CA Superintendent of Public Instruction Primary

There are ten candidates for superintendant of public instruction. This is an area I struggle to make good judgments on, as I do not have kids, and am not generally in touch with the controversies of the day in education. That said, my main issues are (a) willingness to protect kids from in-school intrusion by ICE; (b) understanding of the deep extent of covid-related learning loss and some creativity around how to resolve it; (c) data-driven decisionmaking.

Normally I would discount Anthony Rendon (former Assembly speaker) as a career politician looking for an office rather than as someone deeply committed to education, but back before he got into politics he ran early childhood programs in LA, so he has some deep investment in the subject matter. As Speaker during high COVID, he pushed through a 50% funding increase and enacted universal transitional kindergarten, which is a good legislative record (but that doesn't mean he'd be a good executive, right?). So i'm open to him, but only if no better alternatives present themselves.

Josh Newman, on the other hand, i am discounting because he's a legislator looking to jump into executive office but he had no background in education prior to going into legislative politics -- he was in marketing, then film production, then tech. I don't trust his play here to be anything other than political musical chairs.

Frank Lara I am discounting because he's an elementary school teacher (with no experience running organizations) whose platform is based on reducing class sizes, increasing staffing, and banning charter schools --- but his proposal for how to fund this (tax corporations and billionaires more, and strip all of the waste out of the system) are going to be dead on arrival. So his platform is impossible and there's no evidence he has any skill in running organizations.

Ainye Long is a middle school teacher who isn't really running an active campaign (although she came within a fraction of a percentage of making the runoff in 2022). Her platform is shy of details and seems mostly to be making the case that a teacher should lead the schools (rather than an administrator or a politician).

Wendy Castaneda Leal is the Superintentent of a small rural district in Kern County. Her platform is centered on the needs of low-income rural candidates --- including expanding ESL and dual language programs, supporting the whole child by taking care of nutrition needs, and directing more money to rural districts. (All of this is good, but the overwhelming majority of students in California are in urban districts, and the areas which need the most reform are urban districts, about which she knows little and says less. Whoever wins should hire her to work with rural districts, though).

Nichelle Henderson is an LA community college district trustee and teacher. Her platform is full of vague buzzwords when it comes to education but speaks heavily about single payer healthcare, universal basic income, abolishing ICE, reparations for slavery, and climate divestment. So for me she's landing as someone trying to impress me with her overall progressivity rather than focusing on the specifics of this job. I wish she were running for Assembly instead.

Sonja Shaw is the President of the Chino Valley Unified School Board, and she openly campaigned against mask and vaccine mandates during high COVID. The very first issue in the issues section of her website is requiring trans athletes to compete in their gender assigned at birth. She's been endorsed by the likes of Chad Bianco, Steve Hilton, and Moms for Liberty. The good news is that if she advances to the runoff she doesn't stand a chance.

Gus Mattammal is an educator turned techie who wrote a book "A is for Average". He is running on a platform of returning to phonics and adopting Singapore math; redesigning the supplemental/concentration grant system and routing all growth in the education budget above inflation to funding smaller class sizes; adopting performance-based compensation for teachers; promoting charter schools and magnet schools; and using public pressure shaming campaigns to push schools into changing. He's got probably the most comprehensive and detailed set of reform plans.

Al Muratsuchi is a former assemblyman who was the chair of the ed. committee. He co-authored a law requiring phonicd education, a law banning ICE from California schools, a law to make kindergarten mandatory, and a law directing more resources to districts with the highest concentrations of low-income students (as well as prop 2, a school bond we passed in 2024). his platform is concerned with teacher retention and he has been pushing for raising teacher pay. (But again, he's been a fantastic legislator, which is meaningless for analyzing how well he would do at execution).

Richard Barrera is the President of the San Diego Unified School District, which has been the most successful large district in the state at recovering from COVID-related learning loss. (Presumably he's got something to teach everyone else). He thinks that legislation is often not the answer and that the job off the Superintendent is to build communities of practice among districts rather than relying on the legislature to pass rules. His platform talks about improving teacher pay and finding a way to provide teachers with affordable housing (SDUSD has adopted a plan, pushed by him, to build 3K units of teacher housing on district property); addressing chronic student absenteeism; expanding community schools and student mental health support.

What i'd love to see here is a general election between Barrera and Mattammal; they each are presenting interesting reformist ideas, and a dialogue between the two of them would be fascinating and productive.

But if I have to cast a single vote, it'll be for Barrera, based on the fact that he has been effective in SDUSD. Most of the candidates are legislators; he's an executive, and he's shown success --- so he is the most likely to be successful in this job, too.