Banda Visit to Arbor Heights

From our friends over at the West Seattle blog, a story and video of soon-to-be Superintendent Banda talking geography to a student.  He shows the student on a map where his own son is - in Taiwan teaching English to students there - and they had a good chat.

Good start to building those relationships he was talking about at the School Board meeting.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I was very impressed with what I saw in Mr. Banda during the school tour. He had a warm smile, welcoming and calming presence and showed a genuine interest in the students he met and interacted. It was an exciting day for the Arbor Heights Community to welcome him to Seattle!

~AH Parent
5/20/12, 10:16 AM
Anonymous said…
Interesting, AH Parent. Your post makes me recall -- one of the initial things that "bothered" me about MGJ -- from day 1 -- was that she never seemed warm and authentic around parents and kids. It always seemed a little forced. So glad that era is over.

Braessae
5/21/12, 1:34 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Tuesday Open Thread

The speaker list is up for the Board meeting tomorrow; not as packed as I thought with just four people on the waitlist. The majority of the speakers are speaking on high school boundaries (with several wanting to talk about Ballard High). There are only three of us speaking about the Green Dot resolution asking the City to not grant the zoning departures that Green Dot has requested.  It's me, long-time watchdog, Chris Jackins, and the head of the Washington State Charter Schools Association, Patrick D'Amelio.  (I knew Mr. D'Amelio when he headed the Alliance for Education and Big Brothers and Big Sisters; he's a stand-up guy.)
Read more

Breaking It Down: Where the District Might Close Schools

Update 2: an absolutely fabulous interactive map made by parent Beth Day (@thebethocracy on Twitter - she covers Board meetings and is fun to read).   end of update    Update 1: Mea culpa, I did indeed get Decatur and Thornton Creek mixed up. Thanks to all for the correction. end of update   I suspect some who read this post will be irate. Why do this? Because the district seems very hellbent on this effort with no oversight skid marks from the Board.    To clearly state - I do not believe that closing 20 schools is a good idea. I think they hit on 20 because they thought it might bring in the most savings. But the jury is still out on the savings because the district has not shown its work nor its data. I suspect closing schools and THEN leasing/renting them is the big plan but that means the district really has to keep the buildings up.   But this district, with its happy talk about "well-resourced schools" is NOT acknowledging the pain and yes, gr...
Read more

Education News Roundup

From the ever-amusing Washington Policy Center : Vouchers are Pell Grants for students under 18.  Vouchers are no different than Pell Grants or GI benefits, except the money goes to the families of students younger than age 18.  Except they are. Pell Grants were created to help needy students and that's not really the goal of the voucher program.  The Pell grant website does have a couple of great studies on why low-income students drop out before finishing their higher ed and what makes a difference.
Read more