The Hayward Unified School District’s African- American students failed to meet the most recent federal Adequate Yearly Progress criteria, and are one of lowest performing student groups in the district.

The school district was placed on federal program improvement in 2006-07 after their academic performance was below federal and state academic proficiency standards. Since then, African-American students have shown negative Academic Progress Index growth rates and low graduation rates, according to reports released by the California Department of Education.

The African-American Student Achievement Initiative was initially started in 2010 in response to this, but has since expanded its scope to also focus on API, AYP scores, graduation rates, California High School Exit Exam scores, and college readiness. Suspension and expulsion rates also enhanced the need for the program.

Every Thursday since October 2013, AASAI has met with the school board. Community members, parents, and HUSD staff have created a support system for African-American families through the initiative, which is an essential goal of the program.

The initiative focuses on appropriate intervention, college and career preparedness, parent engagement, and culturally relevant practices. Since its inception the program has tried to honor Hayward’s African- American students in a variety of topics and subjects. A ceremony called the Young AfricanAmerican Student Awards is one of the programs in the initiative.

While AASAI does not personally work with students, they encourage parents to use the knowledge they gain from their meetings to further help their children. They also prepare African-American families through the College Bound program that focuses on getting students prepared for college at a young age.

African-American Regional Educational Alliance co-founders, Robyn Fisher and Bobby Brooks led the initiative initially in 2010, and Diana Levy, administrator for Hayward College Bound, currently runs the program.

“It’s all about the leadership and it’s all about our superintendent… having the vision and the understanding and the commitment to say that this is not going to happen anymore, especially under his watch,” Levy says.

Levy spoke directly with all of the Hayward school principals, who put her in touch with active parents. Some said their school did not have computers for new nationally adopted “Common Core” exams that aim to “level the playing field” for schools nationwide. Test-runs for the exam will happen this spring.

“About 11 or 12 schools in Alameda County were for the most part performing very well, but when we looked at the data for African- American children that just was not the case,” Fisher said. “As a matter of fact AA children in these performing districts were performing the poorest and we didn’t understand why that was.”

After speaking with HUSD principals and collecting data from Hayward schools, Fisher found that by fourth grade 67 percent of Hayward students are reading at grade level, but only 55 percent of African-American students are reading at grade level.

Consequently, by eighth grade only 52 percent of all students can do math at grade level with 35 percent of black students struggling with math at grade level. Statewide CAHSEE results showed the same problems in math and English for African-American students.

“We would definitely like to make the school systems better. There are some things about the schools, not necessarily particular to my school, but California schools in general that could use a lot of help,” says John Baker, a parent of two who has lived in Hayward for 10 years.

Levy acknowledges it will take 5 to 7 years for the program to become sustainable and able to function on its own.