San Francisco Schools Cancel Antisemitism Workshops After Complaints About Potential Bias

San Francisco Unified School District canceled mandatory antisemitism workshops for staff at four San Francisco high schools this week after parents and community groups expressed concerns of potential bias.

A group of SFUSD parents and staff called for the workshops, scheduled for Wednesday, in response to a reported uptick in allegations of antisemitism from Jewish students. The district contracted the American Jewish Committee to provide training at George Washington High School, Galileo Academy of Science and Technology, Abraham Lincoln High School and Balboa High School.

The training was titled “Who Are the Jews: Jewish Identity and Antisemitism in 2024,” and there was a plan to include more schools in the future.

In the 11 months since Hamas attacked Israel, and since Israel retaliated with a military campaign in Gaza that has killed over 40,000 Palestinians, schools across the Bay Area have been disrupted by tension over how to supervise education about the war, political expression by faculty and students, and accusations of antisemitism and Islamophobia.

The workshop cancellation reveals a unique challenge facing school districts, teachers, administrators and parents tasked with educating students in a multicultural setting like San Francisco’s public schools amid a fraught and emotional conflict that hits close to home.

To understand how the workshop unraveled, KQED spoke with parents, staff and experts, along with advocacy groups that supported or opposed the training.

“Folks don’t focus as much as we should on just how hard it is to educate effectively and appropriately about issues that are this complex and nuanced, like the history of Israel and the Middle East, as well as where the stakes are enormously high and emotions are understandably high, like the war in Gaza, because people are dying,” Joe Kahne, a UC Merced professor who studies student civic engagement, said.

Last December, dozens of teachers in Oakland participated in unauthorized teach-ins, presenting pro-Palestinian lessons. In May, Berkeley Unified School District Superintendent Enikia Ford Morthel testified before Congress on the district’s handling of antisemitism allegations in public schools after a group of Jewish parents, along with the Brandeis Center and Anti-Defamation League, filed a federal complaint in February alleging severe antisemitism in the district.

In January, the U.S. Department of Education announced investigations into SFUSD and Oakland Unified School District for alleged civil rights violations and claims of religious discrimination.

Some SFUSD parents and local community groups raised alarms about the American Jewish Committee’s support for Israel. In an internal email forwarded to staff by school principals on Monday, SFUSD administrators Karling Aguilera-Fort and Davina Goldwasser said the workshop wouldn’t take a position on the Israel-Hamas war and that the training was “just awareness building.”

On Wednesday morning, Katrina Kincade, an SFUSD spokesperson, told KQED that the workshops would be rescheduled.

“We want to ensure each and every student and staff member feels and experiences safety and a sense of belonging in our schools,” she said in an email.

Julia David, an English teacher at George Washington, said that the idea for the training originated among parents and staff concerned about the treatment of Jewish students in the city’s schools. She described incidents ranging from pro-Palestinian student walkouts to protests of war to reports of “Free Palestine” being written on campus to graffiti of swastikas on campuses.

She also said the Jewish Student Union, which she sponsors, had been made to feel uncomfortable on campus by staff who identified as pro-Palestine.

“We thought that it was really important to have training about Jewish identity in a multicultural society led by Jews,” David said. “Being a Jewish student in the middle of a really charged political time has brought unique challenges to our school and to our students, and to our educators and our parents.

“This training is just about educating people on what the Jewish identity is and our experiences.”

David said she and a small group of other Jewish parents and staff reached out to the American Jewish Committee, one of the oldest Jewish advocacy organizations. The nonprofit agreed to provide the workshops at no cost to the district.

Parent Lee Filner pointed out that the AJC was chosen by the Biden administration to lead the national effort against antisemitism.

“There have just been too many antisemitic incidents in the district,” Filner said. “It’s leading a lot of parents I personally know to flee the district for private school, and we just can’t afford to lose more students from the district. Especially in this budget situation, because we’ve created a hostile environment for students just because of who they are.”

An email announcing the workshops reached a group of Jewish parents and political organizers who are critical of Israel. Alex Lantsberg, a Jewish parent of students at two of the high schools on the workshop list, said he was shocked and dismayed when he learned about the AJC-led training.

“Educating people on antisemitism is absolutely imperative in this time when antisemitism is being used to justify an ongoing genocide,” he said. “If SFUSD wanted to actually assist its faculty and staff, it would be best to do so in a way that actually recognizes the multiple strands of Jewish thought regarding the question of antisemitism and how all of these things come together.”

Parents of Palestinian students in the district, like Sonya Awwad, questioned how closely the AJC’s values align with San Francisco’s.

“This is a group that openly opposes a cease-fire in this war and does not have a neutral position in the conflict,” she said. “And San Francisco did vote on a resolution for a cease-fire, so that in itself seems conflicting.”

Progressive groups affiliated with SFUSD, like the Arab Resource Organizing Committee, the Council on American-Islamic Relations and Jewish Voices for Peace, criticized the workshop. The groups called for the district to hold a similar training about Islamophobia or anti-Palestinian sentiment, which they said is also on the rise, according to a joint press release.

Last year, Awwad and a small group of parents met with administrators to discuss the war’s impact on their children. Awwad said parents described bullying, racism and isolation plaguing students, particularly those with family in Gaza.

“Any kind of anti-racism training is important,” Awwad said. “So why are our students’ concerns not being met with training that would advocate for them as well?”

Several parents who advocated for antisemitism training said the overwhelming political messaging coming into their children’s schools made it difficult for students to learn. Some voiced their frustrations with AROC, a group that has come under scrutiny for facilitating student walkouts at SFUSD schools. After a parent group demanded an investigation into AROC’s contract with schools last year, students rallied outside of the district’s office in the organization’s defense.

Seth Brysk, the AJC’s regional director of northern California, hopes the antisemitism training will be rescheduled.

“We neither endorse nor oppose candidates for office. We’re an apolitical organization, not only because that’s what the law requires, but we’re also known to be a nonpartisan organization that doesn’t engage in politics,” he said. “More importantly, I don’t see how that relates to anti-bias training about antisemitism.”

Nearly 50,000 students are enrolled in San Francisco public schools, which educate the majority of the city’s children. As SFUSD struggles with low enrollment, administrators must worry about retaining students. At the same time, they are trying to placate teachers, including many who embrace progressive politics and parents who have increasingly demanded a say in how schools respond to the war.

While these tense moments may raise big questions for schools, Kahne said there are inevitable learning opportunities — for children and adults.

“As educators, we often say our goal is to teach young people how to think, not what to think. A big part of what educators should be doing in those contexts is modeling,” Kahne said. “The better we do that, the better our democracy will run.

“Unfortunately, what we are seeing is that many teachers are choosing to do less of this kind of work, and many districts are putting less support towards this kind of work in an effort to avoid conflict.”