A critical report of the San Jose Unified School District (SJUSD) has just been published by the Santa Clara County (SCC) Civil Grand Jury. It validates what many families and teachers have been saying for years: that district leaders are indifferent to their community‘s concerns.

The SCC Civil Grand Jury investigated complaints about SJUSD and found serious leadership issues. These include district leaders tolerating verbally abusive behavior, very high employee turnover due to low morale, and a widespread fear of speaking up about issues.

Mural set up in front of SJUSD headquarters, commemorating lives lost to SJPD, and the loss of connection to ancestral knowledge when students are punished with harsh discipline. (Photo by Jeffie Khalsa)

An SJUSD community member responds to the report: “While obviously SJUSD leadership has been terrible, having that terribleness officially recognized has been heartwarming, especially after a particularly hard past year.” They are choosing to share anonymously “because of genuine fear of retaliation.”

On page 24, the report notes that “there is a disconnect at the [school board] Trustee level about what is happening in their schools, a lack of awareness of management norms and best practices, as well as a non-responsiveness to the school community and the students of SJUSD.”

The report also comes a few weeks after the SJUSD community learned the district is refusing to honor a promised pay raise for their longest serving teachers. On page 9, the report indicates that the percentage of principals leaving SJUSD has been much higher than in neighboring districts. The average turnover of principals over the past two years in these districts is only 22% versus 54% for SJUSD schools.

The report details how SJUSD lags far behind other districts in providing mental health support to students, with only one wellness center open, as well as a failure to create effective safety procedures. On page 14, discussed how wellness center plans have received attention at board meetings. At its April 7, 2022 meeting, the SJUSD Board announced plans to open five new wellness centers. On March 9, 2023, SJUSD updated its wellness center plans by announcing that three new sites would open in the fall of 2023 and two would begin planning an opening. As of the January 18, 2024, Board update on wellness centers, none of the above-announced plans have come to fruition. The Civil Grand Jury found no evidence that Trustees have ever held SJUSD leaders accountable for not meeting their publicly stated goals for opening wellness centers.

The report also found that SJUSD is an outlier for refusing to stock Narcan or train staff in how to use this life saving medication, despite knowing we are in a deadly opioid epidemic.

Many of these issues have been shared repeatedly in public comments at school board meetings, but as the report notes on page 3, the “system of checks and balances between the Trustees and the district leaders of the San Jose Unified School District is broken and negatively impacting SJUSD’s ability to fulfill its responsibilities to serve students, teachers, administrators, and the community.”

Now that these serious issues have been publicly documented in the SCC Civil Grand Jury report, and the constructive steps to address each problem have been provided in nine recommendations, there is hope that the community can be empowered to hold SJUSD leaders accountable to make the needed changes, and our students and teachers can have the safe learning and working environment they deserve.

The recommendations from the SC Civil Grand Jury are as follows:

• Rec #1: "SJUSD should ensure Board meeting agendas reflect topics important to the community, including those detailed in this report."
• Rec #2: "SJUSD should authorize an independent third-party assessment, with participant anonymity, to investigate the causes of high turnover over the past three years."
• Rec #3: "SJUSD should authorize an independent third-party assessment of the management hiring process over the past three years...This recommendation should be implemented by December 31, 2024."
• Rec #4: "SJUSD should authorize an independent third-party review of the completeness and correctness of past investigation processes, to identify missteps, and recommend process or policy improvements. This recommendation should be implemented by December 31, 2024."
• Rec #5: "SJUSD should assess the causes of low levels of trust in the SJUSD leadership and develop a plan and timeline for improvements. This recommendation should be implemented by December 31, 2024"
• Rec #6a: "SJUSD should conduct a comprehensive review of the current state of wellness centers at secondary schools and prepare a detailed public report on the status of the implementation of those centers with specific timelines for implementation. This recommendation should be implemented by September 30, 2024."
• Rec #6b: "If SJUSD is to fulfill its stated priority to fund mental health services for students, SJUSD should provide a long-term sustainable funding plan for fully staffed full-time wellness centers at all secondary school sites. This recommendation should be implemented by December 31, 2024."
• Rec #6c: "SJUSD should provide an accelerated implementation plan with a clear timeline to achieve the objective of fully staffed full-time wellness centers at all secondary school sites...This recommendation should be implemented by December 31, 2024."
• Rec #7: "SJUSD should create a dedicated staff position to lead and coordinate all safety planning and emergency response activities across SJUSD...This recommendation should be implemented by September 30, 2024.
• Rec #8: "SJUSD should ensure that Narcan is widely available at all secondary school sites and train all school site and office staff on how it is administered. This recommendation should be implemented by September 30, 2024."
• Rec #9: "SJUSD should implement hybrid-style Board meetings...This recommendation should be implemented by December 31, 2024."

As is stated in the SCC Civil Grand Jury report, the findings were the result of complaints, investigations, community interviews and well-documented methodology and research. These concerns and the recommendations are to be taken seriously and followed through on by SJUSD. It is the hope of the parents, families, teachers and community members who have been wronged by SJUSD that the district take necessary action to right the wrongs. 

In Solidarity,

The San Jose Unified Equity Coalition

Read Full Report:
District Adrift: Leadership Issues at San Jose Unified School District