‘One decision, one day at a time’: How Stockton Unified’s new leader plans to rebuild trust

In north-central California, Stockton Unified School District, San Joaquin County’s largest school system, is headed toward at least a $30 million deficit, is at the center of an ongoing criminal investigation and has failed to retain a superintendent to lead the district long enough to enact positive change. 

Compounding the situation, the district must educate almost 40,000 students — most of whom fall below state standards in English and math. Academic under-performance has been a persistent problem for Stockton Unified, but in the past few years, the district has been beset with legal trouble, financial issues and instability in leadership — all of which, many Stockton community members say, take away much-needed attention from student needs. 

Amid the yearslong chaos, the largely low-income district has become a “revolving door” for superintendents, making it “difficult, if not impossible, for changes that lead to increased student achievement,” according to a 2020-21 grand jury report. 

“I don’t think we’re getting to the root causes or problems that need to be addressed to better support students directly,” Stockton community member Tanice Wallace recently told EdSource. 

Stockton Unified’s new leader, Michelle Rodriguez, the 14th superintendent to lead the district in 17 years, said she is determined to change SUSD’s troubled reputation by focusing on students, creating stability, restoring public trust and engaging the community “one interaction, one decision, one day at a time.” 

“One of the ways we’re going to do it is to change experiences, to change beliefs, to change expectations,” she said.

To make needed changes, Rodriguez said she plans to dedicate the next eight years of her career to Stockton Unified. She made a similar pledge seven years ago to Pajaro Valley Unified, a district she “left stronger than she found it,” the school board president said in a June 2 news release on Rodriguez’s “esteemed” leadership. 

During her tenure as superintendent of Pajaro Valley from 2016 until 2023, the district faced not only the pandemic, but many disasters, including forest fires, a one-in-100-years rainstorm that led to the relocation of an elementary school, and a levee breach that displaced thousands of students and their families. In spite of those challenges, Rodriguez launched several innovative initiatives to improve student success, family engagement, staff capacity and community cohesion, Pajaro Valley Unified said in the news release.

“As my career has shown,” Rodriguez said, “I have stood the course, even through challenges.” 

But, those in the Stockton Unified community, including Rodriguez herself, say it’ll take more than one person and more than one approach to turn the district around. 

“I can’t do it alone,” Rodriguez told dozens of community members and Stockton Unified employees during a July 7 reception welcoming her to the district. “And I’m not planning on doing it alone. I plan on doing it with each and every one of you.” 

Legal and financial problems have been years in the making 

The San Joaquin County District Attorney’s Office, with the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, launched a criminal investigation into Stockton Unified in April, after a state audit by the Fiscal Crisis & Management Assistance Team (FCMAT) found evidence that fraud, misappropriation of funds or other illegal fiscal practices may have occurred between July 2019 and April 2022.

“For me, that’s in the past, and I’m not going to necessarily pay attention to that noise because it’s not fair to the students or the community,” Rodriguez said. 

But the past continues to play a pivotal role in Stockton Unified’s future. 

In the weeks leading up to her July 1 start, Rodriguez reviewed the district’s nearly $1.1 billion budget. She said the crux of the district’s problems lies in one-time Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) funding, which the district, like other school districts in the nation, received to address the impacts of the pandemic.

Allegations about the use of this funding triggered a 2021-22 grand jury investigation into the district’s spending. Some community members and staff alleged that the more than $250 million in one-time pandemic relief money was being used for long-term spending, an act that FCMAT says increases a district’s risk of becoming financially insolvent and losing local control. 

FCMAT estimates that the district is spending $26.3 million of ESSER funds on salaries, benefits and services, accounting for most of the $30 million deficit by the 2024-25 school year. The grand jury recommended that the district move “essential” roles currently budgeted by the one-time funds to the general fund in order to avoid a possible state-ordered takeover by the county office of education.

Rodriguez concedes the need for such swift, decisive action on the recommendations of FCMAT and the grand jury, but she said the district must be “thoughtful and intentional” in its budget work. 

Making ‘intentional, informed’ decisions

In line with the grand jury’s recommendation, the district will shift nearly 40 ESSER-funded positions to the general operating budget, seven positions such as delivery drivers to the nutrition fund, and 15 other positions to different budgets for the local control funding formula that dictates school funding.

In addition to shuffling funds, Rodriguez must also deal with the challenge of spending down ESSER funds. State data shows that nearly a quarter of California school districts and charter schools have spent none of their money. 

As of March 31, Stockton Unified had spent just 1.84% (over $5 million) of the more than $156 million it received in ESSER III, which must be returned to the federal government if not budgeted by September 2024 and spent by January 2025. Rodriguez said the funds were intended to be used over several years for academic gains.  So far, the funding has paid for career technical education, staffing, professional development, a summer learning academy and books for the program, among other incentives. 

“Now we’re at the end of the usage,” Rodriguez said. With a little more than a year left to decide how to spend the remaining $150 million, the school board held a July 25 study session on the ESSER funds during which district leadership proposed strategies to address the funding. 

Though a key factor, better handling of ESSER spending isn’t the only way to fix Stockton Unified’s budget. 

The district must also work to reduce expenses that “are as far away from the children as possible,” Rodriguez said. 

Stockton Unified, she said, relies on and spends a lot of money on consultants, which the 2021-22 grand jury attributes to district staff lacking the “necessary training and guidance to execute complex district business needs.”

Much like the turnover for superintendents, many long-term employees, including the chief business officer in charge of finances, have retired or resigned since 2020, according to FCMAT, grand jury and media reports.

The agenda of the Jan. 11, 2022, meeting noted that “District staff in our fiscal services department are feeling overwhelmed and are in need of additional support, expertise and training,” and must resort to consultants, an option that comes with a huge financial cost to the district.

The first step in reducing consultant costs, Rodriguez said, is to address staff retention and eliminate the district’s dependency on outsiders.

Filling the “holes” is crucial for Rodriguez’ ability to reach her goals for the district, said Felice Bryson-Perez, former president of the Stockton Teachers Association and currently Stockton Unified’s senior program specialist for early childhood education. 

Making these changes to the budget will not address all the district’s financial woes. Rodriguez pointed to two ways that the district can garner much-needed ongoing funding: improving the district’s average daily attendance to 90% of enrollment and through grants, funding that doesn’t need to be paid back. 

Unlike many states, California funds schools based on attendance, not enrollment. Even though Stockton Unified’s enrollment hovers around 40,000 students, the district receives funding for its average daily attendance, which in the 2021-22 school year was nearly 29,000.

For grant funding, until early 2021, the district’s grant development office had researched and filed grant proposals to public and private entities. The grand jury recommended reinstating the office, saying that its absence led to the district missing grant opportunities, providing little to no guidance for staff submitting proposals and an inability to track grant compliance, which possibly led to misuse of funds.  

Rodriguez said she’ll evaluate the need for such an office; meanwhile, however, the district recently hired a grant writer who works with Rodriguez to track where money is being spent and how grants can be used for programs and initiatives.

“That’s what I did at PVUSD,” she said.  In Pajaro Valley Unified, the grant writer obtained over $20 million in grants within five years. 

“With one person, the district assessed and applied for all the grants the district sought,” she said. 

She said she remains open to the idea of a grant office, but added that having two grant writers and creating a grant development office would be an additional expense, “but will it be an additional benefit for us?” 

“We will take our time and make sure that we’re making intentional and informed decisions” in fixing the district’s financial problems, Rodriguez said. 

Focus on students, not the ‘noise’

“Stockton Unified students and their families must be the focus of every ounce of effort, every decision made, and every dollar spent,” a 2020-21 grand jury report concluded. “Unless this becomes a reality, the SUSD mission ‘to lift all youth out of circumstances of poverty and scarcity’ will always be just a dream.” 

Rodriguez believes students should be at the center of everything the district does and intends to ensure the focus stays on the kids. 

“She told us to ‘shut out all the noise and focus on the kids,’” said August Elementary School principal Lori Risso, who’s been in the district for 32 years. 

Over the years, Stockton Unified District’s troubles have left little room to focus on students or address their achievement, which, according to EdData, shows that 73% of students failed to meet English standards and 85% didn’t meet math standards in the 2021-22 school year. 

At the high school level, over 67%  of students who graduated didn’t pass the required A-G series courses to apply to the University of California and the California State University systems, EdData also shows. 

“Until I get in the classroom, I probably won’t be able to answer the question about lack of student achievement here,” Rodriguez said. She will, in time, build relationships with teachers and students to understand the district’s achievement gap and students’ specific needs. 

While not the cause, the 2020-21 county grand jury identified high superintendent turnover as one critical problem affecting student achievement. 

“The need for stable, quality leadership is essential for improving student achievement,” the report stated. 

Even if students aren’t affected individually, Rodriguez said, the “system that supports them” feels it. 

“There is an impact on everyone in the system.” she said. “Whether it’s curriculum adoption, or it’s which data are we using to determine if we’re moving things forward or just overall direction, focus and priorities of the district — all that eventually trickles down and impacts the students.” 

With Rodriguez’s commitment to finish her career in Stockton Unified, she can create the stability that the district “needs,” employees say. 

“We need stability and for somebody to stay,” said Bryson-Perez, the former teachers association president.  

Restoring confidence and trust in the public school system 

Even though she has a vision for the district, Rodriguez said she’s learned from experience not to come into a school district with nothing but plans; she knows “it’s critical to connect with the community.” 

And in Stockton, connecting with the community means restoring people’s confidence and trust in their public school system. 

“Intentional engagement with families, making it known that their presence is not only desired but necessary, and listening to them when they do show up” are three ways that Stockton Unified can gain that trust, said community member Wallace, who is also youth director for the Amelia Ann Adams Whole Life Center, a family resource center in Stockton. 

Wallace and others say Rodriguez is already doing that. 

Weeks before she started as superintendent, Rodriguez hosted meet-and-greets in English and Spanish. Soon after her official start on July 1, she started going into the community for listening sessions to identify concerns that need to be addressed. She plans to hold both in-person and virtual town hall meetings to develop an action plan for SUSD with “fingerprints” of community feedback. 

“We want to reach the hardest-to-reach parent; we want to reach the hardest-to-reach student,” Rodriguez said. “The only way we’re going to do that is by listening and then showing that we actually listened — by those plans being dictated by what we heard. And within those priority recommendations, you will see your fingerprints.” 

Her one request of those in the community: participate. 

“True success is not the responsibility of one person alone,” Stockton Unified Board President AngelAnn Flores said. “It is a collective effort that requires the collaboration and support of all stakeholders: board members, administrators, educators, parents and students.”

The school board needs to give Rodriguez the tools and time to succeed, said Bryson-Perez, who is hopeful and excited for Rodriguez’s tenure. 

“It’s about giving her time to do her job,” she said.

And although many educators and community members such as Lori Risso already believe in Rodriguez’s vision of building joy, trust and belief — getting the 4,000 other employees and tens of thousands of parents and students to trust and believe — will be the new superintendent’s greatest challenge, Risso said.  

Rodriguez admits that building public trust will take time, but her mantra remains: Trust is built one interaction, one decision, one day at a time. 

“We just have to continue to have positive interactions, make good decisions and do the right thing for kids day by day,” she said. “And we have to do it because change moves at the speed of trust.”