Growth Boundary Meetings
As I previously reported, I attended last week's Growth Boundary meeting at Eckstein. I estimate that there were about 50 people there, many from Green Lake Elementary and Sacajawea Elementary. Staff in attendance included Enrollment's Ashley Davies, Facilities' Flip Herndon as well as Board member, Jill Geary.
The next boundary meeting is this Tuesday at Hamilton at 6:30 pm. and on Thursday at Mercer MS at 6:30 pm.
There was no formal agenda handed out but there was a PowerPoint. However, there were nearly 50 pages of maps. Printed out on very nice paper in color. I cannot imagine the cost for this. There was one single regional map (West Seattle.) The maps are not all that useful because they don't show the original boundaries, just "retained" or "implemented"boundaries.
And yet, when Director Geary went to look at the maps, she asked, "Where's the big one that had it all on one page?" It was not there. That is a fascinating thing to know that there IS one map with all the changes and yet, not handed out nor put up for general viewing at the meeting.
Not a whisper about high schools.
(My aside is that staff had not properly prepared for this meeting. There was no signage anywhere to the front of where the meeting was. Even Mr. Herndon was wandering around. As well, the meeting did not start on-time. That's a problem for a one-hour meeting. Also, they didn't have the microphone working for 20 minutes. Tough to hear in a cafeteria that echoes.)
Here is the staff's list of amendments.
Highlights:
- If your school may be affected by boundary changes, you will get a letter - twice - from the district. Once to let you know of the possibility and then, if your school is affected by a change.
- There was quite the wordsmithing by Ms. Davies about what different votes would mean. The Board already voted in boundary changes but now staff wants new ones. Indeed, the Board may want some new ones (see Cedar Park.) The Board has to vote in any new changes via amendments.
- It does appear that the district is changing some of the Cedar Park boundaries to not have kids cross a very busy street but that doesn't change who is to be enrolled in the school.
Grandfathering
While boundary changes are important, I think the MOST important item for parents to be aware of is that grandfathering is NOT going to happen in most cases. This is interesting because in the last round of boundary meetings, in April 2016, the district said this:
• Grandfathering means that students are able to remain at their current school through the highest grade offered.
– Aside from instances where new schools are opening, SPS aims to grandfather students whenever possible, based on capacity at the impacted schools.
– More information on grandfathering for 2017-18 will be provided in the fall community meetings.
• Transportation is not provided for grandfathered students.
Now yes, the district doesn't guarantee grandfathering but they certainly make it sound like it probably will only happen where new schools are opening. That was in April so we had the same capacity issues and now? Here's what the district says now on grandfathering.
It appears it won't happen in middle school.
On Sped and grandfathering, they said they will "try to minimize any changes or impacts."
Highlights of questions from audience:
- one teacher said it appeared that 45% of students in the district will be displaced in some way and that school staff and parents need to see the data.
- also, how will the district support schools that experience change in demographics? We know that some schools that have a high F/RL population suffer if those number drop just below the cutoff for supports.
- Why is there no Teaching and Learning staff here to answer questions. Ms. Davies first said they weren't needed and then said she had talked with T&L but couldn't answer any questions on that issue. So maybe they need to make sure someone from T&L is there.
- Why isn't there any analysis on using portables for grandfathering versus all this rearranging? Staff seemed to want the audience to believe that the use of portables is already large and the goal is to cut back. I'll just note that when staff wants portables, they bring them in.
- What big theme was how this splitting up of communities will hurt them. One woman pointed out that her school had worked hard to create a community spirit for fundraising and that it has literally taken years. She said that would change will all this rearranging.
- Green Lake Elementary explained they are the only neighborhood school with two dual language programs.
- There was also a complaint about being redrawn out of a school, only to get to a school that has no more spaces for childcare.
- Apparently there is a spreadsheet with more data and Ms. Davies promised that would be made available.
The next boundary meeting is this Tuesday at Hamilton at 6:30 pm. and on Thursday at Mercer MS at 6:30 pm.
There was no formal agenda handed out but there was a PowerPoint. However, there were nearly 50 pages of maps. Printed out on very nice paper in color. I cannot imagine the cost for this. There was one single regional map (West Seattle.) The maps are not all that useful because they don't show the original boundaries, just "retained" or "implemented"boundaries.
And yet, when Director Geary went to look at the maps, she asked, "Where's the big one that had it all on one page?" It was not there. That is a fascinating thing to know that there IS one map with all the changes and yet, not handed out nor put up for general viewing at the meeting.
Not a whisper about high schools.
(My aside is that staff had not properly prepared for this meeting. There was no signage anywhere to the front of where the meeting was. Even Mr. Herndon was wandering around. As well, the meeting did not start on-time. That's a problem for a one-hour meeting. Also, they didn't have the microphone working for 20 minutes. Tough to hear in a cafeteria that echoes.)
Here is the staff's list of amendments.
Highlights:
- If your school may be affected by boundary changes, you will get a letter - twice - from the district. Once to let you know of the possibility and then, if your school is affected by a change.
- There was quite the wordsmithing by Ms. Davies about what different votes would mean. The Board already voted in boundary changes but now staff wants new ones. Indeed, the Board may want some new ones (see Cedar Park.) The Board has to vote in any new changes via amendments.
- It does appear that the district is changing some of the Cedar Park boundaries to not have kids cross a very busy street but that doesn't change who is to be enrolled in the school.
Grandfathering
While boundary changes are important, I think the MOST important item for parents to be aware of is that grandfathering is NOT going to happen in most cases. This is interesting because in the last round of boundary meetings, in April 2016, the district said this:
• Grandfathering means that students are able to remain at their current school through the highest grade offered.
– Aside from instances where new schools are opening, SPS aims to grandfather students whenever possible, based on capacity at the impacted schools.
– More information on grandfathering for 2017-18 will be provided in the fall community meetings.
• Transportation is not provided for grandfathered students.
Now yes, the district doesn't guarantee grandfathering but they certainly make it sound like it probably will only happen where new schools are opening. That was in April so we had the same capacity issues and now? Here's what the district says now on grandfathering.
It appears it won't happen in middle school.
On Sped and grandfathering, they said they will "try to minimize any changes or impacts."
Highlights of questions from audience:
- one teacher said it appeared that 45% of students in the district will be displaced in some way and that school staff and parents need to see the data.
- also, how will the district support schools that experience change in demographics? We know that some schools that have a high F/RL population suffer if those number drop just below the cutoff for supports.
- Why is there no Teaching and Learning staff here to answer questions. Ms. Davies first said they weren't needed and then said she had talked with T&L but couldn't answer any questions on that issue. So maybe they need to make sure someone from T&L is there.
- Why isn't there any analysis on using portables for grandfathering versus all this rearranging? Staff seemed to want the audience to believe that the use of portables is already large and the goal is to cut back. I'll just note that when staff wants portables, they bring them in.
- What big theme was how this splitting up of communities will hurt them. One woman pointed out that her school had worked hard to create a community spirit for fundraising and that it has literally taken years. She said that would change will all this rearranging.
- Green Lake Elementary explained they are the only neighborhood school with two dual language programs.
- There was also a complaint about being redrawn out of a school, only to get to a school that has no more spaces for childcare.
- Apparently there is a spreadsheet with more data and Ms. Davies promised that would be made available.
Comments
Time to start dialing our board members and making media calls. Moving students to situations in which safety, services and academic opportunities actually go down, when with a little introspection of solutions and re-examination of date students might be able to stay in place through their enrollment at grade school or middle........ Gee, what would be the appropriate move for students and families? Apparently we need to help central staff figure it out.
And if these meetings continue with no nod to high school enrollment issues, we need to start throwing a tantrum at each opportunity until staff agrees the issue is linked, urgent and must be addressed immediately.
DistrictWatcher
- Tired
Love Democracy
Clown Show
I think the heart of the problem is the when the board passed the Growth Boundaries Plan in 2013, they clearly noted in all of their remarks that they were passing a "framework" to implement new boundaries for all the BEX IV projected. Sherry Carr in particular was very committed to ensure that all of the BEX projects had a "constituent base."
The board created the provision at the time, that the process would need to be "reviewed" every year in order to make course corrections when the data changed, because the data was going to change.
We have had significant staff turnover and IMHO the promise of annual review and course correction has just been lost in that turnover.
The 2015 and 2016 implementations were very straightforward. The 2017 implementation represents more than 50% of the total number of changes and as such is very complex.
None of this complexity was represented at the meeting.
My guess is that staff is just presuming that the 2013 Geo-split for JAMS pre-approved a geo-split for Eaglestaff. However, that is not exactly correct.
Opening Eaglestaff is going to be more complex than JAMS. JAMS was formed from HCC and Eckstein. Eaglestaff has students from Hamilton, Whitman, JAMS and Eckstein. There was no information about the cohort size that will be removed from each of these schools and whether or not this represents a cohort and what mitigation is required for this work.
There was also no information on the splits / grandfathering for swaps between the other schools, When Eckstein students were Geo-spit to JAMS, the students who were moved to the Hamilton zone were Grandfathered. Each cohort was addressed individually and the expectation for 2017 was the same.
Currently there are Eckstein students who will be moved to Hamilton area. Eckstein has space and Hamilton does not. These students should be grandfathered at Eckstein. However, there was no information about this one way or another.
The middle school boundaries are dependent on assignment pathway. There was recommended change in West Seattle based on the HCC pathway being at Madison. The Meany / Washington changes also noted the impact of HCC assignment. However, these was nothing about assignment pathway for Eaglestaff, despite all the capacity challenges north of the ship canal.
The 2013 plan placed all of QA/Mag and North-end HCC plus Language Immersion at Hamilton. Hamilton is currently the most over-crowded school in the district. (designed for 800, currently with 1200).
The new boundaries make Hamilton's area even larger, and Hamilton gets additional students geo-split from other schools. The only possible relief for Hamilton would be to move a school out of the feeder pattern or to move language immersion or HCC to Eaglestaff. There was no information about this or the impact on the various schools.
The current projections show that Whitman's enrollment will drop precariously to 600, while Hamilton, JAMS and Eaglestaff will be very full. Clearly, there will be some assignment pathway adjustments and those need to be made the board at the same time as the boundaries.
For example, if the feeder patterns are approved as is, then it begs the question of re-assigning HCC or Language Immersion to Whitman. While Eaglestaff is central for LI, Whitman is not. So that would mean that Whitman would become the natural home for HCC for the Eaglestaff and Whitman areas.
All of those need to be board decision, not decisions after the fact.
The 2013 plan, had a notation that Lincoln could be open as early as 2017, if needed. I doubt that is an option but ... it is past time for the high school community engagement to begin.
Big picture
Some other info about "ample time for community input". The HS projections were wrong & some schools have reached highest numbers two years prior to their report. And projections predict more growth the next two years. If the same rate we can expect over 2000 at several schools prior to Lincoln opening. I agree that parents need to ask the board to intervene so they work on a plan for an interim solution.
-train wreck
And there are enough other high schools fixes that could have more impact.
For starters, there need to be some significant support / mitigation dollars sent to the Center School. They could easily take a few hundred more students. However, that school has been not supported since the Banda/Greenberg disaster. With just a little bit of attention and support at Center School, there would likely be more real impact that putting kids at Lincoln before it is ready.
Likewise for Nova.
You highlight a very important point in your note.
The current capacity task force is scheduled to end in January. That's right. The capacity task force will only meet once/month for six months for total of six times and the whole mess will be replaced with a new task force that is only related to high school capacity.
Capacity is complex and has lots of moving parts. There were many issues with FACMAC but most of the issues can be traced to the simple fact that more than half of the committee just vanished after six months and the superintendent did not replace these members.
It will take six months for the people who haven't been following this for years to get a handle on the basics and then the committee will dissolve.
RS is becoming that magic extra option high school that so many parents have suggested over the years ... but invisible because RS does not show up on any enrollment reports.
"It will take six months for the people who haven't been following this for years to get a handle on the basics and then the committee will dissolve."
Yes, but the district persists in doing this. Almost like it works for them (but not for the process.)
What's also troubling about so much RS is that the district loses money when the kids leave. If that many kids are going, that means less money for their schools for that particular period of time.
As the legislature will fund up to 1.2 for part time running start folks, it is possible that when students take 1 RS class and 4 high schools classes, it is possible that there is more money.
When a student is full time running start, there is less money. Most of the dollars go to the community college (where the student is full time) and a small amount goes back to the district to pay for the counseling staff that manages all of the paperwork and graduation requirements.
Not true for special education students. They have to move to schools out of their neighborhood based on seats in a SpEd program.
Hamilton--in the heart of the future Lincoln area--is a complex middle school with multiple programs/services, including HCC and Language Immersion. Both of those involve pathways, and thus both require that students/families make major decisions when it comes to high school options. Since there's a good chance current 8th graders who live in the yet-TBD Lincoln zone will be pulled out of their original high school in order to help reopen Lincoln in 2019 (as 11th graders), the ability to continue on a particular track is a key consideration. For example:
- HCC students need to decide whether to go to Garfield for the "accelerated AP pathway" or Ingraham for a possible IB/IBX track, or potentially to their neighborhood high school if it can meet their needs (or they don't mind repeating some classes they've already taken). If Lincoln opens as an AP-type school, what happens to students who opted for Ingraham's IBX program and are halfway through the 2-yr program? Will they get pulled out anyway, even if they can't continue their IB studies? Or what about those who opted for the traditional IB approach, and who have completed their pre-IB courses and are just getting ready to start? Along the same lines, if Lincoln instead becomes an IB school, what happens to those who opted for Garfield because they weren't interested in the IB approach?
- Language Immersion students often enter high school at a higher language level (e.g., Spanish/Japanese 4). Ingraham is the LI pathway school since it offers languages up through level 6. What happens to LI students if the new Lincoln HS only offers more traditional levels of language classes?
So what's it gonna be, SPS? Will Lincoln HS offer AP, IB or both? Will it open as 9th grade only (unlikely), or will students be yanked out of their existing schools--and if so, which grades will be included in the pull? If students are supposed to be yanked, will there be an opportunity for grandfathering on a case-by-case basis if they can demonstrate that Lincoln prevents them from continuing on the SPS pathway they already selected?
How exactly are current north-end LI or HCC 8th graders supposed to choose their high school in February without any of this information?
Decision Time
BT is sending kids to Viewlands
Viewlands sends kids to Olympic View
Olympic View sends kids to Olympic Hills
Olympic Hills sends kids to Cedar Park.
Is BT over capacity?
Been There
This year's 8th graders are in the same position as last year's. They don't know if they will remain at their option or neighborhood school, they don't know how SPS will handle the overcrowded schools in the interim, and they don't know what other random, massively disruptive changes will be imposed.
-DD
On top of that, when we're talking specifically about LI and HCC students who are likely to be in the new Lincoln zone, they face additional conflicts as well, since the "pathways" that give them options for HS could end up meaning they get royally screwed when the changes all play out (e.g., getting the IB or LI rug pulled out from under you midstream). That's a lot different than it would be to, say, start at one AP-based school and have to move to another that has similar AP options.
Decision Time
Per the current Student Assignment Plan, when a student gets a "choice" seat, they get to remain in that choice seat for the entire time. Therefore the most probable outcome is that all of the students who get choice seats at Ingraham get to stay at Ingraham (making this option more and more attractive over the next few years).
It is the "guaranteed" seats that are the seats that are up for geo-splitting and re-assignment. This means that the neighborhood assignment seats at Ballard and Roosevelt will most certainly be geo-split into the new Lincoln zone. QA/Mag and Wallingford can just start to plan around going to Lincoln.
The "guaranteed" pathway seats are an open question. The pathway to Garfield for HCC and the pathway to Ingraham for the Language Immersion Cohort are also subject to geo-splits. Therefore Language Immersion can be pulled from Ingraham if Lincoln becomes the new pathway school AND HCC can be pulled from Garfield if Lincoln becomes the new HCC pathway school.
hmmmmm
Total Chaos
-curious
-sleeper
-NW HCC parent
BT parent.
Bait nSwitch
Eagkes
Eaglestaff will be full on day one. Hamilton gets more kids. Whitman goes below 600.
-North-end Mom
HF
Enrollment Report
HCC Data
The handout also included school capacity numbers, but I would like clarification on how these were determined. For example, on the sheet it lists Green Lake at 319. However, on the SPS website Green Lake's 2015-2016 capacity is 352, and in the document from the September 14th Capacity Management Task Force Green Lake is 430 for 2016-2017, and 375 for 2017-2018 (decreasing due to K-3 class size reduction). That's a lot of different numbers, and 319 is by far the lowest.
http://www.seattleschools.org/UserFiles/Servers/Server_543/File/District/Departments/Capital%20Projects%20and%20Planning/Capacity/task_force_meetings/School%20Space%20and%20Capacity%20V3.pdf
In addition, without looking at the affected kids by grade level you really don’t get a full picture. Although moving a 5th grader would reduce the overall enrollment number for a school, it would not reduce the enrollment in K-3 where class sizes need to be reduced. So, in my opinion stating “no grandfathering” based on “capacity constraints” where you are only looking at a total number of students at a school is too high level to make that call and force elementary students to move in their final years at a school. (Just one of my many issues with all of this!)
I urge you all to show up to Director Burke's Saturday community meeting from 3:30-5:00pm at Greenwood Library.
Yes you are correct. I looked into this and it was confirmed.There appears to be a gap in the planning, where they have drawn boundaries for middle school but not included planning for the HCC middle school pathways that were suggested during the 2013 vote on this issue. Currently the boundary vote is scheduled for Nov, but the inclusion of HCC site placement and middle school pathways does not seem to be included.
We are on year away from implementation. I suggest parents contact the board and district and ask program placement be included in the board decision in Nov.
-NW HCC parent
-StepJ
The 2013 vote for the 2020 Growth Boundaries plan had over 24 amendments and the total package for the BAR and amendment is about 350 pages.
By the end of the vote, it was quite unclear what had actually passed and the Board said the 2020 Plan would act as a "Framework" and that staff and subsequent boards would make adjustments as needed to the framework.
There are two separate problems as a result of this - adjusting the feeder patterns to make room for the K8 and the long term HCC pathways, that were NOT addressed at that meeting.
The recommended feeder pattern for Eaglestaff was designed to create a full school, without HCC and without an embedded K8. When the amendments that created the embedded K8 were addressed, it was noted at that time that staff and the future board, would need to adjust the middle school feeder pattern for Eaglestaff and that this was not-a-problem because there would be so much extra room at Whitman.
At least one of the Eaglestaff feeders schools needs to be moved back to Whitman to make room for the K8. This was not part of the 2017 plan.
There never was a vote to place HCC in Eaglestaff.
There was a board question about whether or not Hamilton could handle 5 feeder schools plus HCC, plus Language Immersion.
Splitting HCC and placing half into Eaglestaff was a contingency plan, in a footnote of an amendment. This footnote was to answer the question, if Hamilton needed to be adjusted in the future.
The 2012 projections had the highest enrollment for Hamilton at around 1,000 students. The 1200 students who are there this year, means that Hamilton need to either lose HCC or lose a feeder school or lose language immersion.
None of those variations were addressed in the BAR.
Now to be fair to staff. The meeting went to midnight, had 24 amendments and a scope of 350 pages. That is a lot to process and there is an entire new board that likely has different priorities. This one was complex.
Been There
There is a lot of work to be done to get a comprehensive high school up and running and that take planning time and a planning leader.
HF
A planning principal is the principal who will be in place once the school opens. In an ideal situation the person working on the design will be the person who has to live in that design. That changes the accountability.
I was on the design team for Jane Addams and Wilson Pacific. For Jane Addams the principal was in place. For Wilson Pacific, we had a rotating middle school principal for each meeting. The process was dramatically different.
At a minimum, the principals for Ballard and Roosevelt should be on the design team for the Lincoln building as we know for certain that students will be geo-split from both Ballard and Roosevelt. Just having those two additional voices will likely raise things that Dr. Hudson just wouldn't know, because she is not embedded in the community that will be split.
But most importantly, parents have question about the curriculum and programming issues NOW and a planning principal is where those questions should go.
I heard from people attending the capacity meeting at Hamilton that there didn't appear to be anyone from SPS who could speak concretely and coherently about what decisions were being made and WHY. If the district is talking about forcibly transferring some 800 students out of their schools and into others, they had better have a well thought out reason for doing so and an explanation for why other (less impactful) alternatives are not possible/viable.
PLEASE attend Director Burke's community meeting this Saturday from 3:30-5 at the Greenwood Public Library to let him know the public needs ANSWERS and ACTION.
To note, Jill Hudson said at one of the community meetings (boldface added): "The final design of the program for Lincoln will need community input. The new principal will work with the community to determine the needs and corresponding program. Currently, the design is focusing on flexible spaces to allow small group, individual, and large group learning opportunities. There are a variety of different spaces which will accommodate the eventual program. There will be collaboration with the community." It seems clear they are focusing on design only now, with a "design-only" planning principal. They figure they'll get to the other stuff eventually.
Also, I agree 100% that "parents have question about the curriculum and programming issues NOW and a planning principal is where those questions should go." That's where I, at least, have been sending such questions. Unfortunately, it's to no avail. As Dr. Hudson told me, "as far as curriculum and programs, that will not likely be decided until the new principal is hired and has time to work with the community of Lincoln High School."
oy
That is not a planning principal. That is a consulting principal in lieu of an actual planning principal. If she can't entertain questions about the school, her role is way too limited and is just not a planning principal.
Maybe an interim-limited-principal or something but ...
Families that live in the QA/Mag/Wallingford area, who will be impacted by this for the next decade at least, should really start to write the board about a planning principal. There really needs to be one ASAP and will all the drama around growth boundaries this could easily be lost.
High school really matters and a good principal will make the different between the community embracing the school or avoiding it. With $50M or so going into the building, an extra $100K in salary for a real planning principal is a very reasonable investment.
The most expensive capacity is the capacity that is NOT used. Lincoln could be a very expensive white elephant or a great use of resources - the planning principal will make or break that investment.