SBCSS News and Press Releases

County Superintendent Delivers His Inaugural State of Education Address

2009-02-11

SAN BERNARDINO - Resolving the California budget crisis - with San Bernardino County schools and districts bracing to take an economic hit of $500 million over the next 17 months - is paramount to ensuring the long-term academic success of the county's 428,000 students, said County Superintendent Gary Thomas in his inaugural State of Education Address today.

"For our local districts, these are heart-breaking mid-year reductions," Thomas said in his address. "They take the form of teachers and classified employees; art, music and sports programs; after-school and tutoring programs; nurses, counselors and librarians; real genuine people and real services for students. Districts are left with no other choice than to plan for the worst."

The state budget was one of several highlights of Thomas' speech, which also focused on academic progress, closing the access and achievement gaps and reducing dropout rates.

Among those who attended the address were Jack O'Connell, state superintendent of Public Instruction, who introduced Thomas, and Pastor Joshua Beckley of Ecclesia Christian Fellowship, who served as the master of ceremonies for the event. Elected officials, educators and community partners were among several hundred who attended the address.

In terms of per-pupil funding, California ranks 47^th nationally without facing the task of more than $6.6 billion over the next 18 months.

"Is that what the voters of this state want for their children? To be at the bottom of the heap?" Thomas asked in his address. "The state's budget crisis, coupled with the national economic downturn, have severe consequences for all Californians, but the consequences to our schools will have a long-term effect.

"If we are going to secure the future economy of this state and nation, an investment in our public schools is an investment we cannot afford to cut."

The prospect of cuts cloud the momentum of student achievement that is being shown in the most recent data. In the state's most recent Academic Performance Index (API) scores, San Bernardino County students made gains of 12 points to 716 on the annual measurement of academic progress. A record 28 schools in the county reached the state standard of 800 for API Growth scores.

"Ultimately, for student achievement to soar, the classroom teacher is the most influential factor," Thomas said. "We can fight for school funding, have world-class standards, build better schools and buy more textbooks, but our efforts will be for naught if we do not have highly effective and well-trained teachers in our classrooms. I want to thank our teachers who everyday, step-by-step, are building our youth into successful, productive adults."

In addition to the API Growth improvements, nine county schools were able to exit Program Improvement, an intervention program for schools who do not make their Adequately Yearly Progress for two consecutive years under the federal No Child Left Behind legislation. For the second consecutive year, San Bernardino County schools bucked the state trend with decreasing numbers of schools in Program Improvement status.

While there has been improvement in specific areas of the achievement gap - county Hispanic and African American students are significantly closer to White students' proficiency scores in mathematics on the state Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) results than their peers around the state - there remains an overall persistent and troubling gap between under-represented students and their more advantaged peers. "It is our students with the greatest needs that I fear will be most harmed by disastrous budget cuts," Thomas said. "They have the potential to exacerbate the access and achievement gap we are working so hard to address."

Another concern is the high dropout rates in high school teamed with low college-going rates for county students. The one-year dropout rate for the 2006-07 academic year for San Bernardino County was 7 percent - above the state average of 5.5 percent. The four-year derived dropout rate for the county was 26 percent, compared to 21 percent statewide. High dropout rates translate into low college-going rates. San Bernardino County ranks 12th from the bottom among California counties for those 25 and over with a high school diploma and 12th from the bottom among California counties for those 25 and older with a bachelor's degree.

Finding solutions to reversing these trends has been the task undertaken by County Schools, particularly in support to low performing schools and districts to transform the whole system of a school from governance at the district level to directly affecting classroom practice.

Programs addressing these issues include:

• Principal Coaching to help districts grow their own administrators within their own teaching ranks, and supporting the growth of Professional Learning Communities -- a collaborative culture of adults on a school campus feeds academic achievement for all students.
• Building on the successful work of the PROMISE Initiative, County Schools works with five other Southern California county offices of education to expand the knowledge base of best practices for English Language Learners.
• Because algebra is critical to students passing the high school exit exam and for college entrance, there has been an expansion of algebra 1 professional development for teachers to align standards, and increase relevance, rigor and success for students.
• Working with a highly knowledgeable team of experts, County Schools is developing a model system to assist districts in reducing their dropout rates. This model will incorporate data analysis and best practices used in our P-16 Councils, the Alliance for Education and Regional Occupational Programs.
• Knowing that children in early childhood education and preschool programs start school prepared to learn and show greater success in school, County Schools' KidsNCare program expanded this past year, providing child care services for 7,000 additional children through CALWORKS contracts.
• Working in partnership with the San Bernardino County School Boards Association and retired superintendents, County Schools instituted a series of Boardsmanship Workshops to strengthen the district superintendent/governance teams in county districts.

"In these very turbulent economic times for our state and our nation, we must make the absolute best choices on behalf of our children," Thomas said. "These are sometimes difficult choices, but I am confident that if we work toward a common purpose, a common good, we can build upon our traditions of excellence, and all of our students will have the opportunity to soar to new heights."