Rain showers in the morning will evolve into a more steady rain in the afternoon. High 62F. Winds S at 10 to 20 mph. Chance of rain 100%. Rainfall around a quarter of an inch..
Periods of rain. Potential for heavy rainfall. Low 52F. Winds S at 10 to 15 mph. Chance of rain 90%. Rainfall near a quarter of an inch.
Updated: April 20, 2026 @ 2:29 am
Editor,
The May 30 letter “Virtue signaling at SM-FC” makes bold claims that the school district has “a habit of removing programs like resource [officers] and gifted math in the name of equity and not replacing them with resources that address the needs of the community.”
While the letter writers claim there is “no data in regards to a school-to-prison pipeline problem in a specific district,” Ed-Data.org, by the California Department of Education, does indeed track suspensions with SMFCD. Several local organizations keep a close eye on the correlation between suspensions and the juvenile justice system.
Furthermore, SMFCSD has demonstrated it is fully able to maintain good working relations with law enforcement without funding a dedicated school resource officer. The issue is less about funding the position and more about maintaining open lines of communications.
Where there is virtually no data on is the efficacy of middle school “gifted” math programs. I’ve looked everywhere for such data to no avail. Having raised three children who didn’t take accelerated math in middle school but went onto graduate high school with honors in math, they faced zero disadvantages along the way. Conversely, many of their friends who took accelerated math dropped out of the advanced pathway in high school due to misalignment of parent expectations and student readiness.
With no data proving accelerated math provides an advantage in college admissions or that funding more police in schools contributes to any improvement in outcomes, advocates for such programs would better serve their children by sitting the heck down.
David Pollack
San Carlos
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(1) comment
Hi David, thanks for writing. Can you please point to the data to support this statement:
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While the letter writers claim there is “no data in regards to a school-to-prison pipeline problem in a specific district,” Ed-Data.org, by the California Department of Education, does indeed track suspensions with SMFCD. Several local organizations keep a close eye on the correlation between suspensions and the juvenile justice system.
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I'm looking for the *actual data*, not the orgs who keep a close eye. This is a gap right now i.e. absence of data to support the presence of school-to-prison pipeline claim for SMFCSD.
In reviewing Ed-Data.org (thanks for the link), the expulsion rate across our 3 middle schools is...*ZERO* for the last 5 years (range of data available). Have you seen data from "local sources" that conclusively prove presence of a school-to-prison pipeline specifically for SMFCSD?
The reason this data is important is that it is cited as the basis of some pretty big policy decisions. It is only fair to ask - where is the data?
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