Central NSAP Regional Meeting Tonight
(Update: sorry, I had put SE, not Central. This is the Central Region meeting.)
The third of the regional meetings will be tonight at Garfield High School from 6:30-8:00 p.m. Garfield is located at 400 23rd Ave South.
I would love to go to this one but I have a neighborhood meeting to attend. I hope someone attends and lets us know what the discussion was. (I did e-mail Tracy and the Board about shortening the district presentation so that more detailed questions and answers/discussion can take place.)
There is also an Operations Committee meeting tomorrow from 4-6 p.m. in the Board conference room. On the agenda:
- various BEX and BTA projects
- NSAP transition plan (interesting and what's that about?)
-capital monthly report
- 2010-2013 Technology plan
The third of the regional meetings will be tonight at Garfield High School from 6:30-8:00 p.m. Garfield is located at 400 23rd Ave South.
I would love to go to this one but I have a neighborhood meeting to attend. I hope someone attends and lets us know what the discussion was. (I did e-mail Tracy and the Board about shortening the district presentation so that more detailed questions and answers/discussion can take place.)
There is also an Operations Committee meeting tomorrow from 4-6 p.m. in the Board conference room. On the agenda:
- various BEX and BTA projects
- NSAP transition plan (interesting and what's that about?)
-capital monthly report
- 2010-2013 Technology plan
Comments
Sue
To me, #3 is the over-the-top most logical immediate choice to reduce the overcrowding at Garfield next year. 10% is roughly how over-enrolled Garfield is. Yes, it may continue to grow, and solutions must be found, but shouldn't the 10% set asides be utilized for just these sort of problems when they occur? Why not do this while working on concurrent plans from all affected groups so each can take a step toward dealing with Garfield's overcrowding?
The Board and SI have a chance to do right by the community here, by listening, consulting, and taking their time to do this right. Bob Vaughan is working on ideas for solutions as I write. It would be nice if the district finally showed he and APP some respect. After all, without APP, Garfield wouldn't be so desirable in the first place. I hope the whole Garfield community, APP & non-APP, will work together on this problem, instead of letting and us vs. them occur. This isn't APP's fault. It's the district's. They drew the lines.
split session- for example, an 8 period "day" where some go kids go 1-6 and others go 3-8; a simpler one: use the Teen Life Center and Community Center for additional classrooms.
My small discussion group reported back on this topic, but I'm afraid it was lost in all the Garfield/APP hubub.
Can anyone else report back about the meeting?
If those kids live at 20th & Aloha (I live down the street) they would be in the Stevens zone. If they are APP walk zone for Lowell - why are they getting a bus?
I thought that the Lowell overcrowding had 100% to do with increased APP enrollment - or were some kids diverted to Lowell ALO because Stevens is too crowded?
It does seem strange that the Stevens boundary extends so far south - but maybe it was to offer those kids who were displaced from TT Minor a slot at a desired school (if I thought for a moment that the district cared one iota for those kids).
The assignment areas could make sense if TT Minor was still open. It is still the closest school for 400+ students, but politics won over logic. Believe me, there are many who have worked for building our neighborhoods and have been long-time advocates for schools south of Union. There was a waiting list at TT Minor made up of students who live here for for the Montessori Program. After the abusive treatment that this group has endured they accepted the new assignment, breathing a sigh of relief that finally they have a stable known school to which while they have to be bused, it is known.
Gatzert and Madrona have plenty of students living within those areas. Unless you are prepared to build a coalition for a good to great program at TT Minor please don't advocate that these families are again uprooted. There is room for all the students who actually have been drawn into Stevens. There is not another school for many of these former TT Minor families who were just finally relieved to be assigned to a stable know program after decades of destabilization. Actually TT Minor would also be the only school to which many of these students can walk. I don't have time here for the history, but if enough of you want it I will do in a separate blog.
What did you think when TT Minor families were fighting for the school?
That bubble echo caused quite a bit of disruption in neighboring schools--in echo years, Montlake would not be able to enroll their standard circle of kids and that contributed to the Eastlake community's demands for set asides at TOPS. Everything is connected.
David, is joanna right? Are a large number of K kids at Stevens out of area sibs (because of the transition plan)? If so, enrollment should even out quickly--from what I hear, the out of area sib tiebreaker is not on the books this year (and some of the older kids may have to leave to be with their younger sibs.) You might want to check with Tracy Libros-she may have the data.
From the student assignment data. Currently 45% of the students at Stevens are from the assignment area and 21% of this years Kindergarten class is from outside the area. If you do the math there are about 422 public school students actually living within the boundaries. I'm sure that it will take a bit for it all to balance out with current students and siblings being grandfather into the school and some students who were not within the boundaries did not arrive at Stevens.