation of facts and i also think that we should be funding from the credit recovery money, because this is sort of an emergency situation. and i understand that we have tried a lot of different things

like on-line learning, we have tried summer schools and we have tried and i think that what this shows us as a district is that the catch, up is too costly and it does not work all of the time and it is really hard to do, and so you are right, another thing with the requirement does and i think that it has done in this district is made us look backward and made us look at what are we doing in math and middle school and math and elementary school and if our students can't pass that year of math, advanced algebra then what are we done wrong in the middle school and i think that it has made us do that. and so we have given the students access and we have just have not given them the most, or the as a much opportunity, or as many of them as we want to, the community. and i think that that is why the c, and the d, graduation thing is actually a really good data point for us also. and how far are we from

graduating or students a, through g, and all of the students athrough, g but how far are we from graduating all of the students a, through g with real opportunity, and it is false to state to a student that you have graduated a, through g but they have graduated with six, ds and we know in our heart that they are not college eligible for a four year, csu or uc that is a false promise and i think that we need to look at that and we need to look at our grading system and how we grade and i think that we need to also, make a commitment, and as a district, that we keep ourselves accountable, and i know that now, you know, as a board member and i am seeing the first graduating class that i want to hold myself accountable to them and sometimes it means making hard decisions about things and but we do it for the students. and so i just wanted to give

some context, about the historic and the history of a, through g and i want to commend ourselves, for actually adopting this higher level, of graduation standard because we firmly believe that all students can do this. and that is a very bold statement when other people were saying, that the standards are too high, and not all students are going to go to uc and csu, and you know what? it is our students also need the level of education and have living wage job and if we want to stop the school to prison pipeline, it stops here, i have a couple of concerns, and one is that those students who have not passed the kc, but they have passed the a, through, g graduation requirements that is a really hard thing, not to give them a high school diploma because the high school exit exam, the kc is only at an 8th

grade level. and if these students have passed all of our a, to g, requirements that is on us. and that is our fault. and that is not the students' fault and they have passed all of those a, through, g graduation requirements and yet they cannot pass the exit exam that is our quality of education and that is what we are not teaching them and i want all of us here, and in this district to really own that, and recognize, that this is on us, all right? and myself, too. and then, another thing though, i have a question for you, is that i don't understand what is happened, with these two numbers, and we see on page 4, that in the fall, we had 3805 students, and in the spring, we have 3593. what happened to those 212 students? who were they? and i think that our counselors today that they have told us

that they have kept track of every student, so who are these 212 students, and why did they leave? and where are they now? and do we, and where did they go? and i'm assuming though, that this data does not include continuation, does it? >> that is where they went. and in the fall when we ran the data, it had the continuation school students in it. and in the spring, when we ran the data we took those students, out. and the reason that we took them out is the requirements don't apply to those students any longer and so that is the bulk of those students and does it account for 100 percent of every single one of those 200 students? no, but does it account for the majority of those students, absolutely, so those students, they went nowhere and they are still in our continuation schools and they are going to graduate under a different set of requirements as per the board policy passage in january. >> so, could we also have an

update on the county school and the continuation schools, and how well, they have done? and then, i am wondering about the gate keeper classes, and that they are missing math and they are missing language, and so is it, what language are they missing? is it the second year of language that they are missing? is it that they did not pass the second year of language? also, with math, what, math courses and it is math and so which class are they missing? i think that, that this, or that type of information will help us narrow down, or maybe you know, i feel like i have always thought that those gate keeper classes we should lower the class size for them or offer a study lab or some sort of support, because if those were the gate keeper classes and then it is obvious that it is our students need some help with them and right?

and then i think that you know, the ds and fs and just i have to say that i, i don't know why we have fs. because an f, is it means that you just have to take it over and an f means that you get no credit and you have to take it over but incomplete means the same thing, but an f really? it means much more personally, and so, as a student who received an f, or two, i feel like it is sort of you feel like you failed. and sometimes you get 50 percent right is an f. and so really, did i really fail? and yeah, it is a class. but i feel like it is more of and it is more if we want to encourage the students to have that grit and that ten nasty to move on and that drive, and i mean, an f, sometimes devastating, you know?

and so i think that we should, and i think that it is time that we looked at grades and i know that is a bold thing to do and i feel like it is needed especially if we are passing the students a, through g and they are not passing the kc, something is going wrong here, right? and i, yeah, so i, i have a question, though, so, did the students in our county schools, do they need to pass the kc? also? >> >> the california high school exit exam is a state ed code requirement it is not something that we as a district operating in the state of california have an option with and so if it does not matter if they are in a county or in a district and in san francisco, and county, office of education, or san francisco unified school district, and the same rules apply in the california exit exam and they apply to the entire state. >> okay and i am going to ask

the general counsel to explore if there is some way that we can give these students a high school diploma. and even though, they have not passed the kc but they have passed all of the graduation requirements i just think that it is just wrong. and i don't think that there is anything that we can do but you know what? i am going to ask you it look for a loophole there. >> i am happy to take a look at it. >> president fewer, i am not optimistic that i will find anything and i will give it a look. >> i had a conversation from the attorney of the board also about this and because i think that we are all struggling because we are going toward a common core and the common core this does not correlate with the common core at all. and you know, this ant quaited high school exit exam and it does not and i feel like the people who are punished by this

are the students, and because the common core is not aligned to this and we are moving so quickly in this other direction. so i would like so when i was chair of the curriculum committee i called this item every month, and i feel like it should be a standing item every month. just because this is a moving target it seems like, it is changing all of the time. it is how many kids are, and in enrolled in these classes and how many are not, and i think that this learning year, can tell us really a lot about what we can do for the class of 2015 and 2016 and that is what i want to bring up, because in the last slide that you gave us at the curriculum committee it was also a little frightening about the class of 2015 and 16. and so i am equally as afraid for those students so i think

that we through this data let's really, use our best thinking to sort of not that we don't always, but, i think about what we can do for those students in 2015 and 2016. and again, i think that i would like a detailed budget, of how the credit recovery money was spent, and the impact that it has had, because if it has not had a lot of impact on some of the things that we have instituted and then maybe we have to try something else, because this is new, where we are trying to find out what is the best practice for our students and then i think that with the safe and supportive schools and with our rti and the behavior rti and you know, with our restorative practice and i feel like we can make some gains also, and but, this,

data, is sobering. i don't know how many we will be able to capture, i think that for this board to say that we could capture, i don't know how many, you know, all of these 738, it is beyonds optimistic. i don't think that it can be happen myself, we will try to capture as many, but i think that yeah, it is kind of sobering and the commissioner has a comment. >> yeah, i will be quick and thing that president fewer alluded to this, this is clearly a collaborativive effort from the beginning from it being brought forward as a policy to the board by the community and the coordination and collaboration with the students and i am sort of wondering if this stage where we are with that part of this effort and i know that the comments were brought up earlier and i had early as well from the folks from the pack

and the others who have participated with the a, through g task force and i know that we are kind of in another stage of this now, but, i would love to know and, for the public to know as well, where we are at in terms of our coordination and the collaboration with the community and the parents and the pack and the a, through, g task force, and sort of what the expectations are around the communication with them, and also, the recommendations that have been brought forward in the past, and to follow up and i think that we got to this point with working with the community and i think that we will be successful moving forward only if we work with the community and i know that is a priority and i want to make sure that we are continuing to prioritize that is taking the ideas and working together in partnership as we move forward. >> thank you. >> and so we want to work with the community, and there was an a, through g task force, and with all due respect, a task

force has a task and the task has been completed the implementation of the a, through, g policy, and the implementation is staff work. so looking at student data and counselor logs and the professional development and what are the extended learning opportunities, and that is all inherently staff work and so, we, we have reached out to pack, and what we are proposing is to have a regular briefing of the pack and so that the pack becomes for which we keep the community involved. and but i also want to make sure that there is a cautionary tale here and you heard it here first, preview of coming attractions because what is going to happen as we move forward, we have heard very, very loud and clear from the commissioners, that we want to know and we want to continue to build upon the data collection and the program and what is working and what is not working and someone has to do that work and so part of our budget

pro-posal as we forward is going to be the staff people that are going to do that work that are going to be able to drill down and do the evaluation and do the implementation, and do the community engagement work, and here you go, you are adding central office positions again and, this would be a central office position, but it is doing the work that we have identified through the policy, as important to the work of the district. and only because i was a musician and you start the song and you end the song on a positive note, i will tell you since 2009, when we implemented our a, mru g policy in san francisco we have seen an increase of 14 percent with or african americans student graduate rate, and as compared to 4.5 percent increase in our graduation rate over all for san francisco. and so, although, we still have not received that magical 100

percent, we starting to move the dial around african american graduation, and this is also, part of that work that we are going to keep on focusing on and i think that the gentleman who spoke who is a math teacher at one of our high schools, that is exactly what we are talking about, right? relevance, and rig or and relationships, you are not going to do it with just rigger alone it has to be the relationships that we about ld and that means that we are going to invest the staff time into up supporting the teachers. >> and i am sorry, i had one question. that i didn't tap the page, and it is mr. caffman when you talk about sprout funding and i wrote did when the school has the need and they don't have the funds they apply to that that? is that the process? >> and then like i love to know where that money comes from?

>> all right. commissioner, excuse me, so, the new college and career readiness, newsletter, excuse me, it is late. it has come out, and these story in it is the sprout fund and so it is in your boxes now. >> okay. >> it is my mail box. but to answer your question, the short answer is it comes from the p, funding. and that was credit recovery, and so, the long answer is in my newness to san francisco and in my conversations with they hired me, and in the discussions with the leadership was the idea of innovation and the developing