The San Francisco Youth Commission this week unanimously passed a motion urging the mayor and the Board of Supervisors to address the California Academy of Sciences’ decision to curtail a youth group.
This action came a month after a Mission Local story detailing how the museum abruptly dissolved a youth group for climate change, the Youth Action for the Planet program, and moved to fire its staff coordinator. Those actions came shortly after several teenage members distributed fliers in solidarity with the museum workers’ union.
In the Monday motion, the San Francisco Youth Commission said the Cal Academy of Sciences’ actions “appear to represent a disheartening example of pushback against young people for exercising their voices and participating in social justice movements.”
Jason Fong, chair of the San Francisco Youth Commission, said that one of his “big fears was that this situation was just going to get pushed under the rug and people would forget about it.”
All 16 commissioners present at the Monday commission meeting voted in favor of the motion, according to Fong, who acknowledged that there was “quite a bit of hesitation” among commissioners before the voting due to the limited information available about the incident.
The museum has said that the Youth for Action Planet program was always “designed as a time-constrained pilot project, funded through a specific grant” and that it “concluded upon the completion of its contractual obligations.”
The teenage members and the former staff coordinator, however, say the opposite. The Cal Academy created the pilot program in October 2023 for young people who care about nature to build leadership and advocacy skills. Its staff coordinator, Aleks Liou, was featured in the museum’s June staff stoplight for Liou’s “inspiring work with youth” and, in August, got the museum a quarter-million-dollar grant from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services “to fund two additional years of this program beyond its pilot year,” said Liou.
On June 25, three teenage members decided on their own to distribute fliers highlighting the museum executive director’s $632,626 annual compensation in an effort to support the museum workers’ union, which has been negotiating its first contract.
On the same night, all the members of the youth program were told by the Cal Academy’s administrator not to come to the building for the rest of the week. A number of the teenagers say they never returned. The museum moved to terminate Liou in September, and formally dissolved the youth program by Oct. 17.
By Oct. 21, the museum, which has been in a financial crisis, attempted to “restore” the quarter-million grant money to the federal government.
When asked to comment on the previous Mission Local story, the museum said in a Oct. 28 statement that “the Academy identified the need to rebuild” the Youth Action for the Planet program to be an “education program for Indigenous youth,” a decision that was made after piloting the program for six months.
The Cal Academy’s leaders declined to provide details about how the other decisions were made. The museum issued a fuller statement after the the Nov. 21 Mission Local story was published.
On Monday, the commission urged the mayor and the Board of Supervisors to address the museum’s decisions, and called on the museum’s management to provide “a detailed public account of its decision-making process.”
“Once we have more information,” said commission chair Fong, “that’s when the Youth Commission will take a formal stance in the form of a resolution.”
“It’s cool to see the youth stand in solidarity with each other,” said Liou, the staff coordinator who was allowed to resign on Nov. 22, rather than be fired. This occurred after negotiations between the museum workers’ union and the museum.
Since the discord with the museum, some of the former Youth Action for the Planet program members have launched their own organization, Youth Riot Network, to continue focusing on climate and broader social issues.
In the motion, the Youth Commission called on “the Board of Supervisors and the Mayor stand in solidarity with the affected youth and their new organization, Youth Riot Network.”
“Youth climate activism, in and of itself, is super important,” said Fong. “A lot of young people, not just in San Francisco, are very passionate about it, and I think these are programs that we should be supporting and funding.”
After firing the kids for their worker solidarity, the Museum said “the Academy identified the need to rebuild” the Youth Action for the Planet program to be an “education program for Indigenous youth.”
This is such a perfect example of how “Blueworld” (as it were) institutions use “woke” jargon for essentially right wing ends.
How do I interview for the job of executive director?
The Youth Commission is just one of the 65 commissions that togethersf, Bilal Mahmood and a heap of other republicans wanted to get rid off.
Yes, what would we ever do if city didn’t spend the money for the Youth Commission to send a strongly worded letter?
Donut,
I think you’ll be right in the near future when we have Customized Algorithms to oversee the operations of the City’s agencies but I, for one, love to watch and participate in overseeing the whole thing and watching the up and coming politicos.
Keep the Commissions and add more Cow Bell is my advice in a situation very much like this one.
lol
Very good weed.
h.
Names ?
$600,000 a year !!!
Hell, that’s Stormy Daniels money.
Who is this ‘executive director’ and what do they do for this pile of cash ?
Go Niners !!
h.