Guest Column in the Seattle Times
Seattle Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Maria Goodloe-Johnson had a guest column in the Seattle Times this morning. She didn't write anything new or substantial, but did try to get the word out on the upcoming new Student Assignment Plan.
You can read the column here: Seattle Public Schools is making changes to help students succeed
You can read the column here: Seattle Public Schools is making changes to help students succeed
Comments
There are a lot of interesting (and, in many instances, disturbing) battles going on right now about the future of American public education--class size vs. teacher quality; standardizing curricula vs. retaining teacher autonomy; tenure vs. incentive pay; the use of charter schools vs. "all-in" on traditional public schools; strong discipline and ordering vs. room for kids to make mistakes; etc.
What I find amazing is that the superindentant doesn't seem interested in any of the debates. If you read her op-ed this morning, her plan for improving the quality of the public schools is to annouce that the schools will get better. There is just nothing in there about HOW we are going to go about doing it. It is almost--but probably not quite--enough to make you wish for a Michele Rhee or Joel Klein who--whatever their faults--are in there every day with passion, trying things, shaking things up to see if we can get some traction on these seemingly intractable problems.
If the Superindentant wants to improve the failing schools, why doesn't she have representatives in the failing schools kicking butt and taking names? Why doesn't she take a public stand and develop a serious action plan on EITHER class size or teacher quality? Why isn't she consciously recplicating her most successful schools?
If the plan is to send everyone to their neighborhood schools on the theory that all schools will be "excellent," it would be nice to see a little passion about (and a little concrete progress towards) making the less-than-excellent schools excellent.
In my generous moments, I think maybe I'm missing something- maybe there really is some vision and all these seemingly misguided, disenfranchising steps will net some positive. Then, I spend time at my child's school, talk with neighbors and friends, and frustration overwhelms any trace of faith in our district leadership. I haven't completely thrown in the towel because I know that most schools, most programs/buildings, are doing great work with our students. Our communities know what works, know where the challenges are. If we had some commitment to reciprocal community engagement, and a school board who learned to do their job, we'd make progress. Until then, we're left with a divide and conquer, top down, mandate setting system coupled with a diminishing sense of trust in the district charged with educating and helping raise our children.
What came up on Charlie's Communication Breakdown thread? Will Sahila's idea of complaint forms help? Really, how do we get a citizen/parent/teacher round table to help guide the district?
And I would love it if parents/the community demanded - yes demanded - and got the chance for all of us stakeholders to sit in a circle and nut all of this out... no matter how long it takes... keep at it, talking, brainstorming, researching, coming to concensus finally (which despite my appearance of being a pessimist, I am confident we CAN do) on a direction plus the means to implement that direction...
what would it take to get such a circle happening and for us - the entire SPS system and stakeholders - to do all our business that way?
In the last race, 4 candidates received over 130k, dwarfing all their opponents by ratios of seven to one or thereabouts. It shouldn't surprise anyone that they all vote as a block, even in the face of obvious community opposition.
Sure, its nice to get private money, but it quickly loses its lustre with all the strings attached.
We need to pay close attention to who is funding the races this time around, and see who's agenda candidates are likely to further if elected.