San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Dedicated S.F. mom has seen enough
Leading volunteer pulls son out of public school
San Francisco mom Naomi Laguana has spent the better part of 11 years dedicated to the city’s public schools, volunteering in classrooms and the front office, serving as PTA president and leading the timeconsuming Parent Advisory Committee, which provides input to the school board.
Laguana was all in when it came to supporting the school district. Now, she is out.
After her son fell behind during distance learning, and his school appeared to have no specific plan to address learning loss in the fall, she and her husband decided to make the move to private school.
Laguana’s highprofile departure from the district — which includes resigning from her parent leadership role — is the latest blow to the city’s public schools, which has already lost hundreds of students during the drawnout distance learning last school year. It’s likely they will lose hundreds more by the fall, as families with the means to leave officially inform their schools of their departure or simply don’t show up in August.
“I had to do what’s right for my kid,” she said Wednesday. “I gave it my all, and it just didn’t work out.”
Her son, who will be in the eighth grade in the fall, “basically didn’t learn anything,” during the year of distance learning. Private assessments showed he was at least a year behind in math and not writing at grade level.
Laguana asked the district a simple question about the first day of school: “What is the plan on Aug. 17 to address the thousands and thousands of kids that have suffered from learning loss,” she said. “I don’t hear anyone talking about it.”
The district’s stated goal is to “foster highly engaged and joyful learners and support every student reaching his or her potential,” but that’s not happening, said Laguana, whose husband, Sharky Laguana, is president of the San Francisco Small Business Commission.
“They’re providing an education for all, a perfunctory education for all. They’re not going above and beyond,” she said. “It’s a broken system. This is not something a few angry parents can take on.”
The district is running expanded summer programs, including summer school and other academic programs, meant to address learning loss, but they weren’t open to every student. But Morgan Polikoff, University of Southern California associate professor of education, told The Chronicle in May that districts don’t know “the magnitude of what’s been lost because we don’t really have good measurement of that.”
He added that the summer will not be enough to make up for lost learning time.
The district has $60 million in state and federal funding to address learning loss, but it’s not yet clear how all the money will be spent.
District officials acknowledged Laguana’s dedication to the district and her desire to do what she feels is best for her child.
“Naomi has been a valued member of the PAC, and her work will truly be missed,” said board Vice President Faauuga Moliga. “I respect her decision, and I wish her and her family well.”
According to the district, her son is an average student in math, but based on an outside evaluation he clearly is lagging behind, unable to do gradelevel calculations, she said.
Laguana doesn’t believe her departure will spur change, including a deep dive into whether the district inflates student test scores or grades so it doesn’t appear their students’ academic performance lags behind those at private schools.
“People are looking at options,” she added. “We know that from people leaving the district and leaving the city.”
Her departure follows what has been a tense relationship between the parent advisory group and the school board, which rejected gay dad Seth Brenzel — nominated by Laguana and the other parents on the committee — because he wasn’t diverse enough. He was also part of a group calling on the school board to reopen schools.
Instead, on Tuesday, the board approved several new members, including one vocal school board supporter who was on the controversial school renaming task force. Mari Villaluna supported renaming 44 school sites, a recommendation approved by the school board and later rescinded following legal challenges. There are still no fathers on the committee.
Villaluna, who opposed Brenzel’s prior nomination, was previously a member of Parent Voices, a child care advocacy arm of the San Francisco Children’s Council, but was removed in a unanimous vote from the group for verbal abuse and “sucking the energy out of the group,” according to organizers.
“We had no choice but to cut our connections” with Villaluna, said Maria Luz Torre, Parent Voices founding organizer.
Villaluna has been an outspoken supporter of board member Alison Collins, who has sued five fellow board members for $87 million after they removed her from leadership posts over racist tweets Collins posted in 2016 against Asian Americans. Villaluna did not return requests for comment.
Laguana said she has faith the parent committee will remain a strong voice in the district, advocating for families. She just won’t be part of it anymore.
“I want to be the mom that made a difference,” she said. “I just don’t think I am.”