Grow With Us: An Oakland Unified Podcast

"Apply with non-panicked urgency..."Executive Director of Enrollment Kilian Betlach and Enrollment Marketing Team leader Bobby Jordan convene to review the basics of submitting an application for the on-time enrollment and highlight changes for the 2026-2027 enrollment season. Most importantly, perhaps, is the change that allows families to submit After-School Progam applications* when they apply for their core school program. This replaces the Balkanized, site- and agency-specific model with disparate models, timelines and procedures. This is a big deal!*Before-School too, where applicable. Meantioned in this episode:⁠Apply to OUSD schools Our TK episode: Talking TKBurbank Early Childhood Education centerInteractive map feature on a local major air carrierConnect with an enrollment counselorGet GROW WITH US Gear: At a time when there is literally nothing more hardcore than being an OUSD parent, get some hoodies and rock them in public.. ⁠⁠⁠Right here!

"Dual Enrollment is a post-secondary accelerant..."For a long time, if you were doing college-level work in high school, this meant taking Advanced Placement (AP) classes and then cramming for their multiple-choice centric exams at the end of the year, hoping you'd get a 4 or a 5 to earn credit. Today in Oakland Unified, college-level access means taking actual college classes without leaving campus. it's called Dual Enrollment, and it's an ever-growing program wherein more and more high schoolers are earning college credit and high school credit and college exposure and 6-point As and deepening their Linked Learning Pathway experiences. That's a lot. Like almost too good to be true. But it's not. It's real. Meantioned in this episode:Dual Enrollment in OUSDHigh School Isn't What You Remember: our episode on Linked LearningMeasure N/ Measure H: the local parcel taxes that helped support Linked Learning Check out McClymonds and Skyline High SchoolsGet GROW WITH US Gear: Impress the public school afficionados with your hoodies and T-shirts demonstrating your level of local education knowledge. ⁠⁠Right here!

A re-release of last year's episode with Executive Director of Enrollment Kilian Betlach reviews the on-time enrollment offer system and process, discusses waitlists, and waxes nostalgic for 1980s baseball cards. Discussed in this episode:⁠Enrollwise⁠, the district's enrollment toolThe bountiful and jaunty ⁠Enrollment FAQ⁠1987 Topps ⁠Marc McGwire rookie card⁠Support the pod and show your love of Oakland's Public Schools by⁠ purchasing some swag from our store.⁠

"You never when kids are fully--with their whole heart--listening. Turns out it's all the time."Fruitvale's LIFE Academy is a 6-12 school boasting one of Oakland Unified's oldest--and most successful--pathway programs. Students at LIFE embed their learning in the health field, gaining exposure to unique instructional experiences and inernship opportunities. By committing deeply to the linked learning pedagogy and building authentic relationships with students, LIFE graduates students A-G* ready at twice the district average, and student enroll in 4-year institutions at significantly higher rates. We went to see how they're doing it.*Don't know A-G? That's the⁠ course sequence⁠ the UC and CSU systems require students complete in order to even apply to a state college. Get this: It's different than the ⁠state diploma requirements⁠. Not just a little different, like a lot different. True story. You can earn a high school diploma in California, a real diploma, and somehow be ineligible to apply to a 4-year state college. If you read that and thought: "Dang, that makes no sense." Why would we create a gap, a literal crack for students with less access to highly educated parents, private tutors, and lot's of college counseling to fall into? That's why some folks are out here saying the system isn't broken, it's doing just what it was designed to do. Mentioned in this episode:LIFE Academy Previous Episode: ⁠High School Isn't What You RememberReclassification rates in OUSDA-G completion rates in OUSDYou love this podcast and you want swag

"We have to be really clear-eyed that if we're saying no to mergers, no to closures, no to consolidations, then we're saying yes to cuts in the other areas." Being a School Board Director in Oakland is... interesting if nothing else. As he prepares to exit the Board, we speak with School Board President Sam Davis about some wins, his biggest regrets, the current budget deficit, and why he believes the next School Board will need to once again take up the matter of operating fewer schools. Mentioned in this episode: Previous Episode: High School Isn't What You Remember Measure N/ Measure H ⁠Cole Administrative Building OUSD Budget deficit McClymonds Measure Y project Get GROW WITH US Gear: Impress the public school afficionados with your hoodies and T-shirts demonstrating your level of local education knowledge. ⁠Right here!

"When we say 'thriving' we mean all the way... We want students to be the best humans they can be. THAT is this work." The state of California recently dropped billions of dollars into the Community Schools initiative. But Oakland has been engaged in this work for some time, whether you track that back to the Freedom Schools of the Black Panthers, the grass roots reforms that helped drived the original small work, or some of the most recent deliberate, focused community schools work of the last decade plus. In this episode, we're in conversation with two veteran Community School Managers, discussing what it really means to do school this way, and why it matters for Oakland. Mentioned in this episode: The Community School Manager (CSM) role in Oakland Unified Community School work realized in Oakland Unified The California Healthy Kids Survey (not abbreviated "Chicks") The state's investment in community school work Get GROW WITH US Gear: Impress the Playground Mafia with your hoodies and T-shirts demonstrating your level of local education knowledge. Right here!

"This is the building block for how we build really confident, happy, successful kids who can pick themselves up and take risks." Mentioned in this episode TK and Kinder readiness in OUSD Tontra Love in action Diamond Slice Pizza ChooseOUSD.org Support public schools and look good doing it.

Executive Director of Enrollment Kilian Betlach reviews the on-time enrollment offer system and process, discusses waitlists, and waxes nostalgic for 1980s baseball cards. Discussed in this episode: Enrollwise, the district's enrollment tool The bountiful and jaunty Enrollment FAQ 1987 Topps Marc McGwire rookie card Support the pod and show your love of Oakland's Public Schools by purchasing some swag from our store.

“We have to build a standard where if it’s not good enough for my child, it’s not good for anyone’s child.” In this episode, we dive deep into the realm of Oakland Unified Middle Schools, focusing on the extensive opportunities that are to be found--once again--in the middle grades. Computer science and athletics, the arts and the great outdoors, not to mention angst and apathy and acne: We talk with Middle School Network Superintendent Cliff Hong about current realities for middle school and the all the work that's happening every day in one of the most misunderstood arenas in public education. Mentioned in this episode: OUSD's middle schools The Oakland Athletic League (OAL) Oakland Goes Outdoors (OGO) Measure G1 Swag? Oh, we've got swag.

"Kids are amazing! And what they're capable of is so much beyond what most of us think." In this episode, we talk to Nicole Knight, Executive Director of the English Language Learner & Multilingual Achievement Office about dual language programs and the power of kids brains to build bilingual skills. OUSD operates eight different dual language programs--Bridges Academy, Esperanza Elementary, Global Family, Greenleaf TK-8, International Community School, Lockwood STEAM Academy, Manzanita SEED, Melrose Leadership Academy-- where students learn to read, write, speak, and think in both English and Spanish, working toward the goals of bilingualism and biliteracy. These programs have become some of the district's fastest growing and most popular schools, and represent an exciting component of OUSD's overall instructional program. In this episode: Hear from families about their dual language journey Read more about OUSD's dual language programs Apply to school for next year Show your support of public school in Oakland with some sweat gear

"When we went from schools organized for opportunity for some, to schools organized for opportunity for all, everyone rose." We dive deep into the district's embrace of an instructional model known as Linked Learning that aims to provide college and career access to all students. OUSD has shifted the high school landscape with career themed learning, universal college prep, internships, dual enrollment in community college, and much more. Rebecca Lacoque, director of linked learning, is our guide into this big-time high school change work. Mentioned in this episode: OUSD Linked Learning office The Linked Learning Alliance Support the pod and get some cool gear at our online store Learn more about OUSD high schools

Oakland Unified School District's on-time enrollment window opened on December 1, 2023. In this episode, we discuss what that means for families, big picture enrollment timelines, and things to consider when researching and selecting schools (HINT: stay away from websites that rhyme with "Straight Fools"). Mentioned in this episode: ChooseOUSD.org -- the enrollment website, where you can research and apply to OUSD schools The FAQs -- many questions, and somehow, even more answers Tours and other enrollment events -- check back to see when schools schedule tours, and to find links to our virtual school showcases The enrollment page -- actually updated, chocked full of relevant information Swag -- rock some Grow With Us gear, support the pod, promote your commitment to public schools

Do you know about the reading wars? In this corner, systematic phonics and nearly the entirety of empirical science... and in this corner, whole language, uh, proponents. In our first-ever episode of the Grow With Us podcast, we look deeply into perhaps the most important work a district an undertake: teaching kids to read. Guest: Romy Trigg-Smith, Director of Early Literacy Instruction Mentioned in this episode: Rooted in Reading. Stay up to date on Oakland's early literacy work Adopted curriculum in OUSD elementary schools. Literacy Liberators with the Oakland Reach Become an Early Literacy Tutor with OUSD

Every week, the Grow With Us podcast will tell stories about the hard work and creative thinking that makes Oakland Unified such a remarkable place of learning.