Blog: Would MLK endorse "Schools of Choice"?

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Record funding, new tax measures, new leaders, and still using the old structures that keep children apart.

California’s education funding is already one of the highest in the world. Governor Newsom just announced his budget proposal, which includes a record level of education funding in California. He is promising $27,418 per student, which pushes overall spending to new highs. But for the Redwood City School District (RCSD), even this amount is still not enough. District leaders are asking for more.

If that sounds like corporate greed to residents … it should. RCSD is planning to worsen Redwood City’s severe affordability crisis. Retiring superintendent John Baker and Trustees Mike Wells, Cecilia Márquez, David Weekly, David Li, and Jennifer Ng Kwing King want to have their cake and eat yours too.

“The festering sore of segregation debilitates the segregated as well as the segregator.” [Martin Luther King Jr. 1956]

Despite knowing that school segregation has been undermining their budget for the last 30 years, they refuse to abandon it. Their choice for the next superintendent sends a clear message to voters: “we are doubling down on school segregation.” As you might remember, school segregation in RCSD is not an accident; it is a deliberate choice that district leadership made decades ago. There is only one other district in the county that has similarly embraced school segregation as a central feature, and that is the San Mateo‑Foster City School District (SMFCSD) – the second most segregated school district in San Mateo County.

If RCSD’s Trustees were really interested in improving their district, why would they select their next leader from what’s arguably the second-worst school district along the Peninsula? Why would they keep being interested in repeating the same mistakes they have already been making?
Former SMFCSD trustee Shara Watkins and Martin Luther King Jr. would disapprove of this direction.

How to spot deliberate School Segregation

Around the country, magnet programs have often been used to help desegregate school districts. When school boards create “choice school” programs that function as separate schools, they often end up reinforcing segregation rather than reducing it. “Choice Schools”, “Schools of Choice”, “School Choices” aren’t created by accident; these were very deliberate decisions.

One way to spot this shift is by looking at school names and structures. When a public school is labeled “Alternative,” “Language Immersion,” “Academy,” “STEM,” “Fine Arts,” “Magnet,” “Preparatory,” “International Studies,” or “Technical,” the question is whether it truly serves a diverse cross‑section of students – or functions as an exclusionary track that filters students by race, language, or income.

For example, Sequoia HS offering an International Baccalaureate (IB) program can help make that school more attractive. But a separate “Sequoia International Studies HS” with its own admissions pipeline should raise questions about who is welcomed and who is left out.

Similarly, RCSD’s old GATE program was an acceptable, categorically funded educational program. North Star Academy “Enrichment School,” on the other hand, is philosophically steeped in Stanford’s eugenics model of old and is therefore allowed to keep crushing RCSD’s budget.

“One [child] of superior intellectual capacity … may confer greater benefits upon mankind than a thousand of the feeble-minded children upon whom we have recently come to put so much educational effort and expense.” [Elwood P. Cubberley, Stanford, 1920]

Solutions that actually improve Education

The city of Redwood City and its school district claim to care about children and education, but voters should ask whether actions over the last 30 years match the rhetoric. Around the world, there is abundant research on what effective education systems do.

Research in Europe has shown that Safe Routes to School helps with concentration and memory.
In Japan, practices like gakko aruki (“school walking”), kyūshoku (school lunch), taikai (school sports festivals), and radio taisō (group exercise) reflect an almost philosophical commitment to student health.
US research showed us early intervention and racially and socioeconomically integrated classrooms are most beneficial for all children – James Coleman Report, 1966.
California’s Education Code requires 60% of per-student funding to be allocated to elementary school classrooms. That is easily achievable through a combination of small classes and adequately paid teachers (ECD 41372)

Any district that consistently puts focus, time, and money into these proven solutions – early intervention, integration, safe routes, and strong classroom investments – will see education flourish.

Would Martin Luther King Jr. approve?

These programs share a common principle: they benefit all children and do so in ways that reduce rather than reinforce segregation. Martin Luther King Jr. would likely endorse programs that expand access, dismantle structural segregation, and invest in equal educational opportunity rather than gimmicks.

For example, RCSD spends only 26% of its funding on classroom education and 74% on “gimmicks”.

“The richest nation on Earth has never allocated enough resources to build sufficient schools, to compensate adequately its teachers, and to surround them with the prestige our work justifies. We squander funds on highways … but we pauperize education.” [Martin Luther King Jr., 1964]

It is as if Martin Luther King Jr. were talking about San Mateo County and Redwood City of today. Redwood City is planning to spend ca. $500M on one useless Highway Interchange project and $1-2B on six wasteful grade separation projects. But if you ask for just one bike lane around just one school, they always ‘just ran out of funding‘.

Who was in Charge of this?

Within Redwood City, I found four organizations that should be in charge of these projects, but apparently haven’t done their homework:

City Hall claims to have fixed mobility in 2019.
The Redwood City Education Foundation (RCEF), whose salaried leadership is funded by Stanford, yet has achieved little, except … (remember those earlier remarks about ‘Stanford’ and ‘eugenics’?).
RCSD and its large district-office staff, which is significantly above state average.
Redwood City Together, an umbrella group intended to align community efforts like these.

That is a substantial amount of people and funding that could have been mobilized for concrete, research‑based educational improvements. And yet Redwood City, RCSD, RCEF, and Redwood City Together have shown little interest in investing in integration, safety, health, and classroom‑centered programs.

Final Thoughts

The Mountain of Despair in Redwood City will remain if local leaders keep choosing the status quo. Neither the new city manager nor the new superintendent represents a hopeful break with inequity. Both choices point to more of the same rather than providing a Stone of Hope.

Redwood City has struggled with urban policy, and the San Mateo‑Foster City SD remains one of the most segregated districts in the county. Yet San Mateo chose its new city manager from Redwood City, and RCSD selected its new superintendent from SMFCSD. These moves suggest a closed circle of leadership that recycles the same ideas and the same tolerance for school segregation.

“The old order of segregation is passing away. The new order of freedom, justice, and human dignity is coming into being.” [Martin Luther King Jr.]

Martin Luther King Jr. couldn’t know that Redwood City would still be doing this in 2026.

Editor’s Note: The views and opinions expressed in all blog posts are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect those of the Redwood City Pulse or its staff.