This Bay Area school district is already back in the classroom for the 2023-24 school year

At just past 8 a.m. on Monday morning, Gregory Nash called out to a group of children walking toward Oakland’s Hoover Elementary School.

“Welcome to school guys!” shouted Nash, who works as a family liaison at Hoover. He leaned down to collect a series of tiny, haphazard high-fives. “We’re back!”

It was the first day of school at Hoover and all 77 schools at Oakland Unified — one of first of the Bay Area’s large public school districts to start the 2023-2024 academic year. As kids streamed through Hoover’s gates, the courtyard began to fill with excitement. Kids ran to greet their friends while parents checked the class assignments; teachers waved to old students and greeted the new ones.

“I feel amazing and nervous,” said 6-year-old Daniel Lands, a newly minted first-grader. “I just graduated from kindergarten, so I hope I make some friends.”

Those feelings were echoed by moms, dads, and teachers across the school, especially in light of how last year ended. In May, a strike kept Oakland Unified’s 34,000 students out of the classroom for eight days. While teachers and the school district faced off on compensation, improved learning conditions, and other union demands, families were left scrambling.

But this year, it seemed both teachers and parents were more hopeful about the state of education in Oakland.

“Coming out of the strike, I really feel supported and valued by both the community and other teachers,” said Lilly Green, a special education teacher at Hoover. “What I came away with was that support.”

Still, challenges in Oakland — and every other school district in the Bay Area — remain. The nation has continued to grapple with an ongoing teacher shortage, and as of last week, the district reported 65 vacancies at Oakland Unified alone. That’s despite the strike-induced 10% raise for all district staff, along with additional increases to teachers’ salary schedules.

“We’re in a staffing shortage in the field of education in general,” said Dr. Kyla Johnson-Trammell, the superintendent of Oakland Unified. “We’ve been making contingency plans all throughout the summer anticipating that we would have some schools where we wouldn’t have a teacher present the first day.”

On top of that, nearly all districts have been touched by trends accelerated during the pandemic, including falling birth rates, out-migration due to high costs of living, and a shift toward private and home schooling, according to research from the Public Policy Institute of California. Data from that organization shows that in 2021, birth rates in the state reached the lowest level in over a century — a trend that has continued over the following years.

At Oakland Unified, that’s contributed to a nearly 9% drop in students from the 2018-19 academic year to 2022-23, according to state data. And though such numbers are stark, they’re far from the worst in the Bay Area. During the same time period, Cupertino Union saw the most staggering declines in the region, with a 22.4% drop in just four years.

Shante Lands, Daniel’s mother, has been witness to many of those changes. Lands is now 37, but three decades earlier, the longtime Oakland resident was a Hoover student herself. Despite the challenges facing public school education, on Monday, Lands was mostly excited for her three children to be attending her elementary alma mater — and thrilled about how the school grounds had changed. Over the summer, Hoover received a new paint job, and bright shades of orange and blue surrounded the campus courtyard.

The school had also revamped the playground, something Daniel and his brother, 8-year-old Danon’te, were particularly excited to try out.

“I never thought my kids would go here too, but it’s amazing to see the change and the differences over time. Both the school and the city,” said Lands.

East Side Union High opened its doors earlier this month — and the region’s other largest public school districts will follow in Oakland’s tracks. The San Jose, Mt. Diablo, and San Ramon Valley Unified school districts start up again in the coming days, while the Fremont, San Francisco and West Contra Costa Unified school districts begin classes next week. Hayward Unified commences school the week following.

Moments before the school year officially began, a group of Hoover teachers and staff huddled in the school’s courtyard. They piled their hands on top of one another’s, and after a few moments, let out a collective cheer.

“Let’s do it,” one teacher shouted. “Let’s go educate some kids!”