Friday Open Thread
Well, guess who likes unions? Governor Scott Walker in Wisconsin who made it his goal to destroy the teachers union in Wisconsin. Priorities, kids. When it's something like, well, football, he's all for unions but when it's students and decent education, well, we can bring in the farm team.
Tomorrow is a national Free Admission Day at some museums sponsored by the Smithsonian. Check their website for ones in our region.
Reminder of Saturday events for SPS:
Tomorrow is a national Free Admission Day at some museums sponsored by the Smithsonian. Check their website for ones in our region.
Reminder of Saturday events for SPS:
- Community Meeting with Director DeBell from 9-11 a.m. at Cafe Appassionato at 4001 21st Ave W.
- Community Meeting with Director Smith-Blum from 10-11:30 am at the Capitol Hill Library, 425 Harvard Ave. E.
- See It. Be It. event from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. at Seattle Center, NW Rooms.
Comments
How Do Charter Schools Compare to “Schools with Students Like Ours” in South Carolina?
HP
The procedure is now due. Where is it?
There has been frequent communication with staff over the past year and frequent reference to this due date. At no time has any member of the staff suggested that the process was not on pace to meet the deadline. No member of the staff has asked for an extension. There has been no status updates that indicated any kind of delay. On the contrary, the staff has frequently claimed to be working on the procedure and have only expressed confidence that it would be ready on time.
Now is the time for accountability. Now is the time for the staff to deliver the program placement procedure. There is a quarterly program placement update due in October. There are a number of program placement decisions in process (World School, NOVA, downtown elementary, K-5 STEM, etc.). The District needs to make long-term capacity management plans now. This is the time for the district staff to meet the transparency expectations. This is the time for the Board to show support for transparency. This is the time for the Board to provide some governance.
There have been delays, and delays, and delays. Time is up. Let's see the procedure.
Thanks.
Insane Mom
HuffPost - Teacher Evaluation Systems Hold Inherent Tensions, Require Refining: American Enterprise Institute Report
Bob Westgard's the man.
Helen Schinske
That is what my kid's teacher is using (for Honors, I think he said he uses Discovering for the non Honors classes).
They started doing proofs this week!
There are at least 10 kids on the bus my child has been taking that are affected by these changes.
Shift Lowell into the McClure service area.
Reopen North QA school. It's a short trip from the south lake union area.
Looking at the site distance and its current occupant, it still comes back to cost. Sorry, but if you are serious at all about a solution, you need to be realistic and Lowell ES is closer to SLU and is a functioning school with space to accomodate. What is wrong with the idea of Lowell? Why must this school be on QA?
PS parent
PS parent
Folks, we HAVE to think of the good of the district and not our narrow corner of the world.
So he WAS bought and paid for by Gates through Strategies 360.
Forewarned is forearmed. Four armed? Oh, of course, fore-armed.
It's mainly about teacher evaluation, because of course the only purpose of S360/OSC is to be a propagandist/lobbyist for Gates, et al, in weakening the union and standardizing teachers so as to make them cheaper and more disposable.
"Data Gaps
In addition to the information displayed throughout this Data Gallery, the Our Schools Coalition requested data in the areas listed below. The district has indicated data for the following is not yet available.
• Master “dashboard” capturing key metrics SPS is using to monitor CBA implementation progress
• Status on developing assessments in currently non-tested subjects
• Cumulative total spent on Professional Development supports and interventions
• Precise mechanisms in place to account for quality, consistency and effectiveness of $500 stipends awarded to teachers performing at “Basic”
• Correlation between additional 1 hr/week of collaboration time for elementary teachers and student outcomes
oSPS has stated $2.6 M is spent on K-8 collaboration time
• Correlation between MAP scores and teacher ratings
oSPS has indicated they expect to conduct an initial analysis this winter
• Number of teachers who have improved enough on probation to be taken off probation
"SPS Next Steps: A significant number of “data gaps” still exist in the implementation data requested by the coalition beginning on April 5, 2012 (see final page of Data Gallery package, attached). The coalition will look to district leadership to fill those gaps, or outline their internal plans for metric tracking and analysis, by November 30, 2012."
"...implementation data requested by the coalition..."??
"...coalition will look to district leadership to fill those gaps, or outline their internal plans..."??
Pardon me, but WTH is OSC doing here? Who died and left them in charge?
Oompah
Let's hope this is the case.
Jane
There isn't money in BEX IV for this. But we are overdue for SPS and City Hall to work together to plan and hopefully find funding for school and the redevelopment of Seattle Center area. By 2019, we will need a new MS and HS for this cluster because Ballard HS won't be able to meet the need and McClure is a very small MS in terms of footprint so perhaps there'll be a switch and Blaine will become the cluster MS instead of McClure.
-class of 2020.
Being an option school means that ANYBODY outside the "walk zone", (which is entirely within the Hay reference area) has an equal chance of gaining admission to it. In fact, some current students at QAE do not live in McClure's service area.
Blaine is a K-8. You can't assign people there for middle school Rules change.
Mag Res
A large # of QAE students ARE from Magnolia... partly because some are within the transportation zone even if they are out of the geographic zone. So while it is true that outside the geographic zone which overlays the John Hay footprint, if someone from outside the TRANSPORTATION zone wants to come to QAE, they need to get there on their own dime/time. So that provides some incentive/advantage to the Magnolia neighborhood vs. West Seattle or Ballard for instance.
As far as High Schools, at the McClure meeting, it was stated that Lincoln will open as a HS in 2018, with the new wing (funded by this BEXIV if it passes) opening in 2019. So there is the "new" high school that will take pressure off of Ballard and other High Schools.
I agree with class of 2020 that QA/Mag assignments/geographies will need to be re-examined. The best I've heard of in terms of an immediate term solution is to look at boundaries for Lowell and take up some of the John Hay overcrowding.
And if Charters pass, all this is up in the air and a disaster in the making because every time a current school gets converted to a charter, boundary lines are going to have to be redrawn... nightmare scenario.
QAE Parent