Yearly Staffing Cuts - Just Part of the SPS Process?
Remember Kids,Not Cuts? I think they may be back in business soon because I'm hearing of schools fighting staff cuts already. Here's the latest.
| No more cuts to Orca K-8!
Come express your concerns and ask your questions directly to our SE Executive Director, Kelly Aramaki.
JUNE 8th, 6-8 pm
Cafeteria Childcare provided We will join in the cafeteria to get an update from Director Aramaki as well as have an opportunity to voice our concerns. It's time to get every parent in the room. Please spread the word. It should be a standing room only event if we want the district to know we are serious about cuts to our budget.
See you there,
Tiffany Crosby
PTSA President |
Comments
SavvyVoter
Also join wa paramount duty to help us fight funding at a state level.
Its current enrollment is well, well below 500.
2013-14: 482
2014-15: 473
2015-16: 420
2016-17: projected to be 390
By the by I heard the other day that SPS has taken away APs at a bunch of schools under their new formula that counts teachers not students. Don't know more about it and don't know if it hits K8s but wouldn't be surprised. Who exactly is supposed to handle student needs parent needs teacher needs building needs nonteacher staff needs if a principal is all a school has got? If this is true it's a crock.
DistrictWatcher
SPS is not playing fair here. They are rigging this process to keep kids out of the option schools so as to justify closing them down. It's time to rise up in revolt against this - and demand people be fired for doing this.
SPS administration doesn't like you. They don't take you seriously. They view you with contempt.
Fight back
2011 - 16 (5)
2012 - 13 (0)
2013 - 20 (15)
2014 - 10 (0)
2015 - 6 (0)
Students remaining at Orca K8 for 6th grade:
2010-11: 73%
2011-12: 68%
2012-13: 67%
2013-14: 72%
2014-15: 57%
2015-16: 41%
@Fight Back, the trend for the last couple of years is not positive, but is it by student choice?
http://www.seattleschools.org/UserFiles/Servers/Server_543/File/District/Departments/Enrollment%20Planning/Reports/Annual%20Enrollment/2015-16/Section%202.pdf
-confused
WHAT IS ON THE LINE? We are slated to have our Assistant Principle, Counselor, and Librarian all be reduced to half time from current full time. Furthermore, we are slated to lose our existing half time enrichment teacher. We are demanding the district:
MAINTAIN our full time Assistant Principal
MAINTAIN our full time Librarian
MAINTIAN our half time Enrichment Teacher
RESTORE our Counselor to full time instead of half time
WHAT CAN I DO & WILL IT REALLY HAVE AN IMPACT? YES! Writing letters, calling the offices of our district officials, and attending meetings are all incredibly important. The PTSA is working hard behind the scenes and if the work is not supported by the broader community, the efforts will not be as effective. Look for petitions coming home with students on Friday. Talk to them about these cuts, their school, and how they can have an impact by advocating for what they believe is right. Work with your student to get as many signatures as possible and bring the petitions to the meeting on June 8th.
2011: 48 (0 waitlisted, 52 assigned)
2012: 70 (22 waitlisted, 48 assigned)
2013: 59 (10 waitlisted, 48 assigned)
2014: 61 (10 waitlisted, 50 assigned)
2015: 56 (5 waitlisted, 50 assigned)
and at Grade 6 to be:
2011: 16 (5 waitlisted, 12 assigned)
2012: 13 (0 waitlisted, 13 assigned)
2013: 20 (15 waitlisted, 13 assigned)
2014: 10 (0 waitlisted, 19 assigned)
2015: 6 (0 waitlisted, 12 assigned)
With this level of enrollment, the District needs to seriously consider whether there is sufficient demand to keep ORCA open as a K-8 instead of a K-5 elementary. And when they do it, they should do it in an open and transparent way.
When they do, they need to explain why they waitlisted 15 students for ORCA grade 6 in 2013 and why only 13 students were assigned. Those numbers don't make sense.
ORCA has the lowest retention rate for the 6th grade among Seattle K-8s in 2015-2016 at 41%, and that's when they had 19. The next lowest is 66% and the average is 76%.
I think an interesting post would be what size schools have what positions and why similar size schools don't. Again, I think if the district really wants to close the gap, they'd pony up for less testing - more loving, smaller class sizes and support positions in schools where there is a large achievement gap. The gap won't go away otherwise since, I for one, will always supplement the meager education my kids get in SPS (even in the "rich, white north").
Robert, I know many families in north seattle who chose a K-8 in K thinking they'd want a small middle school, but their 5th grade kids are really, really desiring "fresh meat" meaning new friends and a change of environment. I don't know if SPS is starving these schools, but I know many current 5th graders who are ready for a change and want to go to a comprehensive middle school.
I looked at the district's December 2015 enrollment report and the school choice report you found.
Let's compare some K-8 schools.
ORCA (page 97) total enrollment = 427, 6th grade enrollment = 36, continuing 5th graders = 19, new 1st choice 6th graders = 6, other new 6th graders = 11.
Licton Springs (page 100) total enrollment = 124, 6th grade enrollment = 19, continuing 5th graders = 8, new first choice 6th graders = 6, other new 6th graders = 5.
Madrona (page 56) total enrollment = 298, 6th grade enrollment = 29, continuing 5th graders = 19, no new 1st choice 6th graders, other new 6th graders = 10.
In the current year's budget, Licton Springs received 1 extra teacher to reduce K-1 class splits and 1.5 extra middle school teachers for miscellaneous program needs and Madrona received 3 teachers above the number required by the Weighted Staffing Standards to ensure that the middle school grades had two teachers per grade. ORCA received no extra classroom teachers.
Small K-8 middle school programs are very expensive to operate if we guarantee things like two classes per middle school grade or even no split middle school classrooms. Madrona is not even filling it's building. Maybe that's not a problem in the central region? NOVA is not full either and when Meany opens there will be more middle school seats than the area requires. A TOPS 2 would be a better use of Madrona's space in my opinion.
ORCA is in Mercer's attendance area. The elementary schools in that region with waiting lists are the language immersion schools. I wonder if demand for ORCA would increase if they added some kind of world language program. It wouldn't have to be immersion - but maybe adding a Spanish class for all grades would increase enrollment enough that they could also hire part time art and music teachers.
Licton Springs makes no sense. The entire north end is crammed full of students and we just carved a hole out of the much-needed new middle school. Why not turn the John Marshall building into a K-12 Indian Heritage School? There are no plans for the building after the scheduled interim use.
-NW mom
http://invw.org/2015/03/26/state-health-officials-critical-of-seattle-schools-air-pollution-report/
-hazy memory
Melissa posted something the other day - some work order changes or something that needed approval at a board meeting. I was SHOCKED SHOCKED to see SPS spent $2 MILLION on retro-fitting Lincoln for Licton Springs. I really hope I misunderstood what I was looking at since it is a temporary space. The changes to Robert Eagle Staff MS for the k-8 are also really expensive and I still don't believe the K-8 will end-up there due to capacity needs.
I don't begrudge SPS for looking at the K-8s. Everything else, yes, I hold them responsible for bad decisions, but Sharon Peaslee seems to have done some major financial damage here.
Again, I will eat ALL those words if these kids wouldn't be served elsewhere or would have otherwise fallen through the cracks. Then, it's worth it, but it's a tough sell financially and capacity-wise on the surface.
2) The district is strict on numbers to get certain staff. Some people believe the district deliberately underenrolls to avoid having to staff and is so surprised when the enrollment is (slightly) higher than what they thought.
3) John Marshall will be getting updated so I think the district will be able to use it for something other than an interim.
-sleeper
HP
As DistrictWatcher points out, how a head teacher is supposed to replace a vice principal in assisting with the special education needs, let alone teacher evaluation, responsiveness to parents, managing the physical building and - most importantly - working with and knowing students, especially in the tricky area of discipline (remember we don't do much out of school suspension anymore so these kids are in the building and are in need of supervision, retraining and encouragement) is beyond me. And then of course students and families want to see their administrators at after school events such as plays, sports, etc. One administrator only goes so far. It is duplicitous for the district to say they are putting more money in the classroom with a head teacher v a vice principal. No they're not. They are shortchanging buildings.
I don't begrudge any K8, or any school at all, their VP. How many private schools have only one administrator and run a quality program? Oh.
EdVoter
Madrona k-8
5th grade - 14
6th grade - 27
7th grade - 22
8th grade - 23
Wondering if the current middle school at Madrona k8 has two teachers per middle school grade band. Assuming yes and the precedent is just holding for next year. Does 5th grade also have 2 teachers?? The school is half full, the middle school is less than half full (each class should be 60) and they keep throwing money at it. Why?
Neighbor
Neighbor
~Shura
A couple of years ago the then science Teacher stopped teaching in the adjacent science/greenhouse due to students having problems just walking the few feet to class. What was once a thriving interesting program with the garden/plants has become something the PTSA now maintains.
Madrona has equal problems and many of the students who end up at Garfield are fielded into recovery level classes to build skill sets. This may be due to long term subs teaching both math and science classes and constant churn of staff.
Both buildings once thrived but are dying on the vine. I won't work in them anymore it is too challenging and with no support it becomes even more so.
- Long Timer
Lots of infighting among staff.
I wonder whether some of these issues are not school leadership issues -- and whether the District has staffed these two sites with principals who have the capacity of leading a K-8 option school? This is TOTALLY conjectural -- for all I know, each school is staffed by a superstar principal. But the kinds of issues being described (kids not having sufficient discipline to get from a class room to an adjacent science/greenhouse, infighting among staff) are the kinds of things that often flourish when there is either too much turnover at the top -- or where a principal is placed in a position that exceeds his/her management capacities.
I hope that both sites get help -- and wish I had more confidence that all the highly paid Assistant Supes and Exec. Directors, etc. were working diligently and effectively to fix these issues.
Orca has been struggling for a long time in the same way Madrona has but under less of a spotlight.
My friend whose daughter goes there is leaving for Washington for Middle School, she has shown me letters that verge on illiterate from varying staff members. Two student Teachers nearly lost it about two years ago in the Middle school from the stream of abuse by the kids and both women were women of color who were just holding on without any support.
Madrona has had a churn and burn of Admins and staff. The most famous was Ranice Innocent who was applauded by Senator Murray and all and then this year went promptly to Shoreline district. So much for supporting Teachers.
The district does a hideous job of K-8. And for some they are wildly successful but ask many who go into them about how they are maintained. I have worked in them all and found few (well one) that works
- Old Timer
There are real problems there and a former Teacher who "works" there refuses to go upstairs it is that bad. Orca has become what Aki used to be
_ Old Timer
- anonyme