Good Things in Our District
Didn't want these good news items to get lost in the Open Thread section.
Lafayette is putting on the musical The Music Man. Here's an article (and cute-as-a-button photo) from the West Seattle Herald.
From the Times, Denny International Middle School principal, Jeff Clark, has won the Thomas B. Foster Award for outstanding leadership. This comes from the Alliance for Education and he will receive a $50k grant.
Clark said he plans to use the $50,000 prize to buy one book for every student to recognize their hard work, to purchase musical instruments, and to start an endowment fund that can be used to help pay field-trip or other fees.
I heard Clark speak the other night at the 34th District Democrats meeting. He said, "I have my dream job." It got a big round of applause. He was there to explain how important the Families and Education levy is to his school. He is one of the best principals this district has and he deserves this honor.
From the district, Aki Kurose Middle School Academy is going to be taking a "Neighborhood Walk" today to build relationships with neighbors and businesses. This is a great idea so that the kids know who lives around their school (and hopefully build some respect for the neighborhood their school sits in) and for the community see the kids as young people working towards a goal.
What good news have you heard?
Lafayette is putting on the musical The Music Man. Here's an article (and cute-as-a-button photo) from the West Seattle Herald.
From the Times, Denny International Middle School principal, Jeff Clark, has won the Thomas B. Foster Award for outstanding leadership. This comes from the Alliance for Education and he will receive a $50k grant.
Clark said he plans to use the $50,000 prize to buy one book for every student to recognize their hard work, to purchase musical instruments, and to start an endowment fund that can be used to help pay field-trip or other fees.
I heard Clark speak the other night at the 34th District Democrats meeting. He said, "I have my dream job." It got a big round of applause. He was there to explain how important the Families and Education levy is to his school. He is one of the best principals this district has and he deserves this honor.
From the district, Aki Kurose Middle School Academy is going to be taking a "Neighborhood Walk" today to build relationships with neighbors and businesses. This is a great idea so that the kids know who lives around their school (and hopefully build some respect for the neighborhood their school sits in) and for the community see the kids as young people working towards a goal.
What good news have you heard?
Comments
Back to the subject of Madrona. Since the school is now holding additional open houses for those of you who are curious consider attending one. I'm feeling a little sad that the mistake in enrollment was posted here as Madrona works to build the community there.
Below is the email message announcing the open houses:
"Madrona K-8 has added a Saturday Open House. March 19th at 10am. Also added: Thursday March 24th at 9:15 and Tuesday April 12th at 9:15. With Open Enrollment extended because of Transportation issues, Principal Thaxton felt like this was an opportunity to have a weekend open house. Two additional tours have also been added." joanna
In other news, SPE had a FABULOUS Heritage Celebration Brunch this morning with student performances and great food showcasing our school's wide variety of countries of origin/cultural backgrounds (SPE has 17 first languages spoken among our population of just 101 kiddos!)
-SPE Parent
I thought the Heritage Celebration suggestions sent home by the district were crap (like, "tell us about when did your grandfather came over on the Mayflower" type stuff, but our kids/school made a great show of it, too!
http://westseattleblog.com/?p=66336
Denny (with video):
http://westseattleblog.com/2011/03/big-award-for-denny-international-middle-school-and-principal-jeff-clark
But more importantly, we also have several other SPS stories from over here that nobody else covered. My favorite one from this week, if you hadn't seen it - local media organizations were invited to be part of an essay contest that West Seattle Elementary School counselor Laura Bermes proposed to encourage better attendance. We said of course we'd be thrilled to publish the winning essay. Here's the result:
http://westseattleblog.com/?p=65809
We also published a couple updates on special guests at Roxhill Elementary and will within an hour or two publish updates on this weekend's fundraiser auctions at Gatewood Elementary and Pathfinder K-8.
Oops, and wouldn't want to miss this one. West Seattle HS senior Kellen Gearon is doing community service with a donation drive for Treehouse (which as I'm sure you know helps foster kids):
http://westseattleblog.com/2011/03/how-you-can-help-this-west-seattle-hs-student-help-foster-kids
A few Chief Sealth stories - winter sports banquet (including kudos for the mock trial team):
http://westseattleblog.com/?p=66282
And Chief Sealth drummers were part of the dedication ceremony for the renovated Delridge Playfield yesterday (see video toward the end):
http://westseattleblog.com/2011/03/you-voted-you-got-it-renovated-delridge-playfield-dedicated
I'm sorry we don't have coverage of Board President Sundquist's community meeting yesterday - I would have gone if I had known about it (I was at the legislative Town Hall but could easily have delegated that to another reporter). We don't get announcements - I check his website at least once a week and this one must have been put up at the last minute; sadly, as often as I try to check your site here, I didn't see your Friday news of the Saturday meeting till now.
Keep up the good work ... see you at the capacity management work session!
P.S. West Seattle basks in the glory of one of our guys winning, regardless. Winning! Winning!