Five Santa Barbara County Schools Named California Distinguished Schools

Congratulations to all these schools. Peabody Charter School is an excellent model because they are one of the only campuses to implement an approach to reading that is evidenced based, using the science of reading approach instead of the failed whole word , balanced literacy approach. The former is explicit and teaches decoding, the sound letter correspondence while the latter is known as cueing system and encourages guessing at word from context and pictures. It is the culprit for dismal reading scores across the nation. 22 states have banned it. Hopefully more schools in our district will do what this charter school has done. Not easy to train all the teachers in this method but definitely worth it for our students and their success. Congrats Peabody and the other Goleta Schools as well as Cold Springs which has generous funding put to good use.

Not one regular Santa Barbara elementery school listed. Why? Because they are failing our children. Only about 50% of SB City elementery school kids have a grasp of English or Math. English is the international language, not Spanish! The SB School District has done one thing well: It has become a springboard for local Democrats to further their political careers.

Both Laura Capps and Monique Limon dumped their duty to our children and quit the school board part way into their terms on the board. Both of these women have the
sheer guts to say that they "care for our chil;dren"? They care only for their own political careers! Prove I am wrong, ladies!

Senator Monique Limon has and continues to work hard for our children. She helped get bill SB 237 through the senate. This bill was about getting screeners to test for students struggling to read and intervening. It never got out of assembly and was fought by the teachers union. Screeners are part of a proactive approach that would keep 70% students out of special ed which costs districts 4x more. Capps has only been a county supervisor for a month or so.

From what I understand, you have to apply. It isn't an automatic designation based on anything. I do think you might get an invitation to apply based on something, but I'm not 100% sure. Let's celebrate the schools that achieved the designation, but not put down other schools because they chose to work on other things or needed to direct their energies elsewhere. I'm sure the schools that worked hard to apply and who effectively demonstrated what wonderful work they do would appreciate the focus staying on their accomplishments. What you may find is that praising and heralding success proves more helpful in inspiring change than biased, negative assumptions and criticism.

Limon hasn’t done jack, but to tour Lou t maybe she’s getting killed by the teacher’s union. I wouldn’t doubt it. It’s powerful union in CA. I’ll put money on it. And they use their power not to further their “stated mission” - to educate the next generation.

We’re at one of these “awarded schools”, and I think that all this article is about is a PR attempt. Salcido and Thurmond, that’s on you . ALL our local schools are doing poorly. It’s not about Cold Spring vs. Isla Vista, etc. It’s about a way higher level than that. CA vs. elsewhere in the US is a starting point, but for how much we are spending per student in CA we are underperforming in a global sense.

Everyone was counting on Washington Elementary to be on the top of the list. Thankful that we moved and ended up with Foothill School!

Shameful that no standard SBUnified schools were on this list. Super shameful! I don’t put the blame solely on the local small town politicians. The whole school system is full of politicians and ladder climbers who don’t really care about teaching kids and smoke screen the community with educational jargon and hope the kids catch up eventually. It’s pathetic and old and high time people stand up and demand more.

When an elementary school is predominately low-income Hispanic, language is a problem. Highly ranked schools have involved parents who can help kids with their homework and speak English at home as well as their native language. Parent-teacher meeting are fully attended; kids with problems of any nature, including brain issues like autism and ADHD, and transportation to tutoring are identified early and help made available. This county is almost 50:50 European:Hispanic gene pool; in the age groups under 18, Hispanic is the majority. This age group is the future. Early education is crucial if we want to see Hispanic names start to appear on the donation lists not need-assistance lists. If little kids get good primary educations, they're on the path to can get further education and better jobs. They aren't stuck in doldrums that encourage crime and in dispair, substance abuse and violence. Many government and front office jobs already require bilingal Spanish and English. Successful applicants need to be fluent in both. That's the reality. You can argue whether that's what you want, but your time would be better spent seeing that all kids become enabled to be a credit not a debit in the future. Don't you want to see some Hispanic names on donation lists not only need lists?

1853: Listen to podcast by Emily Hanford if you want to understand what is needed to have latinex students, students with learning differences , foster youth and those with economic hardship learn to read. The science of reading is evidenced based and focuses on teaching decoding.. breaking up words and teaching the sound letter correlation through 5 basic areas: phonemic awareness, phonics, comprehension, fluency and vocabulary. Balanced literacy heavily promoted by Lucy Calkins is based on the cueing system which is basically guessing at a word from pictures or context. 40% of students will learn to read even with this failed approach but the other 60% of students will not. They need an explicit, sequential approach focused on decoding. Lucy Calkins loves to repackage her dismal program to keep get millions and millions a year. 22 states banned it. Even Mississippi which has high poverty( like California) banned it years ago and is now the only state to show reading gains during the pandemic. Emily Hanford explains it all in "Sold a Story" also google Lucy Calkins New York times . She is back peddling on her own program. Besides using a science of reading approach successful districts use a proactive approach which includes screening early in 1st grade for all readers, teacher training in science or reading because currently teachers don't learn this in their colleges. That is changing though, by 2025 teachers will be trained in colleges in this successful method. Lastly we need intensive interventions early for all who struggle. 95% reading proficiency is possible if we follow these steps but sadly politics and the teachers union is not fully supporting this yet so it needs to come from the public demand. Soon only half the students reading proficiently won't be acceptable. Remember when it was acceptable to smoke on airplanes and restaurants, or have a few drinks and drive... None of that is happening now. And similarly 50 % proficiency for students will not be acceptable to parents or communities because it hurts us all.

According to the letter, "The exceptional elementary schools recognized this year are illustrative of the hard work, dedication, and resilience shown by educators and schools across the state after communities struggled for multiple years with urgent effects to physical and mental health and unprecedented challenges to delivering education." What a farce. Four of these schools, the exception being Peabody, are the only elementaries on the South Coast with <20% socially disadvantaged students. I feel for the teachers, admin, and families from others schools who likely worked even harder to meet the needs and fight learning loss among their students. Psuedo-awards like these only perpetuate segregation and the achievement gap.

Letmego: Test scores were painfully low for our subgroups before the pandemic. google Independent
" https://www.independent.com/2019/09/25/schools-test-scores-flat-or-dismal-depending-on-who-you-ask/ Sept 19th 2019 article: Tensions flare over stagnant test scores. Click on link to CAASP scores and go to slide 10. It is clear about 60% were years behind their peers. Now with pandemic these students are even worse off. This is a serious issue that our community needs to talk about in town hall type situation. Listen to Emily Hanford " Sold a Story". Our students who were in 1st grade during pandemic are now in 3rd. Their scores were dismal before the pandemic. We need to embrace a proactive approach to reading , reduce class sizes and make sure ALL students are successful. The literacy disparities is what is driving the achievement gap. Other districts and states who follow science of reading and early intervention succeed. No one wins unless everyone wins.