Hiram Johnson works to plug teacher gaps

Sacramento City Unified School District has finished moving nearly 400 Hiram Johnson High School students out of classes taught by substitute teachers after receiving pressure from frustrated employees, parents and a San Francisco attorney.

In a letter sent Monday, Superintendent Maggie Mejia laid out the district's response to a complaint filed by attorney John Affeldt alleging that Sacramento City Unified was violating state law by allowing students to languish in classes with substitutes more than two months into the school year.

Two teachers still need to be hired, Mejia wrote in her response, but in the meantime, two certificated teachers who previously had non-classroom assignments at Hiram Johnson are filling in.

"Thus, all of Hiram Johnson's teaching positions are covered with certificated instructors at this time," she wrote.

Affeldt, an attorney with Public Advocates, filed his complaint Friday. He warned district officials that they could be at risk of losing state funds because they were not complying with state law established by the 2005 settlement of the landmark Williams lawsuit, in which Affeldt was a lead counsel. The case addressed inequalities between schools, setting up a procedure allowing students, parents and others to file complaints about inadequate facilities or underqualified teachers.

He decried the situation as outrageous, noting that students at Hiram Johnson – an ethnically diverse, high-poverty and low-performing school – are some of those most in need of highly qualified teachers.

At that point, district and campus administrators had begun moving some of the nearly 400 students into other classrooms, but an unknown number remained under the guidance of substitutes.

But Mejia wrote Monday that the issue had been fully addressed. She reiterated that the district had struggled to fully staff the school at the year's start because three teachers quit at the end of the summer.

Those three positions – in the areas of English, math and physics – have since been filled by instructors in the process of obtaining intern status. They are awaiting test results that would secure that status.

Currently, intern teachers are considered "highly qualified" under the federal No Child Left Behind law, but Affeldt noted that his firm has filed suit challenging that label.

Mejia went on to explain that about 250 unexpected students showed up in the first week of school. Initially, it was believed six teachers would be needed to accommodate the influx of students, but Mejia said classes have been filled to their 32-student limit, reducing the need to just three teachers.

On Thursday, the district posted job openings for positions teaching English, math and physical education. A physical education teacher has been hired; the application period for the other two was set to close late Monday, according to district spokeswoman Maria Lopez, with interviews scheduled to begin today.

The goal, Mejia wrote, is the "immediate hiring and assignment to the remaining classrooms."

In response to Affeldt's request that the district show how it will work to avoid a similar situation in the future, Mejia said the first 20 days of the school year typically have been used to "level off" class sizes.

"However, based upon what has happened at Hiram Johnson, the district in the future will advance and accelerate this process to address the potential of sharp increases of student enrollment over projections in order to 'anticipate the unanticipated,' " she wrote.

Affeldt said he received Mejia's letter Monday and described it as positive.

"The letter, on its face, is responsive," he said. "Obviously, we'll want to continue to check in with them and make sure they're fulfilling the commitment they made in the letter."

In the meantime, Affeldt said, he considers the 30-day countdown still in effect.

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