117 schools visible, but SFUSD's finder can't count participation

SFUSD's public athletics page says its program includes high schools and middle schools. It links readers to participating high- and middle-school pages, the CIF San Francisco Section and separate high-school and middle-school participation files.

The district's School Finder adds a different kind of information. Its filters include Athletic Programs, with options such as badminton, baseball, basketball, cross country, fencing, flag football, football, golf, soccer, softball, swimming, tennis, track and field, volleyball and wrestling. The finder showed all 117 schools on September 2.

That distinction is the story. The School Finder can help build a school-by-school athletics inventory. It cannot, by itself, tell us how many students participate, whether a season is active, how teams are funded, whether a coach is available or whether a listed facility is open.

DataQuest can supply enrollment, demographic and accountability context when the report year and denominator are stated. Enrollment is not a measure of sports access. A fair comparison would need matching school lists, dates and definitions, along with a clear account of what is missing.

SFUSD's public pages are useful for finding athletics information, but they do not support claims about participation that the district does not measure there.