Lowell High School group sues SFUSD over board's approval of ethnic studies curriculum

The heated debate over San Francisco Unified's required ethnic studies course is headed to court after an advocacy group alleged in a lawsuit filed this week that district officials violated public meeting laws when they approved and purchased a new curriculum for the class.

The Friends of Lowell Foundation, a nonprofit that advocates for the academically competitive Lowell High School as well as merit-based admissions and programs, filed the suit after first submitting a demand letter to the district calling for the reversal of the curriculum adoption. The school board, however, has stood by its vote for the off-the-shelf curriculum.

"This lawsuit is about process, because process is how the public keeps its schools accountable," the organization said in a statement. "Parents were never told, in plain language, that the District was about to decide what every fourteen-year-old in this city would be taught."

Ethnic studies, which focuses on marginalized peoples, has created controversy across the Bay Area in recent years amid a state law requiring a semester of the course for high school graduation - a mandate paused because of a lack of state funding to support it.

The debate in San Francisco and other districts has largely centered around what is taught in the classes. Some advocate for instruction focused primarily on appreciating other cultures while others push for a more activist approach, content that takes aim at white supremacy, racism and other historic injustices while giving students the tools to address them.

Friends of Lowell has questioned the activist instruction in the course's previous curriculum in San Francisco schools. The group has also opposed requiring the year-long course.

The group has asked the California Superior Court to declare the April 28 vote "null and void" because the school board violated the state's Brown Act, which requires agenda items to clearly state what actions a public body will take. 

During the meeting the course materials had already been selected as part of the overall adoption of new social studies and history curriculum for elementary and high school grades, including textbooks and other resources for a variety of courses including US History, World History, US Government and the Advanced Placement classes of those subjects.

Friends of Lowell allege that instead of including the ethnic studies curriculum "Voices" in a broader adoption of history/social studies materials, there should have been a separate vote for the course materials.

Yet California state law identifies ethnic studies as a social science and the U.S. Department of Education includes the course in its history and social sciences framework. Typically, districts don't adopt individual course materials in separate votes, but rather as part of math, language arts, history or science curriculum across several grades.  

District officials said following the filing of the suit that they do not respond to pending or ongoing litigation. 

"We remain focused on student outcomes and do not have additional information to share on this matter at this time," officials said in an emailed statement.

Prior to the April vote, district officials said the curriculum updates were part of a "sweeping modernization" of course content across the district, and specifically in which social science materials are "outdated and do not fully reflect the district's values," officials said.

The year-long ethnic studies course is now a district graduation requirement starting with the class of 2029.

Concerns about the course, which San Francisco has offered as a semester-long elective since 2010, also included the fact that the one-year requirement limits the number of electives a student can take.

Typically, freshmen are assigned to the year-long course, but can opt out and take it in a later year.  This past school year, just seven of the thousands of freshmen eligible opted to delay taking the course. 

Superintendent Maria Su recommended the adoption of "Voices," which replaced a controversial homegrown curriculum used by the district since 2010, initially for an elective semester-long ethnic studies course, one of the first in the country.

"This curriculum was rushed through without the transparency families deserve, and it was paid for with money San Francisco voters restricted for our children's enrichment," said Friends of Lowell board member Sarah Stettler in a statement. "The approximately $7.3 million spent on this curriculum could have funded one-on-one tutoring for students who are furthest behind."

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