DSA news: 80% of San Juan School can be replaced with new construction

We finally have received approval from DSA (Division of State Architects) to move forward with our plans to replace about 80% of the San Juan School structures with new construction. Now we are working with OPSC (Office of Public School Construction) to see what additional funding the state may provide.  This project is through the Seismic Mitigation program (started in 2016) which finally pushes us to the top of the list for funding. We expect to start actual construction in late summer 2024. Preparation for this will begin even earlier in the summer, so the campus will be closed for the summer and summer school for all K-6 will be at Aromas School. Middle School students (rising 7th grade through 8th grade) will have summer school at Anzar.

Phase I Construction: This will occur starting the summer of 2024 and will last through 2024-2025. It will include the demolition and replacement of classrooms with modular construction. Upgrades to the middle school classrooms may also occur this summer. Temporary classrooms will be organized on the existing site. For example, the San Juan Library may be subdivided into 3 classroom spaces to be used for the year. Classrooms should be completed and ready for occupation by the start of school for the 2025-2026 school year.
Phase II Construction: Teachers and students will be in their new classrooms for the start of school year 25-26. During Phase II, construction will include the Library, the Multi-Purpose Room/Cafeteria, and the Administration building. The San Juan School project should be completed by the fall of 2026.

HVAC Goal: completed by start of school 2024-25

It has taken a while to work through the DSA process and obtain equipment, but the plan is that Aromas School and Anzar High School should have air conditioning projects completed this summer and be ready for heat episodes next fall!  Some of the work at Anzar will begin over spring break. Aromas School’s work is going to be more intrusive due to existing structural design. Both campuses will have sections of their campus closed to the public this summer due to the air conditioning installation. 

Summer School to be located at Aromas and Anzar

Because of San Juan School construction, all summer school programming and any Youth Alliance or ASJ+ activities will be held at Aromas for students in grades K-6. Rising 7th graders through 12th graders will be at Anzar for summer school and related enrichment programs.

Transportation will be provided.

Dinners for Eight

During the month of March, 5 Dinners for Eight were each hosted by a different parent in our community for 4 individuals from Aromas and 4 from San Juan Bautista.  We set up these dinners to provide an opportunity for parents who might not know each other to meet and talk about their common hopes and dreams for our students at all schools and to generate ideas on how we can improve the school district. The District Office purchased the main course for dinner and each guest brought a side dish to share.  On April 9, a Second Town Hall will be held for these 40 individuals to share their ideas and conversations. Everyone is invited to attend, even those who were not dinner guests. Please mark your calendar! The Town Hall begins at 6pm in the Anzar Library and while we will not be serving dinner,

Dessert/coffee will be served! We will have translation services available.

Board approved two new TOSAS - ARTS Education and English Language Acquisition positions

TOSA stands for Teacher on Special Assignment. Recently, our Board approved two new TOSAS that will be supported by one time grant funds that we have for a few more years.  One TOSA will focus on bringing more ARTS education into our K-8 schools. The second TOSA will focus on our English Language Learners and assisting them and their teachers in acquiring the skills necessary to reach their potential. These two teachers will be itinerant and shared between sites in the district. They are grant funded positions.

Learning Spaces

Our ten new spaces (9 classrooms and our teacher professional development center called The Studio) have been getting great reviews.  This pilot is giving us good feedback about what furniture is durable, comfortable, agile, and should be considered for future classroom upgrades, especially at the new San Juan School. We are also learning about what we don’t want to purchase again because it breaks, or the vendor is non responsive. As funding allows, we will continue to upgrade other classrooms.  We are surveying our teachers and our students on their opinions about these classrooms. Our consultant, David Jakes will be returning in early May to help us interpret the survey data and make decisions for next steps as we develop a plan for gradual renovation of all spaces over time and as funding allows.

Raptor Visitor Management System and Employee ID badges

We are getting ready to implement our RAPTOR system at each school site. Raptor is a visitor management system which will be housed in each school’s main office. When visitors (parents, volunteers, vendors) come into the office and wish to enter the school site, they will be asked for their driver’s license or state ID which will be used to digitally check their name against Megan’s Law, a site that lists individuals who are identified as child molesters. If they are not on the list and thus cleared, a visitor badge will be printed  which we will ask them to wear that includes their photo, destination for their visit, time for visit. The first time an individual is entered in the system, it takes a couple of minutes. Subsequent visits are faster as the system will recognize them from their drivers license or state id. This new system will help improve school safety but also give us reports on numbers of visitors and also to locate individuals on campus who we need to ensure have left when a school site closes. Thanks for your patience as we implement this system. Many of our neighboring school districts have successfully used this system and it is one more part of school safety practices. 

Photo ID Badge, some uniforms

You will also notice that all employees should be wearing a lanyard with a photo id badge. We are also outfitting our maintenance department crew with uniforms that have their name stitched on it.  These are small steps toward improving school safety and consistency.

Curriculum Adoptions, New Course Proposals

• A committee of teachers and administrators from our K-8 schools have met all year to review and recommend the adoption of a new History textbook series. 

• Grad Exhibition changes enabled by adoption of two new AP courses

Two new Advanced Placement courses have been approved and will be offered at Anzar High School. These two new courses - AP Seminar and AP Research will be replacing portions of the Graduation Exhibitions that relate to content areas. This brings our number up to 8 advanced placement courses offered on campus and provides opportunities for students to learn intensive research skills and be able to apply them to areas of interest. The Post Graduate Service Learning Graduation Exhibition component will remain.

• Hawk Academy, our on site dual enrollment partnership with Gavilan college, saw 38 students successfully complete their first college general education course: Intro to Psychology. They are now enrolled in Personal Finance. Next year, two more courses will be added to the line-up of offerings for a total of four courses for a total of 12 credit hours. In many ways, these free dual enrollment courses are better than Advanced Placement courses for they guarantee college credit if the course is successfully completed and are not dependent on the passing of an AP test.

  These 

  courses provide credit in general education requirements; they are not elective area courses.  What this means is that at most colleges, students can advance more quickly to their major area of interest, having taken care of “gen ed” requirements.

• Focus on Math: we continue our partnership with CalEd Partners networking with other districts who have similar needs to address low math achievement. P3CC Information

• Mechatronics: A new partnership with Hartnell is in the works to develop a Mechatronics course. What is Mechatronics? A combination of mechanics and electronics; electronically controlled mechanical systems; automation, robotics, sensors, data analytics, etc. This will be a New Dual Enrollment opportunity with Hartnell College’s Mechatronics course sequence for the 2024-25 school year. We have 7 spots open to rising Seniors and rising Juniors who will join other high school students from Soledad and Hollister on Hartnell’s campus for this exciting class! We will bus our students the first part of the day to Hartnell’s campus where they will join HS students from Hollister and Soledad. We hope to develop this pathway with additional opportunities in the future.

SuperSTAT

It’s important to give students voice and agency as we seek to improve our schools.  To that end, I have started meeting with a group of about 20 students in grades 8-12 from all three schools. I see it as an opportunity to let them know what we are doing and to act on my invitation to students to listen to their good ideas and feedback on possible projects we are considering. They have offered many good ideas on facility needs and curricular choices. We next meet on April 18, 2024.