Healdsburg to fully merge primary schools after confronting racial, academic divide

As campus volunteer Luz Navarrette held up the cover of the book “Quizas Algo Hermoso” at a recent reading session, she commanded the attention of 15 Healdsburg Elementary School kindergartners fidgeting in front of her.

“Hoy es un dia hermoso,” the chorus of voices in Healdsburg teacher Evelyn Ashleigh’s classroom repeated back to Navarrette. “Today is a beautiful day,” they said aloud.

From there, Navarrette, a retired Santa Rosa Junior College counselor, read the children’s book - “Maybe Something Beautiful” - in both Spanish and English to the predominantly Latino class. The book is about a girl who brought her community together by painting vibrant murals on the gray concrete walls in her neighborhood.

Kindergarten classes from Healdsburg Charter and Healdsburg Elementary were combined in August - one of the first steps meant to unify two schools that occupy the same pair of campuses since the public charter’s formation in 2011.

For much of that history, the two schools were characterized by a sharp racial and academic divide. The charter school population tended to be almost entirely white, while those at the public elementary school were predominantly Latino. And outcomes for the two sets of students were far apart, with charter students outpacing their peers at the elementary school, most of whom were not meeting state standards.

Outcry two years ago from parents and other community members over the disparities sparked a difficult reckoning that led first to combining kindergarten classes last summer, and now will culminate in the full merger of the two schools this fall. The Healdsburg Unified School District board unanimously approved the move last month.

The Feb. 19 vote heralded the next chapter for the two schools, which share the First Street campus for K-2 students and the Fitch Mountain campus for grades 3 through 5. The disparities among the two sets of students fueled one of the most high-profile Sonoma County discussions over the unintended consequences of charter schools, and how introducing choice at the elementary level can segregate schools and widen achievement gaps for minority students.

“It forced us to confront these issues that aren’t often talked about. We often don’t talk about racism,” said charter school Principal Erika McGuire, who also serves as the top administrator for Healdsburg Elementary’s Fitch Mountain site. “This process that we came to was a consensus-building process. We needed to do all of that to get to this tremendous place we’re in now.”

In 2018-19, Latinos accounted for 88% of the student population at Healdsburg Elementary, and only 41% at the charter school, according to the California Department of Education.

For the same school year, about two-thirds of the charter school students met or exceeded state standards on test scores, according to the state education agency

At the elementary school, more than half failed to meet those standards, an improvement over the previous year, when two out of three students came up short.

Those realities rose to the surface in a series of emotionally charged school board meetings almost two years ago, when parents and equal education advocates voiced frustration over budget priorities, citing the schools sharply different student bodies and academic outcomes.

In response, the district convened a special committee and contracted with the National Equity Project of Oakland, which conducted a yearlong campaign and provided a baseline for the next steps. The nonprofit’s findings revealed the charter school was formed to combat so-called “white flight,” a nationwide trend where families increasingly send their children to outside districts or private schools.

The district launched the charter to curb that exodus and began offering a controversial accelerated program for students still learning English. The result was a system where families were shepherded into schools along racial lines. Some Latino parents said they never knew the charter school was even an option.

Holly Fox, mother of a Healdsburg Elementary kindergartner, said she saw the uneven choice firsthand when she was learning about the neighborhood school for her son.

“The de facto choice was the charter,” Fox said, speaking about her introduction to the First Street campus. “We liked the program, we liked the project-based learning. But we didn’t like that when you walked down the hall you’d see classrooms of mostly Latino and on the other side you saw classrooms that were mostly white.”

After the district a year ago set in motion the potential merger of the two schools, Fox joined the team tasked with designing the consolidation. She said there is excitement from incoming families about the change.

The Healdsburg school board’s February vote to fully merge the two campuses was met with applause from the audience. It permitted the district to begin disbanding the charter.

The vote also put forward ?six core tenants for the reinvented Healdsburg Elementary.

They included project-based learning, Spanish language instruction and enrichment programs with offerings in art, yoga and robotics - priorities for many charter school families, said Healdsburg Superintendent Chris Vanden Heuvel.

Small-group lessons, additional support staff to complement teachers and small class sizes also were part of the board-?approved framework.

“The most impactful part of the whole process is we really involved our community and teachers in coming up with those pillars,” Vanden Heuvel said, pointing to a survey that found 76% of staff members favored the merger this year. “This is really what they want.”

The district is crafting a plan over the next few months that will address some of the finer details of the merger. Initial estimates indicate it will cost $660,000. Vanden Heuvel said some elements might have to be phased in depending on the added payroll expenses from the new teachers’ contract, which is being negotiated.

For many in Healdsburg, the merger is the latest step on a long road to mending relationships and reestablishing trust between the community and its school district.

Jenny Levine-Smith, an education equity consultant for Corazon Healdsburg, a nonprofit focused on bridging racial divides, welcomed the vote and noted the broad support for the merger.

“But this is not the end of the road,” she said.

The district hasn’t addressed calls to transform its English learner program. It drew widespread criticism because its accelerated model separated elementary school students based on language comprehension, and required as much as three hours of daily coursework, diminishing the time for other subjects.

The program was changed in 2018 and is better integrated into the core curriculum so students still mastering English can keep pace with their peers, Vanden Heuvel said.

But Corazon Healdsburg and other education advocates demanded more. The district spent $30,000 this year on an outside consultant to assess the program and outline a new approach that could be implemented as part of the merger. The findings from that report will be revealed at a school board meeting Wednesday night.

“This report and whatever the school gets and implements from this is a big deal,” Levine-Smith said. “It’s something we’re really watching.”

The last two years have been an eye-opening experience for families in the charter school community, many of whom had no idea students were being separated along racial lines.

Erin Meyers, a mother of two children in the charter, said it was clear that having two schools was a problem if every student wasn’t given access to both.

She joined the Healdsburg Equity Initiative, a local group heavily involved in the community discussion around the issue.

Her focus now is to ensure the district follows through on its promises.

“I think we’re in a time where a lot of small towns are dealing with the same thing,” Meyers said. “I would love for us to be a visionary pioneer where there was a charter school creating segregation and we did something that serves everyone and becomes a great success. But it’s going to take all the effort possible for the district to put its money where its mouth is.”

You can reach Staff Writer Yousef Baig at 707-521-5390 or yousef.baig@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @YousefBaig.