Toward Black Student Thriving in SFUSD: Understanding Racial Disparities and System Design

In September 2023 a group of SFUSD leaders and researchers from across the country came together to examine what was originally termed the “production of racial and ability stratification” in SFUSD with the purpose of ultimately co-designing solutions. Building on six months of preparation and funding received from a prestigious Spencer Foundation Vision Grant, the researchers and leaders initiated a full year of design-based work, digging deep into the system and the experiences of Black students to understand the district’s persistent racial disparities in discipline and special education placements. Jean Robertson, SFUSD’s Head of Special Education, and Stanford Professor Alfredo J. Artiles, have led the work, gathering SFUSD leaders from across the system and an interdisciplinary group of researchers with expertise on academic and behavioral supports, literacy/biliteracy, learning sciences, linguistic anthropology, technology and digital tools, systems transformation, design-based research, school psychology, racial disproportionality, and inclusive education. In this brief, we summarize the activities and content of this planning work. Broadly, early work generated a set of four focal themes, which included Black family partnerships, the precursors of racial disparities, district policies and procedures upholding anti-Blackness and whiteness, educational opportunity, and cultural responsiveness exemplified in bright spots around the district. By early winter 2024, the team prioritized two themes for deeper work:

● Black family partnerships
● Systems producing the precursors to racial disparities for Black students