Education

Education

San Jose college administrator dies on vacation in Mexico

A top official and longtime leader of the San Jose-Evergreen Community College District has died. Vice Chancellor Jorge Escobar died recently while vacationing in Mexico, according to a Tuesday statement from the district. Escobar, 55, was in the running to take over as chancellor from Interim Chancellor and San José Spotlight columnist Raúl Rodríguez, according...

San Jose student enrollment is a mixed bag

Santa Clara County’s largest school districts are dealing with declining student enrollment this school year. Yet, one group is seeing a surprising enrollment increase. Although school districts are reporting a loss in student population for the 2022-23 school year, according to new data from the California Department of Education, a deeper dive shows that’s not...

What’s the former San Jose mayor teaching at Stanford?

Former San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo had his first day on campus this week, and he couldn’t be more excited. Liccardo, who termed out last year, started a part-time gig as a Stanford University law professor on Monday. His course explores the fiscal, legal and political struggles of policymaking to solve what he said are the...

San Jose desperately needs more crossing guards

Rain or shine, crossing guards guide students to class at the beginning and end of every school day. But a swath of San Jose districts are missing that familiar face. School districts across the city are struggling to hire crossing guards in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Officials and school leaders said the shortage...

Petition demands San Jose school district support LGBTQ students

A community petition calling on Santa Clara County’s largest school district to support LGBTQ students has garnered hundreds of signatures. Eli Dinh, a part-time art teacher and parent at the district who is transgender, started the petition to protect LGBTQ students at San Jose Unifed School District. More than 250 signatures have been collected demanding...

East San Jose parents rally for principal’s return

East San Jose parents are calling for Alum Rock Union School District officials to reinstate a principal who was put on leave amid a sexual assault scandal involving a teacher. More than 50 parents, teachers and students rallied in freezing rain Thursday evening, calling on the district to bring back Maria Guadalupe Gutierrez, principal of Adelante...

Silicon Valley students stranded by shuttered schools

A popular Bay Area charter school system is closing its two Sunnyvale campuses this June despite months of attempts to save them, but parents and teachers said the ordeal is far from over. Board members from Summit Public Schools voted to shut down the middle and high schools in Sunnyvale, called Summit Denali, at a special...