Seattle Schools: What Are Your Favorite Things?

 In the middle of the Seattle School Board's agenda for Wednesday night's board meeting, there was this presentation:

Student Outcomes Focused Governance: Progress Monitoring Memo #2, 7th Grade Math Goal

I did not listen into the entire discussion; it was scheduled for an hour but ran almost an hour and 40 minutes. But I did listen in at the end.

Director Leslie Harris got real and here I paraphrase: 

We are facing the budget cliff from hell. I don't see costs for many of the initiatives here. Does that mean then that we, as a Board and administration, are going to hold portions of our budget as sacrosanct and untouchable? If we are to meet these goals, nothing is free and we need to be terribly candid and forthright about this. 

Say some of our foundation partners decide they won't continue funding; we can't be budgeting on a wish and a prayer. 

Curriculum adoption in years past has been the first thing to come off the budget. 

I had a robust conversation with Superintendent Jones but I don't have a sense of knowing how you charged the cabinet with finding reductions, especially around retention of teachers. Everett (SD) could poach our best folks. 

It sounded to me like she was asking for absolute clarity on costs AND exactly where cuts would be made in the next budget.

I think she also wanted to understand how firm the Superintendent and staff will hold to the Strategic Plan goals as opposed to basic educational spending for all students. (And if I'm wrong, I hope she tells me.)

Superintendent Brent Jones said that he and his colleagues understand they are balancing a budget AND trying to support stated goals. He said "the core of strategies will not be gutted, other elements will go first." He said his staff is also aware that there will not be a reserve of personnel and many people will have to do "double-up work" for others. 

And hence the title of this post - what is your favorite SPS thing (or, more accurately), what do you think is the most important need - in the middle of a budget crisis - for SPS to focus on? 

Here's what I gleaned from reading the presentation:

As part of SOFG, the Board has committed to regular reviews of goals as set by the Superintendent and staff as part of the Strategic Plan. Here's how they are doing on this particular one.

Goal Status: Orange Level - Interim metrics indicate results are unlikely to be delivered without significant changes. Seattle Public Schools are off track to meet their 2023 strategic plan target for 35% of 7th Grade African American males (AAM) to score proficient or above on the Spring 2023 Math Smarter Balanced Assessment.

But there's a lot of seemingly excited "this is what we are doing."

To change the systems, support students, and improve these outcomes, SPS began work at five middle schools and one PreK-8 school in the following five strategic areas: 

1. Excellent Teaching & Joyful Learning, 

2. Strong Relationships & Connected Families, 

3. Equitable Measures & Student Supports, 

4. Opportunity Pathways, and 

5. Expanded Learning & Enrichment. 

These areas are a blend of research- based practices known to improve math outcomes and new, innovative practices.

They have a timeline for this 7th Grade Goal but it seems very ambitious. From the baseline of Spring 18-19 to Spring 25-26, going from 26% math proficiency to 70% math proficiency.

They state the following for why they are not on-track:

- There has been a great deal of educator and school leader turnover at the six schools from 2021-22 to 2022-23. As a result, we have been meeting individually with school leaders, administering classroom observations, and have offered supplementary training on the ICUCARE framework for both school leaders and educators.

- Hiring challenges and turnover for math educators in our six schools continue, including at least two recent math educator resignations. In response, the math department has helped provide lesson and unit planning as an interim support in classrooms where there is a substitute.

- Hiring challenges for highly exceptional instructional coaches to lead the work with our educators has left a gap in leading the educator support in two of our schools. We are continuing to interview candidates and planning for additional support through our math department.

- Administering district-wide MAP assessment in our middle schools came with logistical and adaptive challenges which we have addressed by providing operations support and guidance to school leaders to engage their schools in asset-based data analysis and subsequent strategic planning. We will continue to partner with Research & Evaluation, Assessment, and Business Intelligence to look at deeper cuts of data to support our own strategy improvement.

- Our data from last spring and this fall indicate that Multilingual learners and students with IEPs need additional support. In response, the Division of Student Support Services has launched a districtwide initiative to promote inclusionary practices in collaboration with CAI and school leaders.

On that first one, they already know they are losing educator and school leaders from those six schools? Wow. 

But then, as you read the second item, they announced that two math teachers have already left those schools. 

As for the final point, how could that be some mystery that Sped students and bilingual students would need more support? And the solution is "inclusionary practices?" I'm not sure I get that.