Dear SUHSD Board of Trustees,

My husband and I had a chance to attend last week’s board meeting. As parents of a tenth grader at Menlo-Atherton High School and an eighth grader who is considering attending MA, we have both had direct experience of the topics discussed (“Streamlining Course Offerings and Creating More Diverse Learning Environments to Increase Student Access and Success”) and will be directly impacted by the decision you make, so we care deeply. As a result, we wanted to hear everyone out fully, and stayed until 1am to do so. Consequently, we dedicated time to reflect on the comments and the presentations made during the board meeting, and we wish to contribute additional perspectives to the ongoing discourse. In my brief conversation during a break with the Board member Carrie Du Bois, she mentioned that the board remained open to comments from those taking the time to participate in this open forum. We really appreciate this encouragement and having this opportunity to share our thoughts with all of you. Our comments are divided into two sections: (1) reflections on the issue of “detracking” and (2) observations on the process employed to examine this issue.

Reflections on the issue of replacing the two Freshman English Classes with one “Blended” class: 

Towards the end of the meeting, our Board President, Rich Ginn, posed a highly insightful question: how does the new Multicultural Literature and Voice course at Menlo-Atherton High School differ from AS English I and Benchmark English I? While teachers spoke passionately about the problems with the old AS English I class and the improvements made when designing MCLV, this begs the question whether observed improvements came from delivering a better class vs. putting all children in a one-size-fits all blended environment. The response to Mr. Ginn from the administration indicated that the new course was designed with higher standards and the latest educational best practices, reducing what teachers perceived as burdensome and less valuable homework. Neither the teachers in the meeting, nor the authors of the study ever quite addressed the crux of the question, however: to what extent did the reported improvements in educational performance among SED (Socioeconomically Disadvantaged) students result from better-designed courses with heightened standards and expectations, rather than from the inclusion of students who would otherwise have taken AS English II. The report, as presented, cannot definitively answer this question. In fact, it implies that it was the class design with raised expectations vs. English I Benchmark, that had a greater impact, not the integration of students across a broad spectrum of levels into the same classroom. The report’s summary on page 11 states, “The results of this study... suggest that when students have greater access to rigorous coursework and are held to high standards, they are more likely to meet those expectations.” This is indeed promising for students who moved from a class that didn’t hold them to high standards, but did it come at the cost of holding other students to a lower standard than they would otherwise have been? 

The report did not adequately investigate potential policy harm resulting from detracking experiments thus far. For instance, concerning the merger of English I and AS English I at Menlo-Atherton into a new class Multicultural Literature and Voice (MCLV), the report mentions on page 14, “With regard to 9th-grade English course pass rates, the change seems to have made no difference for non-SED students.” It also acknowledges data limitations concerning 10th-grade enrollment: “With regard to 10th grade English course enrollment in AS English II, it may be too soon to tell the long-term outcomes as only one affected cohort has completed 10th grade.“(Pg.14) To test the hypothesis that eliminating more advanced course offerings might harm advanced students at Menlo-Atherton, the only solid data point examined focused on pass rates for non-SED students in a less rigorous class. Teachers freely admitted that the new class included less reading than the previous AS class and that challenging books, like Tale of Two Cities, were replaced with excerpts or less challenging tests. In addition, a lot of reading in MCLV was done in the classroom (vs given as homework), leaving less time for in-class discussion of the material or writing. While it is possible that some level of revision regarding the quantity and type of reading assigned may have been beneficial, it is hard to believe that there is no value to students from having the option to take a class in which they read and write more and have more class discussions. 

Nevertheless, the report authors confidently conclude that the streamlined course offerings “caused no harm.” As much as one might hope that that is in fact the case, the data presented in the report certainly does not demonstrate this. In fact, the board does have access to data that may indicate the opposite. Multiple students reported directly to the board in person, via parents, board members, and the student representative, that they do believe that the MCLV was not as rigorous as AS English I and didn’t prepare them as well as they would have hoped for AS English II. This is completely consistent with what we have heard from our son from his own and his MA friends’ experience. 

Moreover, the report appears to repeatedly assume non-SED students are all advanced students and vice versa, using these terms interchangeably. Shouldn’t there be a more nuanced analysis that considers both dimensions: (1) SED vs. non-SED and (2) advanced (above grade level), at grade level, and below grade level, to better understand the impacts of the elimination of opportunities for advanced students to work harder and challenge themselves to a greater degree? Advanced students from non-SED backgrounds may find alternative means to supplement their learning, while advanced students from SED backgrounds might be the segment most adversely affected by the elimination of choices in the freshman year of their public school. Regrettably, no attempt was made to assess this impact. 

It also strikes me that so many of the teachers and administrators were so quick to dismiss the testimonials provided by the students who came to speak. Despite the fact that a group of racially diverse students took hours to attend in person to nearly-unanimously decry the changes made, and that many spoke about the number of SED students who did not support the changes, it was assumed that the students’ experience could and should be dismissed as they only spoke for one small subset of the student population, and that teachers and school administrators who came to the meeting best knew the interests of the SED student population. 

It is also worth noting that not all teachers support the position shared by those teachers who were able to attend the meeting. In the open letter to the board signed so far by 24 teachers from Carlmont High School Staff, they shared: “Teaching in a class predominantly composed of advanced students requires an exclusive focus on their needs, while a class with struggling students demands significant time and attention to bring them up to grade level. These are fundamentally different challenges that detracking fails to address effectively. As educators, we understand that helping struggling students achieve mastery is one of the most demanding tasks in education. Maximizing instruction time to meet their needs, while also catering to a wide range of other skill levels, can be counterproductive and lead to less effective outcomes.”

I would like to share our son’s observations regarding his experiences with Multicultural Literature and Voice (MCLV) and AS English II at MA. In his words,

“MCLV felt very easy. We ended up spending a lot of time just reading in class, rather than reading as homework.
The idea of creating a”high ceiling, low floor” was good on paper but not in practice. For example, the material read in the class wasn’t challenging enough to promote learning among advanced students, therefore the “ceiling” was actually considerably lowered for advanced students.
In addition, we wrote less than 5 essays in the entire year of MCLV! Teacher feedback on my essays was minimal and simply pointed out elements of the guidance rubric that I didn’t do. For comparison, in my AP World History class that I am taking this year, we are working up to writing one essay every week or two! I am getting a lot more writing practice in the first few weeks of AP history than I had in my entire year of freshman English class. I don’t feel I was well prepared for AS English II. On the first test at AS English II, our class’ average score was C minus, highlighting how MCLV didn’t provide adequate preparation for students who choose to go into AS English II. A number of SED students who signed up to take AS English II have already dropped the class or seem to be struggling.”

We are not the first school district in the country to attempt changes like these. Reviews of previous research on detracking have shown little convincing evidence of its benefits; in fact, we see that it may exacerbate existing disparities.

• The article “San Francisco Detracking Experiment” serves as a cautionary tale highlighting how achievement gaps can widen despite best intentions to narrow them. The author of the above-mentioned article further concludes: “Whether detracking can assist in the quest for greater equity is an open question. It could, in fact, exacerbate inequities by favoring high achieving children from upper-income families—who can afford private sector workarounds—or with parents savvy enough to negotiate the bureaucratic hurdles SFUSD has erected to impede acceleration. As I have written elsewhere, the voluminous literature on tracking is better at describing problems than in solving them. The evidence that detracking promotes equity is sparse, mostly drawing on case studies that are restricted in terms of generalizability of findings to other settings and with research designs that do not support causal inferences.”
• In an article “Does detracking promote equity?“the Brookings Institute similarly notes that schools experimenting with detracking have not produced compelling results to convince educators to abolish tracking.

We hope SUHSD will not become the next district highlighted in the media for decisions that may have contributed to widening, rather than narrowing, the achievement gap.

Moving Forward:

After listening to all the perspectives offered, I definitely see that the old system was far from perfect and that we should and must work to provide opportunity to all students, not just some. Simply reinstating honors and remedial courses as they were designed several years ago may not be the best course of action. As teachers noted during the meeting, in many cases some of those advanced as well as remedial classes did not consistently apply best educational practices.

Instead, we should design differentiated class options to meet students where they are and incorporate the latest and greatest pedagogical and educational methods. For example, the current Multicultural Literature and Voice class in MA could continue to be an option as it appears to be superior to the previous English I class. In addition to that, a new English class could be designed for students (of all socio-economic backgrounds) who are ready for or desire a greater level of work and challenge than offered by the base MCLV with a focus on more/advanced levels of writing, reading and in-class discussions. Rather than look at this as a track for those more advanced, one could simply present it as an option for those wanting to put in more work, go deeper into material, and be held to a higher standard. The goal of the class would be to better prepare kids for the demands of classes such as AP World History. This point from the open letter from Carlmont High School staff is very pertinent in this regard: “While the pursuit of equity is commendable, we should also consider providing equity of choice. If students seek access to rigorous standards and national recognition, we should not deny them that opportunity.”

It is quite surprising that no surveys of parents were done given the huge impact of this policy shift. In various workplaces, employee surveys help evaluate engagement, well-being, and collect feedback that leads to ongoing improvements. Customer surveys are ubiquitous. It is essential to start asking parents for their feedback through well-constructed surveys, both open-ended and with measurable data points, to improve their children’s educational experience.

Reflections on the Process:

We observed several shortcomings in the process:

• Parents’ and students’ concerns were not adequately acknowledged or addressed in the summary report.
• The study felt more like an attempt to defend the policy changes rather than a non-biased effort to truly understand the positive and negative effects of changes with the potential to profoundly positively and negatively impact a significant portion of the school population.
• The report authors primarily represented one side of the debate, missing an opportunity for an inclusive discussion. Time should have been allocated in the meeting for the SUHSD Students First organization to present their analysis of collected feedback from parents and students.
• A more productive approach would have involved giving stakeholders on both sides of the issue a chance to first present their findings, followed by a Q&A session to address specific questions, followed by public comments. Going with public comments first didn’t provide an adequate opportunity to the public to understand both sides of the issue at a deeper level before offering their comments. Several of you, in your comments towards the end of the meeting, expressed a desire for more of a dialogue as opposed to having two sides talk past each other. This is in your hands to impact by re-evaluating the process used for meetings open to the public like the one we had.

Given the importance of the question at hand, in addition to reinstating at least some of the more advanced class offerings at the freshman level but in a new format, as mentioned earlier, we respectfully ask the Board to select an external, independent contractor for a comprehensive research and analysis of this issue that can be done in parallel. A skilled researcher should include not only passing rates, grades, enrollment data (including number of students who dropped a class to measure survivorship bias) and apply a more nuanced data tagging approach of both socioeconomic dimension and grade level readiness dimension, as mentioned earlier, but also students’, parents’, and teachers’ sentiment and feedback collected via unbiased surveys and interviews, as well as any other pertinent data. An independent research expert not affiliated with the school district administration would limit the inherent bias towards the current policies and direction of the administration and add credibility.

In summary, the decision-making process regarding detracking and course offerings demands careful consideration and improvement. We believe that addressing these concerns and adopting a more transparent approach with an unbiased independent research study will lead to more equitable outcomes for all students. Thank you for your consideration.

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Dear SUHSD Board of Trustees,

Having read the AS/ Honors course elimination report, I would like to respectfully ask that these courses be reinstated. There is no evidence in this report that doing away with the AS / Honors courses has accomplished its desired goals. 

A) Instead of lifting the floor, we have dropped the ceiling: more advanced students are unable to take challenging courses. Worse yet, this hurts the very populations that the move was supposed to help. Rather than increasing access to advanced courses and promoting equity, we are eliminating opportunities. Abolishing AS/ honors guarantees that socioeconomically disadvantaged students can’t take them. Further, a ramp onto AP courses has now been eliminated.

B) The high grades are observationally equivalent: it may be that all students are excelling. But it is equally likely that the grades are now being inflated, since no one wants to fail students who no longer have a less challenging class to take. Grades have increased: test scores have not.

C) There is an increased worry that AP courses will be next: AP European history already got dropped at Woodside. If the point (as the report states) is that students should take the most challenging courses available to them, then why not drop the AP courses? Doing so would ensure that all students would be “taking the most challenging courses available".

D) There is no evidence that the students’ performance has improved: their test scores remain virtually the same. More students are taking them: but there is no evidence that dropping AS courses increased access to AP testing.

Eliminating these courses only eliminates opportunities for students, including socioeconomically disadvantaged ones. It means students can’t be challenged or as well-prepared for more advanced courses. One can see why many parents view this as dumbing down in the name of equity, rather than lifting up all students.