San Francisco Unified School District's superintendent resigned Friday and a plan to close and merge more than a dozen schools in the city is no longer going forward.
Maria Su, the head of San Francisco's Department of Children, Youth and their Families, will be appointed superintendent of the district at a meeting Tuesday, replacing Matt Wayne, who had been superintendent since July 2022, city and school officials said.
Su was appointed by Mayor London Breed as co-leader of a "school stabilization team" made up of City Hall executives late last month to address problems in the district, including a large budget deficit that could lead to a takeover by state education officials.
Wayne was ousted Friday at a meeting of the SFUSD Board of Education. The district said in a statement that under Su's leadership and at the direction of the Board of Education, the school closure plan that had been proposed for the next school year is not happening.
"Su will stop the current school closure process and focus on addressing the district's looming structural deficit to avoid state takeover," SFUSD said in a statement. "There will be no school closures in the 2025-2026 school year. The remaining school meetings about closures will be suspended."
Breed earlier this week had called out Wayne and his plans to close or merge schools to save money for the district.
"I have lost confidence in the superintendent's ability to manage the current process and do not believe this current plan will lead to an outcome that will benefit students and the school district in the long-term," the mayor announced Tuesday.
Su was appointed director of DCYF in 2009 by then-mayor and now California Gov. Gavin Newsom. She will take responsibility for the district's 49,000 students through June 2026. The total operating budget for 2024 is $1.3 billion.
SFUSD must deliver a balanced first interim budget report by Dec. 15 to prevent a potential state takeover, school officials said.
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"The most important thing right now is for the school district to close its budget deficit to prevent a state takeover and to instill trust and confidence in the district," Breed said in a statement Friday. "Maria is a tremendous leader, and the city will continue to provide Maria the city resources and capacity she needs in this new role. We are one city and if our city is going to thrive, SFUSD needs to thrive."
The school board plans to formalize the appointment of Su as superintendent at its meeting Tuesday. Karling Aguilera-Fort will be appointed deputy superintendent and will serve as acting superintendent until Su starts, school district officials said in a press release.
In a statement, California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond said his office will continue to provide fiscal experts to help SFUSD balance its budget and build fiscal systems needed to support the system.
The school stabilization team has begun deploying city staff to support teacher hiring, expediting teacher credentialing, and is conducting a desk audit to improve the district's budget functions, the district said.
SFUSD officials late last month acknowledged that about 350 teachers in the district were not properly credentialed, among other problems like a payroll system that left many teachers and district employees receiving inaccurate paychecks or nothing at all.
