Superintendent's End of Year Message: 5-24-23

 

 

Dear SSFUSD Community,

The end of the year is upon us, and it’s been an eventful and remarkable year! The month of May provides us with the opportunity to recognize the many accomplishments of our students and a time to honor the efforts of our teachers and staff! To see what our students have been up to, please visit: https://www.ssfusd.org/stories.

 

There, you can learn about the many great things happening in SSFUSD, including the story of how our El Camino and South City High students recently took home 33 out of 39 scholarship awards at the South San Francisco Chamber of Commerce’s scholarship luncheon event. Also, if you haven’t done so already, please take some time to acknowledge and thank your children’s teachers and our other staff members for their tremendous work this year. The past three years have undoubtedly been difficult, and yet the efforts and commitments of our staff have been remarkable. Below are other important updates for your reading pleasure.

Last week, our school board approved a final draft of our new Portrait of a Graduate, which is a description of the knowledge and skills our community believes SSFUSD students need to know in order to be successful after graduating from our high schools. Thank you so much for your participation and support! We would never have reached this milestone without you. Almost 4,000 students, parents, employees, and members of the community took part in the process by filling out surveys and attending our virtual and in-person town halls, which were intentionally planned to ensure a student and equity centered profile. I’ve put together this short video to express my gratitude to you all.

Next, we will develop a strategic plan that will help our students achieve the outcomes outlined in our Portrait of a Graduate. That process starts in earnest in the fall of the 2023-24 school year, and we will engage you again in order to help finalize that plan.

After more than 30 years of service in education, our Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Dr. Jay Spaulding has announced his intention to retire at the end of the 2022-23 school year. We are thrilled to have recently hired Mr. Jason Hannon for this position. He currently oversees 13 elementary schools as an assistant superintendent in a nearby district. This is a bittersweet moment, as we say goodbye to Dr. Spaulding, but we wish him great joy and relaxation in his retirement. We are excited to also welcome two new elementary school principals next year. Angelica Garduno-Fletes has been officially appointed as Spruce Elementary School’s new principal, and Richard Yee will replace Mrs. Marybeth McLaughlin as principal at Los Cerritos Elementary School.  We wish them much success in their new roles.

With the immense amount of support from our community, the district was able to pass Measure T in November 2022 for $436 million. This school improvement bond measure will help repair and modernize our schools. Last month, our district successfully completed its financing and sale of the first series of bonds and has received $150 million. We appreciate your trust in us and your desire to help us improve our schools and community! This investment will keep our students safe, provide them with tools needed for a 21st century education, and enable the district to maintain a high-quality workforce. To that end, we are assembling a Citizens’ Bond Oversight Committee (CBOC) to assure the community that bond funds are spent in the fashion outlined in the district’s bond resolution. Please consider joining the CBOC.  For more information and to obtain an application, please visit the district’s website or contact  our Assistant Superintendent of Business Services Ted O.

As we think about our priorities going into next year, we will continue to focus on academic excellence, deepening our understanding of continuous improvement, prioritizing the ways in which we plan, teach, and engage our students in relevant, relational, and innovative ways. In addition to the strategic planning work and the focus on improving our school facilities, we will also prioritize alternative supports for students to ensure they feel a deeper sense of connection and belonging in SSFUSD. We are also excited about further developing the ways in which we recruit and develop the talent within SSFUSD to ensure our students continue to have highly qualified, diverse, and talented staff from which to learn and engage!

The school board with the commitment and support of my staff and me, will remain focused on exercising strong governance practices through an equity lens, where we shall continue to work collaboratively with our school leaders and educators to ensure equal access to educational opportunities for all students such that we can dismantle inequitable systems that are creating disparities or minimizing resources or access for our students, especially those most in need.

We are thrilled about the year ahead and enthusiastic about the ways in which we can partner with our families, students, and staff to ensure our efforts are done in collaboration with our community!

In closing, I want to thank you all again for your engagement, communication, partnership, and presence at the myriad events, activities and parent meetings we hosted this year. Your presence, participation and collaboration are incredibly important and valuable to us. I remain humbled and deeply grateful to serve in this role, and much of that is because of the relationships we have established in our community. I have so much love for you, our students, our staff, and the greater SSF community.

I wish you and yours a wonderful, restful, and inspiring summer filled with a lot of love, laughter, and fun! Take good care and be safe!

In gratitude and partnership,
Dr. Shawnterra Moore
Superintendent
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Estimada comunidad de SSFUSD,