Oakland Unified School District
Oakland, California
District details
Superintendent:Kyla Johnson-Trammell
# of school board members:7
Website:Link

Oakland Unified School District is aschool district inCalifornia.

Click on the links below to learn more about the school district's...

• Superintendent
• School board
• Elections
• Budget
• Teacher salaries
• Academic performance
• Students
• Staff
• Schools
• Contact information

Superintendent

This information is updated as we become aware of changes. Pleasecontact us with any updates.

Kyla Johnson-Trammell is the superintendent of the Oakland Unified School District. Johnson-Trammell was appointed superintendent in 2017.^[1] Johnson-Trammell's previous career experience includes working as an elementary school teacher, elementary school principal, and director of talent development.^[2]

Past superintendents

• Devin Dillon was the interim superintendent of the Oakland Unified School District in 2017. Dillon's previous career experience included working as the district's chief academic officer.^[3][4]
• Antwan Wilson was the superintendent of the Oakland Unified School District from 2014 to 2017. Wilson's previous career experience included working as the assistant superintendent for post-secondary readiness ofDenver Public Schools, a middle school and high school teacher, and a middle school and high school principal.^[3][5]
• Gary Yee was the superintendent of the Oakland Unified School District from 2013 to 2014. Yee's previous career experience included working as the vice chancellor of the Peralta Community College District and dean of instruction at Merritt College.^[6]

School board

The Oakland Unified School District school board consists of seven members electedby district to four-year terms.^[7]

Elections

See also:Oakland Unified School District, California, elections

Members of the Oakland Unified School District school board are elected to four-year terms. Three or four seats are up for election on a staggered basis every even-numbered year in November.

Four seats on the board were up for general election onNovember 5, 2024.

Ballotpedia covered school board elections in 367 school districts in 29 states in 2024. Those school districts had a total student enrollment of 12,203,404 students.Click here to read an analysis of those elections.

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Public participation in board meetings

The Oakland Unified School District school board maintains the following policy on public testimony during board meetings:^[8]

District map

Budget

The following statistics were published by theNational Center for Education Statistics, which is a part of theU.S. Department of Education.^[10]

Teacher salaries

The following salary information was pulled from the district's teacher salary schedule. A salary schedule is a list of expected compensations based on variables such as position, years employed, and education level. It may not reflect actual teacher salaries in the district.

Academic performance

Each year, state and local education agencies use tests and other standards to assess student proficiency. Although the data below was published by theU.S. Department of Education, proficiency measurements are established by the states. As a result,proficiency levels are not comparable between different states andyear-over-year proficiency levels within a district may not be comparable because states may change their proficiency measurements.^[14]

Students

Staff

Schools

Noteworthy events

2020: Recall effort

• 2020: Recall effort (click to expand)

  See also:Jody London recall, Oakland Unified School District, California (2020)

  An effort to recall acting president and District 1 representativeJody London from theOakland Unified School District school board did not go to a vote in 2020. During a school board meeting on December 10, 2019, London was served with a notice of intent to recall her from her position.^[15] Those calling for her removal had to collect 9,236 signatures in order to get the recall election on the ballot. They did not submit signatures in time to hold an election six months before her term was due to end.^[16][17][18]

  The board voted in September 2019 to close Kaiser Elementary School and merge it at the end of the 2019-2020 school year with the Sankofa Elementary School. Kaiser Elementary School was in London's District 1. The school closure and proposed merger sparked protestors to initiate the recall campaign against London, who announced in 2018 that she did not plan to seek re-election in 2020.^[19]

  London argued that the student body of Kaiser Elementary was diverse and comprised of students from all parts of Oakland. She also argued the district could increase the quality of its schools by focusing resources on fewer facilities. London also said she did not believe enough signatures would be gathered to mount the recall.^[19]

  Protestors argued that school closures hurt students and demanded the halt of school closures until the summer of 2022 when voters would have the opportunity to vote on statewide ballot measures that could increase education funding.^[19]

2017: Superintendent announces plan to leave

• 2017: Superintendent announces plan to leave (click to expand)
  Oakland Unified SuperintendentAntwan Wilson announced he would be leaving his position in February 2017 in order to become chancellor of schools inWashington, D.C. The board appointed Devin Dillon, the district's chief academic officer, to serve as interim superintendent.^[3]

  “I come to this work having worked at every level of the school system, starting out as an instructional assistant in college and my favorite role of being a teacher,” said Dillon. “I still consider myself a teacher first. We need to continue our focus on equity and ensuring that every student thrives.”^[3]

  Wilson was the district's eighth superintendent in 16 years. His time with the district ended six months before his three-year contract was up.^[3]

2016: CCSA and OUSD agree to stay Proposition 39 lawsuit

• 2016: CCSA and OUSD agree to stay Proposition 39 lawsuit (click to expand)

  

  In September 2016, the California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) agreed to stay a lawsuit it had filed against the Oakland Unified School District after the district offered to work on its process of sharing facilities with itscharter schools. CCSA filed the lawsuit in March 2016 in order to require the district to align with Proposition 39, a law that was passed in 2000 to ensure that public school facilities were shared equitably among all public school students, including public charter school students.^[20][21]

  Under Proposition 39, the Oakland Unified School District was required to provide school space where the charter school wanted to be located—somewhere reasonably equivalent to the places other district students attend school. The district was also required to locate all of the classrooms for the charter school at one site. In its lawsuit, CCSA said the district had violated these laws for a number of years by offering charter schools split sites, not offering equivalent space, and not making a reasonable effort to offer a site in a desired location. The lawsuit also said the district's Proposition 39 process had lacked transparency and had used confusing language to "make charter schools inadvertently waive their Prop. 39 rights."^[20]

  "The illegal Prop. 39 tactics by OUSD create insurmountable barriers and we felt we had no alternative but to take action on behalf of Oakland students and families. CCSA has corresponded extensively with OUSD, putting it on detailed notice of its extensive violations of the law," said CCSA President and CEO Jed Wallace when the lawsuit was filed.^[20]

  The agreement to stay the lawsuit was reached six months after the lawsuit was filed. CCSA agreed to put the case on hold until the district issued its Proposition 39 facilities offers for the 2017-2018 school year. The district agreed to work with CCSA to provide a more transparent Proposition 39 process.^[21]

2016: School lacks accreditation

• 2016: School lacks accreditation (click to expand)
  Oakland Unified School District officials announced that they failed to meet a deadline to obtain accreditation for a new high school on September 27, 2016. Madison Park Business & Art Academy—a public elementary and middle school that was expanded to include grades nine through 12 for the first time that year—had not been accredited with the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, making it harder for the 75 seniors set to graduate to get into a University of California or California State University school.^[22]

  In reaction to the announcement of the school lacking accreditation, students at Madison Park staged a walkout on September 28, 2016, demanding to know how the lack of accreditation would affect their chances of getting into a university. The district responded by holding an impromptu town hall meeting to answer questions.^[23]

  District spokesman John Sasaki said the accreditation process for the school had “dropped between the cracks” due to the school's newness and the district's staff turnover. He said students who planned to attend a community college, a private college, or an out-of-state college would not be affected. “Obviously this is not what we want to have our students dealing with,” said Sasaki.^[22]

  Certifying a school with the Western Association of Schools and Colleges proves that the school's courses are state-approved and allows admissions officers at universities to use students' grades and the courses they took in high school to determine their eligibility. Without that accreditation, the admissions process relies on test scores or "a demonstration of exceptional circumstances that merit admission despite the lack of traditional qualifications," according toSF Gate.^[22] Sasaki, however, said, "We have been assured by the UC system that it should not adversely affect these students.”^[23]

  The Western Association of Schools and Colleges voted on Madison Park’s accreditation application in December 2016, but the district announced that it had received early word that the school would receive full accreditation in October 2016. College applications for California university systems were due in November 2016.^[22][24]

  In response to the mistake, Oakland Unified officials hired an accreditation coordinator and pledged to send a college and career readiness counselor to Madison Park twice per week. The district also promised to sponsor a college admissions course and gave the school $10,000 for activities such as college campus tours. Officials said no other schools in the district lacked accreditation.^[22]

2016: Oakland Unified charter schools listed in ACLU discrimination report

• 2016: Oakland Unified charter schools listed in ACLU discrimination report (click to expand)

  

  Eleven of the Oakland Unified School District's 37 charter schools were alleged to have discriminatory admissions practices in an August 2016 report released by theAmerican Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Southern California and Public Advocates. Researchers with the ACLU and Public Advocates said they started investigating admission policies after hearing from parents that some charter schools were not accepting all students as they were required to do by state law. The 11 Oakland Unified schools were included in a list of 253 charter schools flagged for discriminatory practices acrossCalifornia.^[25][26]

  The 11 Oakland Unified charter schools included in the report were:^[26][27]

  American Indian Public Charter ARISE High Downtown Charter Academy East Oakland Leadership Academy

  Francophone Charter School of Oakland North Oakland Community Charter Oakland Charter Academy Oakland Charter High School

  Oakland Military Institute, College Preparatory Academy Oakland School for the Arts Oakland Unity High

  Before the 2016 election, two of the schools—ARISE High and the North Oakland Community Charter—were removed from the list after they adjusted their admissions policies.^[26]

  The ACLU report grouped the discriminatory admissions practices into five categories:

  “

  Exclusion Based on Academic Performance Discrimination against English Learners Pre-Enrollment Essays or Interviews Illegal Parent/Guardian Volunteer Requirements Requirements that Discourage Undocumented Students[26][9]

  ”

  Schools could be put into multiple categories if researchers found multiple types of discriminatory practices. Oakland Unified's charter schools were nearly equally split between requiring essays or interviews and rejecting the applications of students who were in the U.S. illegally, but two schools were found to have mandates for parents. No schools in Oakland Unified were found to have bias against English language learners.^[26]

  In response to the report, the California Charter Schools Association encouraged its members to review their school policies and to revise them if needed.^[25]

2016: Grand jury report calls for better management of district's charter schools

• 2016: Grand jury report calls for better management of district's charter schools (click to expand)
  AnAlameda County grand jury report released in June 2016 recommended that the Oakland Unified School District add more oversight and accountability to itscharter school approval and reauthorization process in response to how the district's charter schools had performed on state assessments. The report also recommended that the district increase fiscal and governance oversight for its charter schools through a larger staff at its office of charter schools and through additional site visits.^[28]

  The grand jury report showed that Oakland Unified's charter schools had on average scored lower on the 2015 California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress than the district's regular public schools. The report showed that 15 of the district's 37 charter schools had performed below the district's average in both math and reading. A total of 19 charter schools scored below the district's math average, and 17 scored below the district's reading average.^[28]

  More of the district's charter schools fell below the state's average. A total of 23 performed below the state's average in math, and 24 performed below the state's average in reading.^[28]

  Though the report acknowledged that additional measures should be used along with state assessment scores, it also stated that “it’s a concern that some charters are not achieving expected results and yet may still be reauthorized.”^[28]

  “The district remains committed to ensuring all students have access to a high-quality education and will continue our important work toward equity in our schools,” said Valerie Goode, a spokeswoman for the district. She said the district follows the state education code when reviewing charter school applications.^[28]

  The California Charter Schools Association (CCSA) announced its disagreement with the report. “We find the report lacking understanding of the depth and nuance in both law and practice of charter schools across California. Furthermore, the report is oversimplified in both its definition of the issues and recommended solutions,” said CCSA spokeswoman Emily Bertelli.^[28]

  Oakland Unified had the largest number of charter schools in Alameda County in 2016. At the time the report was released, almost 25 percent of the district's schools were charters, compared to the average of 6% nationwide.^[28]

Contact information

Oakland Unified School District
1011 Union Street
Oakland, CA 94607
Phone: 510-879-8000

About school boards

Education legislation in California

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See also

California	School Board Elections	News and Analysis
List of school districts in California School board elections in California Public education in California	School board elections, 2025 California school board elections, 2025	School board election data analysis, 2024 United States school shootings, 1990-present

External links

• Search Google News for this topic
• Oakland Unified School District
• California Department of Education
• California School Boards Association

Footnotes

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