Still Waiting

 I think my guess was correct; Seattle Schools will NOT have any new information on the Closure and Consolidation process in July. And frankly, probably not until right before the next School Board meeting on August 28th. 

I also do not see the Board retreat that the Board needs to have before school resumes.  I check both the district and Board calendars regularly and will keep you update. (Sometimes the Board will have dates that the regular calendar does not so, unfortunately, you have to check in both places.)

I do see the one brave Board member - Gina Topp - is having a virtual community meeting next Wednesday, July 17th from 6-7 pm. 

This meeting will be held remotely with Microsoft Teams.


Comments

Anonymous said…
Thanks for posting the link! I hope it is well attended, and that some other directors show.

Watchful
7/10/24, 7:02 PM
Outsider said…
I read the supt's "Budget Book Introduction" linked from the latest School Beat newsletter, and it was strangely reasonable. The part not said: small, walkable schools with strong community can be a great experience for many students. The part said clearly: economies of scale apply in education. Small, walkable schools are a luxury that costs extra, and they are an obvious candidate for being cut when money is tight.

Another thing not said, or admitted by most people: I think special ed looms as the main driving factor. SPS gets a lot of heat, both legal and in terms of PR, when it tells high-needs special ed students they can't be accommodated at their neighborhood school, and need to travel further to a school with critical mass of the service they need. More complex special ed services are extremely subject to economies of scale, and it would be extremely expensive to provide everything at every site. Justice (our favorite word) requires closing the entire school, so all students need to travel further, not just special ed students.

Typical Seattle, people virtue signal to no end on the topic of special ed, but then refuse to reckon with the costs, and refuse to reconcile their virtue signaling on special ed with their other passionate priorities.
7/11/24, 7:11 AM
Sped parent said…
I have a kid who will be starting SPS K in extended resource. Right now only resource level is offered all schools. I would be thrilled if extended resource would also be, both because kids should be able to attend neighborhood schools AND because the nature of extended resource is that it over serves kids who’s needs are discovered after they start elementary. It is an embarrassment that kids have to deal with the double blow of the identification of higher needs AND being moved away from friends to a different school to get services. (Whereas kids who are in more self contained classes more often have those needs identified before K and so at least get to have continuity in where they go to school).
7/12/24, 7:08 AM
Anonymous said…
Ah Sped parent. You’re new around here. Sadly an early diagnosis and a sentence to self contained does not mean any continuity. Parents of children with more impacted needs tend to move a lot and those self contained rooms often shrink below sustainable (contract) levels. When that happens the students are reassigned to somewhere else with an open seat. So the students are often booted out of their school in addition to being placed in another sped classroom. Further educational degradation occurs when classrooms span many grades Eg k-5. That sped teacher knows nothing of the educational content of any grade, much less all of them at once. Self contained sucks. There’s no self contained life is there?

Bottom Line
7/14/24, 11:12 PM
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