An Acorn sitdown with Simi's school superintendent
Q&A
By Eliav Appelbaum eliav@theacorn.com

Kathryn Scroggin

Concerns about the California budget crisis continue to grow.

The ripple effect of the crisis will perhaps have the greatest impact on public schools, including those in the Simi Valley Unified School District.

The budget, however, is only one of many issues affecting Simi Valley schools. In a recent sitdown interview with the Simi Valley Acorn, Superintendent Kathryn Scroggin shared her thoughts on navigating through tough fiscal times and on other topics impacting SVUSD.

Principal of Simi Valley High School from 1992 to 1996, Scroggin first worked in the district as a teacher at Sequoia Junior High School in 1982. Sequoia has since become Santa Susana High School.

Scroggin was an assistant principal at Sequoia from 1984 to 86, then served as assistant principal at Moorpark High School from 1986 to 89. This is her fifth year as superintendent of the school district.

Q: This was supposed to be the year of education reform in California. State Superintendent of Public Instruction Jack O'Connell recently called it the year of "education evisceration." With that in mind, how will the state budget crisis affect SVUSD?

A: It's too early to tell exactly what the effect will be on our district because so much is uncertain at this time. We know at this point in time that midyear, around March, we're going to have to cut about $500,000 from our budget. Then next year, we're looking at $6 million in cuts that would be on top of reductions we already made several years ago that we have not been able to restore to this point. So they're cuts that are deeper than what we've seen before.

Q: What is the most difficult part of leading a school district through tough budget times? What are the hardest decisions you have to make?

A: The hardest decisions you have to make have to do with where those cuts have to be made. We try to focus everything we do as far away from the classroom as we can get. That becomes the real challenging part.

The thing I will say that is very good about our district in times like this is that we have excellent relationships with our employees and associations. And we have, under (associate superintendent of business and facilities Lowell) Schultz's guidance for many years now, a budget study committee that includes teacher representatives, classified staff representatives and district staff representatives who sit down and take a hard look at what we're hearing from Sacramento and then prioritize a list of where we think we can tighten our belt a bit in order to have a balanced budget.

Q: The federal government adopted the No Child Left Behind Act six years ago last week. How well do you believe the district, in 2008, is doing in making sure "no child is left behind"?

A: We're doing an excellent job considering that it's not funded at the level where it should be. We believe in continuous improvement. We celebrate the successes of all our students all the way along even though sometimes the gains they make may not measure at the level where No Child Left Behind or other accountability measures say they should.

We do see the steady progress. We're very pleased that our API (Academic Performance Index) for the entire district moved to 802 this year. So we've seen steady growth over the years. We're pleased with that, but there's always more to do.

Q: One of the primary goals of No Child Left Behind was to increase academic accountability. The state has done this through standardized testing and its API. Do you believe the introduction of API scores has helped or hindered our teachers in the classroom? Do you think it's fair to compare schools based on their API scores?

A: I believe accountability is good. There should be systems for accountability because they give us a benchmark from which we can measure where we need to go next and how successful we're being. The fine line that you walk when there are accountability systems like the ones that we have in place right now is that you don't want to focus all of your instructional energy in the classroom on the test. There are other measures of success and of progress, and we really try to work with our teachers to make sure that our students aren't just focused on what's on that test. That is, as you can imagine, always challenging.

Q: It's well known that Simi Valley is a diverse community. What specifically is the district doing to narrow the achievement gap between students of different economic and/or cultural backgrounds, specifically, English language learners and non-English language learners? What do you think of the progress that's been made in recent years?

A: We did hire a teacher on special assignment who focuses on ELD (English Language Development), helping to identify curriculum and strategies that are effective with our English language learners. We also are looking at the way we deliver instruction to our students from different backgrounds. Right now, we have a cluster school model where programs are run at a few schools as opposed to every school in the district. We're looking at revamping that model.

Q: Chuck Weis, the county superintendent, said last week that drug and alcohol use by young people is the "biggest problem in Ventura County." He even called it a crisis. What kind of behavior trends have you observed among the students of Simi Valley and what's being done, besides the DARE program, to combat issues like binge drinking and illegal drug use? Would you agree it is a crisis?

A: Drugs and alcohol have been a concern for many, many years in every school across America. It's something that our teachers are very well aware of.

We're also taking a look at other other things that kids find their way to which can be harmful, like some of the things you see on MySpace- the cyberbullying kinds of things they get involved in. Our police department, through support of the city, has provided us with school resource officers. It's still in its infant stage at this time, but there's a new youth services program they're rolling out over the next few months that makes an additional officer available.

Once you think you have a handle on one area, something new comes up. . . . Right now we're really focused on misuse of prescription drugs and overthecounter drugs because that's a trend now that we're seeing nationwide. Of course, Simi Valley is not isolated from all that.

Q: A lot's been made in recent years, nationally, about the kind of destructive bullying that goes on in our country's middle schools. What's been done in Simi Valley to try to prevent that type of bullying? What's been done to try to teach students better conflict resolutions?

A: We have a program in our district that started at the elementary schools. It's called Second Step. We expanded it last year to our three middle schools. It's a program that all students are engaged in. It teaches them strategies for dealing with bullies. It also teaches them mutual respect for everyone with whom they come in contact, and it really teaches them tolerance. We've found it's been effective to this point. We haven't been involved in it long enough in the middle schools to see a long-term effect. But that's been very effective.

We have various forms of character education at the elementary and the middle and the high school levels. It's different in every place. Hillside (Middle School), for example, has a club that's very popular called the Diversity Club. Basically they come up with all these projects that are of interest to a wide variety of kids. You don't have to like chess; you don't have to be an athlete; you don't have to be any one particular anything in order to join this club. That's what the kids love best about it.

So we're really just trying to get kids to socialize together, to break down any of those barriers they might have and to find a place where they can understand that people are people and share the same kinds of interests and all do the same kinds of things. They really love that club. They have to turn kids away.

Q: In light of recent events at Virginia Tech and even Columbine, what steps have been taken to ensure the safety of students on campuses?

A: One of the things that we have done is we have worked with the Simi Valley Police Department to develop procedures that keep students and staff safe whenever there is any incident or potential for an incident to occur.

We have lockdown procedures and regular lockdown drills. We have protocols for alerting staff to the fact that there is a potentially dangerous situation at a school. With help from the police department, we have an understanding of who we call and who the first responders are and what we need to do in a situation like that.

But I think, more importantly, we have adults on all of our campuses who know our kids. They know the normal patterns at our schools. They know who belongs there and who doesn't.

Q: Why is parent involvement important to the success of students?

A: Parents are the foundation for their children in terms of helping them know right from wrong, helping them develop skills to avoid risky situations and helping them to make good choices.

Because we are entrusted with the care and education of children for the better part of every school day, we need to partner with parents so that the child has a support system everywhere he or she goes and that support system is not working opposite one to the other, but in fact is working together to accomplish the same thing.

One of the things we're trying to do right now is to redefine parent involvement. Because many parents are working, they can't come help in the classroom. There are many things they can't do, but parent involvement also extends to the home, to making sure homework is done, to having a discussion with children- not necessarily how was your day, but what was good about your day today, what wasn't good about your day today.

Q: How has the district prepared students who enter the work force out of high school as opposed to those who enroll in college?

A: We have vocational programs at all of our schools. Many programs that existed years ago went by the wayside- some of the different shop classes and things like that. We're coming back to a place where career technical education, which is what they're calling it now, is really on the forefront and viewed as something that's critical to students' education.

Probably the best model of that is at Santa Susana High School, where they have a number of different programs where students earn certificates and really learn a trade. We still run an auto shop at Simi Valley High School. We have different programs that are spread around.

What we're looking at right now is something in partnership with Moorpark College, which we're really not ready to talk about yet because it's in conjunction with other school districts in our area. Once that whole plan is ready to roll out, I think it's three districts that are going to go forward with it at the same time. But we are actively working in partnership with Moorpark College to further the career technical education.