This and That, September 16, 2026

First up - the Seattle Education Association voted to approve the new contract for teachers and others. It's interesting that the statement from SEA came from its embattled president who is on leave from her SPS job, this from KING-5 News:

“We’re really proud of the work every member did to get us to this agreement,” said Ibi Idowu, Special Education teacher and president of SEA. “We can make gains even in times of budget challenges when we prioritize our students and our classrooms.”

But meanwhile, at tonight's Board meeting, two members of the Board voted no on the new contract, leaving the vote 5-2. Those votes came from Evan Briggs and Liza Rankin. (And oddly, Rankin mentioned former director Chandra Hampson who should never be spoken of again.)  

I'll review the video but Rankin went on and on and on. (I think I saw President Topp's eyes glazed over at one point but who could blame her?) I believe Briggs and Rankin think the contract violates some Board policies. 

It was a very short meeting and the public testimony list wasn't full. The district is going to put up very tall lighting around Eckstein's smallish playfield and those lights could stay on until something like 9 pm. One speaker - Sheri Vahey - brought a prop and used voices. It was quite fun.

As well, the district seems to want to roll back on some supports for multi-lingual students with one speaker saying hundreds of students will lose support. Another speaker said the district wanted to use digital help and then read Superintendent Shuldiner's words on dialing back screen time. 

I did note one speaker who said that she thought parents whose first language isn't English were being manipulated into saying their child speaks English even if that isn't what is spoken at home. While it may be true the child speaks a different language at home, they are very likely learning English and learning curriculum in English at school. 

It was interesting because I had heard a lot of chatter out there about elementary recess and yet, no one signed up to speak about the issue. (I got into the meeting late and may have missed what the Superintendent may have said about recess. I'll review that part of the video.)

Looking for the Board agenda for the meeting, I found something of interest. Seemingly without notice, the Board has a very different webpage from the SPS webpages. Their pages seem to be under the auspices of a company called Diligent Community 2026. I also see that a photo that is supposed to be of all the directors and yet somehow only shows three adults and three student members. If I were on the Board, I would not be happy. 

The Board will be especially busy next week with this schedule:

Finance & Audit Committee - Tuesday, September 22nd

Policy Committee - Wednesday, September 23rd

Board Special Meeting (formerly Work Sessions) - Wednesday, September 23rd.

Operations Committee, Thursday, September 24th

However, there are no links to any agendas. I will review what President Topp said about the topics for the Special Meetings coming up. I do find it odd that there are no available agendas for the upcoming committee meetings. 

I had written a post about the DOJ indicting many a group of people in late 2024  - including one family in Seattle - the Jacksons - for a multi-state drug trafficking conspiracy. I used the term "Patu family" when in fact, it is the Jackson family. Only a single member of the Patu family is in this group. 

The National Merit Scholarship Semifinalists from Seattle were announced today. On the upside:

Ballard - 3

Ingraham - 2

Lincoln High School - 9

Roosevelt - 1

That adds up to15 students and kudos to all of them. 

But for those of us who have been around a long time, it doesn't look great. Both Ballard and Roosevelt used to have many more students. And look who is missing entirely - Garfield. 

By my count, Bellevue high schools had 65 students. Redmond had 54. 

Another interesting number was not just how many students Lakeside has but its Downtown Lakeside location also has some. 

I saw on Reddit someone said Garfield was no longer an HC pathway high school. From the SPS webpage, I see for this school year, it's Lincoln, Garfield, and West Seattle. Is that a change from previous years? I would guess that some families did turn away from Garfield for Lincoln because of the murder at Garfield. 

As one reader said to me in an email:

I feel like we really have two educational systems in the state. One is the very high powered Northshore/Issaquah/Lake Washington/ Bellevue/Mercer Island schools. And then there’s everywhere else.