The San Juan Unified School District has decided to shift from at-large representation to by-district representation. Under the current system (at-large), 5 Trustees are elected; they may reside anywhere within the District (Business 80 to Orangevale). With by-district representation, each elected Trustee must be a resident of a specific sub-area of the District. As part of the change from at-large to by-district representation, the District is assessing whether to have 5 or 7 Trustee areas.

There are 4 different proposed maps of the Trustee areas for both the 5-Trustee option and the 7-Trustee option. The District has posted the maps at https://www.sanjuan.edu/Page/51682 for public review and input The District's demographer will formally present the draft maps at a School Board meeting on July 13. The Board will. hold a public hearing then  to receive input on the proposed maps.

On July 14 and July 15, the district will hold community meetings at 6:30pm at three locations throughout the District, as well as online, offering the opportunity to learn more about the process, review proposed maps and provide feedback that will be shared with the School Board members for their consideration.  The meetings on July 14th will be held at Dyer-Kelly School, Mira Loma HS  and Casa Roble HS. On July 15th the meetings will be held at Greer School, Mesa Verde HS and the District Offices at 3738 Walnut Ave. The draft maps may be changed based on the public reviews. Any changes will be made available for the public no later than July 20th and presented to the School Board at its meeting on July 27th, when there will be another formal public hearing.

Our blog has discussed the subject of San Juan Unified's shift from at-large to by-district representation.  It was also the subject of a Guest Editorial. We are following the proposed change to the election of  District Trustees with great interest and hope our readers will as well. We are a wee bit concerned that the demographic changes are being based on the 2010 census, but we recognize that the District has been sued to get on with the shift and it's not the District's fault that the 2020 census data is not yet available. Meanwhile, we are pleased - very pleased, actually - that the District is making its material available in 5 different languages: English, Spanish, Arabic, Farsi/Dari, and Pashto. To that our Chinese-speaking elves say, "好" (hao -> Mandarin for good)!