SACRAMENTO REGION, CA (MPG) - An effort is underway to recall the five members of the San Juan Unified School District (SJUSD) Board of Education—which governs schools in Arden-Arcade, Carmichael, Citrus Heights, Fair Oaks, Gold River, Orangevale, and parts of Sacramento.

Marina Gabel, the driving force behind “Recall San Juan,” first grew concerned last summer when SJUSD shut down schools and transitioned to distance learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The shutdown prompted her to spend months navigating the legal requirements of a recall and rallying others to the cause.

A Recall San Juan press release dated June 10, 2021, alleges that the distance learning model has had detrimental effects on students, such as learning loss, declining attendance, and student mental fatigue and depression.

As COVID cases dropped earlier this year and Sacramento County entered the less-restrictive Red Tier, SJUSD reopened for a hybrid model of learning. On March 22, students had the option to return to their classrooms two days a week, while supportive remote instruction continued the rest of the week. When physical distancing requirements were updated from 6 ft. to 3 ft. inside classrooms, SJUSD began offering in-person learning in the mornings four days a week starting on April 26.

According to Gabel and others involved in the recall effort, these changes weren’t enough. “Our main reason is to get schools open full time with no reason for them to ever do this to our kids again. We need people on the Board that will listen to the parents,” said Gabel.

Raina Carson is also involved in Recall San Juan, and she agrees that SJUSD should have opened schools full time as soon as possible. Carson has stated that the Board members did not defend students’ rights to access public school buildings.

When asked to comment on the recall effort, SJUSD Communication Coordinator Raj Rai answered on behalf of the Board, stating that “at all times, the district complied with the requirements of state and local health officials, which impacted school capacities and necessitated alternative learning models for the 2020-2021 school year.” Rai also stated that SJUSD was “among the first school districts in Sacramento County to offer students at ALL grade levels the option to return to some form of in-person learning.”

Even when SJUSD was able to offer the option for in-person learning, Rai explained that “many of our families chose to remain in the distance learning model.” Returning to a full five days a week schedule for some families while maintaining the distance learning option preferred by other families would have meant reassigning thousands of students to new classrooms and teachers with just a little more than a month before the end of the school year. “Valuing the relationships that were built between teacher and student, and between student to student, returning four days a week in the mornings was the option that was the least disruptive for all,” explained Rai.

The SJUSD 2021-2022 school year will start on August 12 with the traditional full-day schedule five days a week, which was announced at a Board meeting in May and through a message sent to all families with students enrolled in SJUSD schools.

But Recall San Juan wants to send a message to the Board, letting them know that some families in the district oppose the choices they made. At the June 2021 Board meeting, Gabel spoke during public comment: “The recall effort is underway. Our voices will not be silenced.”

In addition to students losing a year and a half of full-time in-person instruction, Gabel also shared another of her personal reasons for pursuing the recall. She said her son—a 10-year-old student in fifth grade—was assigned to a teacher who had been with the school for just a year. She asked that her son be transferred into a class taught by an experienced teacher with whom he was already familiar, but school policy required a reason for the transfer. Because classes were held over Zoom, Gabel said she found her reason: “I now had full access into the classroom and everything my son was exposed to by his teacher,” including “critical race theory, racism, gender stereotyping, and suicide.”

She demanded that her son be transferred, and the school did comply. Gabel believes that issues about race, gender, and mental health should not be taught in K-12 classrooms—and she has signed her son up for “weekly counseling sessions” as a result of those lessons.

The SJUSD does not include Critical Race Theory (CRT) as part of its curriculum. CRT is a theoretical framework for examining structural and institutional racism, typically studied in post-secondary education and used in legal analysis. “CRT is not part of our K-12 curriculum,” Rai explained. “However, lessons that address race and social justice are embedded in classes in alignment with state standards and our district’s 8-Point Commitment to Educational Justice.”

Rai continued: “At San Juan Unified we believe diversity is a valuable asset that strengthens and enriches our community. We recognize that we have achievement gaps in our system and educating students about issues such as ending racism and creating equity is one way we can work towards closing those gaps.”

The Recall San Juan movement is insistent that SJUSD needs new leadership. “We have people all over the district collecting petitions,” said Gabel. The petition timeline and number of required signatures are calculated based on the number of registered voters in the district, and Recall San Juan has until October 19 to gather the 20,044 signatures necessary to trigger the recall.

For more information call Marina Gabel 916-410-4316 email [email protected] or visit Recallsanjuanunifiedboe.org