District Overview
District Unifications
Recently, some school boards and community groups have commissioned SCOE to finance studies that evaluate mergers of various combinations of the county’s school districts. One study examined unifying Santa Rosa City Schools’ high school district and its feeder elementary districts. Another set of studies in west Sonoma County examined unifying the West Sonoma County Union High School District with its feeder elementary districts or creating two unified districts within the footprint of the current high school district. These studies are for informational purposes only and there is currently no active petition to move forward with the scenarios outlined in the studies. In the event of any unifications, an entirely new district would be created, with a newly elected board of trustees.
An Overview of Our Schools
SCOE acts as an intermediary agency between the California Department of Education in Sacramento and Sonoma County’s 40 public school districts, plus its charter schools. Each district in Sonoma County is governed by elected school board trustees. These trustees provide community leadership as advocates for children, their district, and public schools, and ensure the schools they oversee are responsive to local values, beliefs, and priorities. Trustees hire and evaluate a district superintendent, who serves as chief executive officer of their district and is responsible for day-to-day operations. Trustees also adopt policies, approve Local Control and Accountability Plans, adopt and monitor budgets, and track their districts’ performance and student achievement.
Unified school districts operate both elementary and secondary schools. Cloverdale, Cotati-Rohnert Park, Geyserville, Healdsburg, Sonoma Valley, and Windsor are unified districts.
Santa Rosa City Schools and Petaluma City Schools consist of distinct elementary and high school districts governed by a single board of trustees and administration.
Students at Horicon and Kashia elementary schools in northwest Sonoma County attend secondary school in Mendocino County to the north.
