Pacifica School District: Preparing Students for an Evolving World

Pacifica School District’s first day of school was August 28, 2013!  Our classrooms are filled, and there are smiling faces in every seat.  This will be an exciting year of transition not only for Pacifica School District, but throughout the State.  With a new funding formula for school districts labeled Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) and the shift to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), we will be very focused on the implementation. 

Accountability and CCSS

In reviewing the California Standardized Testing and Reporting (STAR) program test results for our district, language arts and mathematics had very little change in the percentage of students meeting standard over the past three years. We continue to exceed the proficiency percentage as compared to San Mateo County and the State, and exceed the State 800 benchmark of high performing for the Academic Performance Index (API) with a PSD API of 852. Although a slight decrease from 2012 (API of 857), we are confident we are moving in the right direction.  This will be the last year for STAR as the State moves to using the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) as the student assessment system beginning 2014-15.  SBAC is aligned to the CCSS.  Therefore, as PSD focuses on making the shift to CCSS, we do anticipate a possible slight drop in our STAR scores as this test (in its final year) is not aligned to CCSS.

Local Control Funding Formula (LCFF) and Local Control and Accountability Plan (LCAP)

After 40 years of using an extremely complicated Revenue Limit funding formula for public schools, legislators adopted a new funding option called LCFF.  The goal is to simplify school funding in an equitable manner along with increasing flexibility and accountability at the local level.  School districts throughout California, including Pacifica School District, continue to monitor the implementation of the LCFF.  In particular we are monitoring to see what programs are being included in LCFF so we can maintain the services we have offered in the past at the same time leveraging new dollars to our district from a balanced approach of people, operations, and programs.  After coming from years of drastic cuts, it is encouraging to know we may be moving into a few years of budget enhancement. 

As a part of this change is the development of the LCAP that will consist of annual goals and describe how the district will use available resources.  This plan is to include input from those who  care about and impact our district including  teachers, classified staff, parents, principals, and community members.   Although the actual template will not be available until March 2014, we will begin the process of informing and gathering input beginning this fall.

The PSD team continues to work hard to provide a strong educational program and experience for our students!  We cannot do this alone and thank our parents and community for their support.  With us working together, we continue our quest of preparing students for an evolving world.  We are looking forward to a wonderful year!