Tueday Open Thread
Sad stat: Washington's homeless student population is the eighth largest in the country. From the Spokesman-Review:
Free dental care for kids - really.
From NBC, Does the SAT Still Matter If Nearly 1,000 Colleges Are Test-Optional?
While the poor Boy Scouts have to listen to the POTUS babble on, the Girl Scouts are working on new badges.
What's on your mind?
The number of homeless students in Washington state increased 30 percent between 2011 and 2015, according to a study released Thursday.Have you checked out the district's new website look? I think it's cleaner looking but I haven't tested out looking for specifics.
Washington had the eighth-highest number of homeless students and the ninth-highest rate of student homelessness in the nation. During the 2014-15 school year, there were 3.3 homeless students for every 100 public school students in Washington, according to the Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness study.
In 2014-15, there were more than 35,000 homeless students in Washington. In 2015-16, there were 39,671 homeless students, according to data from the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction.
Free dental care for kids - really.
From NBC, Does the SAT Still Matter If Nearly 1,000 Colleges Are Test-Optional?
While the poor Boy Scouts have to listen to the POTUS babble on, the Girl Scouts are working on new badges.
Girl Scouts from tiny Daisies to teen Ambassadors may earn 23 new badges focused on science, technology, engineering and math.
It's the largest addition of new badges in a decade for Girl Scouts of the USA. The effort takes a progressive approach to STEM and also nudges girls to become citizen scientists using the great outdoors as their laboratory.It's election day; who do you think it will be for the top two spots for mayor?
What's on your mind?
Comments
http://www.seattletimes.com/education-lab/one-way-to-improve-schools-treat-parents-as-equals-uw-prof-says/
HP
"today is the last day to vote in the primary - i hope you'll consider me as your next seattle school board director (district 5)!"
"hey! have you been curious what the seattle school board district 5 map looks like? well, here ya go! i'd be so grateful to represent and serve bailey gatzert, garfield, leschi, lowell, madrona, middle college at seattle university, nova, seattle world school, sboc, stevens, thurgood marshall, washington. make sure to vote by next tuesday, aug 1 at 8pm by mail or drop box by 8pm!"
"please join me this saturday at one of the few exciting campaign events before the august 1 primary. i would love your support"
Months, names of cities etc. should be capitalized, too.
This is a school board election.
I have been looking at the HALA Draft Environmental Impact Statement as you urged.
In it, (https://www.seattle.gov/hala/about/mandatory-housing-affordability-(mha)/mha-citywide-eis , page 3.298) it says that Bex4 will increase Seattle school capacity by 7,900 additional students. Is that true? I have never seen that number in any documents. I think HALA is double counting. The HALA EIS makes it sound like 18 new schools are coming, when most schools in BEX 4 are being renovated, and capacity increases are not an actual increase in seats as students will move from overcrowded schools.
Gerry Pollet is right, the draft HALA EIS makes it sound like SPS has school capacity all under control with their 2012 data. Based on what I am reading, we should be alarmed - it doesn't look like HALA has considered schools at all.
I am submitting a public comment agreeing with Gerry Pollet that HALA is disturbingly unconcerned about where children will go to school in the proposed urban villages. There is also nothing about parks, libraries, and other things that kids need to grow and thrive.
I would appreciate your thoughts on this.
"No Caps, I'm deleting your comment but you may repost it if you spell out what you are saying. I don't have time to explain all the acronyms."
nor do i. i also don't know what my post was exactly. can you add that acronyms are needed in all fairness. or don't, but sheesh a bit capricious right?!?!
here is what i posted as i recall.
homeless students are a national record high in seattle.
black students comprise the vast majority of the homeless students.
black students have a large opportunity gap versues whites/asians in sps.
therefor according to teachers at tm and ghs, geary and blandford: hcc is racist.
of course many are recent immigrants. and many are struggling to make it to school.
to be clear i wish this wasn't the case and i wish seattle was more like historically black cities that have established long standing communities. i also think kids are being missed and that there should be universal testing and nomination and everyone on the borderline should get in. but to kill hcc because the program can't raise all ships unilaterally is demagoguery. ted howard knows that, susan follmer knows it. as does, katie may, nyland, tolley, apparthied sticker placers and all the others. they see different and want same regardless.
we can't solve the ses (social economic status) issues with a single program and it is wrong for those listed above to think otherwise.
think i have the vapors over something that is nothing?
-it was honors for none before it was honors for all.
-tm has no data on the success of the their social studies for all but they are asking to expand it.
-next year follmer is having teachers who hate hcc, teach hcc kids. see honors for none.
-the recommendations for the sup from altf2 (you got that right mw) have been greatly ignored. every building does as it wishes, there is no curriculum, they have hired education experts to teach the teacher but no one knows what they do or have never seen them. there is no high school programs including mental health help the list is seven recommendations and the only change really was from app to hcc. yuck.
my kids came out the program saying it was racist without a story or interaction to support it. correlation or causation? charlie liked to talk about culture and he was wrong. it is not heritage it is being in poverty and dealing with the challenges of homelessness that is keep success at bay. sad and the mayor should deal with it as best possible, but it hardly is anything that sps can deal with without a ton of resources.
no caps
3498 homeless students (or 0.07% of the district's students)
1582 Black/African American
727 Hispanic/Latino
487 White
340 Mixed race
209 Asian
90 American Indian/Alaska Native
63 Hawaiian/Pacific Islander
---------------------------------------------------------
Over 90% of the homeless students were low income.
22 were migrants.
708 had limited English.
699 were special ed
436 qualified for LAP (supports for below grade level performance)
11 were highly capable
We'll see if teachers at tm and ghs, geary and blandford start advocating to take the housing away from students underrepresented in the homeless stats to make them equitable... That's what we want our teachers and school board members doing, right? When they're not busy at their private members-only swim clubs, that is.
You lost me there.
Waiting
Your comments seemed to be be trashing those who are trying to convert HCC from a program for those who are born at third base to a program that targets vulnerable students who are gifted (with predictable pushback from the third base coaches..I mean parents).
Please explain your "analogy" about taking homes away that targeted the teachers who are tired of this charade called HCC.
By the way, you can't drop a statistics and analogy bomb that supports your clear vested interest in HCC and then quote OSPI. OSPI's website, if followed, would put SPS in a Civil Rights lawsuit.
Progressive in action, not words. Try it sometime.
Waiting
Look, what's weird to me is that people are trying to change the program NOT to include the kids of color but to include all kids. That's not a gifted program.
I, along with many others, want the district to do their job and find those gifted kids of color and get them in the program.
As for this, "the district is breaking the law" stuff - if that's true, why no lawsuits? Why no slap from the state over the use of funds...for years?
The posters who used the tragic information about homelessness in WA to jack-up their defense of the HCC demographics were given a pass.
No response. Crickets.
Waiting
only one thought on this .07% should be 7% or .07 of all students right? (not.07%). 7 out of one hundred are homeless in seattle. many of these students are also recent immigrants. not easy to talk to and things sway back and forth depending on who you talk to. keep in mind hispanic and african american doesn't take in immigration status but here is what lynn posted from sps:
Here's the district's 2016 enrollment data:
African American 8,240 (down 5.6% from 2013) FRL 84% SpEd 17% AL/HCC 3%
Asian 7,818 (down 8.4% from 2013) FRL 52% SpEd 9% AL/HCC 14%
Hispanic 6,530 (up just 39 from 2013) FRL 64% SpEd 19% AL/HCC 6%
Multiracial 5,388 (up 40% from 2013) FRL 28% SpEd 12% AL/HCC 17%
Native American 342 (down 77 from 2013) FRL 69% SpEd 32% AL/HCC 5%
Pacific Islanders 209 (down 58 from 2013) FRL 75% SpEd 11% AL/HCC 2%
White 25,012 (up 10% from 2013) FRL 10% SpEd 13% AL/HCC 24%
aa = 3% al/hcc and 84% frl
does anyone know the racial breakdown of private schools in seattle?
what i see here is the higher the race's frl percent the less likely you will be in al/hc. you can't tie that on the backs of hc program to change. you read what is going on at football high school ghs. it is dirty. it is not concerned about morals. single students classes in the past for jocks. none for nerds... and now you can only take 3 ap classes as a junior and none as a freshman. bah humbug.
it is concerted to break hcc all down and it is coming from howard, fullmer, may, nyland and tolley. but cheat on football no problem. rapes on field trips by athletes no problem. counselors who cheat. no problem.
only one thing is respected in ted howard's world... sports. not academics. he has made that clear. bring in a kid for football and then call him homeless. no big deal. they don't want to learn no big deal. they aren't there in next semester no big deal. inflated homeless numbers may be an issue for ghs. under recognized brilliant scholars at all high schools is a disgrace. but if you are only wanting to win... kids will always lose.
no caps
The person who posted the homeless info did not really reference HCC; that's all you, Waiting (FWIW or whoever you are).
Homeless demographics are not evenly distributed between all the various different groups who make up the students of Seattle's public schools. Is the correct approach to take housing away from groups that are less likely to be homeless until equal proportions of the various demographic groups are homeless? No. Morally, we should be fighting for no students to be homeless. Similarly, advanced learning opportunities shouldn't be taken away from kids until everyone is equal. All students should have access to learning. If they're having too hard of a time, they should have access to supports. If they're having too easy of a time, they should have access to challenge. For the sake of morality. AL should have universal testing. And every school should have a robust and fluid approach to advanced learning opportunities that make it possible for kids who go through the learning equivalent of a growth spurt, an academic breakthrough or whatever you want to call it, to jump to a harder level of reading/math/science/social studies so that they continue to learn and be challenged and develop grit and obtain a basic education. Kids should be encouraged to learn and the teachers and principals and EDs and superintendent should not be setting up roadblocks to slow them down. And choke them out of the public schools. We want a lower dropout rate, not a higher one. One size does not fit all. Schools should not order children to be at specific achievement levels based on their age. And we should never level the playing field by taking housing away from children because "too many kids in that demographic have housing." Ridiculous. And immoral.
You write, "Your comments seemed to be be trashing those who are trying to convert HCC from a program for those who are born at third base to a program that targets vulnerable students who are gifted (with predictable pushback from the third base coaches..I mean parents)."
I don't think you understand how birth works, Waiting. The kids are all born as infants. They don't know how to roll over or sit up or walk or talk or read or write or do long division. They meet their milestones at different paces. There's a wide range of ages when kids learn to walk. Are parents out there coaching kids in learning to walk? Sure, some are. That's actually not bad parenting, right? Does it matter if your kid learns to walk a couple months earlier or later than another kid? Or six months later? Or a year later? Some babies walk freakishly early. Some walk quite late. Some kids don't say their first words until they're three (see Thomas Sowell's Einstein Syndrome for an interesting discussion of gifted late-talkers).
I just don't see what the hoopla is about. Almost all kids learn to walk eventually. They almost all learn to talk. They almost all master addition and subtraction and fractions. They almost all learn to read and write. None of them are born already knowing how to do any of these things. How much can a "coaching" parent speed them up? Who knows. Who cares? Is coaching bad? I guess I don't see why. Teaching kids to read is not bad for them. If they're ready to learn, they're ready. It happens at different times for different kids. Miraca Gross is actually of the belief that "hiding" reading from gifted kids or stalling them from learning when they're ready can be harmful. It's one of the things the parents of gifted kids often regret. Kids should not be stifled or prevented from learning. Parents of gifted kids are exhausted from trying to keep up with their kids' demands to learn. Learn, learn, always learn. Why can't these kids just veg out????!!!
But all kids learn and develop at their own pace. Some kids require acceleration to thrive. This was the case for MLK Jr. and Thurgood Marshall. Both skipped two grades in school. And it's the case for many of the kids in HCC. If some of the kids were coached (so they skipped learning how to walk and skipped learning how to read??? How would that even work?), I hardly see how it's bad for them to be in with the gifted kids if they're keeping up.
It seems like you're saying you want HCC to be just for the blue group and not the red group on this web page? Sure, why now? AND they'd have a curriculum! And acceleration in science and social studies as well as LA and math! But I don't really see what harm coaching does. In the end no one really cares how old your kid was when he/she learned to walk. You just mostly just want to avoid teaching kids who already know how to read how to read all over again. What a waste of everyone's time! All kids deserve to learn material they don't already know.