On the Other Big Story on the Seattle Schools front, Still Nothing New

Update 2:

The Board had an Executive Session today for an hour which I suspect was to discuss Superintendent Brent Jones and his contract. I don't know when they put this up but it was after I posted this story here and tweeted about it. The rule is 24-hour notice for ANY meeting and maybe they got it posted just under the wire.

But not only that but there is now ANOTHER meeting right before the August 28th Regular Board meeting, starting at 3:30 pm. Hmmm 

end of update

Update:

I am tracking district progress on the school closures work and I can report that there is NOTHING on the calendar for closure engagement inAugust, save the August 28th regular Board meeting. You may recall, I did urge Director Gina Topp at her last community meeting to ask the district to submit their plan on closures at that meeting. 

I do note that there is another Board "special meeting" the next day on August 29th. There is no explanation for this. Hmmm. Maybe the Superintendent asked for a closure announcement meeting separate from a regular Board meeting. I'll try to find out. 

end of update

Except for this article from the Seattle Times. I sure wish they would ask follow-up questions and not take the first answer they are given. It does start with an intriguing statement:

In a gentrifying city and socioeconomically segregated school system like Seattle’s, closing 20 elementary schools could trigger a demographic shake-up.  

This is absolutely true but also, for a district with dropping enrollment, the shift could be seismic. 

But that sentence is followed with this which is a bit baffling:

Free lunch is guaranteed for all at schools where at least 30% of families are low-income. Multilingual teachers are stationed where English learners attend. Certain schools offer cultural programs that cater to students’ heritage. As the district makes plans to redirect thousands of students to new buildings, it faces pressure to preserve certain programs for kids who need them the most. 

Most schools have English language learners and so I don't get the point there. 

That third sentence? No idea what the reporter means and she never states it in the article.

District officials say that, according to their understanding of state law, districts are required to do a demographic analysis of the schools they are considering for closure. 

“And I would say we are going above and beyond that, knowing that there’s racial segregation and socioeconomic segregation in our city,” said Marni Campbell, SPS executive director of operations.  

This district rarely goes "above and beyond" for anything.

Here's what I found for "learning environment" at the SPS website. It's a mix of the physical building and how the school meets district/Board goals.

But there is good stuff in this paragraph below but will the district do this? Nope.

“There’s a tragic story of school closures: One in which the schools close, and the resulting dissolution of the surrounding community” hurts the local population, said Francis A. Pearman, an associate professor at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education who is consulting with the San Francisco school district on its school closure plans. 

Pearman’s advice to the district is to go about the process slowly and involve community feedback as much as possible. He also urged the district to look for ways to preserve the public nature of the soon-to-be closed school buildings. Closed schools could be converted into medical clinics, for example. 

The district should be especially mindful of how the loss of a school will affect areas dominated by communities of color, Pearman said.

Professor Pearman is right on about the ripple effects of school closures. SPS could truthfully say, "we are going slowly" BUT they are NOT including parents and community in any decision-making. 

Closed schools could be converted into housing for teachers (see San Francisco Unified SD).

And if the schools selected for closure are ones that tend to be underenrolled or lag in academics, that’s an opportunity for reflection on why some schools don’t receive as many resources. 

“The questions districts don’t ask themselves are why some schools are underenrolled and better performing than others,” he said.

Big point there because the district has said they are NOT considering academics which seems very weird. It is possible for a school to be smaller and still have good academics. As for resources, I'd have to see the data about which resources and their use.

A school with a smaller population but room for more students and strong ratings in other areas might well stay open.

I personally believe if a school is doing decently and has room, they will go this route. The district wants bigger elementaries.

Districts should try to keep students from a closed school together as much as they can to preserve community, Pearman said.

I totally agree and again, because these are our youngest students, many of whom went through COVID times as a student. 

One expert queried said this on where kids go:

DeRoche said the district should consider offering displaced families the option of choosing their next school through the district’s open enrollment process.

In San Francisco, where there aren’t any attendance zones, the district gives preference to families residing in historically marginalized areas. 

SPS hasn't committed to this but Board president Liza Rankin said the district would listen. Well, the only people the Board is listening to are district staffers. If a group of parents came up with such a proposal, would the Board consider it? In SFUSD, it's a lottery system with multiple choices so, at some level, you got "a choice."

Conversations about equity needed to happen sooner, said Uti Hawkins, a former Seattle teacher union leader with a child at Concord International Elementary School. 

Hawkins said not enough information has been released about how SPS is considering each community’s needs, or what those needs are. Or how it plans to handle integrating new communities into an existing school. Without this information to “chew on,” she said, “We’re going to be arguing amongst ourselves in this segregated city about what our communities deserve.” 

SPS should focus on how these closures will better meet families’ needs for child care, commute and other factors, she said. 

“There is plenty of space to approach this in an intentional, thoughtful way, so that communities can talk about how this is happening and why this gets better,” she said. 

I do question that word "deserve." As opposed to "need?" Readers, any thoughts?

I don't see how closing schools won't create longer commute times for some students.

 As for childcare, it will be interesting if one school closes and (mostly) moves to a larger nearby school. Will that school's childcare be enough for the now larger population at the school?

Here's what Rankin also said and remember this because it is unlikely to come true:

Rankin also hopes the redistricting will help ensure students with disabilities can receive services at their neighborhood school. 

“We’re not just moving around little numbers on a page to make them fit neatly on a page. We’re really thinking about the ways communities would be reconstituted,” said Rankin. “And we need to make sure everyone has the full ability to participate and feels ownership over their new school community.” 

That last line is funny coming from a Board that has done nothing to push the district to include parents and communities more and has dropped their commitment to the larger community with moving to just one meeting a month. (Private meetings with some groups with Board members DO NOT COUNT.)