The following is from the Mount Diablo Unified School District:
On February 23, 2017, community members in the Northgate area of the Mt. Diablo Unified School District (MDUSD) submitted a petition to the Contra Costa County Superintendent of Schools to form a new school district that would include the following schools and their attendance areas: Bancroft Elementary, Valle Verde Elementary, Walnut Acres Elementary, Foothill Middle, and Northgate High schools.
The petition was denied by the County Committee on School District Reorganization, finding that it failed to meet the many criteria necessary to approve such a petition, including:
- the petition would not result in an equitable division of property between the districts;
- each affected district would not have the ability to educate its students in an integrated environment and would promote ethnic discrimination or segregation;
- the petition would not promote sound educational performance and would significantly disrupt the educational programs in the affected districts;
- the petition would increase school facilities costs in a significant way;
- the petition would not promote sound fiscal management and would create negative effects on the fiscal statuses of each district.
The petition is now up on appeal before the California State Board of Education, with the State Board scheduled to hear the appeal on July 13 and/or July 14, 2022.
MDUSD values its ability to offer the best quality education to all its students in educational environments that center inclusion and promote respect, collaboration and creativity. To that end, the MDUSD Governing Board, with the support of District employees, students and the greater Mt. Diablo community passed a resolution formally opposing the petition on appeal, finding that the outlook on the underlying data make each of the failed criteria even less viable.
The Walnut Creek schools want out. They have wanted out for many years. Why keep them in Mt Diablo if they want out. Mt Diablo SD has reasons. WC keeps their scores up.
Leave this kind of stuff alone.To much political crap going on.Just like changing Concord High Schools mascot from Minutemen to something else.Nothing but idiots with to much time on there hands.
What a load of garbage….The schools in W.C. want to form their own district and they should absolutely be allowed to do so.
“each affected district would not have the ability to educate its students in an integrated environment and would promote ethnic discrimination or segregation”
Give me a break!
The MDSD came up with some losing reasons to keep the district as one.
I would have been ashamed to write them.
I think it’s time – People are moving in and out of the district – new families, new property taxes, new revenue – they could concentrate a lot more on the school district and make it better.
Because they don’t get to make that decision?
It’s the same reason that federal taxes from Californians get spent on things like the Tennessee Valley Authority which we don’t benefit from.
The reasons Walnut Creek wants out are purely classist.
Is that a fancy way to throw out the race card?
WC wants out because MDUSD is a mismanaged pile of garbage. They should be “allowed” to leave. How is MDUSD able to prevent this from happening?
Yes miss m, what’s the problem? Do you really need kids from wealthy families driving new BMWs making poor kids feel inadequate? What’s your point?
MDUSD needs to be broken up, it’s way too big and difficult to enact positive change in its current configuration. If you go item by item with the reasons the Committee denied the request, there is really only one valid reason and that is based on demographics.
What’s so wrong about wanting something better for your kids?
“Equity” sounds nice and makes liberals feel good, and it’s used to imply a positive change will occur. In reality, it’s proven to dumb-down the system to accommodate low achievers and hold back our bright students.
This is exactly why families who can afford it will send their kids to better private schools.
Precisely and it is exactly why these Walnut Creek schools wanted to form their own district. The parents want something better for their children.
Once again another of the buzzwords they use, in this case “equity” is being thrown around by the liberals as if it is the be all and end all of every conversation. It doesn’t mean a bleeping thing in the context that they are using it and to say so does not make one a racist.
I don’t pretend to speak for everyone but I have had about enough of this foolishness.
This has to pass. MDUSD needs to be sent a message. The state needs the message. The country. If you prioritize unions and marginalize kids you will lose. We need to know there will never be another Nzewi elected to represent us. No more McFerrins. Done. Never again. They are a cancer. The leadership at the district, county and state level are incapable of running a lemonade stand.
Nzewi is a caricature come to life. She is a vile, soulless human being, which pretty much sums up the rest of the Board.
Nzewi is the biggest racist of all.
There is already a Walnut Creek school district. Just merge those new schools into it.
There was a movement to do that back in the late 2000s, which was to place Bancroft Elementary, Valle Verde Elementary, Walnut Acers Elementary, and Foothill Middle schools into the Walnut Creek School District, and Northgate High School into the Acalanes Union High School District, however the Mt. Diablo Unified School District, as well as the Acalanes Union High School District, and Walnut Creek School District all opposed the movement, as MDUSD did not want to lose those schools, and WCSD and AUHSD were opposed because it would have just made their districts larger, and created more financial difficulties for them.
MDUSD is mandated to spend all the $$$ to bring English learners up to zero. Thus, that is where all the money goes due to changed demographics in the last 25 yrs. Northgate High got their “gifted program” (GATE) deleted because of this. MDUSD is always strapped for cash. Thus, NUSD wanted to separate from MDUSD so each entity could serve their clients better. MDUSD is the largest school district in Northern California, 30,000 students 149 square miles and ungovernable.
Illegals bring all our schools down. None of the money goes to the taxpayers’ kids. It is all to help the illegals and special programs. It is a sad reality.
Full Disclosure: My kids attended Highlands, Walnut Acres, Pine Hollow, Foothill, Northgate, and Clayton Valley. For many years, I was adamantly opposed to breaking up the district. However, I have come to the opinion that the Mount Diablo Unified School District is completely unmanageable. Much of that is the fault of terrible management, but there are also way too many students in too many schools.
So, my question for those of you who still live within MDUSD, where would you like to see boundaries for new school districts?
To start, crossings kids have no business being bussed to Walnut Creek for school when there are so many other options within walking distance.
Andrew – the crossings kids were sent there back in the late ’80’s early 90’s because Northgate needed more kids to attend in order to keep it open. It was not by choice. This was just after many of the same kids (1/2 of the crossings) were forced to transfer to the Highlands and PIne Hollow track a couple years prior. They were not excited to be forced to change school tracks again, especially when they could walk to CV.
If I remember correctly, the Crossings was specifically included in the Northgate area to gain support for building Northgate in the first place. Clayton Valley was certainly more convenient.
I had heard that another factor was homeowners in the Crossings and the newer Crystyl Ranch and Montecito areas wanting to be assigned to Northgate for home value reasons.
.. of course MDUSD opposes it… they lose membership… I used to give donations to a local elementary school thinking (and stipulating) the donations were to be used in a specific classroom by the teacher as they saw fit and and another donation to the specific school.. little did I know but found out later that because the school I was donating to “has enough in donations” it was re-directed by MDUSD staff to other schools with fewer donations.
As mentioned, this has been tried before without success and will fail again. I’m surprised they don’t just file for charter status like Clayton Valley did. It gives them more money and they manage the school. Of course charter schools get that money at the expense of the rest of the district which no one ever wants to talk about since that would be unpopular..
I am all for less money for the district. They get WAY too much and mismanage it horribly. It is time to make them accountable.
The families in the Northgate area of Walnut Creek have wanted out of the MDUSD since about this late 1980s and early 1990s, due to the major sociological and demographic changes that have transpired in other parts of the MDUSD since the early and mid 1980s.
As annoying as it may be to have their schools managed by MDUSD due to the demographic and sociological changes in Concord, Bay Point, and even Pleasant Hill to a lesser extent over the past few decades, they should be blessed to have their own schools not served by other areas, especially in regards to the high school (Northgate).
For those who are unaware, Northgate High first opened in 1974 after being built to relieve SEVERE OVERCROWDING at nearby Ygnacio Valley High School just over the Concord city limit in the early 1970s, as from the time that Ygnacio Valley High opened up in 1962 until the time that Northgate High opened 12 years later in 1974 since YVHS was SO OVERCROWDED, the boundaries of YVHS were rather expansive as they covered the school’s current Concord boundaries, as well as the area of Walnut Creek south of The (Contra Costa) Canal now served by Northgate, and YVHS had a diverse socioeconomic makeup, as it had the upper-income area of Walnut Creek, which is now zoned for Northgate, the many middle-class tracts of south Concord, as well as the low-income Monument Blvd. area of Concord (which was a mostly white working-class neighborhood back in he 1960s and 1970s).
Several years after Northgate was built, the enrollment of Pleasant Hill High School declined drastically forcing the (Mt. Diablo) district to shut that school down, and some mentioned that it might have been a mistake to build Northgate, as if Northgate had not been built, they probably would not have had to shut down Pleasant Hill, as they could have just done a boundary shift.
When I learned about that it made me think that I am sure that most people in that sector of Walnut Creek would not like having YVHS as their designated high school today, due to the major sociological changes that have since transpired in the current YVHS boundaries (mostly the Monument Blvd. area) since the 1960s and 1970s.
I mean, it is not wrong for people to want their kids to go to a school with other kids that have a similar background, values, morals, and parentage. Forcing “diversity” on anyone only means that the school ad district cannot adequately serve ANY of their students. If they were more homogenous, then they can address needs better. It has nothing to do with race or discrimination. Just a different way of living life.
this is a great comment. and yeah theres no way WC people would have allowed their kids to attend YV the way it took a turn. makes me also think… but what if that scenerio did play out? would WC be at the housing value it is today? i think that people would not want to live in walnut creek and it would be a totally different city.
If you want to send your kids to private school, just send them to private school. If you want to state to prioritize your kids over others, I understand the selfishness-by-proxy, but I don’t agree with it.
School Choice all the way. It’s my money and it should follow my kids. Government schools are trash.
Roads are trash, but I don’t try to rope off my own personal lane between home and work. Maybe I should?
From the State Board of Education
From the CDE staff report: “In addition to failing to meet all of the minimum conditions for approval, the CDE did not find any compelling local educational needs or concerns that would be addressed by the unification proposal. Further, the proposed unification would remove the most affluent area of the Mt. Diablo USD in order to create a smaller, less diverse, more affluent school district. Based on its analysis of the proposal, the CDE recommends that the SBE disapprove the petition to form a new unified school district from the Northgate portion of the Mt. Diablo USD.”
Stay tuned for information about transportation to Sacramento and talking points for public comment! We are almost there!
https://www.cde.ca.gov/be/ag/ag/yr22/agenda202207.asp
Sherry Whitmarsh. You mean to say MDUSD is going to bus parents and supporters up to Sacramento to speak on their behalf? That is disgraceful. Oh and provide talking points…lol. They cannot provide bus service for field trips, parents have to drive and/or pay for bus service. I have to say whoever made the decision to use taxpayer monies for this should be fired.
Ick. You cannot support this garbage. MDUSD is so very corrupt and too big to serve anyone adequately. That is why we left. And that is also why I support School Choice!
Meanwhile, Walnut Creek families, many of them minority families, are told to drink the Kool-Aid and send our children to under-performing schools, such as Oak Grove Middle. Who wouldn’t be delighted to send their child to a school that is ranked 1 out 10? Fortunately, for those of us who value education, and not indoctrination, there are excellent local private schools. MDUSD is completely deaf to parent concerns, too large, serves too many areas, and should have been split up the last time this issue was raised. We weep when we see the test scores from other local districts, that are smaller and better managed.
Given what occurred during Mrs. Whimarsh’s time on the the board, I’m not so sure we should be blindly following her post.
All the liberals in the WC area want out of MDUSD? Why is that?
How would you know they are liberals.
oh the irony. the rich white liberals trying to escape the lower income people that they so call support. their “blm” signs in their front yards. their leftist votes. but “its best we seperate from mdusd”? LOL
I have been saying for the past few years that we need to dissolve the MEGA Districts and make smaller local districts that conform to their communities specific needs and demographics. Mega Districts made sense years ago when communities, especially suburban areas were more homogeneous and you could benefit with massive “buying power” and get a uniformed education from one end of the County to the other… NOW not so much… Micro Districting would also allow the STATE to focus attention on the special needs of communities that might otherwise get “washed” away in the mega districting of the past.
Anon 2 you, there you go speaking common sense…
I would argue against this idea, as much as it seems nice, for one reason- Have you ever seen how few people actually pay attention to the overseeing of their school system? There are people who have been “elected” to the MDUSD board, even though it is a sizable district, by default because their name was the only one on the ballot. In the last election that included the county superintendent of education, the incumbent was unopposed. It doesn’t matter what you think of the job they’re doing because no one seems interested. And that job pay $200k+ per year.
You can only have more, smaller districts work if you actually have people (and they need to be quality people who have ethics, and not agendas to push) who give enough of a damn to oversee what is going on to make sure that bad things aren’t going on behind the scene. At least in this area I don’t see very many people getting involved. I don’t see many people run for school board positions, and I don’t see many people go to school board meetings.
Making things more local won’t guarantee that it will be run any better. If you think you’ll get more people involved, I disagree. If they really cared about the “local” district, be it big or small, they should start by getting on their school board now.
This proposal has come up numerous times and always fails. There is a reason we have a unified school district, it’s so we can make progress on the above factors and it ultimately benefits all of us. To carve out more “balkanized” pieces would leave some areas without few resources, and some with too large of a share. It’s important to make the connection that more uniform standards and opportunities for all students, regardless of there they live, is a principle that improves all of our lives and makes the area a better place long term.