Friday Open Thread

Off to the Murray/Nyland press conference this morning at Madrona K-8.

And speaking of Madrona, there is to be a meeting next Wed, the 21st for "future families" for the to-be-reopened Meany Middle School at the Miller Community Center at 7 p.m.

Meany Middle School will house both general education and Spectrum programs. ALL students who live within the reference areas of Montlake, Stevens, Lowell, McGilvra, Madrona, Leschi and John Muir Elementary schools (including those in 7th and 8th grades) will be assigned to attend Meany in 2017. This means that current 5th graders will start at Meany in 8th grade. When it opens, Meany will have around 700 students, and it is projected that Meany will eventually house up to 850 students, allowing the school district to be able to serve the increasing number of school-age children in central Seattle and alleviating the current overcrowding at Washington Middle School.

For questions contact Jennifer Emrich (Montlake & Garfield parent), jen.emrich@comcast.net

Event next week not to be missed - Thursday, Jan. 22nd at 7 pm in the Quincy Jones Auditorium at Garfield High, 1968 Olympic bronze medalist, John Carlos, will be speaking on a community panel about the current Black Lives Matter movement.  The panel also includes Garfield teacher/activist, Jesse Hagopian. 

Arizona has become the first state in the country to require students to pass part of the U.S. Citizenship test on civics in order to graduate.  Their law requires students to get 60 (out of 100) questions right.  I'm not sure passing this test will make anyone a better citizen but we need better informed citizens. 

 What's on your mind?

Comments

Anonymous said…
"Meany Middle School will house both general education and Spectrum programs."

The expectation of everybody should be that Meany Middle School will "house" the full continuum of services for special needs students too. It's really distressing that this basic announcement fails to acknowledge this important and so frequently/consistently excluded constituency in the central area. Hoping planners are on top of this one.

Watching
Anonymous said…
So did the district go out of its way to separate Washington and Meany along economic lines? Take all the waterfront property and roll it to Meany?

Also, it is interesting to hear that 8th graders will be pulled out of Washington and sent to Meany that first year. I think there will be a lot of unhappy students and surprised adults.

Mid-Capitol Hill
Po3 said…
And let's not forget the key word is "re-open."

The financial tally and displacement of students due to those ill-conceived closures continues.
Anonymous said…
The WA Post says for the first time in more than 50 years, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/majority-of-us-public-school-students-are-in-poverty/2015/01/15/df7171d0-9ce9-11e4-a7ee-526210d665b4_story.html?hpid=z1>the majority of students in public schools live in poverty.</a>

What a depressing statistic. Even more depressing: the degree to which state and national legislators, thinktanks and foundations fail to create and fund human services that are <b>intertwined</b> with classroom services. Without this pairing, public schools can't overcome poverty on a large scale.

In our own legislature, the Pay for Education by Starving Human Services push has already begun, as proposed by Republican (of course) Andy Hill.

I truly fear for the human services cuts likely to come out of this WA legislation session in the name of education. It will make matters worse, not better.

Bigger picture: the national public school poverty statistic is crushing. This country is on a downward slide. Class warfare, brought about by the hubris of the rich and the grinding poverty of the rest, with no middle class left, is quite likely our grandkids' economic and social destiny.

EdVoter
Anonymous said…
Mid-Capitol Hill,

This is where it pays to watch what is happening in the rest of the district.

Remember, the initial proposal was to start new schools as 6th grade only & roll up. But that caused a huge parent outcry about 6th graders not getting a comprehensive middle school. So it was changed to move all grades to the new middle schools at once.

When Jane Adams middle school was opened this year, the boundaries increased economic disparity between the area middle schools. Also 7th & 8th graders were reassigned to the new middle school. I would not assume anything different in the opening of other new middle schools. Also disruptive was what happened to staff/teachers & programs.



-HS Parent
Anonymous said…
I didn't do a good job with my link above. Here is the depressing article again:

the majority of students in public schools live in poverty.

EdVoter
Benjamin Leis said…
http://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2015/01/16/mississippi-withdraw-parcc/21859553/

And now the PARCC testing consortium is down to 11 members.
Lynn said…
The first of the Top Ten Questions and Answers documents has been posted on the district website. This one is for the School Board Office

I like it.
Anonymous said…
Have fun at your next school board meeting with Educational Jargon Bingo:

http://www.joannejacobs.com/2015/01/laser-like-focus-on-mission-critical-paradigms/

parent
mirmac1 said…
parent,

Wow, I had major deja vu' moment of recent staff briefings.....
mirmac1 said…
The Friday Memo for T&L is very interesting. Seems the guardian who was painted as the villain during the SPED/Roosevelt data breach, prevailed with the OSPI Citizen Complaint re: Roosevelt's failed special education model. Oops, who's got egg on their face?

Of course, as is typical of OSPI (Toothless from HTTY-Dragon, just not adorable) the required corrective action was only applied to Roosevelt. It's been common-knowledge among parents for years that SPS secondary special education is, for the most part, a wasteland. The Memo hints that SPS might actually start following the law?! This I gotta see.
Lynn said…
Leshi's website has some information on the Amendment to the Student Assignment Plan for Leschi Elementary blended model
for 2015-16 on the agenda for yesterday's Operations Committee meeting.
From my reading of Leschi's webpage, the school has a mostly white, affluent Montessori program and a mostly black, not-so affluent general education program. School staff want to address inequitable education outcomes of these two populations by blending the programs so that every child receives math, phonics, grammar and geography instruction using Montessori methods and reading and writing instruction using the Readers and Writers workshop methods.

Here are some points from the school staff:
Evidence shows that in order to have an equitable learning opportunity for every child, our classrooms must be heterogeneous—integrated by race, culture, home language, and economics. Right now, they are not. Leschi currently has 387 students. We have 211 students in the Contemporary program and 176 students in the Montessori program. We have 9 Contemporary classes and 7 Montessori classes. Racial, cultural, home language, and socio-economic segregation has come to define the two programs. The Blended Model curricular approach offers the best approach to accelerating all students’ learning, starting from their just-right level.

Research shows that teacher morale has a huge impact on student performance. Teacher morale is really challenged by the current two-program system. The faculty has said that this proposed change is a start. This is getting rid of some of the barriers, so we can start really addressing the inequitable outcomes for students from a place where we are bringing all of the resources of our school to bear on a common problem.


I don't know much about Montessori methods - is the Readers/Writers workshop method superior?

This is reminiscent of the end of self-contained Spectrum at Lawton.
Anonymous said…
If I was a Montessori parent, I would be very angry. Better to make the whole school Montessori than do this blended program.

Is this split true at the other Montessori sites?

HP
RE: LESCHI Montessori—
One of the biggest problem with public Montessori schools is finding qualified teachers who are certified to teach grades 1–5+ When we were at Graham Hill, it was a nightmare—hopefully there are more now. But only a handful of schools even offer upper-grade training/certification for Montessori teachers. There is one south of Seattle (Federal Way—honestly can't remember).

The Montessori method is not a one-size-fits all program. It works great for some kids (like mine) and terribly for others (friend's children).

It CAN segregate classrooms because it is usually a "choice" option often selected more by "white" families than those of color. At Graham Hill, this was because of a lack of understanding by the uninformed. Many families and their kids thought it was some form of Special Ed (and it can be a great environment for kids who are kinetic and/or can't sit still at a desk for hours at a time).

Having separate programs is often unpopular with principals and staff. There are no easy or equitable solutions. I do not, however, believe that any "assignment" school should be 100% some special program (Montessori, Waldorf, Language, etc.). It's not fair to the families whose kids don't fit that mold.
Anonymous said…
Looking at the proposed attendance area maps for Meany is really depressing. The maps are drawn so that Meany is an affluent white school and Washington a poor minority one. Truly appalling.
- Neighborhood Parent
Lynn said…
You're not taking APP into account. Because APP takes up so many seats at Washington, there is only room for three elementary schools to be assigned to Washington. The nearest ones have high numbers of poor and minority students - and the APP population will balance this out.
Charlie Mas said…
That Friday memo from T & L was a pretty candid admission of failure.

So where's the accountability? Who is being held accountable for this and how?
Not guilty said…
To all the poor me crowd, Lowell and Gazette are both title one schools with Madrona not far behind. Meany middle school will draw from rich and poor kids in the area. There is not a conspiracy to keep poor people poor.
The school had to be somewhere and the boundaries should not be drawn to accommodate some notion of forced economic equality. Remember, we are moving to a neighborhood system and should not bus kids to far from where they live.
Lynn said…
Gatzert is assigned to Washington - not Meany.

If we really want to bus fewer children, APP should be placed at Meany.
Anonymous said…
APP only balances things out on paper - not in real life where kids are on separate tracks and in separate classes. As for the point about travel, if you look at the maps you'll see big clusters of kids in the CD who are closer to Meany than those kids on the lake. Of course those kids won't be at Meany.
- Neighborhood Parent
Anonymous said…
I'm trying to understand the blended Montessori - is it still Montessori? Will all classrooms have Montessori certified teachers and materials? Or will all teachers claim to use Montessori methods, but not have Montessori certification?

skeptic
Lowell parent said…
John Muir and Thutgood Marshall are a lot closer to Washington then Meany. Maybe you should look at a map that works.
Lynn said…
I think they're going to team-teach so that every student will have a Montessori teacher for part of the day and a non- Montessori teacher for Readers/Writers Workshop.

I would be angry if I'd enrolled my child in either program at this school.
Anonymous said…
Neighborhood Parent said: "APP only balances things out on paper - not in real life where kids are on separate tracks and in separate classes."

Not quite.

APP kids are in separate classes for their LA/SS block and their science. Not the whole day.

Health, music, art, world languages, & PE are all blended. Math is by ability placement.

open ears
Anonymous said…
Yes, math is by ability placement. But, many APP kids coming from Thurgood Marshall are 2 years ahead of the students coming from neighborhood schools and so the advanced math classes have a high proportion of APP kids because they already covered the material at TM. Then the school schedules LA/SS and science classes and the remainder of a student's schedule is based around their APP commitments leading to a lack of blending between Gen Ed and APP. - Neighborhood Parent
Anonymous said…
APP elementary students have often been accelerated in music through private lessons. The music world at both WMS and GHS is dominated by APP students.

Old Timer
Anonymous said…
Thanks Old Timer for pointing out the reality of the music programs at WMS and GHS. The folks at WMS are trying to engage kids to join but the advanced and more successful music programs are the APP kids who have access to instruments, lessons and of course the money that music advancement requires.

Go to the schools to "volunteer" and then have a wander to see the APP classes composition and the Gen Ed classes composition. Take a look at the lesson plans and demands on those kids and in turn the lesson plans and demands for the Gen Ed. Just talked to a student teacher who said he never gets homework from the Gen Ed kids and they seem to struggle over the APP classes and have less attention spans and behavior issues.

GHS has eliminated detention, suspension or any discipline as a result of the DOJ complaint so now kids who actually need a focus have no carrot or stick to encourage academics... they are utterly ignored. Hey no one wants kids kicked out but how about Saturday or Night School or some way of pushing kids into realizing that they need a push to make it as they don't have the APP label that gives one group an advantage over the other.

APP and IB causes the numbers to skew upwards when it comes to testing and disproportionately reflects a school. It is akin to adding a billionaire into a room of fast food workers and then the average or median income is suddenly raised to reflect an artificial high.

Gen Ed vs Advanced Ed are two schools in one school.

- Asking questions
Anonymous said…
Hey no one wants kids kicked out but how about Saturday or Night School or some way of pushing kids into realizing that they need a push to make it as they don't have the APP label that gives one group an advantage over the other.

The APP label doesn't give kids an advantage, and the label doesn't do the work for them. If other kids don't do their work, don't blame APP. Kids in APP aren't receiving something "better" than everyone else at school.

HF

Carol Simmons said…
Dear Asking questions,

You state that Garfield has "eliminated detention, suspension or any discipline as a result of the DOJ complaint."

I cannot imagine that "any discipline" is eliminated....could it be that that a positive/creative discipline approach is used as a response to offenses. It has been my experience that positive/creative discipline approaches are much more effective in correcting student behavior.
Anonymous said…
@Asking questions, interesting point. But your analogy of throwing a billionaire kid in the room- average income would indeed be higher. Median income would be much, much lower and more useful in the analysis. I do get the gist of your point re: how useful it is for SPS ( and the school) to have a large high scoring/ high achieving population in the school.

@ HF, your discussion of APP labeling is true on the surface. It can be PRISM, HCC, G& T, etc. But there's a lot beyond the name that makes the discussion very complex and such a flashpoint among educators, parents, and students. It certainly isn't just about kids who work for it and others who don't.
B&G
Anonymous said…
Asking questions, the inclusion of APP and IB skews the numbers upward only for the overall student performance of the school. Say what you will about NCLB (and I could say plenty), but the requirement to desegregate scores for certain ethnic groups, ELLs, poor students, and students will disabilities prevents, for the most part, a school from allowing a high-peforming subgroup of students to mask the entire academic achievement story of that school.

--- swk
Anonymous said…
As for the Garfield "discipline" from talking to former teacher and a current substitute in the schools they have eliminated any and all discipline focus. If a kid acts out he/she acts out and there is nothing that will or can be done. Now why these people would lie to me I don't know but I can give you there names and numbers if so inclined.

As for any "program" that draws in the highly capable it levels the playing field so that the school can keep its enrollment numbers up. When you see such programs eliminated or non existent, Aki, comes to mind you see a school badly underenrolled and academically struggling.

So when you look at the real stats of the American schools as they currently have there are a lot of poor kids who need a lot not just academically and what school can provide that? So we add more acronyms, STEM, APP, IB, pick a letter and put it together and when all else fails add sports and the sports culture it provides. Colleges are now making money on their teams to rival NFL ones. Go team.

So if you aren't in one of those groups and sadly just "average" what does that do for you?

- Just asking questions
FlyOnTheWall said…
The City of Seattle's Department of Education had charter school operators in their office.
Anonymous said…
The SPS news page quotes MLK on education. The full text of "The Purpose of Education," from which the quotes are taken:

http://mlk-kpp01.stanford.edu/index.php/encyclopedia/documentsentry/doc_470200_000/

parent
Watching said…
Chicago Schools refuses to give PARCC- Common Core test as mandated by state:


http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/wp/2015/01/17/chicago-school-district-refuses-to-give-parcc-common-core-test-as-mandated-by-the-state-of-illinois/
Charlie Mas said…
Just asking questions raises a number of valid issues and concerns. It would be easy to snipe at the word choice or rhetoric, but the idea has merit.

The idea - and pardon me if I have it wrong - is that APP (or Spectrum, Montessori, language immersion, or any other specialized program within a neighborhood attendance school) creates a school within in a school - two separate schools - and that there is no benefit to housing two schools in one building. More than that, that real harm is done by housing these two schools together and pretending that they are one school. This harm comes in a variety of ways:

* Children living in poverty lose Title I funding for their school because the children in the co-housed school are from affluent homes.

* Children can see the difference in lessons given the children in the other school.

* Children can see the difference in discipline for the children in the other school.

* District, state, and federal authorities judge the two schools as if they were a single school, resulting is a number of mismeasures of the school's activity.

* All sorts of statistical measures - like test scores, discipline rates, participation in advanced classes or music programs, etc. - that are supposed to have a normal distribution (bell curve), and are presumed to have a normal distribution, actually have a bi-modal distribution (with two peaks) and so all statistical averages and even medians are misleading. And all references and responses to those averages are based on a mistaken understanding of the data.

All of this is true and sound reasoning. So what do we do about it?

Do we eliminate APP, Spectrum, language immersion, Montessori, and the like? Do we standardize all classes across all schools? That would solve some problems, but it would create others. Would we rather have those problems instead?

Do we put these special programs in a stand-alone buildings instead of co-housing them in attendance area schools? That would solve all of these problems, but it would create others. Would we rather have those problems instead?

How can we achieve equity when there are children who are so different in their needs? How can we create equity when some sixth graders are ready for and Algebra and others in the same school still need their basic math facts? How can we create equity when some sixth graders have been schooled in music since the age of seven and others are picking up the instrument for the first time? How can we create equity when some children share a culture and a set of social norms with the teachers and other students come from a different culture with a different set of social norms?

I don't know the answers to these questions, but I do know that this is one of the discussions that we should be having. And we can't shirk away from those discussions or dodge them by sniping at imperfect details, word choice, or rhetoric. We have to start by listening and thinking when someone starts just asking questions.
Anonymous said…
Charlie-

I think you got to the root of the problem with education thinking today. The questions you posed are the most serious problems we face in education, but they can't be solved easily and are ignored. If we don't solve hard issues like poverty, we won't get anywhere, yet the billionaires don't like to talk about it because there's no curricula or bubble test to be produced that can solve it. Worse yet, you can't blame it on the teachers.

The current state of education thinking is so depressing.

-resigned
Anonymous said…
Equity of outcomes or equity of opportunities? Answer that, and you'd get at the heart of the debate.

observer
IMHO, the only way I see of achieving "equity of outcomes" under the present systems of education and social services in both Seattle and the country as a whole is to lower the standards so everyone "succeeds"—at least on paper.

We have to tackle poverty. I good way would be to work to break the cycle of poverty by discouraging girls and women from having babies before they are able to raise them emotionally and financially, and backing up that discouragement with free and easily accessible means to prevent those pregnancies.

There are so many issues in play here that there are no simple, single answers. Empowering girls and women is making some headway in other parts of the world.
blite said…
It's a complete lie that we don't owe all kids equal outcome, meaning simply every child reaches the same level of their potential. Hopefully that is close to 100%, but it must be the same for all regardless of what they bring to the academic table.That's going to mean lots of extra cash and or effort for special needs, poor, abused,highly capable, average, or ELL.

You can't make up for centuries of oppression and discrimination with simply providing equal access. There must be remediation.

It's analogous to cleaning up the Duwamish river.Just giving it a cessation of pollution is not going to ever turn into a viable environment for fish and clams, etc. It takes active steps to correct the neglect and abuse committed in the past.
Joe Wolf said…
Via my good friend Ian, teaches at Maryland: A Montgomery County couple is being investigated by Child Protective Services for letting their two kids, 10 and 6 walk a mile home from a park.

Latest article from the Washington Post:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/montgomery-county-neglect-inquiry-shines-spotlight-on-free-range-parenting/2015/01/17/352d4b30-9d99-11e4-bcfb-059ec7a93ddc_story.html
How does every child meet "the same level of their potential"? How do you measure that? How does anyone know what a child's potential is? IQ testing—we all know how effective that is.

Every child deserves an education that will give them the resources they need to survive and thrive in the world. That education should open them up to a wealth of possibilities in everything from STEM to the arts, as well as skilled trades.

But we are talking publicly funded education, and too many children start out disadvantaged because no one read to them when they were toddlers (parents either couldn't—ESL, didn't have the time, or didn't see the value). Or no one talked to them much (at least not in English).

There are a myriad of reasons why kindergarteners don't all start on a level playing ground. It's up to the public school system to try and make up the difference. Poverty is a huge contributor to this difference. We must work on that.

Parenting is the hardest job on the planet even when one is in a comfortable–exceptional financial situation giving parents the time and resources to devote to child rearing. I can only imagine how difficult that job is when a parent is worry about putting food on the table or paying for utilities.
Anonymous said…
Charlie,
We're moved on, but my student attended Bagley Elementary, which has both Montessori and Contemporary (the non-Montessori program). It is very tricky to have one school with two programs, but Bagley has managed it well (and we were there through something like 4 principals over a long period of time). It is a little separate, because kids are either in the one or the other, but lunch, recess, after-school, school family events, etc. are whole school. I think both programs are strong and I think there is at least a little benefit from the Montessori program being there for the school at large. So, it can work, I think. APP plus neighborhood school might be harder. Also good to have both programs for parents with two or more kids -- sometimes Montessori works well for one, but not another, and this offers a good match for different learning styles at one school. For us, public Montessori worked very well.
--Public Montessori Parent
Anonymous said…
A very thorough article on charter school takeovers and effect on public school systems. Don't let the title of article discourage you, it is a fair evaluation, (think someone at Salon chose the title without reading article fully).

http://www.salon.com/2015/01/17/koch_brotherscharter_school_nightmare_white_kids_get_to_go_to_a_school_with_a_montessori_approach_while_children_of_color_get_eye_control/

CCA
Anonymous said…
Blite, it's a bit harsh (and false) to declare that "It's a complete lie that we don't owe all kids equal outcome." The goal of public education has never been to "maximize the potential" of every student. This has always been a nice platitude voiced by certain politicians and most advocates. It would be a worthwhile objective but it's simply not operational as a policy goal.

How do we identify the potential of each student and know when we've achieved it? And which potential outcomes are we talking about --- academic, social-emotional, athletic, financial, artistic, etc.?

And we've tried these things to some degree in the past and it's led to disaster, mostly for minority and low-income students who were pushed (i.e., advised) into vocational and general track courses and pathways because the powers that be believed this was their potential. It's called tracking.

--- swk
blite said…
Dear swk,
You might be surprised that achieving student potential is in fact included in the school board policies.

"The Board of Directors of Seattle Public Schools believes that every student can and must learn at grade level and beyond, and that all students will be afforded the opportunity to reach their potential and graduate from high school ready for college, career, and life."

"Programs designed to promote the full development of each student’s capabilities, including social/emotional capabilities, to ensure that all students can meet or exceed college ready standards in addition to state and district performance standards, regardless of the student’s skills upon entering school"

You an call them platitudes, but they are in fact policy.
Anonymous said…
blite, "all students will be afforded the opportunity..." It doesn't say the policy goal is to maximize their potential. That's the point. There's a difference and it's not small.

--- swk
Equity does not mean remediation. (not in my dictionary).

Blite, there may be Board policies but our Board certainly doesn't enforce them and, of course, they are not laws.
blite said…
You're both wrong, even a child can understand what the policy means. I know I asked my 11 year old and two of her friends. They understood words like "regardless" and "promote" and "full development".

I also have seen that the board, as well as staff, believe in these ideals and work hard to achieve them.
Anonymous said…
I think that equity does include remediation.

Certainly for students with disabilities it is legally required.

I think that we have to meet each student where they are. That may mean giving them breakfast, teaching ELL, teaching school culture,teaching social skills, giving students extra time to learn things, second chances to learn things, different learning strategies.

I was in one school that agreed that they would provide equal access but they did not think it was their job to offer any different support for different students. So if your parent could teach you to read a text book, take notes & memorize them for a test, then you did fine. If your parents didn't teach you that, then you fail. If you needed extra help or remediation for a skill not mastered in an earlier grade it was up to your parents to teach it or hire a tutor. Fortunately those students mostly came from parents who were college educated & could afford tutoring. I'm guessing that 25% of those students had a private tutor at some point. What would have happened to a different population meeting those expectations?

If we are going to get all kids to graduation then remediation must be part of the job. Whether it is Saturday school, opportunities to repeat classes with no penalty, or small groups within a class working on skills.

-HS Parent
Anonymous said…
Melissa, equity does not "mean" remediation, true. But are you suggesting that equity does not require remediation when needed? We'll never get to equity of outcomes, but we'll get a lot closer if those who need remediation get it. If we could get to the point where nobody actually needed remediation, that might look more like equity. But how to get there is the big question.

And swk, "opportunity to reach potential" and "maximize potential" are the same thing. Reaching vs. maximizing doesn't make any sense in the context of one's potential, since potential implies the maximum. Unless you're suggesting that the board's use of "afforded the opportunity" is board doublespeak for "hey, we're not going to help, but we're not standing in your way of learning on your own..." Was that your point?

Half Full
Anonymous said…
Half Full, I'm not suggesting doublespeak in any way. I'm reading the words that are there and I do not conclude that they are the same thing.

In my reading of these policies --- "...all students will be afforded the opportunity to reach their potential...." along with "Programs designed to promote the full development of each student’s capabilities.." --- indicates to me that the board will ensure that there will be courses of study and programs made available that provide all students the opportunity to maximize their potential. However, the board is not ensuring outcomes. In other words, programs and courses of study (plus supports) will be made available to students. There is no guarantee, however, that students will avail themselves of these opportunities nor is there a guarantee of college and career readiness for all students.

That is the difference between equity of opportunity and equity of outcomes IMO.

And despite blite's inappropriate but ultimately ineffective insults, there is some bit of word-smithing to written policy and how this policy is written clearly indicates a focus on opportunity, not outcomes.

--- swk
Anonymous said…
Well yes, of course the board can't make it policy that kids actually reach their potential, just as parents can't force their kids to do that either (unfortunately!).

This all goes back to that dreaded word: equity. What does it mean in public education? Equity of outcomes--even though not all have the same potential? Equity of access--even though some need more in order to reach a lower bar, and others will exceed that bar if they get that same level of access?

What about equity of opportunity, whatever that even means? Would equity of opportunity mean everyone gets the exact same program/service? Or would it mean that everyone has equal opportunity to learn, so that those who start higher have the opportunity to continue growing just as much? That doesn't solve the gap, but it seems equally unfair to hold some kids back...

The board throws this equity thing around all the time, but it's never clear what they mean. Equity and equality are not the same thing, and equity can be understood in many different ways. What is their intent/goal--and are they even on the same page?

Half Full
Ann D said…
Equitable Access Framework slide deck from April 2013:

Equitable Acess Framework
Anonymous said…
@ Ann D, does that slideshow somehow answer those questions for you? It sure doesn't for me.

For example, slide 7 says they should (a) "place programs or services equitably across the district" (#2 on the list); and (b) "place programs or services where students reside" (#3). So which is it? APP/HCC is a good example of a service in which placing it where most students reside means it will be clustered in certain areas of the district. What exactly does placing them "equitably" across the district mean?

Or how about slide 9, which reads:
Equitable Access – “the district shall provide every student with equitable access to a high quality curriculum, support, facilities, and other educational resources, even when this means differentiating resource allocation”
For one thing, that's completely untrue given the NSAP and the clear differences in curricula and offerings across schools. For another, what does "equitable access" mean? That everyone has the same chance of getting in, regardless of other factors? Or could equitable access be dependent upon other factors, e.g., geography, sibling preference, qualifying for HCC, etc.?

From what I can tell, the Equitable Access Framework never once defines what they mean by equitable access. Am I wrong?

Half Full
Ann D said…
I don't think it is a comprehensive doc, Charlie Mas has dismissed this file before as not the equitable access framework. It is however what the district has produced and made public at this time. In the absence of other information should we not reference what the District has put together to inform our debate both here and in our challenges to the District to do better?

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