More than 100 community members arrived at the Stockton Unified School District board meeting this week to support KIPP Public Schools during a public hearing to determine the fate of their petition to establish a new high school in Stockton.
Itzel Velazquez, a ninth-grader at KIPP High School, which shares a campus with KIPP Elementary School, emphasized how these schools have built a community for the students.
“My classmates and I are the founding class of KIPP Stockton High School. “We are taking the very first steps, leaving footprints, so future students can walk a path that we help begin,” Velazquez said. “Every lesson learned and every challenge overcome becomes part of that path.”
However, all the large show of support at Tuesday’s Stockton Unified board meeting didn’t sway trustees.
Six boardmembers voted Tuesday to deny the petition from KIPP, known as the Knowledge Is Power Program, to establish a new high school in University Park in central Stockton.
While the rest did not elaborate on why they voted against the petition, Trustee Patrick Martin said he could not support a new KIPP school in the district due to state data showing its students are performing below state standards across the board.
“It’s a little troubling when you see this data, and the confidence just kind of goes away because of the data and the numbers,” Martin said. “So, the numbers speak a little louder.”
KIPP CEO Beth Thompson says that new KIPP students come to their schools multiple grade levels behind and data shows the students’ performances are improving.
“What our data shows is that students who stay with us experience tremendous academic growth as long as they stay with us,” Thompson told Stocktonia Wednesday afternoon. “In one year, we often cannot catch students all the way up to grade level, given where they’re coming in.”
Kipp’s petition requested approval for a five-year charter term for a new high school beginning July 1. The school would have served grades 9-12, starting with 225 ninth graders in the upcoming school year, growing to 650 total students by the 2030-31 school year.
In 2019, Stockton Unified approved KIPP to operate a TK-12 educational pathway in south Stockton. Since then, KIPP opened a middle school in 2021, elementary school in 2024, and launched its first ninth-grade class last fall, according to a KIPP press release.
Board president Sofia Colon opened the hearing explaining that district staff findings showed KIPP’s request was not up to the mark.
“Staff, in consultation with legal counsel, analyzed the legal requirements set forth in the Education Code to determine whether the petition meets the minimum standards for approval,” Colon said. “The staff report includes the review team’s proposed findings of fact and determination that the petition does not meet the minimum requirements to be eligible for approval for a five‑year term.”
Without much further discussion, the board then put the petition to a vote, ultimately denying KIPP’s request for a new high school. The vote was 6-0, with Trustee Isabel Perez abstaining. Perez left the boardroom before the vote without elaborating why she had recused herself.
SUSD Superintendent Michelle Rodriguez said that while it is best practice to give a reason for abstaining, it is not law binding.
Perez represents SUSD Area 1, which includes KIPP Middle School, in south Stockton.
KIPP plans to appeal the board’s decision to the San Joaquin County Office of Education, though tight construction timelines could force KIPP to temporarily close its middle school to accommodate high school enrollment growth.
If the denial stands, KIPP’s middle school in Conway Homes will temporarily close and a new high school will take over the middle school facilities
KIPP officials also encouraged students to apply to the existing KIPP University Park Middle School even amid concerns about availability.
Initially, KIPP had planned to house all its schools at the Conway Homes campus but external factors made it unfeasible, according to the press release. After reviewing dozens of options, KIPP said it secured a three-acre parcel in the University Park neighborhood, which fits the charter’s geographic focus.
The proposed address was part of KIPP’s charter renewal, but the board removed the planned high school site before approving the renewal, limiting operations to the charter school’s existing sites. KIPP then submitted a new petition in November 2025 to secure the University Park location to enable long-term facilities, according to a press release from KIPP.
Support not enough to convince trustees
More than 100 community members arrived in support of KIPP at Tuesday’s board meeting, though not all got a chance to speak. The board allotted only 20 minutes total for the public to comment on the issue, with three minutes for each speaker.
The turnout had even been larger than those who attended a rally at KIPP Middle School the day before, which was also organized to call on SUSD to approve the potential new high school location before KIPP’s petition was scheduled to go before the board.
Kimanh Truong, the former principal of KIPP Middle School, had emphasized the community built around his former school in an area with much need.
“We centered Conway homes and our community, a community that has historically been under-resourced, overlooked and, too often, asked to wait for opportunities that other communities take for granted,” Truong said. “Tonight, I ask you to remember something simple, that a school is more than a building. It’s a place where children learn that their neighborhood matters and that they do, too.”
Stockton City Councilmember Brando Villapudua, whose district also encompasses the middle school, arrived in a show of support for KIPP and called on the school board to approve the a new high school.
He filled out a public comment card, Villapudua said, but didn’t get a chance to speak due to time limits.
“I’m very happy that my community came out here to support and stand for something, and that’s why I was here,” Villapudua said. “We may have lost the fight tonight, but we’re going to come back stronger.”
Villapudua said he had reached out to Trustee Perez but she redirected him to her district communication.