Oakland Community Organizations
BUILDING A DISTRICTWIDE MOVEMENT FOR SMALL SCHOOLS REFORM

ABOUT THIS STUDY SITE

It is not often that a government entity publicly credits community organizing for a positive transformation in public schools. But this is exactly what happened in Oakland, California, where years of on-the-ground organizing – community meetings, relationship building, and public actions – led to the creation of forty-eight new small schools, fundamentally transforming the district landscape. From its initial organizing effort in the late 1990s to convince the district to create ten pilot small schools through the present day, the work of Oakland Community Organizations (OCO) – a member of the PICO national network – played a critical role in sustaining the small schools movement in the midst of a fiscal crisis that led to a state takeover and multiple transitions in district leadership.

FINDINGS

This report shares findings from a six-year research study on the impact of OCO’s education organizing on Oakland schools. The study found that OCO’s organizing:

• built school-community relationships that contribute to improved schools;
  
  
• contributed to improved student educational outcomes;
  
  
• stimulated change at the systems level that expanded school capacity and equity in Oakland, in spite of a period of significant fiscal and political turbulence.

JIGSAW ACTIVITY WORKSHOP

Community Organizing to Transform a School District: The Small Schools Movement in Oakland is one of a series of research-based workshops that focus on community organizing strategies in four communities. Through a “jigsaw” reading-and-discussion activity, each workshop helps participants understand the organizing efforts of one community, explore the implications those efforts may have on their own community, and identify next steps they want to take.

Note: To conduct this workshop, the facilitator will need to download the facilitator's guide PDF, the PowerPoint presentation and video ZIP file, and the case study PDF.

Important: When you open the ZIP file, the PowerPoint file and two video files (1 and 2) will be in the same folder. To be able to show the PowerPoint and the videos correctly, be sure to keep them in the same folder after you download them. You will be prompted in the PowerPoint when to show the two videos. If you do not have PowerPoint installed on your computer, you will need to download Microsoft's free PowerPoint Viewer.

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Case-study jigsaw activity: facilitator’s guide with participants’ handout and group readings
[PDF: 23 pages]

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Case-study jigsaw activity: PowerPoint presentation and video
[Zip file]

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Oakland case study: full research report
[PDF: 60 pages]

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Jigsaw activity workshops are available for Oakland and Chicago.
Note: Austin and Los Angeles tools will be coming soon.

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