Seattle Schools Once Again Shoots Itself in the Foot
The Times is reporting that the district is using the Bill Clinton school of language to explain what the word "support"means in matching funding from the Alliance for Education for the IB program at Rainier Beach High School. The Times includes footage of the Alliance event where the announcement was made by President Patu. It must have come as quite the surprise to her to learn what "support" means.
No offense but bullshit. The district could have stated what they meant by "support" from the get-go and did not. I would ask Mr. Nielsen not only to "own" how SPS operates but to "own" that this was a foul-up of the highest order. I can only wonder what the RBHS students will think.
To add insult to injury, State Senator Pramila Jayapal, from the 37th LD in Seattle, wrote an insert for the state budget, targeted to RBHS' IB program. The grant was written for high schools with a 70% F/RL and an IB program.
Except she forgot to mention this to anyone at RBHS and the one other school that qualifies is Yakima's Davis High. Nielsen says SPS is applying - there is no mention of when the application is due - but again, a day late and maybe a dollar short.
I said I was going to read the district's "Gold" book on the budget and now I really need to. Because truly, where is all the money going? Why is the district's policy to open programs that they cannot fiscally support?
This is all fairly frustrating when you have the state PTA saying parents shouldn't be wasting their time advocating for McCleary and the district's largest grant partner is PTA funds.
What's a parent to think?
One thought I have is that maybe the last Board should not have extended Superintendent Nyland's contract an extra year.
As well, I was told that the overnight field trip for 5th graders at Stevens Elementary is back on and the students will take that trip in a couple of weeks. But the Times reports that none of the 5th grade teachers are going but soon-to-leave Stevens' principal, Kelley Archer, is. Principal Archer says she doesn't know "specifically" why teachers aren't going. What does SEA say?
Despite great fanfare at the announcement that Seattle Public Schools had made an agreement to fund International Baccalaureate (IB) classes at Rainier Beach High earlier this month, the district says promising to support that program does not mean giving it extra money.
“They have enough money to make the hard choices to pay for that program, though it’s always at the expense of something else,” Deputy Superintendent Stephen Nielsen said. “We never said we were going to add dollars above and beyond what they are already getting.”
“This has everything to do with what ‘support’ means in Seattle,” Nielsen said. “The way we do things is unique, and I’ll own that. But we have not walked away.”
No offense but bullshit. The district could have stated what they meant by "support" from the get-go and did not. I would ask Mr. Nielsen not only to "own" how SPS operates but to "own" that this was a foul-up of the highest order. I can only wonder what the RBHS students will think.
To add insult to injury, State Senator Pramila Jayapal, from the 37th LD in Seattle, wrote an insert for the state budget, targeted to RBHS' IB program. The grant was written for high schools with a 70% F/RL and an IB program.
Except she forgot to mention this to anyone at RBHS and the one other school that qualifies is Yakima's Davis High. Nielsen says SPS is applying - there is no mention of when the application is due - but again, a day late and maybe a dollar short.
I said I was going to read the district's "Gold" book on the budget and now I really need to. Because truly, where is all the money going? Why is the district's policy to open programs that they cannot fiscally support?
This is all fairly frustrating when you have the state PTA saying parents shouldn't be wasting their time advocating for McCleary and the district's largest grant partner is PTA funds.
What's a parent to think?
One thought I have is that maybe the last Board should not have extended Superintendent Nyland's contract an extra year.
As well, I was told that the overnight field trip for 5th graders at Stevens Elementary is back on and the students will take that trip in a couple of weeks. But the Times reports that none of the 5th grade teachers are going but soon-to-leave Stevens' principal, Kelley Archer, is. Principal Archer says she doesn't know "specifically" why teachers aren't going. What does SEA say?
Phyllis Campano, acting president of the Seattle teachers union, said the teachers did have concerns about safety, specifically student behavior, and they wanted to have more adults than the minimum requirement.Some students aren't going either:
“It was about putting the right supports in place, like extra staffing (on the field trip),” Campano said. “The teachers felt the district didn’t do that.”
Parents said about a fifth of the students aren’t going either because of their own concerns about safety — or as a show of support for their teachers.What's somewhat concerning is that issues that the teachers would know about with students are not going to be shared with parents. Here's what one parent said:
“Am I going to camp with kids that have something going on that I don’t know about?” she asked.I am now learning that there are major issues happening at Laurelhurst Elementary with student behavior that some parents believe is concerning/endangering for other students including two alleged suicide attempts. That is deeply troubling especially for an elementary school. More on this to come.
Comments
-SPS parent
What is wrong with telling RBHS that SPS will fund the remaining $200K if the state grant doesn't come through? And why on earth is there nobody at SPS that reads the entire state budget document? They shouldn't have to depend on legislators to find the Easter eggs, whether those are good or bad.
Get rid of the MAP for K-2. It is a useless exam. My very solid student's scores fluctuated by 30(out of 100 total) points over the 5 times he was required to take the MAP in K and 1. Why? Perhaps because he boys aren't expected to develop academically until closer to 2nd grade. Perhaps because he didn't like the sandwich I packed for him for lunch. Perhaps because there was a squirrel outside. Get rid of the useless MAP and part of the $500,000 a year they spend on in could easily be used to support RBHS.
Fire the communications department. Any department that can spin the fantastic news that SPS will be reducing class sizes into horrible news that split grade level classes will be increasing next year, leaving parent confused and upset, is not earning its salary.
-So Frustrated
That said, I understand the difficult position of the district. They are in the midst of planning for a $70M shortfall related to the levy cliff. The district just lost $12M due to a decrease in the levy inflator, and the district must pick-up $12M to support lower K-3 class size in high poverty schools.
The district must face a state that foists unfunded mandates upon them. I'm thinking about the 24 credit requirement, decrease suspension (requires additional support/ funding), creating a department to support AA etc. There are many worth-while initiatives. The board and the district must make all the puzzle pieces fit.
It appears, to me, that the district is attempting to get funding from another source; the funding which Jayapal refers....
It is sad to see that a school is having issues related to suicide. There is at least one other school that had an incident and our schools need support.
Fabulous that A4E is offering support, but the funding is a drop in the bucket. As well, why wouldn't the city provide funding? I do have a problem with a city that wants to help, but poaches a good principal away from a high need school.
Once again, the Alliance for Education is involved and I can't help to wonder if there is a political agenda behind this inflammatory story. After all, the mayor and his in the midst of holding his secret education committee meetings behind closed doors.
I have no doubt that making the district look bad is part of the plan for some people's agendas. Sometimes it's hard to tell incompetence from cunning.
Ramona, the board has a WSS-style funding sheet for IB in hand, prepared by people from the three IB schools.
Schools are a reflection of society - this city's society. With so many kids living in poverty, so many families torn apart, its no wonder we have so many kids crying out for help. But instead of coming up with lasting supports to help those children & those families, the mayor lobs stink bombs at SPS & yanks FSWs, the ed deformers carve out their new exclusive little charter enclaves of privileged kids, and kid behavior in public schools makes front page news. And of course, public schools are always to blame for the latter. Or they blame the parents and the schools. Never a thought to policies, society, etc.
CT