The Santa Barbara Unified School District board on Tuesday night unanimously approved a $258,000 contract with Just Communities Central Coast to provide implicit-bias training.
The one-year-contract, approved on a 5-0 vote, calls for customized training and professional development for district employees, students and their families around issues of diversity, inclusion and equity, and understanding of how race, socio-economic class, and individual and system-wide bias affect the learning environment.
The 2019-20 contract has been controversial because some critics suggest that the curriculum is racist toward some groups of people, and teaches that white, heterosexual men are the most privileged members of society, and therefore oppressors of everyone else.
“If you want to do cultural proficiency properly, transparently, effectively, and without prejudice, there are many alternatives out there,” said James Fenkner, a parent and critic of the training. “We don’t have to bucket money out of public resources for this important issue”
Fenkner is one of two plaintiffs who has filed a lawsuit against the district and its superintendent, Cary Matsuoka, over implicit-bias training.
The district and the school board hope that implicit-bias and cultural-proficiency training will help reduce the achievement gap between white and Latino students.
“In 2019, tackling implicit bias is not radical,” said board member Laura Capps. “It is what we should be doing.”
She said this type of training is happening all over America.
“Corporations across the board require this type of implicit-bias training.”
Board member Kate Ford supported the training, but said she would like to see more information about the program.
“There is a bit of an air of secrecy about what the curriculum is,” she said. “I would like to see a curriculum night.”
More Mad Academy Allegations
Parents of current and former students in Santa Barbara High School’s MAD Academy spoke during the public comment portion of the closed-session agenda, calling on the board to “take further action in the case concerning unfitting behavior by the MAD Academy leadership.”
“We have seen videos, we have heard first-hand testimony from parents, and to us, most tragically we have received screenshots, seen copied text messages and heard recorded conversations,” said Mark Sherman, in a statement on behalf of himself and his wife, Tami Sherman.
Sherman said his son, now a student at UC Berkeley, reported in January 2018 inappropriate texts he had received from a different member of MAD Academy leadership.
“Mr. Williams took no action on the matter, in fact, he downplayed the accusations and told our son that the texts were an error caused by crossed wires associated with the debris flow,” Sherman said. “An insult to any intelligent individual, an exhibition of cavalier hubris, a dangerous incident of non-reporting by a mandated reporter.”
After nothing was done, Sherman said, his son reported the information to Assistant Principal Tiffany Carson in Jan. 2019.
Dan Williams, the director of the MAD Academy, was been placed on paid administrative leave pending an investigation in April by the district, but then reportedly recently returned to campus. The district has not commented on the reasons for his brief departure.
The Shermans’ allegations were against a different member of the MAD Academy leadership, who reportedly also has been put on leave.
“Neither of these individuals has been sanctioned in a manner that would prohibit them from working closely with children,” Sherman said.
Members of the school board did not comment publicly on the statement at Tuesday’s meeting.
— Noozhawk staff writer Joshua Molina can be reached at jmolina@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.
