Tuesday Open Thread
Update:
From City of Seattle:
Katie Gibbons
Seattle reLeaf Project Manager
(206) 684-3979
www.seattle.gov/trees
Hearing from the Kids Not Cuts group that one school, having gone to their principal about the staff cuts, he/she directed them to the Ex. Director for that region, Sarah Pritchett. Ms. Prichett's office is refusing to take messages, directing them back to their principal. That directly goes against the established protocol AT the district's website. As well, appealing to the board director of that region, Stephan Blanford, has gotten no answer as well.
Very disturbing and "talk to the hand" stuff.
In the "Brother, can you spare a reader" category, ed blogger Mercedes Schneider reports:
On September 03, 2014, I wrote a post about Education Post, a nonprofit set up to pretty much just operate a pro-corporate-reform-promoting blog. Upon start-up, EdPost scraped together $12 million.
Now that’s one expensive blog.
It turns out that billionaire Eli Broad convinced Peter Cunningham, former communications official for (freshly resigned) US Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, to run the cushy, pro-privatization blog operation.
EdPost has been in operation for just over a year, and it seems that Cunningham can’t seem to attract what he cannot purchase:
Readers.
Are you a worrier? What about your kid? Relax, you are probably a creative genius.
Tonight is the first look at the Democratic candidates for President. It's on CNN at 5:30 pm PST. Wonder if public ed will come up at all?
What's on your mind?
From City of Seattle:
"...We
still have trees in need of good homes! If you, a friend, neighbor, or
family member have room in the yard for a beautiful Western hemlock
(Tsuga heterophylla), grand fir (Abies grandis), or willow oak (Quercus
pehllos), please let me know. The yard tree application is still open
and we're still accepting applications for these lovely yard trees. Send
your friends to our website to learn more.
Please feel free to contact me with any questions. I look forward to seeing you at the workshop on October 24th!
Sincerely,Katie Gibbons
Seattle reLeaf Project Manager
(206) 684-3979
www.seattle.gov/trees
Hearing from the Kids Not Cuts group that one school, having gone to their principal about the staff cuts, he/she directed them to the Ex. Director for that region, Sarah Pritchett. Ms. Prichett's office is refusing to take messages, directing them back to their principal. That directly goes against the established protocol AT the district's website. As well, appealing to the board director of that region, Stephan Blanford, has gotten no answer as well.
Very disturbing and "talk to the hand" stuff.
In the "Brother, can you spare a reader" category, ed blogger Mercedes Schneider reports:
On September 03, 2014, I wrote a post about Education Post, a nonprofit set up to pretty much just operate a pro-corporate-reform-promoting blog. Upon start-up, EdPost scraped together $12 million.
Now that’s one expensive blog.
It turns out that billionaire Eli Broad convinced Peter Cunningham, former communications official for (freshly resigned) US Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, to run the cushy, pro-privatization blog operation.
EdPost has been in operation for just over a year, and it seems that Cunningham can’t seem to attract what he cannot purchase:
Readers.
Are you a worrier? What about your kid? Relax, you are probably a creative genius.
Tonight is the first look at the Democratic candidates for President. It's on CNN at 5:30 pm PST. Wonder if public ed will come up at all?
What's on your mind?
Comments
-Blandford yuck
Thanks,
Ravenna
One audience member asked the candidates what they would tell parents to tell friends/neighbors/co-workers about voting for the upcoming school levies when parents are so deeply unhappy.
It is interesting to read the Strategic Plan (2013-2018)
(page 7)
Implementation of evaluation systems for central office staff;
The budgeting process dedicated to the realignment and deployment of resources to the strategic plan will begin immediately after the Board adopts this refreshed and revised strategic plan.
Well ... we may not know what the Exec. Director job entails ... but the persons are being evaluated.
Certainly those Exec. Directors are not being over-paid for resources has been realigned and deployed.
Does the above make you feel better? If not read read page 2 =>
transparency of processes and sound fiscal controls.
high-quality service in support of teaching and learning.
We believe community partnerships and family engagement are fundamental to achieving and sustaining student success.
Certainly Nyland would be carrying out Banda's plan so thing must be OK, right?
-- Dan Dempsey
DistrictWatcher
Director/Executive Director, Strategic Planning and System Improvement
reader47
And if post-election the candidates calling Foul on the current foul situation have gained office, Nyland and his people may very well find themselves out on their a$$e$. Few voters would argue with removing the full lot of high paid positions of District upper and middle management and starting over with a substantially downsized JSCEE. And, with an eye to the upcoming levies and the amount we are all expected to pay to keep that behemoth of a downtown HQ, few voters would argue with removing the building itself and downsizing to a much smaller facility. There's cheaper real estate south. Which is where HQ should probably be anyhow, to better-serve our diversity of families.
In short, the JSCEE house of cards could tumble right quick if Nyland doesn't get out there and lead starting with addressing the Half-Baked Sale and protests today and the committee meeting tomorrow, both of which will be featuring skeptical, angry parents.
I hope we see some Board candidates at these functions.
DistrictWatcher
DistrictWatcher
The Standards as near as I can determine are driving the Heath and Box "scope and sequence" instead of the use of the Board adopted materials Math in Focus "scope and sequence".
The CCSS-M are apparently the "justification" for "scope and sequence" chaos coming from Box and Heath etc. with apparent support from Marty McLaren ( I guess )
Did anyone observe the C&I meeting yesterday in regard to "elementary math implementation"?
--------------
This formulation and enforcement of a "Scope and Sequence" document strictly aligned to the Common Core State Standards and not aligned with the "Scope and Sequence" of the Math in Focus materials is in direct contradiction of the Mission of the Seattle Schools : of ... ensuring equitable access, closing the opportunity gaps and excellence in education for every student.
This "strict alignment" scope and sequence will continue the tradition of math mishmash jumble ... which "ensures" maintenance of large math opportunity gaps.
MORE at
Seattle's Strategic Plan a misguided or ignored document in too many ways
Are Seattle Schools closing the Math "Opportunity Gap"? or just failing to report the data?
STOP Common Core in Washington State
That being said, not all EDs are as disengaged or neglectful of their duties when it comes to the protocol of contact/resolution. Kelly Aramaki is a wonderful example of an Exec. Director who is not only visible in his region but accessible. Personally, I think if it were possible to hand Mr. Aramaki the reigns, with appropriate and "qualified" staff, he could effectively secure better outcomes than Pritchett/Whitworth/Halfaker (and possibly Vela) combined. I fail to understand why we need all the EDs ... there are five... and isn't there supposedly a position between Tolley and the EDs, a "Chief of EDs" as well ... and yet no one seems quite clear, including staff at site level, as to what EDs are doing? At $163K a head I think we really ought to have some answers and some accountability on this, don't you?
Math in Focus should be the primary textbook for elementary students and better curricula should also be implemented for middle and high school students. We have far too many parents supplementing poor math instruction with tutors, worsening the opportunity gap.
Teach real math, SPS, not something cooked up by a few downtown administrators!
S parent
In regard to: Math "scope and sequence" revision as something cooked up by a few downtown administrators
The justification for the cooked up "revision" is the "supposed need or requirement?" for strict adherence to Common Core State Standards.
Melissa spent some time reporting on the downward spiraling of Gates attempt to control "USA public schooling" through CCSS and other measures ... support for Charters etc.
Today we are faced with a strategic plan with Common Core State Standards language and apparently Board members to timid to act in the best interests of students.
So a Board was elected and Math in Focus was adopted but Bill Gates and his cronies run elementary school math in Seattle at least until further notice.
-- Dan Dempsey
HP
Anna Box does not really care about CC alignment. She is using it as an convenient means of eliminating Math in Focus.
-Box Yuck
-skeptical-
I heard there were cuts to Special Ed positions at the High School level. Haven't seen any details.
- North-end Mom
Proven outcomes?
Usability?
Cultural competency?
Differentiated lesson and homework materials?
Problem sets that support mastery?
Appropriate lesson progression?
Online support/immediate feedback?
Quality graphic presentation?
Many of these were deemed important when they were going through the adoption process, so why not now?
HF
Odd how last year the "Scope and Sequence" from MiF was used and SBAC results were good..... yet this year the big revision was inserted at the start of school.
Supt. Banda watched the "math sedition" of central staff and eventually acted. Likely his action was inspired by the Board.
Apparently this year central staff's "math sedition" has yet to be checked by either Nyland or the Board.
---
I've answered your questions for Ms. Box as best I can.
Perhaps she will choose to join in and answer your questions.
Proven outcomes?
- NO we just threw this stuff together
Usability?
- NO teachers will need to shuffle and juggle
Cultural competency?
- revised materials are unknown and untried but kids without support outside of school are going to find making good progress difficult.
Differentiated lesson and homework materials?
- cannot say as still under construction)
Problem sets that support mastery?
- all of this is yet to come (still under construction)
Appropriate lesson progression?
- NO as the progression through the textbook has been tossed aside.
Online support/immediate feedback?
-(still under construction)
Quality graphic presentation?
- do not know
-- Dan Dempsey
We got our ES SBAC scores in an envelope. Nothing for our other kids.
-Do it
"The downtown administers are using "common core alignment" as an excuse to push their own math curricula agenda."
So does that make this any different than the original sedition moves that took place under Supt. Banda before he stopped the sedition?
-- Dan Dempsey
We're not teaching from MIF because we need to be sure we've covered what will be on the SBAC.
Direct result from this mom: My kid now has to do math out of school as her class lessons appear to be worksheets pieced together by the math whizzes downtown. We were excited for MIF and consider this to be an inappropriate intervention from managers who aren't even in our classrooms. MIF book hasn't been opened this year, as far as I can tell. The replacement of MIF with worksheets is shocking. What a waste of district money.
Math Mom
Depressing math
1. I have had the opportunity to see SBAC scores. I can't comment on exact numbers since they're not public data I guess (yet) but they suck. Across the board suck. As a district, we never got close to 70% meeting standard. Highest was 5th grade girls. Lowest was 3rd grade boys. Don't know what that means entirely since I'm new to this system, but man that doesn't look Good
2. I tried calling Pritchett. Wish I had the transcript from my phone call. It was the end of the day so I assume Heather (assistant) had been getting an earfull all day. I was told to talk to my principal about staff cuts. Pritchett had sent an email asking us to share with her if there weere extunating factors which we wanted her to consider. That's what I was attempting to do. I was not allowed to 1) leave a name, 2) leave a phone number and ask for a callback, 3) leave a voicemail for her so the assistant wouldn't have to write anything, 4) Ask when would be a good time to call back as Pritchett was (in a meeting). At some point, Heather started complaing to me that people had been calling and yelling at her all day. I tried to apologize on behalf of the passionate parents out there that we were just trying to get some information. The last few seconds of the conversation were, sorry sir I can't help you she will not be calling you back, you need to talk to your principle, good bye. THen she hung up on me.
Astounding.
Seems to me they should be kissing our little behinds at this point in time.
One non-classroom expenditure I'd like to see: the Board should have funding to hire an independent consultant who presents them with a quarterly report of satisfaction ratings for every employee in the JSCEE, based on feedback from parents, students and teachers. I'll bet they could find $6 M in administration cuts pretty easily. Why are there always more and more assessments of students and teachers, but never any of downtown?
I pretty much stole this idea intact from a comment by someone else a week or two ago. I liked it so much I intend to keep repeating it as long as necessary! :)
Scrawny Kayaker
And regarding the SBAC, I looked at the wrong papers. Its actually worse than I thought. Only had data for 3rd and 5th english language and math. As a district, no group scored 60% of MEETING Standard. Just meeting standard. Jesus, what are they doing to our kids....
Good thing they've got all those funds for the Levy election coming up eh? Going to need some serious "messaging" if they want to turn the disgruntled citizen/parent ship around anytime soon...
Why not do what is known to work?
The link above will take you to some SBAC data as well as a huge observation about CCSS-M. => Implementing Common Core: The Problem of Instructional Time by Tom Loveless.
This talk about CCSS-M being internationally competitive is rubbish, no way is CCSS-M internationally competitive. Compute fluently with multi-digit numbers is a 6th grade Common Core Math Standard.
Using CCSS-M will put students at least two-years behind those students in the A+ countries by the end of grade 7
The USA has been doing better in recent years but take a look at TIMSS 2011 grade 4 and grade 8 results in
"Chapter 1: International Achievement in Mathematics"
East Asian countries continue to lead the world in mathematics achievement.
Singapore, Korea, and Hong Kong SAR, followed by Chinese Taipei and Japan, were the top-performing countries in TIMSS 2011 at the fourth grade.
Similarly, at the eighth grade, Korea, Singapore, and Chinese Taipei outperformed all countries, followed by Hong Kong SAR and Japan.
This would lead me to believe that following the Math in Focus "Scope and Sequence" as written and using MiF materials would be preferable to the Heath Box math mishmash "Scope and Sequence" aligned to match CCSS-M.
See exhibit 1.1 for USA 4th grade average; exhibit 1.2 for USA 8th grade
Exhibit 1.3 shows only 7 countries rank significantly above USA at grade 4 with Singapore 606 and USA 541
Exhibit 1.4 shows only 6 countries rank significantly above USA at grade 8 with Korea 613 and USA 509 and Massachusetts 561
8th grade score change in average from 1995 to 2011
USA +17 :: Korea +32 :: Japan -11 :: Massachusetts +48 (1999-2011)
If thinking about STEM for students consider this:
The five East Asian countries had the largest percentages of fourth grade students (30–43%) reach the TIMSS 2011 Advanced International Benchmark. Building on this head start, these five countries pulled away from the rest of the world by a considerable margin at the eighth grade, with by far the largest percentages of students reaching this benchmark—nearly half (47–49%) in Chinese Taipei, Singapore, and Korea.
While at the Advanced Benchmark the USA 8th grade had 7%
At grade 4 USA had 13%.
======
It is really time to find some competent leadership for SPS math.
The pipeline that promotes Math Ed philosophers into leadership is not cutting it.
A few questions/notes:
Who paid for this?
How will changes/responses be funded?
Disconnect/distance between counseling and administration?
No mention of 504s, which were written & coordinated in the counseling office until at least June 2014 (not sure about last year, where are 504s administered now?)
"Equity" - whatever that means to you
Worth a read.
- hangin' in at GHS
I absolutely agree. It is a house of cards.
"Kelly Aramaki is a wonderful example of an Exec. Director who is not only visible in his region but accessible."
Also agree on this as well. A gem.
On the Alliance. The district has operated for over a year without a new MOU with the Alliance. They have met - over and over - and cannot come to agreement but I don't know on what issues. I know some of it is the amount the Alliance is charging to be fiscal agent for some schools. Last thing I heard was the Superintendent saying he called the office and no one returned his call (this was a couple of weeks ago). Maybe someone called him back but I doubt it.
What this all means for what the Alliance does, I don't know. But someone did point out that Bainbridge district has a Foundation and I'd like to learn more about that.
The whole thing is silly because we should scrap the test for any number of reasons (excessive cost, excessive time spent taking and preparing for them), invalidity of SBAC test questions and responses to assess anything of value, inability to evaluate test due to proprietary nature and test format, expense of (and problems with) computerized format -- and general invalidity of high stakes testing to evaluate students, teachers, schools, etc. Now we can add to that --degradation/destruction of curricula in a ham-handed, poorly thought through effort to "cram" for the test by mis-ordering (not a word, maybe, but "reordering" is way too benign) the sequence of concepts taught and substituting poorly thought out "worksheets" for the professional materials we bought a year ago. We are paying a huge amount to destroy something that we just paid a lot of money to buy (MIF). AND -- we are doing all this so that we can actually teach math in a worse, less effective manner! Agghh! This is like buying a new car, and then paying someone a lot of money to crash it. Only to discover that now you have no way to get to work!
What on earth is going on downtown -- and why does the Board let the Superintendent get away with it?
It didn't work, and they have now moved on to trying to take over the district through stuff they can get done through the City and the state legislature. So -- there is no deal because there is no more will, on the Alliance's part -- to make even a pretence of caring about whether a deal gets done. Fortunately, the board is not a total corpse -- so they haven't been willing to sign just ANYTHING -- even blank pages, or stuff marked "draft" with obvious errors -- or things so glaringly NOT in the districts best interests as to threaten a recall vote -- the way the MJG board would have done.
S parent
I don't have a solution. I just see the threat. And I have to wonder perhaps some of the board members (Peaslee and Blanford? Carr, perhaps? HMM?) are being complicit -- whether they are doing so "knowingly" or whether they are just clueless tools handing over the asset we care most about -- public schools and our kids' futures -- without having any idea of the harm they are doing.
Subject: Space Prioritization for SPS School Program Partners
Date: Tue, Oct 13, 2015 7:00 am
Dear Seattle Public School Partners,
You are receiving this letter because you are a valued and collaborative partner working with the students of Seattle Public Schools. As you may be aware, the population of our public school enrollment, as well as the city, has been increasing rapidly over the past few years. The growth of student enrollment within our schools has been climbing by roughly 1,000 students per year over the past several years and is a trend that we see continuing for the foreseeable future.
In addition to the increase of enrollment growth, there has also been legislation and movement in allocation of additional resources to reduce class sizes in kindergarten through third grade classrooms. The lower class size student to teacher ratio of 17:1 is called out in both the McCleary decision (a court case that requires the state to fully fund public education) and Initiative 1351. The result of lower class sizes is an increase in the number of classrooms needed to have such instruction take place
As a result of both of these changes, the Seattle School Board recently supported an emphasis on using all spaces within buildings owned by Seattle Public Schools for the primary purpose of K-12 instruction. This prioritization may result in the displacement of some support activities or programs (e.g. preschool, before and after care, or other youth activities) from current spaces being used in such manner. However, there was also some clarity on the prioritization after K-12 instruction. The following is the list of prioritization related to non-hourly before/after hourly use:
1. K-12 Instruction
2. Preschool (because it requires dedicated space and licensing)
3. Before and After Care (because it is more flexible in utilizing multi-use space)
4. Other Youth Activities
5. All other Activities
Currently, it looks like most of the impact will happen at the elementary level of buildings, but this space prioritization is applicable to all buildings. Additionally, an evaluation of space needs will happen on an annual basis and any impact to an organization or partner would be communicated as soon as possible to allow time transition. Just because you are receiving this letter, does not mean that you are losing space that is currently being used. This is a general notification. In the event that the space currently being used by your organization needs to be prioritized for K-12 instruction, a specific letter referring to the applicable lease would be sent with a timeline attached.
We do appreciate the fact that this is very challenging for many of our partners and that we have long standing partnerships that have been developed over decades. However, the growth and movement on class size reduction is something not experienced in Seattle Public Schools for many, many decades and is what we must do in order to respond to the instructional needs of our students.
Sincerely,
Flip Herndon
Associate Superintendent
Facilities and Operations
Well duh. Our high-flying "Associate" Superintendent realizes that, maybe, our classrooms should go towards K-12.
Confused Mind
Did I hear you some time ago on KIRO? Good for you. It is madness!
@Maje - this from an email I received at school last spring. Try it, it might work.
From home, the online resources may be accessed from any computer at http://spscatalog.seattleschools.org/onlineresources.
In order to access the “Math in Focus” and “Washington Our Home” textbooks (and other online resources) from home they must log on:
Username: studentsps
Password: access (or use individual SPS logon to access the math textbook)
This article dates back to 9/15.
He also says he went to the Healthcare exchange in California and his computer was immediately infected with malware and he lost a lot of data. Oh my gosh!
I am seeing a cost savings measure I don't believe has been publicized. Students in all grades whose IEPs requires the district to provide transportation would only receive that service if they attend their assignment area school or an option school in their middle school service area. If they choose an option school outside of the middle school service area or manage to get a choice seat in another attendance-area school, they have to manage their own transportation.
Boy, that sounds like equitable access to me. (Sarcasm.) Nyland should be ashamed of himself.
The updated bell times schedule is the very last two pages of the report. Why is the Denny the only middle school in tier one? Does sleep science not apply when you get that far south?
I think the reason why Denny is in Tier 1 is because it cannot have the same start time as Sealth, which has a Tier 2 start, due to the shared campus (I have seem this in previous transportation standards, though I can't remember why this is, perhaps access issues?).
I don't know why Tier 1 was chosen over Tier 3.
- North-end Mom
"Note: Per construction Master Use Permit, Denny International Middle School and Chief Sealth International High School must begin school a minimum of 30 minutes apart."
Part of the co-location of Denny and Sealth was that the students at each school would not get there at the same time. But NE Mom is right; why Tier 1 over Tier 3 is a mystery.
Is there any other elected board that allows their employees to dictate the terms under which they can work? The board works for us, not the superintendent and it is our power they are giving away. I cannot wait for December.
Parents need to get the word out on which potential board members will be driven by community and which will be driven by staff. Any reader of this blog knows those answers, but I'll leave it to Melissa to post her knowledgeable take. No doubt she'll give a rundown, tying it to this latest JSCEE outrage, soon. Some of the candidates in the current race would be calling Nyland and saying: Fix it. Fix it now. Others most certainly would not. I want Fix It Now board members.
DistrictWatcher
How do seniors get to their final year without fulfilling basic requirements? “Part of it,” offered one counselor, “is that the curriculum is heavily weighted to AP, and we need more classes that are regular and honors. That would give students more choices. Right now our curriculum is set up for kids who are headed to college; many of our at-risk kids, they can’t take those courses.”
I'd like to point out that even students in the Advanced Placement Program can and do have academic and social challenges and that I have seem no evidence at Garfield that anyone other than the nurse is concerned about them. It's reminiscent of the 2007 or 2008 outside report on APP where they interviewed counseling staff at Washington Middle School. Those counselors simultaneously reported that they saw many signs of distress (including incidents of cutting and eating disorders) in APP students and that they were focused on meeting the needs of non-APP students because the APP kids got all the supportt they needed from their parents. (Seriously, who looks at a child who cuts or has an eating disorder and thinks "that's a kid who doesn't need help?")
Fast forward and the percentage of FRL students at GHS is now hovering near 40%. There is a lot of section 8 and transitional housing in the GHS boundaries and students enroll everyday throughout the year. One of the main qualifiers for the US News and World report top ten high school list is the percentage of students taking AP classes. The number of kids at GHS taking AP classes has not fallen, but the number of students not taking them has increased dramatically because of the NSAP.
The sky is not falling. If you look at the list of the top 10 schools, they are all very affluent communities and the percentage of kids taking AP classes is going to be very high. The counseling office at GHS has long been dysfunctional, nothing new. GHS is a complex place because there are so many different kinds of people (race, religion, SES) trying to get through high school. It makes for a dynamic and sometimes challenging environment, but at the end of the day, the kids learn so much from being around differences. But yes, because of the changing demographic due to the NSAP, the percentage of kids at GHS taking AP classes has probably decreased.
Chicken Little
-jk
NSAP has changed a lot of schools in a lot of ways -- but change is inevitable. I think we just need to continue pressing to make ALL Seattle public high schools great places for learning. Not every school has to be identical, meaning not every school can meet each kid's needs exactly the same -- but if we want to, we can make every one of them better every year than they were the year before -- and that is what we should be striving for. While AP classes provide a certain amount of rigor -- in some ways -- they are not God's gift to education, advanced or otherwise, and some of them are mile-wide, inch-deep information cramming exercises that are of less value (in my opinion) than a really good seminar-type class would be -- one with lots of reading, writing, and analysis. I just want the best learning experience -- and the most learning -- for the actual kids who show up at GHS (be they APP, gen-ed, SPED, whatever) that we can figure out how to provide -- and let the rankings take care of themselves.
HF
The US News and World Report rankings data says the GHS participation rate for AP exams is 55%.
Those numbers don't match up. Is the counseling report possibly referring to APP (HCC) rather than AP? Where on the district website can one find data on HCC enrollment by school?
HF
-sleeper
-sleeper
New Data on Early Career Teachers Finds Most Remain in Teaching
I am now thinking about the costs and reasons for starting the Seattle Teacher Residency Program... The motivation for beginning this program might be as irrational as the "educational" reasons for bringing Teach for America to Seattle.
New data reports 80% of new teachers are continuing to teach. Salary does matter.
-- Dan Dempsey
I'm quite pleased with the results of the Exec Comm of the Whole. The board failed to fall for Toner's pathos and half-truths (there has been little to NO collaboration or mixing between the SPP shiny-new classroom and the Brand X Developmental PreK for disabled youngsters at Old Van Asselt.) Charles Wright was up to his old tricks, shilling for the Alliance and the City DEEL to ram things through before the election of a new independent board. I wonder if he sees his light dimming and he's not looking for greener pasture$$$ elsewhere. Let's hope so. That'll save $Million$$ in wasteful JSCEE spending per year.
-Anony Mouse
Report it immediately to the Acting General Counsel John Cerqui at jcerqui@seattleschools.org. Copy Jacque Coe at jacoe@seattleschools.org. Let them know of a potential FERPA violation requiring immediate attention. It is highly possible that the children's parents gave permission for their child to be video'd but better safe than sorry.
I believe they will look into it very promptly. Copy sss.westbrook@gmail.com to guarantee it. : )
-Anony Mouse
- every student, really