Proposed redesign of San Francisco school system
San Francisco parents are likely aware of these proposed changes. Feel free to pass along any other details that you are aware of.
More details are below as per the San Francisco Unified School District’s website passed along by Zephyr staff.
The proposed redesign was originally supposed to be done in time for the 2009-2010 school year apparently, which obviously didn’t happen. They’re then said it would be done for the 2010-2011 school year, but now the site is saying it’ll launch it for the 2011-2012 school year.
There are several proposed ideas of how to redesign the system, but the one that seems to have the most traction at this point isn’t neighborhood-specific (i.e. if you live in Noe Valley, you’re assigned to a Noe Valley school), but rather a zoning system similar to the Berkeley School District.
Basically, what this entails is dividing the City up into Zones (Berkeley, for instance, has three zones, though many more neighborhoods) which would each be ethnically/socioeconomically diverse. You would still rank your school choices as happens now, but are given priority to the schools that are in the zone where you live in order to help minimize what often happens now where there are some kids who have a 45 minute commute to school if they live in Silver Terrace and go to school in the Marina or live in Outer Sunset and go to school in Potero. It keeps kids closer to where they live, but still provides some choice and some balance at the schools.
Which way it will ultimately go is still not finalized though.
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