Richard Barrera

June 2, 2026 Primary Election

• Office: State Superintendent of Public Instruction
• Election Date: June 2, 2026
• Candidate: Richard Barrera
• Due Date: April 7, 2026
• Printable Version

Thank you for seeking GrowSF's endorsement for the June 2, 2026 primary election! GrowSF believes in a growing, vibrant, healthy, safe, and prosperous city via common sense solutions and effective government.

As a candidate for state office, your day-to-day responsibilities in office will affect not just San Francisco, but California as a whole. As a representative of the people of California and of San Francisco, the policies you bring to Sacramento should reflect the best of what we have to offer.

The GrowSF endorsement committee will review all completed questionnaires and seek consensus on which candidates best align with our vision for San Francisco and have the expertise to enact meaningful policy changes.

We ask that you please complete this questionnaire by April 7, 2026 so we have enough time to adequately review and discuss your answers.

• Your Policy Goals
• Your Leadership
• The Issues
• Personal
• Thank you

Your Policy Goals

We'd like to get some details about your high-level goals and how you intend to use your elected office to achieve them.

What policies do you hope to change or preserve by running for State Superintendent of Public Instruction? Please be specific, and list them in order of priority.

1. Fully funded, equitable public education. Treat Proposition 98 as a floor, not a ceiling. Secure sustainable, progressive revenue so funding is stable across economic cycles and resources reach students with the greatest needs. Preserve the core promise of public education by keeping funds focused on classrooms and direct student supports.

2. Strengthening and respecting the education workforce. Improve compensation, protect benefits, strengthen working conditions, expand pipelines such as classified-to-certificated pathways, and support practical educator and staff housing strategies where feasible. Workforce stability is a student outcomes issue.

3. Schools as anchors for healthy, inclusive communities. Expand community schools, student wellness and mental health supports, and early learning. Enforce civil rights protections consistently, including for immigrant and LGBTQ students, so safety and access do not vary by district.

Why those policies?

They get at the conditions that determine whether schools can do their job well. When funding swings wildly, districts hesitate, cut too late, or build programs they cannot sustain. When schools cannot keep strong teachers and staff, students experience constant churn. And when students do not feel safe, supported, and able to attend school consistently, academic improvement becomes much harder to achieve. Those are not side issues. They shape everything else.

Explain why your #1 goal is your #1 goal.

Because every other goal rests on it. Districts cannot hire well, hold on to staff, expand student supports, or build real academic momentum if they do not have enough certainty to plan. When money is unstable or inadequate, cuts tend to hit the highest-need communities first, and the damage often lasts well beyond a single school year. If California wants more consistent results, the state has to provide more consistent capacity.

How will you build the coalition and political capital to enact your #1 goal? What obstacles will you face, and how will you overcome them? Will the power of the office of State Superintendent of Public Instruction be enough to achieve this goal?

I would use the office to force clarity about what it actually costs to run schools well. That means working with educators, families, students, district leaders, school board members, labor, and community groups to define what districts are expected to provide and what it takes to provide it responsibly.

The obstacles are familiar: anti-tax politics, revenue swings, competition from other state priorities, and public skepticism about whether new dollars will reach classrooms. The way through that is not rhetoric. It is specificity. If the state is asking for more investment, it should be able to show what the money will fund, how it will be tracked, and how the public will know whether it made a difference.

The Superintendent cannot create new revenue alone. That takes the Governor, the Legislature, and sometimes the voters. But the office can make the case, keep the issue in front of the public, and help build the coalition needed to move it.

Will the power of the office of State Superintendent of Public Instruction be enough to achieve the other goals?

For my third priority, the office has substantial power. The Superintendent can shape how programs are run, issue guidance districts actually rely on, help solve problems when local systems are struggling, and enforce legal protections that should not depend on zip code.

For the workforce priority, the office matters, but it does not act alone. Pay and staffing decisions are made locally, and state funding levels shape what is possible. Still, the Superintendent can help districts use money more intelligently, expand pathways into the profession, support educator housing efforts where they make sense, and press for the resources needed to keep strong people in schools.

What is an "out there" change that you would make to state/local government policy, if you could? For the purpose of this question, you are not constrained to the office of State Superintendent of Public Instruction.

California should treat public land as a long term public asset and use more of it to build permanently affordable housing at scale, including on land owned by school districts and other public agencies. The goal should be housing that stays affordable over time, not a short-lived program that disappears after one funding cycle. That would reduce displacement, help working families remain in their communities, and make it more realistic for educators and school staff to live near the schools they serve.

Your Leadership

We'd like to learn more about your leadership style and plan to execute effectively once you assume office.

Why are you running for State Superintendent of Public Instruction?

I am running because California needs stronger execution in public education. Districts are being asked to do a great deal, but the results students experience still vary too much depending on local staffing, local capacity, and whether schools can connect students to the support they need outside the classroom.

I have led at the district level through budget fights, labor negotiations, and real implementation work, and I now work inside the California Department of Education. Those experiences have taught me the same lesson from two different angles: policy only matters if it reaches schools in a form districts can actually use.

Public education also shaped my own life. I went to California public schools from kindergarten through college. My father immigrated from Colombia, and my grandparents came through Ellis Island. Public institutions created opportunity for my family. I am running because I want California's schools to do that job well for every student, not just for children in places with the most local capacity.

In your own words, what are the core constitutional and statutory responsibilities of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction?

The Superintendent is California's elected statewide education leader and the head of the California Department of Education. The office is responsible for carrying out state and federal education law, overseeing major programs and funding streams, issuing guidance to school systems, and helping local education agencies and county offices meet their obligations.

The job also includes enforcing basic legal protections. The state has a duty to make sure students are not denied equal access because of disability, race, language status, immigration status, gender identity, or sexual orientation.

Just as important, the office has a public facing responsibility: making the condition of the system visible, identifying where students are being underserved, and pressing state actors to respond. What the Superintendent does not do is run local district budgets, negotiate local contracts, or pass legislation. The office is strongest when it is clear about both its reach and its limits.

What makes you uniquely qualified for this position?

I have done the two kinds of work this job demands: local governance and state execution.

On the San Diego Unified School Board, where I have served since 2008, including multiple terms as Board President, I have worked on budgets, labor relationships, facilities, and districtwide decision-making. That work taught me how to govern in the real world, where progress depends on judgment, staying power, and the ability to hold together support across groups that do not automatically agree. It is also where I learned to measure success by what actually changes for students. In San Diego, that meant expanding community schools and early learning, strengthening bilingual education, improving educator compensation while maintaining fully paid family health care, modernizing campuses through major voter-approved bond measures, and pursuing housing strategies that help school employees stay in the communities they serve.

At the California Department of Education, I have seen the state role from the inside. I work on matters tied to attendance, housing on district property, and compliance with laws protecting immigrant and LGBTQ students. That experience matters because this job rises or falls on whether the state can give districts clear direction, solve problems early, and apply the law consistently.

I also have the confidence of people across the education system who know this work well. Support from State Superintendent Tony Thurmond, the California Teachers Association, and school administrators reflects trust from people who understand both the demands of the office and the stakes of getting it right.

What three measurable outcomes should Californians use to evaluate your success after your first two years in office?

First, chronic absenteeism should be down statewide, especially in the districts and student groups that have been hit hardest. Students cannot benefit from what schools offer if they are not there, and chronic absenteeism is also a useful proxy for student wellness. I currently lead a working group at the California Department of Education that has developed guidance for schools, districts, and County Offices of Education on reducing chronic absenteeism. Attendance experts involved in that work, including Attendance Works, point to three strategies that matter most: student health and safety, student connectedness, and family engagement. In other words, when schools create environments where students feel safe, supported, and connected, attendance improves. After two years, Californians should be able to see that progress in the numbers.

Second, college and career readiness should improve, as measured by California's College and Career Indicator. Students should be leaving high school with stronger preparation and more real options, whether that means college, career pathways, or both.

Third, districts should be able to say that the California Department of Education has become easier to work with and more useful. That should show up in measurable ways: faster turnaround times, fewer duplicative reporting demands, and greater participation in state-sponsored problem-solving and professional learning efforts.

The Issues

Next, we will cover the issues that voters tell us they care about. We hope to gain a better understanding of your policy positions, and we hope that you use this opportunity to communicate with voters.

What specific actions will you take through the Department of Education's oversight and technical-assistance powers to accelerate learning recovery statewide? How will you measure whether those supports are improving outcomes across districts?

I would treat learning recovery as a management problem, not as a collection of disconnected grant programs. The state should focus on the conditions that make academic progress possible: students showing up, schools keeping strong staff, and districts having the capacity to respond quickly when students fall behind.

Through the Department's oversight powers, I would push districts to plan for recovery in a way that protects teaching and student-facing support rather than defaulting to cuts that deepen instability. In districts facing fiscal or operational trouble, state and county teams should work directly with local leaders on credible multi-year plans instead of waiting until the damage is already done.

The most immediate statewide lever is attendance and reengagement. If students are missing school, recovery efforts will always be partial. I would continue pressing for stronger attendance work tied to safe school environments, meaningful family engagement, and support systems that reconnect students to school before absence becomes chronic.

I would measure progress by tracking chronic absenteeism, student engagement, and college and career readiness by district and student group. The question is simple: are more students coming to school consistently, staying connected, and leaving with stronger outcomes?

Many have identified Mississippi as an example for meaningful and durable reforms that have boosted student achievement across racial, economic, and geographical lines. What is your understanding of their reforms and how will you bring those reforms to bear on California to improve student achievement?

Mississippi is worth studying seriously, but not mythologizing. Its gains were tied to a sustained early literacy strategy, including the Literacy Based Promotion Act, support for K–3 reading, and structures around implementation and student promotion. The right lesson is not that one slogan or one bill transformed a state. The lesson is that improvement came from a package of policies, sustained attention, and follow-through.

That distinction matters. Mississippi's improvement on NAEP is often cited as proof that those strategies can work. But it is also important to look at the comparison carefully. Over roughly the 2013 to 2023 period in which Mississippi's growth is most often discussed, San Diego Unified started at about the same NAEP levels, grew faster, and now outperforms Mississippi on most NAEP measures. That matters because it shows that the underlying approach is not foreign to California. We have seen similar progress here when districts commit to strong literacy instruction, sustained support for educators, and consistent execution over time.

California should study what Mississippi did carefully, including how the state supported teachers, what it expected from districts, and how results were measured over time. Mississippi's progress also appears to have leveled off and dipped, which is another reason not to treat it like a miracle story or a one-time fix.

What California should take from that example is discipline. If we want better literacy outcomes, the state needs to help schools improve instruction, invest in coaching and professional learning tied to classroom practice, and track whether students are actually improving. Passing a law is not the same thing as helping teachers and schools do the work well. California does not need to import another state's reputation. It needs to scale the kind of steady, grounded work that has already produced gains in places like San Diego Unified.

Enrollment declines and expiring federal funds are straining district budgets. How will you use the Department's fiscal oversight and data systems to help districts plan for enrollment loss and financial stability?

Enrollment decline and the end of federal relief money are forcing districts to make permanent decisions on compressed timelines. The Department should use its data systems to spot trouble early and make it harder for districts to drift into crisis.

That means identifying districts headed toward structural deficits, encouraging earlier public planning, and making the underlying numbers easier for local communities to understand. Districts should not wait for emergency cuts before having an honest conversation about the size of the problem.

Oversight also has to be paired with hands-on help. When a district is clearly moving toward insolvency or repeated deficit spending, the state and county offices should help build multi-year recovery plans that protect classroom services as much as possible and examine whether spending is drifting away from teaching and student needs.

I also support moving away from attendance based funding and toward enrollment-based funding so districts are not financially punished in moments of disruption. But even before the law changes, the Department can press for better budgeting habits and earlier planning.

Some say California schools struggle due to lack of money, others highlight widening inequality in household income, and others point out many districts are doing well in spite of these issues. According to the literature, what are the primary determinants of a successful school and how can you ensure each school has what it needs to succeed?

The research and the lived experience of school systems point in the same direction. Successful schools usually have a stable and capable adult workforce, a coherent instructional approach, strong attendance, and a climate where students feel safe and known. They also benefit from leadership that can plan beyond one school year rather than lurching from one short-term fix to the next.

Resources matter. Family income and housing instability matter. It is also true that some districts do a better job than others under similar conditions, usually because they are better at turning resources into consistent practice.

The state cannot run every school directly, but it can do more to create the conditions for success. That means making funding less erratic, helping districts improve instruction and attendance, and enforcing baseline protections so students have a fair shot no matter where they live. The state should spend less time generating churn and more time helping schools do a few important things well.

California faces persistent teacher shortages in key subjects. What partnerships or incentives would you champion — within the Department's existing authority — to strengthen the educator pipeline, especially in high-need regions?

California's shortages are not just about recruitment. They are about whether teaching is a job people can enter, grow in, and afford to stay in.

Within the Department's authority, I would focus first on expanding pathways that already show promise, including classified-to-certificated programs, stronger induction systems, and support for new teachers in high-need schools. Too many districts are trying to build these efforts alone when the state could help spread models that work.

Second, I would treat housing as a retention strategy in places where cost of living is driving turnover. When educators cannot afford to live near the communities they serve, vacancies become structural. The Department can help districts move educator housing projects from idea to reality where that makes sense.

Third, I would use state guidance and fiscal review to encourage districts to put staffing stability ahead of choices that create more churn. Schools do better when they can keep good people.

The State Superintendent of Public Instruction directly oversees the California Longitudinal Pupil Achievement Data System (CALPADS) and can modernize how districts report and use data. What is your top data-system modernization priority, and what measurable performance goals would you set for CALPADS or related systems during your term?

My top priority would be to make CALPADS faster, simpler, and less duplicative so districts get useful information sooner and spend less staff time on reporting the same material through multiple channels.

A modern student data system should help districts act earlier on issues like attendance, student mobility, and course access. It should not trap them in slow certification cycles, repeated corrections, and fragmented reporting demands.

I would set clear performance goals: shorter time from submission to certification, fewer error-driven resubmissions, stronger system uptime and reliability, and a measurable reduction in duplicative reporting hours for district staff. Just as important, modernization has to protect privacy. Student data should be limited to what is necessary, secured aggressively, and governed by clear rules about access and retention.

How will you strengthen coordination between schools, counties, and state agencies to expand student mental-health support? What metric would you track to evaluate whether access to services is improving?

I would start from the reality that schools are often the public institution families encounter most consistently. That makes them one of the best places to identify needs early and connect students to support.

The state should make that connection process far less fragmented. Schools, county offices of education, county behavioral health agencies, and community providers need clearer referral pathways, shared expectations, and a more workable division of labor. Smaller districts in particular often need county-level help to build systems they cannot sustain on their own. I would use the Department to push for more consistent coordination and to make it easier for districts to build school-based support models that do not disappear when a short-term grant ends.

At San Diego Unified, we have made student wellness our top priority, but one of the biggest problems is that the state still lacks strong tools to measure it. The California Healthy Kids Survey is not enough. It is too bulky, too time-consuming for students, and it does not give teachers, counselors, and school administrators the kind of timely information they can actually use. That is why our district is working with researchers at San Diego State University, UC San Diego, the San Diego County Office of Education, and Wellness Together to develop a Student Wellness Index. That index combines more frequent student survey data with educator observations and data on student participation in clubs and extracurricular activities. It is designed to capture student mental and physical health, relationships between students and adults on campus, and the extent to which students feel connected to and engaged in their school community.

As State Superintendent, I would build on that work and lead an effort to create a statewide Student Wellness Index. If we want to expand access to mental-health support, we need better tools to see students' needs early and respond before problems deepen. The clearest operational metric for access is still time from referral to first appointment, because families feel that directly. But over time, California should also have a stronger statewide measure of student wellness, so we are not only tracking whether a referral was made, but whether school environments are becoming healthier, more connected, and better able to support students in the first place.

Should the state encourage, and provide funding for, school districts in high-cost areas to build teacher housing?

Yes. In high-cost regions, educator housing should be treated as a legitimate workforce strategy.

Teacher shortages in those areas are often driven less by lack of interest in the profession than by the simple fact that people cannot afford to live near their jobs. Districts can raise salaries and still lose staff when housing costs absorb too much of a paycheck. Students experience that instability through vacancies, substitutes, and reduced course offerings.

School districts control land, and that gives the education system a practical lever. The state should help districts use that land for long-term affordable housing when doing so is feasible and does not interfere with core educational needs. Funding should favor projects that keep units affordable over time and directly address workforce retention.

Should teacher housing be exempt from CEQA, Discretionary Review, and zoning?

Teacher housing should be much easier to build than it is now, especially on district-owned land in places where housing costs are driving school staffing problems.

On CEQA exemptions for educator workforce housing, I support AB 1021. It provides a CEQA exemption for housing built on school district property for district employees when a majority of the units meet affordability requirements. I support that approach because it recognizes that this is public land being used for a public purpose, and that projects meeting clear affordability standards should not be trapped in years of avoidable delay.

At San Diego Unified, we are already moving forward six projects that meet the AB 1021 criteria and together would provide roughly 3,000 affordable units for our staff, enough to serve about 20 percent of our workforce. At the California Department of Education, I lead a working group focused on accelerating affordable housing development on school district property, and part of that work has included supporting legislation such as AB 1021.

More broadly, I support a streamlined path for educator and staff housing, with clear guardrails around affordability, labor standards, and transparency. That does not mean no standards. It means a process designed to deliver housing for a public purpose instead of one that lets badly needed projects get stalled indefinitely.

As a voting member of the State Board of Education, how should the state's Boards of Education be reformed to ensure accountability and better performance?

It is important to clarify the structure here: the State Superintendent staffs the State Board of Education, but is not a voting member of it. That makes the relationship between the two especially important. The Superintendent helps shape what the Board sees, how issues are framed, and how Board decisions are carried out, even without a vote.

More broadly, California's education leadership structure should be easier for the public to understand and easier to judge. Right now, authority is spread across multiple actors, and it is often hard to tell who owns the result.

The Board should stay focused on a small number of clear statewide outcomes and require regular public reporting on whether those outcomes are improving. California does not suffer from a shortage of goals. It suffers from scattered responsibility and uneven follow-through.

When the state adopts a new requirement, it should also say how districts are supposed to carry it out, what help they will get, and what lower-value compliance burdens can be retired. A system that keeps adding mandates without making room for the work does not become more effective.

The public should not need a flowchart to figure out which state entity is responsible for which part of the system. I would support a clearer division of labor, stronger alignment between the Board and the Department, and more regular reporting that connects state action to student results.

Personal

Tell us a bit about yourself!

How long have you lived in California? What brought you here and what keeps you here?

I am a lifelong Californian and a San Diego native. My father immigrated from Colombia, and my grandparents came through Ellis Island. I grew up here, attended California public schools, raised my family here, and built my career here. What keeps me here is simple: this is home, and California is still a place where public institutions can change the course of a family's life when they work the way they should.

What do you love most about California and/or your hometown?

I love California's ambition and its diversity, and the way people continue to come here looking for possibility. In San Diego, I especially value the habit of civic problem-solving and the belief that public institutions, including public schools, can still improve people's daily lives when they are run well.

What do you dislike the most about California and/or your hometown?

California asks people to build lives here while making it harder every year for working families and public servants to remain. Housing costs, inequality, and unstable public financing put pressure on communities from every direction. Students feel that instability too, because schools cannot be steady when the families and workers around them are constantly being squeezed.

Tell us about your current involvement in the community (e.g., volunteer groups, neighborhood associations, civic and professional organizations, etc.)

My work in education is also my public service. I serve on the San Diego Unified School District Board of Education and currently work at the California Department of Education. I lead a statewide working group focused on attendance and chronic absenteeism, and I have been involved in efforts to move affordable housing on school district property from concept to construction. I also serve in youth leadership and civic-engagement roles connected to public education, with a particular interest in making student voice part of real decision-making rather than a formality.

Thank you

Thank you for giving us your time and answering our questionnaire. We look forward to reading your answers and considering your candidacy!