Fresno Unified ending Designated Schools Program, Fresno Teachers Association pushes back
The FTA said cutting this program will lead to a 12% pay cut for nearly 40% of district teachers.
FRESNO, Calif. (KFSN) -- With signs in hand, dozens of Fresno Teacher Association members gathered Wednesday evening to push back against the elimination of the "Designated Schools" Program.
The Designated School Program was first rolled out in 2014.
By 2019, a total of about 24,000 students at 40 elementary schools and one middle school were part of the program.
It was created and designed to improve student achievement in schools that were underperforming.
It includes 30 extra minutes of instruction time every day for students. Ten extra professional learning days for teachers at those schools.
As well as an extra teacher on special assignments to help with teacher development and student intervention.
Despite the additions, Interim Superintendent Misty Her says that in the 10 years since its implementation, the $28 million annual investment hasn't delivered the results the district expected.
"There were schools that had good data, but then there was schools that didn't. Overall the data was mixed and the data was not consistent year after year." Her said.
The district hired a research firm to look into the program during the 2020-2021 school year.
It found evidence of program effectiveness on academic outcomes for students was mixed.
It also found the implementation of the program varied across school sites.
Chief Communications Officer Nikki Henry says the district attempted to make changes based on those findings.
"We tried to address that fidelity piece, but again, five years that it's been, these 41 schools have all had at least five years and seeing mixed results at best, it's time to make that decision," Henry said.
Henry says because of the inconsistent outcomes, declining enrollment and lower average daily attendance, Interim Superintendent Her and staff decided to stop the program at the end of this school year.
Henry says the decision is in line with the new five-year "Goals and Guardrails" recently passed by the FUSD Board of Education.
Goals include increasing the percentage of first graders who are proficient in literacy from 48% to 80%.
It also aims to increase the percentage of students graduating from high school who are college and career-ready from 43% to 64%.
"It's hard, it's heartbreaking, it's painful, but it's the right thing to do if we're going to move to these ambitious goals and move our kids to a place of success we've never seen before," Henry said.
Henry says the change will impact around 1,300 teachers out of the district's 4,400.
However, she says they don't plan on laying anyone off.
President of the Fresno Teacher Association Manuel Bonilla says cutting the program will lead to a 12% pay cut for those teachers.
"That's $651 dollars a month less that that teacher is going to be making. At the highest end of our salary schedule, people that have been here 25 plus years, they're going to make approximately 1,200 less per month," Bonilla said.
The FTA says the district kept the program in place after learning of its mixed results in 2021.
In 2022, a document provided by the FTA shows the district wanted to expand Designated Schools to all elementary schools.
The district noted it in its "initial interests" in negotiations with the FTA.
And in 2023, in FUSD's Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP) it highlighted the program was effective.
"They wanted to expand the designated schools program multiple times throughout that 10 years, touting the academic improvement of it, and now, when the narrative fits them, to want to rip that away from both our students, parents and our teachers. Now they want to pull it." Bonilla said.
The FTA says the decision to eliminate the program was not in line with the board's recent goals and guardrails. They were passed on January 22, 2025.
One of the guardrails includes "The superintendent may not propose major decisions to the Board without first having a community engagement plan."
The FTA says that didn't happen before the decision was announced to schools and staff on January 23 and families on January 24.
"If the district wants to meet those goals then I invite them to the table to have an authentic conversation about how we do that. That has to involve the people doing the work. They haven't done that and, until they do, we're not going to get to the goals that are necessary," Bonilla said.
District officials say when they tried to expand the program, FTA leadership fought against the expansion and against the expansion of meeting hours/professional learning time.
Henry also said the decision to eliminate Designated Schools was made prior to the January 22 adopted guardrails as they went to arbitration with FTA on the issue in November.
The district says they are countering the salary reduction by offering teachers a four-and-a-half percent raise, with an additional half a percent the next two school years in their last, best and final offer.
They also say they have not determined where the money will be reallocated in the budget.
