School Beat: Welcome Back to School

The challenges facing our district this year are once again familiar and large—the achievement gap between African-American and Latino students on the one hand and Caucasian and Asian-American students on the other, insufficient funding, and declining enrollment, to name some of the top contenders. But what’s different now is the climate, which in contrast to the daunting issues before us has an optimistic and energized feel to it. Some of that is no doubt attributable to the presence of a new top administrator. But fortunately there is more to it than that, both in terms of Garcia himself and in terms of where the entire community of public school supporters is positioned.

In regards to Garcia, unlike past superintendents he is more of a known entity, having been a successful principal of Horace Mann Middle School in the Mission district earlier in his career. Principals, teachers, staff and administrators have worked with him. In this way, we have the best of both worlds—a leader with a track record who also has the potential to take us in new directions.

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