The public will vote on the issue , though the effort is now largely symbolic: The school board, facing consistent pressure to reinstate the course, . 

“After 10 years of damage, the district did the right thing,” said Rex Ridgeway, who, along with several others, on the matter last year, casting doubt on the by removing the course from middle school. 

San Francisco is just one of many school systems nationwide that has grappled with when to offer algebra in a battle that has pitted equity against rigor. An earlier survey by ����Ӱ�� of the country’s largest school districts showed varied participation rates in the course at the middle school level with white and wealthier students often having greater access.  

Some education experts called algebra an unnecessary barrier to student success while others were trying to increase the number of children who can take it.

Dallas made advanced coursework at the middle school level, including mathematics, opt-out rather than opt-in, dramatically increasing participation rates among traditionally marginalized students — without seeing a drop in scores. , which nixed middle school algebra years ago, recently reversed itself after parents . 

While some groups, including the , praised San Francisco for its earlier decision to remove the course, parents quickly mobilized against it. They feared the plan would hinder students’ ability to take calculus in 12th grade. The impact, they reasoned, could follow them to college, jeopardizing their chance to enter lucrative STEM fields. 

Ridgeway, a retired stockbroker, tutored his granddaughter, Joselyn Marroquin, from first to ninth grade, plugging in what he described as gaping holes in math, English and science instruction. 

“Immediately, I saw she was not getting the type of education I would expect,” he said.  

Ridgeway paid $860 for Marroquin, now 16, to take an online algebra course the summer before her freshman year of high school so she could sail through the class in 9th grade — and double up on another course, geometry. 

But it was a challenge. 

“It was a little difficult because it was online,” Marroquin told ����Ӱ��. “I think I learn best in person.”

She said the course succeeded in preparing her for high school math, but that the time commitment ate into her other plans.  

“Although classes were in the morning, I had to complete homework and study for the next lesson,” she said. “Because of that, it was difficult to do other activities I enjoyed. I didn’t really have a summer vacation.”  

SFUSD moved to its current model to address the fact that few students were successfully progressing through its math sequence at the time: Just 19% of tenth graders — and only 1% percent of Black children — had passed the state math assessment and had not repeated math coursework across the 2011-12 and 2012-13 school years. 

Those pushing for the change also noted a lack of participation in advanced math courses among Black and Hispanic students.  

But a 2023 found “large ethnoracial gaps in (Advanced Placement) math course-taking did not decrease after the policy change.” Specifically, the percentage of Black students enrolling in any AP math course in high school remained the same while Hispanic student participation increased by just 1 percentage point.

Meredith Dodson, executive director of SF Parents, understands the school district’s rationale for eliminating the course, but has long disagreed with the move.

“I think their experiment 10 years ago to delay algebra was well-intentioned, but in the end it had the opposite of the intended effect,” she said. “Kids who were supposed to be helped by that policy change were ultimately further harmed.”

Dodson said the disparity is stark.

“Parents around San Francisco are shocked when they hear algebra isn’t offered in middle school currently,” she said. “It’s time to bring it back, and we’re just glad that the district isn’t ignoring the data any longer.”

California public schools, like those in many other states, have to private schools and homeschooling post-pandemic. SFUSD’s student population alone shrank from to . District leaders just announced they will because of the loss. 

The district’s reversal on algebra comes two years after three school board members were in a February 2022 referendum. The vote reflected the public’s enormous dissatisfaction with . 

Algebra will be piloted in in the district next fall. It will also offer an online Algebra 1 course next school year and a summer course in 2025. 

Patrick Wolff, cofounder of Families for San Francisco, served as the group’s executive director before the organization was absorbed into TogetherSF. Wolff, who had children in the district from 2010 to 2022, said its problems extended well beyond a single course.  

“SFUSD has done a terrible job of teaching kids math,” he said. “Kids who are capable of learning more math have been held back for no good reason and kids who need more support in order to reach their full potential have absolutely been failed in receiving the support and instruction they need.”

Wolff said there is nothing wrong with acknowledging that some students might excel in advanced mathematics at a younger age while others will not — as long as those who struggle are helped to improve. 

Melodie Baker, national policy director at , an organization that promotes math policies that support equity in college readiness and success, said the district can’t simply return to an earlier, failed approach. 

“So the prior tracking policy didn’t lead to equitable outcomes,” she said. “Detracking didn’t lead to equitable outcomes either. So it makes sense that they’re not sticking with it, but they’ll need to find new ways to implement eighth-grade algebra that ensure better outcomes for Black and Latinx students. Not just revert to what they were doing before.”

A released last month noted just 65% of U.S. principals said their elementary or middle school offered algebra in eighth grade — but only for some students. Twenty percent of respondents said it was open to all. 

Eighth-grade algebra was even scarcer in California: only 48% of principals said their school offered the course, and only to certain children. Eighteen percent said any child could enroll.

A bill from Republicans in the Wisconsin Legislature would require University of Wisconsin schools to provide out-of-state students with information on how to vote absentee in their home states.

The bill’s authors say the proposal is a way to encourage civic participation from students in communities they know better than their college campuses, but opponents say it’s an effort to remove the largely Democratic student vote from close statewide elections. Students would still be able to decide if they want to vote in Wisconsin or their home states.

“We want to encourage maximum civic participation, but out-of-state students are not often provided the information on how to vote in their state of residence,” the bill’s co-sponsorship states. “This bill would require the Universities of Wisconsin to provide non-resident students information on how to vote absentee in their home state. The goal is to make sure that every UW student has the best information on how to vote before they vote. A 2020 study shows that only 15% of non-Wisconsin resident students stay in Wisconsin after graduating.”

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“College students from out of state typically move back to their home state after graduating and do not stay here in Wisconsin,” the memo continues. “Students are typically more involved in their home state where they grew up and have ties to. This bill would simply require the UW System to give students information on voting absentee so they are able to vote in their home state.”

The student vote in Wisconsin is often consequential. In the spring 2023 election, long lines were seen at campus polling locations across the state and the heavy turnout among students was cited as a reason for Janet Protasiewicz’s comfortable margin of victory in last spring’s Supreme Court race.

In Madison, the large student population is one source of the Democratic Party’s strength in Dane County, yet Wisconsin residents make up less than half of the approximately 37,000 undergraduate students.

Rep. Clint Moses (R-Menomonie) told his concern is college students casting deciding votes in local races when they aren’t fully entrenched in the community and don’t pay property taxes.

“Why should a student be voting on these when they are not gonna have any of the impact of it? They’re not paying any of the property taxes in our area,” Moses, one of the bill’s co-authors, said.

Rep. Mark Spreitzer (D-Beloit) said that paying property taxes isn’t a requirement to vote and noted that college is often when students become more politically engaged and informed about local issues where they live. He added that the Legislature should be finding ways to keep out-of-state students in Wisconsin after graduation.

“We are constantly talking about workforce challenges and we know that the only way to solve that is gonna be to bring people into our state,” he told WPR. “And bringing them here for college and then spending those four years convincing them that Wisconsin is where they wanna spend their rest of their lives is one of the ways that we can do that.”

is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Wisconsin Examiner maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Ruth Conniff for questions: info@wisconsinexaminer.com. Follow Wisconsin Examiner on and .

The effort to get on the November 2022 ballot is just getting started, but such a statute would give parents “legal standing” before a judge to argue that districts should make better use of education dollars, said initiative spokesman Michael Trujillo, a veteran political strategist.

“Here’s a chance for parents to become effective policymakers on behalf of their children,” said Trujillo, who has long worked for former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, a supporter of the initiative.

The move comes as parents across the country are vocally asserting their rights to influence the education agenda. Parents’ anger over school closures and controversial diversity and equity initiatives was considered a key factor in tipping the Virginia governor’s race in favor of Republican Glenn Youngkin.

The California initiative would be the third effort nationally to enshrine a child’s opportunity to receive a high-quality education in a state constitution. Supporters have launched similar campaigns in and . 

“Having that right in the constitution could be very helpful in addressing long-standing inequities in our educational system and closing opportunity gaps,” said Ted Lempert, president of Children Now, an Oakland-based advocacy organization. He added that “getting more dollars to kids of color and English learners has to be part of the equation.”

The California initiative, however, includes wording that would prohibit courts from issuing remedies that include “new mandates for taxes or spending.”

That restriction could be an obstacle to improving educational quality, said Jessica Levin, a senior attorney at the Education Law Center, based in New Jersey. 

“More funding would be the way to address many of the issues that the proponents of this initiative are purporting to want to fix,” she said. The center represented plaintiffs in , a 1998 New Jersey school finance case that led to far-reaching reforms, including universal preschool for 3- and 4-year-olds.

A from the center gives California a C for the level of per-student funding schools receive from state and local sources. But it grades the state a D on how much it spends on education as a percentage of overall economic activity — less than 3 percent.

State constitutions, Levin added, all include some “affirmative obligation” to provide students a public education, but courts have varied in how they interpret what that education should include.

Federal courts in recent years have also been asked to consider whether the U.S. Constitution should entitle children to an education. Last year, Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer agreed to a $100 million settlement in a 6th Circuit Court of Appeals case in which seven Detroit students argued their schools had failed to teach them to read.

On Nov. 1, the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in in which 14 Rhode Island students argue their schools don’t provide civics education, leaving them unprepared to exercise their rights as citizens. 

‘There’s no remedy’

In California, David Welch, who waged a lengthy challenging state laws on teacher tenure and seniority, is behind the ballot initiative. That lawsuit, Vergara v. California, argued such provisions keep poor and minority students from having effective teachers. In 2016, the California Court of Appeals ultimately held that the attorneys for the nine student plaintiffs were unable to prove that state law controlled teacher assignments.

The state’s powerful teachers unions came out on top when the state supreme court declined to review the case. A ballot measure that aims to improve schools by making it easier to fire ineffective teachers would be certain to reopen that fight. Levin said the initiative “on its face” might sound appealing, but could be a way to once again go after teacher tenure and laws that  result in new teachers being the first to go when budgets are cut.

Trujillo said the initiative is not just an effort to revive Vergara. 

“W�󲹳� Vergara taught us is that there is a right to a free education,” he said, “but if you want to sue because of a reading gap, there’s no remedy.” 

Some experts say the measure, which would need roughly a million signatures by June to qualify, is vague and ignores the limitations districts face when the majority of their budgets are spent on salaries. Laura Preston, director of governmental affairs at F3Law, a California firm that handles education cases, said laws that require districts to negotiate budgets with teachers unions can limit flexibility to address students’ needs. 

Schools are also facing teacher shortages now and even superintendents are — not a time to discuss getting rid of teachers, she said.

The initiative is “so broad that we’re all trying to figure out what it means,” Preston said, calling the proponents “a bunch of people who don’t know how education works trying to reform education.”

‘A battle royale’ 

The effort to add the constitutional amendment isn’t the only California initiative likely to provoke a fight with the teachers unions. A venture capitalist is behind a measure to eliminate collective bargaining for public sector employees. The argues that unions “protect bad employees.”

A failed in 2012, but the prolonged school closures could have shifted some voters’ attitudes. Julia Koppich, an independent San Francisco-based researcher, said proponents could play on “unions being blamed for keeping schools closed longer than some parents thought they needed to be.”

Republicans tried to use parent frustration with school closings during the September election to recall Gov. Gavin Newsom, but were unsuccessful.

“I’m not sure if that anti-union, pandemic-specific anger is of the lasting variety,” Koppich said, but even so, “if this initiative is on the ballot, it will be a battle royale and an expensive one.”

Lisa Gardiner, a spokeswoman for the California Teachers Association said members “certainly believe that all students deserve a high-quality public education,” but that the union does “not take positions on — or even consider — ballot measures until they have qualified for the ballot.”

School closures are also fueling efforts to get two private school choice initiatives on the ballot. Now in the signature-gathering phase, both would create education savings accounts, of either $13,000 or $14,000 per year, that families could use for private and religious school tuition. 

“The pandemic required families to try alternatives,” according to . “Today more than 60 percent of families are interested in alternative learning options for their students beyond the traditional public school system.” 

State officials estimate the cost of the program would range from $4 billion to $7 billion, which “could be paid with reductions to funding for public schools and/or reductions to other programs in the state budget.”

The unions are also likely to oppose efforts to expand school choice in the state. Trujillo said he’s expecting a “well-funded” campaign to defeat the constitutional amendment guaranteeing a high-quality education if it goes before the voters. But he’s hoping that when proponents highlight smaller class sizes and higher pay for qualified teachers as possible results of the amendment, the unions might like what they hear. 

“Unions that want to oppose this are going to feel like they’re in upside-down land,” he said.