This story aired in the January 8, 2025 episode of Crosscurrents.
School boards in California are unique. The state is just one of three in the country that requires its boards to have student school board members if their peers advocate for it.
In Oakland, student members have used that power to make real change. Several years ago, they helped lead the charge to get 16- and 17-year-olds the right to vote in school board elections. And today, one of these young Oakland leaders has his sights set on something new.
Story Transcript:
REPORTER: 17-year-old Maximus Simmons spends his days a little differently than most of his peers. He’s not really interested in sports…
MAXIMUS SIMMONS: I play the PlayStation once every Sunday.
REPORTER: People in his life have told him to make a little more time to be a kid.
MAXIMUS: I don't really interact with many people my age unless I'm polling or serving. Most of my time is actually speaking to people in power, and adults and elected officials.
REPORTER: That’s because Maximus is serving his second year on the Oakland Unified School Board.
MAXIMUS: People call it a lot of different things. Student director, student trustee, student representative. They all mean the same thing: in my role, I represent all 34,000 students in OUSD.
REPORTER: He takes it seriously. His job is to poll his peers on the issues they care about and then to advocate for them on the board.
MAXIMUS: There's two student directors in OUSD, but around California, it's different all over the place.
REPORTER: California's students have fought to get representation. More than half of the state’s school boards have at least one student director. It was actually an older classmate of Maximus’s who first told him he should run.
MAXIMUS: She kept pushing me to take on different public speaking and leadership roles. Although she was a mentor, I kind of started to see her as a rival. So I was like, yeah, I’ve got to run for student director. I’ve got to one-up you.
REPORTER: His peers elected him. And he quickly realized how much he loves speaking up for them.
MAXIMUS: You know, I love representing students. You know, it wasn't a thought to rerun after my first year. I already knew I was gonna do it.
REPORTER: In school board meetings, he speaks slowly and deliberately.
JENNIFER BROUHARD (board meeting): Director Simmons…
MAXIMUS (board meeting): I always say that I think as a district, we don't focus on the individuality of our students enough.
REPORTER: The board’s job is to set the district priorities. Its members have to make complicated decisions about budget cuts and teacher contracts.
MAXIMUS (board meeting): We need to go to these surveys and look at those responses and see what students prioritize at the top of their list so we can actually make a budget that represents our student needs.
REPORTER: The board negotiates with unions and hires and oversees the superintendent. And they meet twice a month in meetings that often stretch late into the night.
VALARIE BACHELOR (board meeting): We will now, um, be discussing closed session items, so labor matters, D dash 1 25 dash 1 8 64, uh, legal matters, uh, D dash 2 25 dash 24 27.
REPORTER: And every meeting, Maximus and his fellow student director Marianna Smith present a student report.
VALARIE (board meeting): All righty. Now we will move on to Item K, which is our student board report.
REPORTER: The student directors talk about upcoming events and polls they’ve conducted with students. And they work on special projects. For the last year, Maximus has been writing a proposal to add more restorative justice coordinators to Oakland schools.
MAXIMUS: This resolution, we will prioritize finding one million dollars in funding for restorative justice.
REPORTER: Restorative justice is an alternative to traditional forms of discipline. In moments of conflict, the coordinators facilitate conversations between peers, even between students and teachers.
MAXIMUS: You know, it kind of turns a teacher from a dictator to a humanitarian.
REPORTER: Maximus says he spent over a year talking to students, and building on an old OUSD program that was slashed during budget cuts a few years ago. He found research that shows a reinvestment in coordinators could help drastically cut suspensions, like it had in the past.
His plan only asks the district to find the money. And he understands the board is in a tricky financial spot right now — last month the board approved a plan to cut $100 million from next year's budget
Still, Maximus says he's optimistic that the plan will pass.
But when the proposal finally reaches the board — there’s a catch.
Maximus and his fellow student director can cast their votes. They can say yes or no, just like everyone else. But their votes don’t actually count. They’re advisory only — symbolic gestures. They won’t show up in the final tally.
Should they?
MAXIMUS: Students have a lot of good ideas, and I think if you can trust us to get up on that board, and if we're showing up to work all the days that we need to show up to work, just like all the other school board members, if we're getting paid the same amount as the other school board members, then there's no reason for our vote to not count.
I've been showing up to these school board meetings for a year and some change and I've been on the school board longer than some of the school board members up here now, so I've gained the right for my vote to count I believe.
REPORTER: The adults are divided. Board member Mike Hutchinson doesn't think Maximus’s vote should count. He says budgets and contracts are too complicated for high schoolers.
MIKE HUTCHINSON: We are responsible for over a billion dollars in combined funds. I don't think it's appropriate really to have students in that role with those kinds of votes, especially since they're not necessarily prepared. They can't really have the authority then to have votes that matter, like the issues that we vote on.
REPORTER: But board president Jennifer Brouhard disagrees with Hutchinson. She told me that you don’t have a real voice if you don’t have a real vote. She thinks if everybody has a vote, then everybody should have a vote that counts.
But for now, the student directors’ votes don’t count. Sometimes Maximus says it can feel like he’s seen as a symbolic kid, not to be taken seriously.
But, you know, once you're in those rooms, to me, it means that you are meant to be in those rooms.Maximus Simmons
MAXIMUS: My first year as student director there was a lot of tokenization as a black boy with dreads who speak well. But, you know, once you're in those rooms, to me, it means that you are meant to be in those rooms.
REPORTER: So, Maximus makes his presence known. Like this one time at a meeting last spring. There was a heated public comment period about cuts to after-school programs.
JENNIFER (board meeting): Appreciate the audience here.
COREY HOLLIS (board meeting): We have 73 speakers signed up to speak, 18 of which are students.
REPORTER: Maximus felt like the other school board members were being disingenuous.
MAXIMUS (board meeting): Our community is the priority. They're just now being updated that these cuts are coming to their programs, and don't respond and say that we're just now being updated because I know that isn't true. I know it isn't true.
REPORTER: And he didn’t mince words.
MAXIMUS (board meeting): I've sat on the board with a level head and I've never gotten frustrated. I've never raised my voice. And it's so hard because I hear you guys lie every night. Every night. And that's sickening. It's sickening, honestly.
REPORTER: Maximus hopes he can show his peers the power of speaking up to adults. Because you never know who’s listening.
AMARU MENDOZA-NAJERA (board meeting): I am Amaru Mendoza-Najera and I am in third grade. I am also going to be a future school board director. Thank you and goodnight.
MAXIMUS: I can't speak for all the student directors that have been on the board, but for me at least, it all started on a path just trying to find my voice.
REPORTER: And when you don’t get a vote, maybe you have to speak a little louder, a little more forcefully.
MAXIMUS: Because you know, although your lip might quiver. You are just now able to open your mouth, you know what I mean? Because you saw me do it.
REPORTER: Board President Jennifer Brouhard says Maximus's restorative justice plan will go to committee first. If it passes there, it will go to the school board for a full vote...or a mostly full vote.
