The Burlingame Elementary School District has announced that they have 2 schools with over 900 API State Performance Index scores and 4 with over 800 API State Performance Index scores.  That’s fantastic Burlingame!!  Add to that the 2009-2010 California Business Roundtable Honor Awards that all 5 of the elementary schools received and Burlingame has something huge to be proud of.

Burlingame Intermediate School’s, otherwise known as BIS, Knowledge Masters Team ranks 3rd in the State of California and 47th out of 649 schools internationally.  Is there any wonder why Burlingame is one of the most coveted communities in the Bay Area?  Home values have held and are once again rising.

This is the time to consider making a move to Burlingame if you live some where else.  Top schools.  Beautiful weather.  Central to San Francisco or Silicone Valley.  Graceful homes.  All of this makes a fabulouso community for raising a family or just as a special place to hang your hat.

The Wilkas Group is here to assist you in finding just the right house to make yours.  Our knowledge and expertise of the area is available to assist you.  Give us a call or drop an email.

The district is trying to keep all children at their neighborhood school whether they live in San Mateo or Foster City.  These children have priority in attending their local school. Only then can transfers from other schools within the district come in and on a space available basis. All four of the middle schools are technically impacted and that’s why we are seeing portable class rooms popping up all over the district.

There is early discussion about developing a committee to study theenrollment issues within the district.  If this takes place, the Board of Trustees will announce it. Right now, our San Mateo/Foster City School District has an abundance of children and that’s good.  What’s not good is there is no room for many of them to
immediately attend their neighborhood school, but the district is working  hard on accommodating everyone.

Generally within the first three days of class in the fall, the schools have a pretty firm handle on what their enrollment will be for the term.  At that time they can move the children back to their neighborhood schools if there is room.  What you as a parent must do is be patient. The reason it takes a couple of days is many of the parents who enrolled their children in the Spring decided to place them into private schools, or might have moved, so the first week of class is really a shake down period for the school.  Got it?  Good.

Thank you Amber for your corrections. Keep your eye on the website for the district to know what’s changing and when.  Or better yet, attend a Board of Trustee meeting.

UPDATE:

Because of the large number of children expected to enroll in Kindergarten for 2009/10 school year at Foster City Elementary, the school will be impacted.  Unless the Kindergartner has a sibling already enrolled in this school the new student will be entered into a lottery for class space there.  They may or may not have room and if not, the child will attend kindergarten at either Audubon or Brewer Island Schools.  Foster City is not a huge community and this should pose only a minor inconvenience to parents.   All Foster City children will remain in Foster City schools.

The school district is hoping that the City of Foster City will donate land for a 4th elementary school.  The land they have identified is Boothbay Park.  There are many, including the City Counsel, who believe that the school district could overcome the shortage of space by rebuilding Foster City Elementary School as a 2 story school.  Foster City Elementary School is slated for updating and this is the perfect time to add the second story to the buildings.  This could enlarge the capacity of the school while keeping the playground and field areas available for the children to play on.

There will be a special meeting of the City Council on Monday, August 31, 2009 to discuss this further.  More information can be found here and here and here.

What you need to know about these numbers: If you see a letter “grade” of A or D it is not a grade at all. The letter A means the school surpassed the statewide goal in 2007 and therefore, wasn’t given a goal for 2008. The letter D means the district did not receive any goal or target information for 2008. It does not mean they didn’t do well!

This is how to read the charts, the first number is the 2008 score. The second number is the 2007 score. The third is either an A, D or the expected growth by the school. The fourth number is the actual growth, or lack thereof.

The schools I am featuring are those the children in Burlingame, Hillsborough, San Mateo and Foster City attend.  There are three other schools within the district that I am not including here.

San Mateo Union High School District

2008 2007

What you need to know about these numbers: If you see a letter “grade” of A or D it is not a grade at all. The letter A means the school surpassed the statewide goal in 2007 and therefore, wasn’t given a goal for 2008. The letter D means the district did not receive any goal or target information for 2008. It does not mean they didn’t do well!

This is how to read the charts, the first number is the 2008 score. The second number is the 2007 score. The third is either an A, D or the expected growth by the school. The fourth number is the actual growth, or lack thereof.

There are three elementary schools in Foster City and one Middle school. The scores of the Foster City schools are right behind those in Hillsborough.

San Mateo/Foster City Elementary Schools

Foster City Schools                 2008  2007

What you need to know about these numbers: If you see a letter “grade” of A or D it is not a grade at all. The letter A means the school surpassed the statewide goal in 2007 and therefore, wasn’t given a goal for 2008. The letter D means the district did not receive any goal or target information for 2008. It does not mean they didn’t do well!

This is how to read the charts, the first number is the 2008 score. The second number is the 2007 score. The third is either an A, D or the expected growth by the school. The fourth number is the actual growth, or lack thereof.

San Mateo/Foster City Elementary Schools

San Mateo Schools                        2008 2007

What you need to know about these numbers: If you see a letter “grade” of A or D it is not a grade at all. The letter A means the school surpassed the statewide goal in 2007 and therefore, wasn’t given a goal for 2008. The letter D means the district did not receive any goal or target information for 2008. It does not mean they didn’t do well!

This is how to read the charts, the first number is the 2008 score. The second number is the 2007 score. The third is either an A, D or the expected growth by the school. The fourth number is the actual growth, or lack thereof.

Hillsborough City Elementary School District

2008 2007

What you need to know about these numbers:  If you see a letter “grade” of A or D it is not a grade at all.  The letter A means the school surpassed the statewide goal in 2007 and therfore, wasn’t given a goal for 2008.  The letter D means the district did not receive any goal or target information for 2008.  It does not mean they didn’t do well!

This is how to read the charts, the first number is the 2008 score.  The second number is the 2007 score.  The third is either an A, D or the expected growth by the school.  The fourth number is the actual growth, or lack thereof.

Burlingame Elementary School District

School                                                  2008   2007

Bravo Hillsdale High School!  San Mateo’s gem of a school has been featured in Newsweek talking about a fabulous program that rolled out several years ago and has seen amazing results for the students and teachers.  When I am asked about the high schools in San Mateo, locals generally roll their eyes at the thought of buying a house within the Hillsdale district, at least that was then, but not any longer.  This high school, who serves students from the southern part of San Mateo and from Foster City, has made such progress in test scores that the entire country is watching and learning about a terrific teaching strategy.

When a Freshman starts high school it is generally with trepidation at the thought of getting lost in a big high school.  Most of us felt this and is was scary.  Hillsdale doesn’t let this happen because they have totally redesigned how the school works and it isn’t in the usual way with 30+ kids in a class and the kids taking 7 classes per day.

Stanford University’s School Redesign Network presented a great way to change things.  They divided the school into three houses of 100 students per house and four teachers, 25 students per teacher.  Something unheard of in high school.  This began in 2003 with the freshman class.  Today this program encompasses the entire school and is being rolled out to the entire San Mateo Union High School District.

Like most California school districts, funding isn’t coming locally but from Sacramento and has been cut annually for several years so how did they manage to fund this?  The school said out with electives and in with Small Learning Community grants from the district.  The first class to go through this system graduated last year, in 2007 and this class had received $2.6 million in scholarship money and half of the class met the requirements for entry to UC.  This school outdid Mills, Burlingame and Aragon in scholarships offered graduating seniors.  They also jumped dramatically in test scores.

One of the reasons people send their children to private schools is because of small class size.  Hillsdale managed to enact this and the kids have blossomed.  This program is so unique that it is in the spotlight for other school districts across the country to come and see what it’s all about.  Smaller classes, fewer teachers, collaboration between teachers, education becoming exciting and interesting to both constituencies.

Thank you Stanford!  We are in their backyard and are very lucky to have a school district willing to open up to something unique presented by the University.  Bravo Hillsdale High School.  I can’t wait to see the impact on our community over the next few years as the other 5 high schools in the district roll this program out to their students and teachers.

Our area has what I call a public-private education system.  What do I mean by this?  I mean you may send your child to a public school, but be prepared because you’re going to be asked to pay a whole lot of money to that school for anything and everything they need that’s not covered by our property taxes.  Now, the private comes from the foundations that have sprung up in our public school districts.  You don’t see these foundations in low income districts, mind you, but only in high wealth areas.  The areas where the schools know that they can come begging to the parents, and the local residents for funds. And, get them.

The schools have gotten creative since these foundations first showed up back when my three kids were in elementary school.  We’re talking back in the early 1980′s.  They should have by now, since they’ve had over 20 years to create new reasons for us to fund them.  Expect to get a phone call soon from your local district if you live in the San Mateo-Foster City Elementary District.  Or San Mateo Union High School District, for that matter.  They’ll come asking you to donate.  One school within the district, Baywood in San Mateo, puts on an auction that raises a whale of a lot of money — somewhere in the low six figures.  This money pays for teachers as well as “enrichment”.  The things that we used to expect to see taught in elementary school like art and music, new books for the library, computers for the computer lab, field trips, etc.

So, the API scores are out and as expected Hillsborough Elementary leads the pack in the number for the districts: 959 out of a possible 1000. This is expected as Hillsborough is a very high wealth area.  Burlingame Elementary follows with 874, Belmont and San Carlos are just behind with 873, Millbrae follows with 834 and San Mateo-Foster City has 801.  San Mateo-Foster City is the largest district with the widest range of incomes and therefore scores.  So, I ask what does this mean?  Is it really so critical to you as a buyer that you’ll pass up a great home near an okay school just to try and buy one for much more money near the top school?  Does it matter if you don’t have children yet?  Does it matter for resale?

These are questions I pose often and everyone has a different answer.  In my thinking, if we can change the demographics around a specific school with moreeducated parents, the school with improve their test scores.  So, why should it matter today when the child of the future (maybe 6 or 7 years away) will go there?  It doesn’t.  You can only be concerned with what’s going on today and not try to project the future.  Even though I collect magic wands and crystal balls, they’re only for fun.  Do you see anything in them?