On Feb. 6, the Anaheim Union High School District (AUHSD) kicked off its Local Control Accountability Plan (LCAP) for the 2024-25 school year, entering the second year of a three-year cycle.
For the next four months, LCAP will hold a series of meetings where AUHSD students, staff, and parents decide on action items to concentrate state funding towards. The district’s Board of Trustees will vote on which to prioritize and approve, aligning with the district’s vision and values for its communities and schools. AUHSD’s LCAP meetings take place in four focus groups, centered on California’s eight statewide priorities.
This year’s LCAP cycle is the second year of a current three-year cycle, expanding on previously approved action items and goals to work towards finalizing. Past initiatives include collaborative workspaces in classrooms, focused on shifting the traditional “table environment.” AUHSD’s Executive Director of Educational Services Robert Saldivar indicated a common LCAP goal of aiding career exploration by involving youth voice and purpose, as he presented LCAP’s visions of an innovative future.
“LCAP supports Servathon, civic-minded students, AIME, career preparedness, [and] opportunities in classrooms to engage in projects, connect[ing] them to careers where they feel a sense of purpose,” Saldivar said. “It’s grounded in our LCAP so that we’re able to do these things.”
Key speaker California State University, Long Beach professor Dr. Jose Moreno led the first session; presenting data comprising AUHSD alumni’s academic achievements, he revealed disparities between various ethnic groups and genders. He emphasized the importance of second-generation immigrant students using their first-generation parents’ struggles as fuel and taking advantage of their resources to pursue higher education.
“Education is a capital; it matters. When our children get their education, it makes the lie, [of ‘yes, you can’] a truth,” Moreno said.
Moreno connected this to the LCAP process’s shaping of educational funding for schools to engage students in career preparation. In turn, students are able to better prepare for college, as seen through the increasing number of AUHSD students meeting A-G requirements.
“The work of LCAP is not just to look after your own child, but to look after all of our children, all of our teachers, all of our staff,” Moreno said.
Students are encouraged to attend LCAP to be involved in change for AUHSD and represent their ideals to the district.
“I went to LCAP this year because I wanted to know more about what the district was doing at our schools, specifically what they were doing about the recent immigration issues,” Anaheim High School sophomore Sebastian Viera said.
Moreno emphasized how LCAP places the district’s initiatives in community members’ hands, allowing staff, students, and parents to align their needs with AUHSD goals.
“In reality, a truth can hurt,” he said. “It’s in our hands to do everything we can so that it’s not a lie: so that what we really believe to be true comes true.”
