Grand jury: Nearly 1 out of 4 SFUSD teachers not fully credentialed

SAN FRANCISCO – Almost one-fourth of San Francisco Unified School District’s teaching positions are filled by people without full teaching credentials, a predicament that highlights larger issues in the district’s teacher shortage as well as for the quality of education students are receiving, according to a civil grand jury report released Thursday.

The civil grand jury—a panel convened in each county around the state annually to investigate and report on local government operations—released the report “Not Making the Grade: San Francisco’s Shortage of Credentialed Teachers.”

“SFUSD does not employ an adequate number of credentialed teachers to afford a quality education to all San Francisco students,” reads the report.

California requires teachers to be credentialed, but it allows for exceptions when those teachers aren’t available. However, those exceptions are supposed to be temporary. A statewide teacher shortage—worsened by the pandemic—resulted in many school districts relying upon those exceptions, the jury said.

Only 77 percent of teachers had full credentials in San Francisco in the 2020-2021 school year, and 10 percent were labeled “ineffective” by the state. 

Teachers may be labeled ineffective if they do not have full teaching licenses, which includes teachers who were assigned under emergency permits and those who are credentialed as school administrators, like librarians or nurses.

The civil grand jury found that recruitment and retention may be harmed by low starting salaries—the third-lowest of 22 Bay Area districts, according to 2021-2022 data—and a lack of awareness for potential hires of available competitive benefits like pensions. Another impediment may be last year’s payroll “fiasco,” which impacted employee paychecks and prompted a “sleep-in” by educators at district offices.

The district implemented a new payroll system, EMPowerSF, in January 2022. Following the change, many teachers and district employees reported receiving inaccurate paychecks or nothing at all, some for multiple months.

In a statement Friday from the union for teachers—United Educators of San Francisco—in response to the grand jury report, the union leaders agreed with the jury’s findings and said, “we can overcome any challenge public education faces if we work together.”

“As educators who love and care for our students, we will continue to urge our leaders on a local and national level to take this crisis seriously and partner with us to fix these solvable problems,” wrote union president Cassondra Curiel.

COVID-19 had an impact on retaining teachers, the report said, but the jury found that “for more than a decade,” an average of 9 to 10 percent of teachers left annually due to resignation, termination or retirement.

Union officials urged the district to support teachers by agreeing to the union’s contract demands, including raises for paraeducators and to fund fully staffed schools.

The civil grand jury also reported that district administrators were reluctant and non-responsive during the investigation, which led to delays and required repeated intervention from the office of the San Francisco city attorney.

“Our requests for interviews and information frequently went unacknowledged, and multiple interview subjects either did not make themselves available or refused to participate outright,” reads the report.

A spokesperson for the district said they will comment on findings and assertions after thoroughly evaluating the report.

“No matter what we ultimately determine, we appreciate the time and effort spent by the civil grand jury and its members to provide feedback to our district,” said district spokesperson Laura Dudnick.

The civil grand jury recommends that the San Francisco Board of Education and the district superintendent prepare reports on the district’s teacher recruitment and retention and on salaries relative to other Bay Area districts and federal income limits. It also recommends that they collect more data about candidates who declined job offers in order to understand the district’s shortcomings and remediate its credentialed teacher shortage.

Mayor London Breed, the district superintendent and the board must respond to all findings and recommendations by Aug. 14 — 60 days after the report’s publication.