With Brookfield Elementary’s Destiny Unsure, Dad and mom Wait in Limbo

Throughout a latest group assembly at Brookfield Elementary faculty, Oakland Unified College District’s Director of Steady Enchancment, Jen Corn, let dad and mom know that the district’s enrollment system is not going to enable them to enroll their kids at this faculty for subsequent yr. Her rationale: Brookfield and 5 different public colleges are slated to be closed in June.

Brookfield, Grass Valley Elementary, Carl B. Munck Elementary, Fred T. Korematsu Discovery Academy, Horace Mann Elementary, and RISE Group Elementary are scheduled to shut in June. Hillcrest Okay-8 can be scheduled to lose its center faculty program.

These strikes have been a call made by final yr’s faculty board, a board that included three board members who didn’t search re-election in November: Gary Yee, Aimee Eng, and Shanthi Gonzales. 

Nevertheless, Oakland voters made an necessary choice within the November election. Two of the three faculty board races up for grabs have been received by candidates who voiced opposition to closures. Incoming board members Jennifer Brouhard and Valarie Bachelor will be part of present board members Mike Hutchinson and Vancedric Williams to kind a brand new board majority that may have the facility to forestall the closures. 

In the course of the November 30 board assembly, Director Hutchinson launched a decision to rescind the scheduled closures, and that decision shall be mentioned and probably voted on by the brand new board in 2023.

A Tight-Knit Group at Brookfield

“All people in my household went to Brookfield,” stated Tutherukhonsuhotep KingdomX, who has lived in Brookfield Village his complete life. He’s a seventh technology resident of the Deep East Oakland neighborhood nestled alongside the East aspect of the 880 freeway. 

KingdomX is the proud father of two eighth technology Brookfield Elementary college students. 4 months in the past, his spouse gave delivery to a son whom he hopes shall be a future Brookfield pupil.

Earlier this yr, he turned extra energetic as a mother or father on the Brookfield campus within the wake of the OUSD faculty board’s choice to completely shutter the college on the finish of the 2022-2023 faculty yr.

KingdomX instructed Oakland Voices that dropping a neighborhood faculty is worse than dropping a job, as a result of you may get one other job. “If you say a faculty is gonna shut, that’s traumatic,” stated KingdomX, who added that he felt the necessity to step up in protection of the college group. “It’s very traumatic for the households.”

KingdomX’s job prevents him from being accessible to take his children to and from faculty day-after-day, however having a neighborhood faculty and fogeys who nonetheless reside close by makes that problem just a little simpler to cope with. He instructed Oakland Voices, “It takes a group to boost a baby, and we now have that at Brookfield.”

Oakland’s Most Susceptible Households

In line with the district’s information from final yr, 90.9% of Brookfield’s college students have been low-income, 23% had disabilities, and 49% have been English learners. There have been at the least seven native languages spoken by Brookfield households.

The Brookfield group has lengthy been Black and dealing class, however there have been important demographic modifications throughout this century. At 197 college students final yr, Brookfield’s whole enrollment is lower than one third of what it was earlier than the state takeover of OUSD in 2003, when it had 602 college students.

The Black pupil inhabitants at Brookfield has been hit significantly laborious. For the reason that state takeover, Brookfield Elementary has gone from 360 Black college students to 42 Black college students. Black college students used to comprise 60% of Brookfield, however now account for less than 21% of the scholar inhabitants. 

The varsity’s Latinx pupil inhabitants has additionally been lower in half over the previous ten years, however as the bulk ethnic group on the faculty for the previous 19 years, its proportion of the whole inhabitants hasn’t modified a lot.

Declining Enrollment

Declining enrollment is without doubt one of the major causes the college board voted to shut Brookfield and the opposite colleges. Declining enrollment isn’t a phenomenon restricted to Brookfield, however Brookfield is a superb case research in what has transpired in OUSD this century, particularly underneath the college board of the final decade. 

Whereas general enrollment in OUSD colleges declined by 2,441 college students since 2013 (a 7% decline), the Black pupil inhabitants in OUSD noticed a lack of 3,650 college students (a 33% decline) in that very same time interval.

Constitution colleges have seen a rise of 153 Black college students (a 6% enhance) in that point. Census information exhibits that the general Black inhabitants in Oakland decreased between 2010-2020 by 14%. 

The Latinx pupil inhabitants in OUSD has grown barely since 2013, growing by 8% (1,136 college students). Nevertheless, constitution colleges have seen a 27% enhance (1,889 college students) in that point, which coincides with the 28% progress within the Latinx inhabitants in Oakland from 2010-2020. 

Whereas general enrollment within the district has been declining since 2014, the variety of college students with disabilities in OUSD has grown by 34%, going from 3,832 to five,119 college students. The share of the general pupil inhabitants which have disabilities has additionally grown, going from 10% to fifteen%.

A Good Studying Setting

Two of Vanessa Gutierrez’s kids go to Brookfield, and he or she has one other elementary-aged baby who attends Grass Valley Elementary up within the hills as a result of there is no such thing as a program for college students with mid-to-moderate disabilities at Brookfield.

After noting that OUSD doesn’t present busing for college students with an Individualized Training Plan, which two of her 4 kids have, Gutierrez admitted that she will get emotional when she thinks in regards to the prospect of her neighborhood faculty closing. “I really feel like crying,” Gutierrez instructed Oakland Voices. 

“I adore it there. I’ve by no means had lecturers as wonderful as those there,” Gutierrez stated, including that she is impressed along with her two kids’s studying expertise. “Brookfield has among the finest lecturers, to be sincere.”

The Brookfield campus additionally has a model new Science, Expertise, Engineering, Artwork, & Math laboratory that was created with the assistance of a $100,000 grant from the NBA Cares program.

There has additionally been dialogue a couple of new soccer discipline and a “inexperienced” plan for the campus. 

“There’s some lovely issues within the works,” KingdomX stated. He additionally feels that Brookfield is an effective studying setting for his kids.

Each dad and mom additionally agree that the college is a protected place to ship their kids, and share a concern of getting to ship their kids into one other neighborhood.

“I don’t really feel comfy sending my children to a different faculty,” Gutierrez stated. She famous that there have been two shootings this yr on the nearest public elementary faculty.

KingdomX, who has generational ties with most of the households in Brookfield Village stated, “I’ve by no means lived in another neighborhood.” He instructed Oakland Voices that he has the household sources to homeschool his kids, and would go that route fairly than ship his kids out of the neighborhood.

Competitors For College students With Native Constitution Colleges

There are 4 constitution colleges close to the Brookfield neighborhood: Aspire Monarch Academy,  Lighthouse, Lodestar, and Cox Academy. 

Previously twenty years, constitution faculty enrollment in Oakland has grown by over 1,009%, peaking at 16,991 college students in 2020. Constitution faculty enrollment has declined barely from 2020-2022.

Of the 15,626 whole constitution faculty college students in 2022, 19% have been Black, and 58% have been Latinx (in comparison with 21% and 45% respectively in OUSD).

Aspire was one of many first constitution faculty administration organizations in historical past. Ninety-seven % of Monarch’s college students are Latinx, and fewer than 2% are Black. Since opening in 2000, the college’s whole enrollment spiked within the wake of the state takeover from 2004-2006, however has in any other case remained comparatively fixed over the previous twenty years. 

Lighthouse began in 2002, and has grown from 82 college students to 531 college students as of final yr. Cox Academy began in 2005, and has really declined in enrollment by 24% in that point. Lodestar began in 2016, and was situated in Fruitvale close to the Dimond district till 2018. Its enrollment has grown 286% over the previous seven years.

Since 2005, when Aspire Monarch, Cox Academy, and Lighthouse have all been in operation, Brookfield has skilled a 60% decline in enrollment. Although it’s laborious to show the decline in Brookfield college students is attributable to the rise of enrollment in the constitution colleges, the information appears to recommend a connection.

Along with Brookfield competing with constitution colleges for college students, OUSD has made 5 totally different Prop 39 affords to co-locate a constitution faculty at Brookfield previously 4 years. Even when Prop 39 affords will not be accepted by a constitution faculty, the method will be disruptive to a faculty group as a result of households aren’t positive about what is going to occur at their kids’s faculty the next yr. 

“The Group Was Empowered” 

Each KingdomX and Gutierrez have been on the group assembly at Brookfield in early December the place Corn and OUSD Community Superintendent Monica Thomas, who was listening in by way of Zoom, have been encouraging households to enroll in one other faculty for subsequent yr.

A powerpoint slide projected through the assembly listed three choices for the dad and mom in attendance: wait, submit an software now, or submit an software.

Members within the assembly pushed again on the narrative that Brookfield will shut on the finish of the yr, forcing Thomas to look on the Zoom feed to deal with the criticism. She listened to the considerations of the dad and mom, and seemed to be taking notes. In the long run, each she and Corn acknowledged that ready to enroll till after the January board conferences was a smart technique.

“I feel it went cool,” KingdomX stated. “The group was empowered.” 

“I beloved it,” Gutierrez stated. 

The varsity board decision to doubtlessly cease the six faculty closures on the finish of the college yr, together with Brookfield, could possibly be mentioned and voted on on January eleventh or twenty fifth. Households have till February 10 to enroll their kids for the 2023-2024 faculty yr.

In the meantime, Lawyer Normal Rob Bonta’s workplace is wanting into doable civil rights violations in reference to the college closures in Oakland.

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Disclosure: Tony Daquipa volunteered for College Board Director Mike Hutchinson in 2020.