Vallejo Vignettes – Vallejo Unified School District helped my twins thrive

The Vallejo Vignettes are reader-submitted stories of something fun, quirky or inspiring that happened to them in Vallejo. If you'd like to submit a Vignette for publication, please email your submission of 50 to 800 words to vallejovignettes@vallejosun.com.

During the pandemic, many things changed for many people. For us, one of those changes was a long wanted pregnancy. An unexpected surprise was that our pregnancy was two little girls. Twins?! Really? Looking around our small home in San Francisco, it became clear that we needed something much more suitable for our growing family. The hunt was on.

We looked all over North Bay for a new home, as far north as Santa Rosa. Prices were incredibly high, and the distances to San Francisco were getting astronomical. While the pandemic made our income remote, that income was ultimately going to come from an office in downtown, so long term access to that commute was a requirement.

In the midst of the endless home searching, we visited a home in Vallejo… and It was perfect for us.

The owners had refinished the entire house. It had a lot of space. It had a big backyard. The price was in our range. Looking at the situation, Vallejo had everything. It was relatively affordable by Bay Area standards, it had nice open spaces, and it had a ferry to downtown San Francisco. We knew Vallejo had some struggles, but we took a chance. We bought the home, and moved in within a few weeks of our daughters’ birth.

As our daughters grew, we noticed that they were struggling a bit with their language skills. One thing that some twins deal with is that they have less outside pressure to communicate with adults. They seem to create a language of their own, happily spending all day talking to each other in this language they have created. As adorable as this language is, we needed to make sure that their English skills improved before they got to formal schooling, as we didn’t want them at a disadvantage.

Thus began our introduction to the local school system.

We found out from their pediatrician that the county has services for helping young children with their language skills. The county would assist us in the near term, but as our children were getting closer to three years old, they would need to transition into the local school system. This entire process involved a lot of testing and interviews. We got hearing tests, cognitive tests, spoke with Vallejo school district speech pathologists and more.

Our daughters have now been getting this help for a few years, and the experience has been excellent. Everyone in the district has been kind, attentive, and eager to help. Our daughters will enter daily school next year, and there has been critical improvement in getting their speech ready for that transition. 

They have school twice a week, one session from home, and one at Wardlaw Elementary. They LOVE it. They love their teacher Rachel and her assistant Jessica. They especially love that Jessica waits for them early at the gate to let them come play in the playground before class. 

We love that their teacher Rachel has been extremely communicative with us, always reaching out to work with us on ways to help them each get better. We are left feeling very confident that when they start school next year, they will be in good hands with loving and committed teachers looking out for them.

We all know that our city struggles, but it has a lot of promise. We sure feel great knowing that our local school lives up to that promise. Thank you Vallejo City Unified School District!

— By Michael Dietel. Michael Dietel is living in the Hanns Park neighborhood with his wife Cathy and twin daughters.