List of "Merging" Seattle Schools' Elementaries

Apparently there is a plan by Seattle Schools to "merge" some elementary and K-8 schools. Now closing a school has a multi-step legal process but merger? I don't think so. 


Here is how I have been hearing (the first school is the one closing and moving):

- Sandpoint ES is merging with Laurelhurst.

- Sacajawea is merging with John Rogers.

- Orca K-8 is merging with MLK, Jr. (Orca's middle school population would move to Mercer MS)

- Rainier View is merging with Rising Star ES.

- Cedar Park is merging with James Baldwin.

- Sanislo is merging with Highland Park.

- John Hay is merging with Queen Anne.

- Stevens is merging with Montlake.


This information came via an email to staff that wasn't supposed to be "shared." I suspect this is not the entire list. 

The larger schools receiving students have been renovated for about 500+ students in them. 

Reddit is burning up with many questions. The main one I hear - a question that has been asked for lo a many year - when will they redraw boundaries? 

Another question that is related to boundaries is if SPS will move a school's population intact to another building. One commenter said if that were true, her child and all her friends staying together, then her child would just shrug.

Which brings me to a question I have - how will this impact future enrollment? SPS already has a problem and it's going to take years to get all their ducks in a row. Will parents turn away from the churn and go elsewhere?

And staff? What's in the SEA contract about this kind of situation? I don't think I need to ask but I assume length of service is a big one here and possibly right of first refusal to be moved to any other school. 


I find this troubling and I hope it doesn't come back to bite Shuldiner. Leadership needs to say something. 

Comments

Outsider said…
I believe in the past SEA had a strict seniority system for deciding who got which job. (This is based on observation of several particular cases, not from being an expert on the actual contractual language.) Under the seniority system, if a school hires a bunch of new teachers to handle a big jump in enrollment, those positions go to whichever teachers in the district decide to claim them based on seniority. It is therefore not possible, if you close School A and move all their students to School B, to also move School A staff to School B as a group. This issue seemed to come up in the '24 school closure fiasco (though it was never clearly articulated), and it was one of 20 objections to the closures -- staff of the closed schools would be scattered to the wind, and there would be no continuity of school community, culture, etc.

That was then, of course, and it's possible the issue was quietly addressed in the most recent contract negotiations. It's also possible that calling the action a "merger" of schools allows the district to bypass the seniority issue and transfer the staff of the merged-in school to the surviving school as a block.
10/21/26, 11:27 AM
Anonymous said…
John Hay merging with Queen Anne shouldn't be a problem--they're only 1/2 mile apart, and after all, QA is the "Old John Hay" building. If they can move all the students and staff from QA to JH, the social disruption could be minimized, and a single building could serve the whole neighborhood.

Old Queen Anner
10/21/26, 1:55 PM
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