Striking Parallels Between San Francisco USD Board and SPS Board

 In news that has some parallels to the current situation in Seattle Public Schools, three members of the Board for San Francisco were ousted from their positions in a recall by over 72% of the vote. This includes the Board president. 

From the NPR story (bold mine):

San Francisco Mayor London Breed, who endorsed the recall, heralded the results.

"The voters of this City have delivered a clear message that the School Board must focus on the essentials of delivering a well-run school system above all else," she said in a statement after the polls closed.

What was the San Francisco School Board focused on?

In January 2021, it spent time debating a plan to rename 44 public schools - among them those named for Abraham Lincoln, and current U.S. Senator and former San Francisco Mayor Dianne Feinstein. Breed, at the time, said she could not understand "why the school board is advancing a plan to have all these schools renamed by April, when there isn't a plan to have our kids back in the classroom by then."

Yes, while COVID was in full swing in Seattle Schools, the then-president, Zachary DeWolf, and then-VP, Chandra Hampson, were off on their own causes, seemingly leaving all the concerns about COVID to the superintendent. Hampson was busy dismantling HCC (and keeping the meme that the segregation in SPS is ALL because of HCC which is ludicrous) and DeWolf was busy getting trees planted to honor graduating seniors. Another parallel:

(Board member Alison M.) Collins appears to have been recalled by the largest margin, with more than 78% of voters opting to remove her. She sued the school district, the city and individual commissioners of the school board in March 2021 after the commissioners voted to remove her as the panel's vice president. It did so after years-old tweets she wrote surfaced that many called racist toward Asian Americans. Collins sought more than $80 million in damages, but the suit was dismissed.

Chandra Hampson currently has a lawsuit going against the district because of the investigation both she and DeWolf demanded found that they used their "positional authority" to harass and intimidate two senior Black staffers. It appears from Hampson's court filing and the court dates around it that she and the district may be in negotiation for  some kind of settlement (because who really wants a trial)?

I'm sure Hampson and the district want this all to go away but again, if people had acted as adults, none of this would have happened in the first place. And, by settlement I don't mean monetary but rather, some kind of statement from SPS saying the investigator got it wrong? Overstated? Anything so that Hampson won't have self-wrecked her own chances of ever getting elected again.

Yet another parallel is the fact that some of the anger against the three eliminated directors was over changes to San Francisco USD's highly capable program.

Lastly,

The district, which serves more than 50,000 students at 130 schools, faces declining enrollment and a budget deficit. The board will need to hire a replacement for retiring superintendent Vincent Matthews.

Sounds familiar.

I will again state my opinion - Hampson is a bully. She has worked tirelessly to dismantle HCC and now is going after Option Schools. (Option School parents, you better WAKE UP and do something.) She loves to say, over and over, that her constituents are the people who elected her. Except that when you get elected to school board, you are to listen to and represents ALL parents. She certainly has not done that with the parents in her district who voted for her in her primary. You do not get to ignore large swaths of parents out of hand.

She truly should be primaried out if she runs again.

I'm also making my prediction that, in the end, the Seattle School Board will keep Brent Jones as superintendent. Mayor Bruce Harrell, in a speech yesterday, singled out Jones and that kind of relationship would be hard to build again with a new superintendent. 

Here's what Harrell said in his speech yesterday that references/applies to SPS:

Over the last several months, the City has closed some of the largest encampments Seattle has seen – like Green Lake, Broadview Thomson, and Ballard Commons – providing over 400 people with shelter and support. 

And 

We are forging a new relationship with our Seattle Public Schools at a time when supporting public education – and the 56,000 kids enrolled in our Seattle Schools – has never been more important. Working with Superintendent Dr. Brent Jones and the School Board, we are going to make sure Seattle students receive the support they need coming out of this pandemic, and the educational tools to thrive in a changing economy.

And 

I look forward to partnering with Education Chair Tammy Morales on how we can do more for Seattle kids and students, including increased access to high quality, affordable preschool and to post-secondary education through the Seattle Promise. Her passion and commitment to drive equity through education is a shared principle of ours.