Let’s Shake the Trees: How To Actually Fully Fund San Francisco’s Public Schools

SF Parents Town Hall | April 23 | Virtual | 7:30–9:00 PM

The premise is simple. The problem isn’t.

San Francisco’s public schools are facing a structural budget crisis—and our students are feeling the impact. Levers to change this do exist. They’re just hard to see—and harder to pull.

This town hall is designed to cut through the noise.

We’re bringing together leaders from SFUSD, City Hall, and across California’s education system to break down how school funding actually works—and what it would take to fully fund our schools. We’ll talk about where parents, teachers, and communities fit in, and what actions we can take to actually move the needle and increase funding to our schools.

Meet the Panel

• Maria Su — Superintendent, San Francisco Unified School District
• Rafael Mandelman — President, San Francisco Board of Supervisors
• Phil Halperin — Silver Giving Foundation
• Kunal Modi — Chief of Health and Human Services, Mayor’s Office
• Jill Golub — Campaign strategy expert and Partner, BMWL

What We'll Cover

• What’s structurally broken about how California funds it's schools, and what a real fix looks like
• Where funding for SFUSD actually comes from—and where it gets stuck
• What tools San Francisco has to generate more funding (including local ballot measures and city budget decisions)
• What’s already in motion—and where more support is needed
• What parents and the community can do right now to help bring more funding to our schools

Who Should Attend

Public school parents. Teachers. PTA leaders. Community partners. Anyone who has looked at a school budget cut and thought: how is this still happening?

Join us to learn how school funding works, where the opportunities are, and how we can collectively push for more of it.