Save Fresno Unified is a partnership between Fresno Citizens for Good Government and the citizen advisory group who produced the “Choosing our Future” report. "Choosing our Future" is a plan to turn Fresno Unified from one of the worst school districts in the nation to what we hope will become one of the best. Nothing is more important to the future prosperity of our community. Our purpose is to monitor progress of the District and to encourage community support for this ambitious and vitally important turn-around effort.
For benchmarking purposes, the Task Force selected the eight California school districts that most closely resembled Fresno in size (50,000 to 100,000 students) and demographics. The Clovis school district was added only because the Task Force felt readers would want to see that comparison, even though Clovis is considerably smaller and has significantly different demographics than the other benchmark districts. All benchmark data is included in Appendix “C” and where relevant in the body of this report.
The following charts and graphs show key statistics for the ten benchmark districts, including Fresno Unified. Where applicable, State averages are also shown. All data is from published sources, using the latest year for which comparable data is available.
Summarizing the preceding graphs, FUSD has: - the second largest enrollment in the benchmark group, after Long Beach Unified; - more students per school, on average, than all districts except Long Beach Unified; - comparable ethnic diversity, except for Clovis and San Juan, although the mix of ethnic groups varies significantly; - higher poverty level (as measured by the percent of students receiving free and reduced lunch) than all other districts, except Santa Ana (although all districts except Clovis and San Juan are at 60% or higher). - An average number of English Language Learners (EL), although considerably lower than Santa Ana and Garden Grove; - The fourth lowest class size and teacher/pupil ratio; and - The fourth highest total revenue per ADA, after Oakland, San Francisco and San Juan (Note that Clovis is significantly lower than Fresno).
The graphs below show comparative student achievement data for the ten districts. Fresno has:
- The highest percentage of schools in the bottom decile (the lowest 1/10th of the State); - The second lowest percentage of schools in the 6-10 decile range (the top 50% of the State); - The third highest number of schools in “AYP Program Improvement” levels one through four; and - An Academic Performance Index (API) that ranks second from the bottom.
The percentage of FUSD schools that are in the bottom 10% of the State is a particularly appalling statistic in light of the fact that California today ranks 48th among the 50 U.S. States in NAEP reading and math scores (See Rand Report, “California’s K-12 Public Schools – How Are They Doing?”). That suggests that 51% of our schools are among the lowest ranked in the nation. If we are to turn around the social and economic prospects of our region, the process must begin with turning our schools around. For definitions of these performance measurement terms, please see Appendix C.
Additional benchmark information for the ten districts can be found in Appendix E. |
|||
