COVER

vcreporter.com Ventura School Board Candidates, Area 3

Amy Callahan

by Kimberly Rivers

kimberly@vcreporter.com

ELECTION

The quality of local schools impacts property values and adds to community character and vibrancy. Officials elected to school district boards manage millions in taxpayer dollars for the vital job of educating students.

Ventura Unified School District (VUSD) employs about 1,300 certificated employees and 850 classified staff members, making it one of the largest employers in the area, with a budget of about $200 million. It is governed by a five-member elected board. Two candidates are seeking the seat in Area 3: Jackie Moran, a mother and local realtor, who was elected to an at-large position and is running for the first time with area voting, and Amy Yamamoto Callahan, a mother, educator and education consultant.

In a Sept. 11, 2020, forum hosted by the Midtown Ventura Community Council and moderated by David Maron, Callahan and Moran responded to community questions.

Experience, literacy gaps in the spotlight

Explaining why she entered the race, Callahan said, “I was tapped on the shoulder” because of a “lack of experience that was being exhibited” by her opponent. Reflecting on Moran’s four years on the board, Callahan posited, “What really has been accomplished?” She added that Moran is “professining things that are just not true.”

“Experience matters,” said Moran about why she should be elected, touting her four years on the board and serving on the California School Board Association for the district.

Asked about “literacy gaps” in the district related to differences in socioeconomic status, Callahan charged the district with failing to address literacy with English language learners.

“We need to be looking at the data . . . [it is a fact] that there is not a single English learner at Ventura High School that has” tested as proficient in English, she said. “It starts with leadership, it starts with caring that every student” achieves literacy. She said the library must reflect that aim and should “mirror the diversity” of students and what they are seeing in “the world around them.” She said the district doesn’t have adequate “baseline” assessments to track student progress.

“Regardless of what Amy is saying . . . we have great markers,” said Moran. “All kids are tested and identified. This is not a specific child [but an] all-child issue, any child falling behind needs resources.”

Callahan pointed to her goal of bringing to the district a literacy program that is designed to ensure all students, including English language learners, are grade proficient by the end of the third grade — a program being used in other areas of the state and nation.

Moran said issues in learning need to be indentured “very early, rather than waiting until third grade” and that resources needed to be put in teachers’ hands early, claiming that the district has “made great progress and it’s charted.”

School bond measures

Both candidates agreed that Measure H should be approved as it renews necessary funding for work on district facilities, and they both agreed that the district needs to pass a new bond measure for additional funding, with the caveat that due to the pandemic now is not the time to ask the community to pass a bond.

Reopening the schools

Both Callahan and Moran expressed support for students getting back on campus when it’s safe to do so, but they disagreed on the best and safest way to reopen.

“We were working really hard with” our committee “through summer to figure out how we would reopen,” said Moran. The district came up with a hybrid model, with slight differences between elementary and grades six to 12. She described the “A-B format for elementary” as a kind of shift program, with group A going to campus for three hours and group B going for the other three hours each day. For middle and high schools, cohorts of students would attend in person on different days. Moran says the plans are designed to “keep exposure down,” and the district is preparing with “ a lot of PPE.”

But Callahan countered that the committee did not include outside experts and the state is developing best practices that differ from the district’s plans.

“The A-B model is not being looked at as the best, specifically because of safety,” said Callahan. You have to “think about cleaning and supplies.” She said others in education “haven’t found that [approach] the most successful. We need to “make sure our committees are not just internal committees,” and said the district needed to reach out to experts across the state for “best practices” that use a “pod-sized” approach.

Charter schools

“Unlike many school board members, I am not opposed to charters,” said Moran. She pointed out that students don’t all learn the same and having options is beneficial. “I think public school offers amazing things . . . I think we can compete fairly with all of them.”

“I’m a proponent of choice,” said Callahan. “I’m a proponent of public education. [We] need to make sure that charters are given an equal handshake here in Ventura County,” they are a “viable option in public education.”

Improving student achievement

Moran said that when she was first elected, the VUSD school board broke up the curriculum and instruction department into three departments, each with a new administrative head. “One for overseeing the whole thing, one for elementary, one for six-12 . . . it really became important during the pandemic” by making it easier to develop distance learning plans. She emphasized the need to identify students who are struggling in elementary school and get them “resources that they need” to ensure they don’t fall behind, and for middle and high school students to create “pairings with community college” so that they “come out not just with A to G [requirements] able to go to college, [but also with] real world experience.”

Callahan pressed that the district is not currently doing enough to ensure equal student achievement is possible.

“We need to take student achievement seriously,” she said, noting that effort would be “reflected in our LCAP,” or Local Control and Accountability Plan. “We do not have an indicator . . . a universal screener.” She said the district does not have a starting point from which to assess students. “So how are we able to track student achievement without having some of these metrics? As a community we really [need] to look at literacy, look at math, as our two core components. Right now we are not competing.”

Position on school resource officers

“Is there a need right now for school resource officers?” asked Callahan, adding that a conversation needs to take place “in partnership” with the Ventura Police Department, and that student assistant program counselors need to be considered as an alternative, with an eye to “restorative justice.”

“I am on the subcommittee for that role,” said Moran. She called the school officers “amazing” and explained that they must apply for the position and go through a rigorous vetting process. “They are parents of kids in our district, they love our students, they are good mentors.” Moran emphasized the officers “are not there to police our kids,” but rather to “make sure they are safe and feel safe.” She said the officers are “good with restorative justice practices” and conduct “outreach to communities of color.”

Potential budget cuts

A question was posed about what programs could be cut in the event of major budget impacts. Both Moran and Callahan agreed that the district has to ensure staff positions are protected, but neither candidate answered the question.

Moran plans to continue lobbying at the state and federal level for continued funding. “We have not had the horrific decline that we thought we were going to see,” due to federal funding assistance. She said “85 percent [of our budget] goes towards our staff; I don’t see a way to cut teachers. I don’t see a way to cut janitors.”

Vision for the future

While both candidates agreed that the immediate priority is students getting safely back on campus, their 5-10 year visions for the district were dramatically different.

Moran said she envisioned a trend toward smaller class sizes, largely due to online learning and the technology capabilities developed by the district during the pandemic. She’s “very confident [the] data [will] show a huge difference.”

Callahan said a “roadmap” is needed. The district needs “to be taking into account diversity and looking at addressing equity and access issues.” She said a plan needs to have “assigned metrics involved,” and a “functioning board, functioning cabinet. Making sure we have goals and metrics specifically identified around literacy,” to help close the achievement and equity gaps at the local schools.

Changing racist names of schools

When presented with a question about whether a school’s name should be changed if it’s racist or otherwise problematic, both candidates appeared to support change — although Callahan appeared more emphatic about it.

“Of course they should be renamed,” said Callahan. “I feel firmly about it . . . many Venturans feel that as well. it’s just what we need to do.”

Moran noted that community input and “all voices” must be part of the process when renaming or rebranding public property. She proposed that a committee with public input could be formed to make a recommendation to the board, for a “community-led approach.”

Ethnic Studies

The candidates were asked about whether they support ethnic studies being part of the curriculum. Both support it. Moran touted a plan she said the district developed, but Callahan challenged that assertion, pointing to state legislation that requires ethnic studies in high school.

“We are ahead of the curve on this one,” said Moran. She said an ethnic studies committee worked with a “friend” of hers at UCLA and other leaders to put together a year-long proposal that is now a high school graduation requirement. But she said that this committee plans to do more and embed it in K-12.

“There is more that we can do. I don’t think the VUSD authored [the curriculum]; it came through A to G requirements” from the state, Callahan said. She also emphasized that in addition to curriculum shifts, “systemic change around bias and race in our school systems” is needed to really address the inequities.

School of choice

Ventura Unified has approved the School of Choice program. The state allows a district to designate itself as such, which allows families to select the best school in the district for their children. Families are not bound to their neighborhood school.

“I don’t believe in boundaries,” said Moran. “We would be able to have our kids apply to any school they want to.” She said different specialities at schools will “attract different people,” creating a “stellar opportunity” for the student and the district.

Callahan also supports School of Choice and said the district can go farther and develop an “academy . . . linking to the workplace,” that would foster “different career pathways. We need to see more partnership, coalition building.”