Civic Center Secondary School

Civic Center Secondary School is one of several San Francisco County Community Schools which provide educational services to students in grades 7-12 who are assigned due to expulsion proceedings, recommended by Juvenile Probation, Foster, Homeless, and/or Social Services, or through truancy or behavioral intervention. The County Community Schools function as an interruption in the educational system, breaking the pipeline to prison design for many underrepresented students. The staff, students, parents and community partners openly struggle to interrupt the cycle of low expectations, neglect and institutionalized racism that is characteristic of the educational experience for at risk students. We strive to create a caring, inclusive, safe educational space where building relationships is the focus.

Instruction is based upon a small classroom cohort model managed by multiple adults including a special education instructor, a general education instructor, and a counselor or social worker. Teaching teams are provided with collaboration time and professional development to support their professional relationship building and planning. This support-enriched classroom experience creates a trauma-sensitive school environment where students, adults and families benefit from healing through utilization of trauma-informed classroom practices. In our support enriched classrooms with our community partners we provide support for job and career readiness, substance use awareness, and individual case management.

Our County Community Schools serve a population that is both transient and lopsided. By the end of the 2018-19 school year 63% of students were male, 37% female, 32% of students were African American, 38% Latinx, and 8% Pacific Islander – all widely disproportionate to the city as a whole. 43% of students have IEPs. Nearly all students are low income and more than half of students are identified as foster, homeless, and/or on probation. Nearly all have significant patterns of truancy and significant academic skill gaps.

To serve the complex needs of these young people and their families, the County Community Schools operate the main campus of Civic Center Secondary School and additional satellite campuses across the city. At the main campus of Civic Center Secondary School, we offer three classrooms for high school students as well as one classroom for middle school students. The satellite campuses consist of one Center for Academic Re-Entry (C.A.R.E.) classroom at the Bayview YMCA, another Center for Academic Re-Entry (C.A.R.E.) at the Buchanan YMCA, and two small classrooms comprising the Youth Chance program at the Embarcadero YMCA. Each self-contained classroom supports a cohort of generally less than 15 students. Instruction is highly personalized and culturally relevant. All students receive intensive orientation and intake support, develop an individual learning plan, are intensively case managed, and supported to achieve their own learning and transition goals. The programs are open-entry/open-exit with students enrolling when they need to and making a transition when appropriate. Typical enrollment is between one semester and one year, but there is no minimum and no maximum.