Gov. Newsom tours community schools in Sacramento to highlight their gains

Gov. Gav Newsom toured three community schools on Thursday, serving up lunches and highlighting the state’s investments in an education model that emphasizes wraparound services for students, families, and community members.

“This is one of the most dramatic transformations of public education that’s ever happened in the state, and I think it’s one of the most interesting happening in the country,” said Newsom, speaking at the press release following the tour, which was recorded by ABC10.

For years, California’s school system has lagged behind many other states. A recent report by Scholaroo ranked California as number 45 out of 50 when comparing for student academic success, student safety, and school quality.

One way the state is hoping to change that is by utilizing a $4.1 million investment in community schools included in the state’s 2021-22 budget act. Newsom hopes that over time, that funding will hit one in every three California schools.

In its first year of implementation, the state approved $649 million in grants to 268 school districts, county offices of education, and charters to both create new community schools and expand related initiatives. Last year, an additional $141 million was allocated to nine county offices of education, intended to help those teams support community schools in their regions.

Some of the largest benefactors of those grants are Bay Area districts, including Oakland Unified, which received $66 million to expand its community school network in 2022.

Newsom and First Partner Jennifer Siebel Newsom toured Greer Elementary, Katherine Johnson Middle, and Encina High schools, a trio of schools that work across two campuses in Sacramento. Nearly two years ago, the schools received $1 million in community schools grant funding, which have been used to expand before- and after-school programs, increase social work staffing, and provide mobile health care and other services, according to the governor’s office.

“It’s really, really hard for kids to focus on their education when they’re hungry, when they’re housing insecure, when they’re struggling with their health or mental health, or when they don’t have help with their studies,” said Paula Villescaz, board president of the San Juan Unified School District in Sacramento, at the press conference following the tour. “The whole-child approach that’s been spearheaded under current leadership really is the transformation that we need to remove barriers that our kids are seeing when reaching their academic goals.”

The community school model is not new. Over the last few decades, educational experts have built up supporting evidence, advocating for the benefits of extended hours and expanded services that fit the unique needs of a particular neighborhood.

Siebel Newsom shared what she saw during the tour, from a first-grade class doing yoga and breathing exercises, to interpreters equipped to handle all 11 languages spoken throughout the school’s halls. Siebel Newsom also highlighted the state’s universal meal initiative, a mobile service program that brings services and resources to families.

The visit was also intended to showcase what had changed as a result of the state’s initial investments in the community schools model – and to drum up excitement for investments to come. That included getting into the trenches to speak with students, and serving lunch alongside a school’s cafeteria staff.

“It’s been so much damn fun today,” Newsom said. “We gotta do this everyday.”