Richard's Vision for Our Schools

Richard Barrera will fight to turn the San Diego Unified School District into one of the truly great modern public school systems in America. As a parent of two students who attend public schools within the District, as a son of two retired teachers, and as a product of San Diego’s public schools, Richard understands firsthand what our public schools mean to our familes and to future generations.

“Young people growing up in San Diego have tremendous opportunities in front of them. In a world that is becoming smaller and more connected across countries and cultures, our young people benefit from growing up in diverse neighborhoods along the world's busiest international border. In a world that will increasingly demand environmentally sustainable solutions, young San Diegans are growing up in one of the world's most ecologically diverse regions, home to centers of technological innovation. The students in my District need and deserve the education and skills that will be necessary for them to take advantage of the opportunities waiting for them.”

Representing the diverse neighborhoods of Central and South San Diego in District D, Richard will fight to build a school district in which:

• All students graduate from high school on time, and enter a path to college or to a demanding career in a skilled occupation. Currently, nearly four out of ten high school freshmen in the District fail to graduate from high school, and across the nation only one out of ten high school freshmen will graduate from college and enter a promising career within ten years. With the opportunities waiting for young people in San Diego, these outcomes are unacceptable.
• All high school students, whether they are on a path to go straight to college or straight into a technical career, benefit from a rigorous and exciting program combining academic work and real world experience. At San Diego Met High School, where Richard’s son Jeff is a freshman, students split their time between classroom learning and internships, allowing them to see the connections between academic work and hands-on problem solving. All Met students are currently on track to graduate on-time and attend college
• Communities pull together to make sure that all students are on track to succeed by the time they enter high school. Research shows that students who successfully transition from pre-school to elementary school, who are reading proficiently by third grade, and who maintain strong attendance records during middle school, will be prepared to avoid the drop-out trap after 10th grade. At each school within District D, Richard will work to organize community coalitions of parents, teachers, para-professionals, high school and college students, senior citizens and other community volunteers to mentor elementary and middle school students. Similar to successful “neighborhood watch” efforts in which citizen groups work closely with police departments, these community coalitions will work with their neighborhood schools to keep a vigilant eye on students who begin to fall through the cracks, and will spring into action to prevent tragedies before they happen
• Schools become centers of family support and community development, so that students can stay in school and thrive, rather than constantly having their education interrupted by family and community crises. Schools can and should help families access critical services such as job training, health care and affordable housing, while engaging students in neighborhood clean-ups, tree plantings, community gardens and other projects that build neighborhood pride
• The teaching profession is valued and supported, including pay scales that allow talented teachers to stay in District classrooms as their skills and experience grow. Currently, a teacher who spends his or her career within the San Diego Unified District will earn less than teachers at 34 of the 38 school districts within San Diego County, and will retire having earned over $400,000 less than teachers at some County districts. By bringing teacher pay up to appropriate levels and by supporting teachers in other critical areas, San Diego Unified will help insure that our kids stop losing good teachers to other districts and to other careers.

Richard understands that none of these goals can be achieved until we stop pointing the finger at each other and start working together as an entire community.

“As a member of the School Board my goal will be to help bring our community together to build a vision for what is possible in a modern public school system, based on the best and most exciting examples of what already is working well. Our vision will be grounded in two core principles:

The first is that all of us – parents, students, teachers, staff, administrators, community leaders, business leaders, and taxpayers – are accountable to future generations, and therefore we all can and must contribute our best ideas and best effort to building a great public school system.

The second core principle is that the public school system we build together must be accountable to real outcomes for our kids, not simply to standardized test scores. Test scores can serve as one of many ways of measuring our interim progress. But our final exam needs to measure what is happening to our young people when they leave our school district. Simply put, does our school system set young people on a clear path to a positive future?”