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The Mountain View Los Altos High School District’s board is not moving forward with a proposal from district social studies teachers that aimed to ensure all freshmen have a full year of social studies instruction.
After the school board voted 3-2 in October to shorten its yearlong ethnic studies class into a single semester requirement, trustees asked social studies teachers to make proposals for elective courses that could be taken alongside the truncated freshmen course. Instead of creating multiple elective options, the department came up with a single proposal that would require freshmen to pair one semester of world studies with the single semester ethnic studies course.
This week, board members said that they’re not interested in requiring a second semester of social studies for ninth grade students, stressing that the decision to not have a full-year social studies requirement for freshmen had already been made.
“It makes no sense to me to consider a required course, because it immediately goes against the board’s vote,” trustee Vadim Katz said at the Jan. 12 meeting.
Katz, along with the other board members, urged social studies teachers again to provide proposals for elective courses before a Jan. 26 deadline.
“Like we said from the beginning, offer us elective options that will support students’ growth and will be exciting for the students to take, and we’ll be very happy to consider and do what the board is expected to do,” Katz said.
One of the social studies department’s main concerns with having several elective options for students to choose from is that it would create competition among teachers and lead to a lack of a common freshmen experience, teachers’ union President Dave Campbell told the board while presenting the world studies proposal in December.
Additionally, shortly after the board’s vote to shorten ethnic studies, district staff were notified of the potential for layoffs in the social studies department. The teachers’ proposal aimed to mitigate the risk of job losses by filling the gap that the eliminated semester of ethnic studies will cause, Campbell said.
On Monday, board members directed Superintendent Eric Volta to look into how they can avoid having to let go of any district teachers. Board member Esmeralda Ortiz highlighted that she originally voted against shortening ethnic studies and said she wanted to minimize the impact of the decision, adding that she thought the effect on teachers had been an important implication to consider in the first place.
“As much as possible, we should be leveraging the talent of the district,” Ortiz said.
Volta told the Voice after Monday’s meeting that while administrators have not yet identified their options for avoiding layoffs, he thinks that it’s likely doable.
Mountain View High School teachers are looking to bring back contemporary world issues or Latin American studies as one semester options for freshmen, Campbell told the Voice, adding that neither course would need approval from the board because they’ve been offered before. Similarly, Los Altos High School is considering opening up psychology to ninth grade students, Campbell said.
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