Por Ashley Mackin | Editor SDUN

At a Board of Education meeting on Nov. 29, the San Diego Unified School District (SDUSD) Board reviewed the first set of recommendations from the school Realignment/ Closure Committee.

In an initial plan, which was presented to community members and parents in early October, approximately 10 schools were slated for closure for a $5 million savings. Franklin Elementary School in Kensington was included on the list.

At the Nov. 29 meeting, SDUSD Deputy Superintendent of Business Phil Stover gave a presentation outlining the new recommendations, which focus primarily on the realignment and consolidation of five schools, as opposed to closures. The presentation and following discussion were presented as information items only, and no decision was made at the meeting.

Stover explained the purpose was to “give you some further information [and] concepts about the five recommendations that we have and for [the Board] to ask questions.”

Stover continued to explain that cost savings was no longer the primary factor in how the committee came to these recommendations. “The shift of these recommendations has changed from being primarily driven by cost and cost savings to being driven by recommendations that we believe will provide a better opportunity for students academically to learn,” Stover said, “both from a…breadth of curricular perspective and… from a facilities perspective.” Stover added that certain recommendation have a cost savings as a part of the proposal.

One of the recommendations was to consolidate the San Diego High School of Communications with San Diego High School of Science and Technology.

San Diego High School currently has six sub schools with individual themes housed in one complex located at 1405 Park Blvd. next to Balboa Park. The consolidation would provide an approximate saving of $90,000, according to a SDUSD sales team analysis.

Another recommendation read at the meeting was to consolidate the four schools in the Crawford High Education Complex, located at 4191 Colts Way, outside of Talmadge, into one school with four pathways.

The schools include the School of Community Health and Medical Practices; Invention and Design Educational Academy; School of Law and Business; and Multimedia and Visual Arts School. The pathways at the unified school would replicate the separate schools in their programs.

The sales team analysis estimated a $370,000 saving from this consolidation.

The following are the three remaining recommendations listed in Stover’s presentation, as it was presented to the Board: “Close the Barnard campus-predicated on the identification of a larger site in better condition that will enable the Mandarin Immersion Program growth to a Pacific Rim Language Academy,” “Change the grade level configuration of Lincoln cluster K-6 schools to K-5 to support articulation with Knox and [Millennial Tech] middle schools,” “Consolidation of Pacific Beach Middle and Mission Bay High schools into a 6-12 grade Imperial Beach Academy.”

The decision regarding these recommendations will be made at a Dec. 13 meeting at 5 p.m. at 4100 Normal St. For more information, visit sandi.net/boe.

School Board member Richard Barrera emphasized the importance of coming to a decision at the Dec. 13 meeting. “We can’t just leave these schools sitting without any clarity about what their future is in this district,” he said.