Response to Findings and Recommendations (r2-r4) from Advancing Education Through Sharing*

- Innovations (creative teaching methodologies which benefit students) at any school are neither utilized nor shared between charter and district schools. *PARTIALLY AGREE FBUSD has maintained a positive working relationship with Three Rivers Charter School (TRCS) for the last three years. FBUSD has invited TRCS staff to attend our beginning of the year professional development days and we have included TRCS staff to attend our all-district staff training. Because of TRCS limited size, invitations to their trainings have not been received from FBUSD.

- Since district schools operate under more restrictive rules and regulations, it is difficult for the district schools to offer some of the same options or programs as charter schools. *AGREE As charter schools may offer other programs without the strict credentialing requirements, our district continues to struggle to hire appropriately credentialed teachers for specialized programs.

- The district schools are changing their curricula to attract students and increase their ADA funding. *DISAGREE FBUSD adjusts our curriculum as the state standards change and as our curriculum adoptions become outdated. We have never adjusted curriculum to attract and recruit students. We adjust our curriculum when we are mandated to do so, when our current curriculum is outdated, or when we find a curriculum that is better suited for the needs of our students.

- Where existing, the assigned oversight person between the district and the charter schools has not looked for opportunities to broaden the success of district schools. Currently, the GJ found no evidence of collaborative processes between the charter and district schools. *PARTIALLY AGREE While FBUSD has invited TRCS to participate in professional development opportunities, collaborative opportunities are limited in scope. Both FBUSD and TRCS have different academic calendars, different early release days, and different adopted curricula.

- Many parents are not aware of the availability, or even the existence, of SARC, API, and other scores and reports to determine the best educational experience for their students. Parents have traditionally not been educated in the availability of these tools. *PARTIALLY AGREE & PARTIALLY DISAGREE FBUSD publishes every school's SARC on the district website under Public Documents and the SARC is also published on each school's website. School administration provides a public report to the FBUSD Board of Trustees annually for Board approval prior to submitting the new SARC to the California Department of Education (CDE). While many parents may not be fully aware of this document, this document can be found in multiple locations on the FBUSD webpage. FBUSD disagrees with the "existence" of API. The Academic Performance Index (API) has not been in existence for a little over six years. California produced the last API report in 2013. (See CDE confirmation at https://www.cde.ca.gov/re/pr/api.asp.) Any reference to API as an accountability model is a clear indication that current California school accountability standards are not understood or known.

- The GJ has found in Mendocino County the mission of charter schools as originally envisioned has not been fulfilled. *PARTIALLY AGREE The report summary states, "Charter schools were originally envisioned as a parallel system of education alongside the traditional district schools to drive innovation through a progressive approach to classroom instruction." If this is what F6 is referring, then FBUSD partially agrees with this statement. TRCS faces the same challenges as FBUSD – finding qualified teachers who can afford to live on the Mendocino Coast is difficult. With consistent staff turnover, strengthening programs, expanding educational opportunities, and providing a wider range of courses is challenging.