What We’re Working On

Friends,

The district may cut our school enrollment in half.

We need YOU to show up on Wednesday. In-person. They need to see the families that want this school. Bring your kids. Bring a friend.

Only two weeks ago, the district said they intended to launch with 9 classrooms, 198 seats with three classrooms across TK, K, and 1st grade.

Now, SFUSD is considering dropping two TK classes and cutting 1st grade entirely. Launching with only 4 classrooms, 88 seats. Less than half the original vision. That’s what we heard at Asian PAC this week.

We haven’t heard a compelling reason for this change. The demand is there. Our data shows overwhelming demand across all three opening grades — and demand at upper grade levels too.

It’s not a final decision yet. Wednesday is our ONE chance to make our voices heard before everyone leaves for the summer.

Let’s make this school happen — at scale.

RSVP for in-person or virtual →

And extra credit: please sign up HERE to help with this event! We’re just two working parents with 3 kids under 3, so we can’t do it alone.

See you on May 13.

Abby & Justin
Friends of the SF Mandarin School

Please join us for a town hall with SFUSD on Wednesday, May 13 at Ulloa Elementary. They have graciously agreed to share the latest on the Mandarin Immersion TK–8 school and answer your questions directly.

Come in-person if you can. A packed room sends a message. Let’s show SFUSD the size and energy of this community. Of course, we’ll also have a virtual option — we’re all busy parents!

RSVP for in-person or virtual →

A few details: Doors open at 6pm, talk starts at 6:30pm. Kids welcome, pizza and water provided. Please submit questions in advance.

If you want to help more:

• Tell a friend. Share this with parents in your daycare, preschool, or neighborhood group.
• Volunteer. We’ll need help with set up, tear down, and managing Zoom. Hit reply if you can help.
• Know a journalist? We’d love local press coverage. Reply if you have a media contact.

A quick update: SFUSD announced last night that it is delaying timelines for school reorganization and assignment. It seems that Mandarin immersion has not been delayed, but our September deadline for a Board vote is quickly approaching and we are still missing key details like location and budget.

Let’s make sure the district stays on track to launch in 2027 as promised.

See you on May 13.

Big week. Here’s what happened, and what’s coming next.

The whole school board is with us.

We’ve now spoken with every member of the SFUSD Board of Education, and all seven have agreed to be listed as supporters on our website. That’s unanimous board backing for the Mandarin Immersion K–8 school. And we’re just getting started — our supporters list will grow with more community leaders over time.

The commitment is real — and your responses helped.

During our monthly meeting on Apr 21, the district reaffirmed its commitment to open in Fall 2027, starting with TK, K, and 1st grade and 3 classrooms per grade for 198 seats in the first year. We also learned that the district is considering both a temporary co-location and a permanent wall-to-wall site as options, so everything is on the table. The long-term vision remains a dedicated, independent Mandarin Immersion school.

Your responses are part of why. Over 700 families, representing more than 1,000 students, expressed interest through our website. The data shows overwhelming demand for full enrollment across all three opening grades.

Liana Szeto, founding principal of Alice Fong Yu and district lead on the MI K–8 effort, is working on a program description. She and Hong Mei Pang, SFUSD’s Head of Communications & Governance, will also present to the Asian Parent Advisory Committee on May 6, 6–8pm at Ulloa Library.

However, there’s still a lot we don’t know. The district plans to bring a Board vote in August or September, but they have not shared what needs to be done, by when, to make that vote successful. We don’t yet know the location — by far the #1 question from families. And given the late timing, right before October’s enrollment fair, there’s no room for error.

A town hall is coming in May.

We pushed the district for more transparency on the path to launch, and they responded. Hong Mei Pang and Liana Szeto have committed to a community town hall this month (in-person and virtual) to share progress and answer your questions directly. Commissioner Supryia Ray will also be there. We’ve invited Superintendent Dr. Maria Su and we expect to hear from her on Monday.

Date, time, and location are being confirmed — details coming very soon. It is critical that our community shows up in huge numbers. We’ve also asked the district to publicize it on their official channels.

You can help us make it a success.

Reach out if you can help with:

• A venue — ideally accessible, free or low-cost, and large enough for a crowd
• Event logistics — we want to run this as a hybrid in-person/virtual event and could use some expertise
• Food and drinks — donations of refreshments welcome
• Media contacts — connections to local press or community media who should cover this

Also: the district is building a teacher pipeline. We expect the school will need 12 teachers in the first year. If you know qualified Mandarin-credentialed teachers, curriculum folks, or school leaders, please reach out. Here’s the official teacher job description.

As a community, we will make this school happen.

There’s been tremendous excitement — 700+ families, representing over 1,000 kids, have signed up to support a new Mandarin Immersion K–8 school in SFUSD, and the list is growing every day.

Our next meeting is this Tuesday, April 21, and we’ll share our demand data with SFUSD to inform their decisions on size and location of this school. We’ll send you an update afterwards, and after each of our monthly meetings.

If you haven’t already, please share our effort with a parent group — a WhatsApp group, daycare chat, or Facebook group. More families means a stronger case for more seats. Here’s a message you can copy and paste:

Are you interested in Mandarin immersion?

SFUSD is launching a new Mandarin Immersion K–8 school next year! We’re a group of parents helping the district gather interest to inform its future size and location. Over 700 families have already signed up to support it. Add your name — it takes 2 minutes:
https://www.sfmandarinschool.org

One more thing: hit reply and tell us — what questions do you have for SFUSD? We’ll share a summary of community questions during our meeting, and it will help guide future district communications.

We held our first meeting with SFUSD leadership on March 10 in the Superintendent’s conference room — and the energy in the room was real.

In attendance were Liana Szeto, Alice Fong Yu’s founding principal and the leader of this effort; Hong Mei Pang, SFUSD’s Head of Communications & Governance; School Board Commissioner Supryia Ray; and School Board President Phil Kim.

We aligned on three areas of focus:

• Parent engagement & demand data. The district needs to see strong interest — especially from young families who would be future SFUSD families. This data will directly inform the school’s size and location.
• Teacher recruitment. Mandarin-credentialed teachers are the biggest staffing challenge. The district is working on detailed job requirements so we can help recruit qualified candidates.
• Fundraising. SFUSD will be the primary funding source, but supplementary fundraising — especially for startup costs — will help ensure the school launches on time regardless of other budget pressures.

Key decisions and timeline:

The School Board must approve the new school at its second meeting in September 2026, so that the school can be presented at the enrollment fair in October and families can receive information in time to apply.

The initial plan is for the school to be co-located with an underenrolled school, with the possibility of moving to a more permanent site as the school grows. The initial idea is to start with earlier grades (e.g., TK, K, and 1st grade), and ideally, demand will support three classrooms per grade, which is the size needed to sustain a full K–8 program over time. The interest data we’re collecting will help determine that.

What the district owes us:

• Detailed job requirement documents for Mandarin-credentialed teaching positions, so we can begin recruiting
• A broader update about the district's progress on this school, so we can share with parents

What we’re working on:

• Launched sfmandarinschool.org with an interest form and mailing list to capture demand data
• Promoting the interest form — printing flyers, sharing across parent groups, school communities, and neighborhood networks
• Setting up fiscal sponsorship so we can accept donations and begin more formal fundraising

Our next meeting with district leadership is April 21. We want to walk in with overwhelming demand data. If you haven’t already, fill out the interest form — it takes two minutes and every submission counts.