Seattle Schools Community Forum

The Alliance for Education is looking for a new president/CEO .  The notice for the job has interesting reading.

From SPS Communications: The Alliance for Education and Seattle Public Schools today announced a multi-year agreement to sustain the International Baccalaureate (IB) program at Rainier Beach High School, which has been at risk of being discontinued at the end of the current academic year due to lack of funds. The Alliance for Education has pledged $50,000 per year in philanthropic funds for each of the next three school years – 2016-2017, 2017-2018, and 2018-2019 – for a total of $150,000. This pledge has been made possible through the early support of the Thomas B. Foster Endowment and the John Stanford Fund. Seattle Public Schools will fund the remaining costs of the program and will be examining mechanisms to sustain the program beyond the 2018-2019 school year.

Hey, the Alliance for Education had their Roaring Twenties fundraiser: What a wonderful night we shared on Saturday and what a powerful statement of support to the more than 52,000 students in Seattle.  You contributed over $400,000 to support students in our public schools - wow!  This is by degrees a significant increase over the past few years and yet another compelling testatment(sic) to the generosity and commitment to high quality public education that exists in our community.  Thank you! Well, it's great that they are still saying they want to give to Seattle Schools but I wonder how?  (Oh wait, the first face I see on their photo roundup of the event is...Don Nielson.  Never mind.) Really good piece from Seattle Education by parent Carolyn Leith on the possible raise for Superintendent Nyland. As we at this blog have all seen, from the past two school board elections, counting your chickens before you count all the votes is a bad idea....

It will be quite the week by the time we all get to the end of it. From SPS Communications : Tuesday, Nov. 3 Deaf/Hard of Hearing (DHH) community gathering cancelled Due to an unforeseen circumstance we must cancel and reschedule the Nov. 3, 2015 DHH Community Gathering. A critical component for this meeting is appropriate interpretation services. Despite early requests and multiple agency contacts, interpretation services were not secured. The district was informed of this on Oct. 30.

I'm a little late in writing this up but here are the highlights of what is to be discussed at tonight's Board meeting . There is to be a presentation called, " Can Assessment Actually Improve Schools?" by one Rick Stiggins.  (There is no link to his presentation.) That's a ludiacious title because, of course assessments can help.  It's how many, the cost, the time and the actual assessments themselves that are at issue. But here are his seven principles of assessment and it's fascinating that he doesn't mention data once. Mr. Stiggins is - surprise - part of the Pearson Assessment Training Institute.   He also has his own website .  He's not here out of the goodness of his heart but I have no idea how much he is being paid. Speakers  The speakers list is full with 13 people on the waitlist.  Many of the speakers are addressing bell times and transportation and school staffing cuts.  One speaker stands out - Jane Broom who is the Director...

Unbelievable but true.  Not only does the Alliance say - via a Times op-ed  by CEO Sara Morris and Jon Bridge -  that the district is making a mistake in ending the relationship, they don't even admit they did a thing wrong. Here are both letters. Kind of amazing considering that the district has been trying, for literally years and years, to steady and make better the relationship with the Alliance.  The district wrote quite a detailed accounting of the issues, which the Alliance answered with their letter including a refutation chart, and now, an op-ed saying how much this partnership means ...to the district. There was no partnership left.  Here's what I said in my comments at the Times:

As I reported, the district and the Alliance for Education each put out a letter, outlining the dissolution of their 20-year partnership.  As I also said, there is something bittersweet to this as the Alliance started with the blessing of the late Superintendent John Stanford.  Here they are in one place at Scribed . I was around then and I always did think of the Alliance as its own separate self but it was very much put forth as being a fundraising (to help meet challenges and gaps and provide enrichment) group as well as a civic cheerleading group for the district.  I remember the early years of pre-first-day-of-school pep rallies at Mariners field with a huge number of parents, teachers and children. But there was a lot of upheaval and the Alliance morphed much more towards its business side.  I believe the Alliance was impatience with the slowness of change and very much wished it could control who sat on the Board and their governance. But these letters! ...

The Board has now smushed today's Executive Committee of the Whole together with the Work Session.  Agenda here . Kids Not Cuts is planning to listen in, hoping the Board may talk about the current staffing issues.  The meeting starts at 4:30 pm so be there by 4:15 pm if you want to sit with the group.  To the meeting topics: - P reschool - there is some delusion out there that City's pre-K program is both going to expand in SPS as well as trump before-after school program space.  Given the two classrooms that are City-enrolled and way under capacity, I find it hard to understand how the district could choose to take on more. - Alliance for Education.   This should be interesting, given how bad the relationship has been for the past year.

Monday, Oct. 12th Board Curriculum&Instruction meeting from 4:30-630 pm at JSCEE.   Agenda Highlights: - there's a Race to the Top grant for the Seattle Teacher Residency.  The Board should reject this.  Why?  Because the relationship with one partner for the STR, the Alliance for Education, is tenuous and the district may be left holding the bag for this project.  I think that the district had the right idea but, like most district initiatives, did not have the long-term planning or backing to fulfill the mission. - Did you know our district has NO "Instructional Philosophy?"  Apparently not, as a new Board Policy A.01.00, has been written.  Sigh. Yes, that's the most important thing to get done. - High School Credit for World Languages (this is for both students who have taken a language as a second language and those whose first language isn't English and can receive credit for what they know in that second language). - Special Ed program...

A busy, busy week.

As I had previously posted, there is a Work Session today with the Board.  The topic had been "Alternative Calendar" (along with a closed Executive Session) but the topic is now "Closing Opportunity Gaps."    The topic part of the Work Session is from 4:30-6:00 pm with the Executive Session after that. Looking at the presentation, it has the district-wide SBAC results on page 4. Good news - SPS did better than the state-wide results - across both ELA and Math - in every grade level, many times with a 10-point gap.   For 7th grade math, the gap was 12.4%.  Most of the scores were in the high 50s to low 60s. This is quite a difference with the MTSS scores from previous years.  Staff says it's because of "leadership," "teaming and collaboration," and "data/analytics."  They don't explain if this is at the district level or school level. But to the subgroups, there a slide...but no data.  Then, the presentation goes from a ...

Update: here's the Executive Committee meeting agenda .  There are no links to any documents but t he agenda packet is 90 (!) pages.   Kids, that may be a record.  Highlights include the City's preschool program.

Some topics of interest in the Friday Memo from the Superintendent and senior staff:

Please, feel free to add to this list. Ron English Alliance for Education MOU MOU for partnering with the City on their pre-k program the issue of Africatown getting back into the Mann building (which they apparently believe is going to happen) FACMAC  Directors Blanford and Martin-Morris' plan for African-American boys (an idea that both have said they want to work on but have never said how) a high school for QA/Magnolia transparency in this district - why can't the district put up every budget for every school/department? 

Monday, Jan. 5th Community meeting with Director McLaren 6:00 PM - 7:45 PM at  Delridge Branch Library, 5423 Delridge Way SW Tuesday, Jan. 6th Paramount Duty conversation at JSCEE from 6:30-8:30pm The speakers are: Tom Ahearne,  the trial lawyer for the plaintiffs in the McCleary case, will speak on how Washington State is not meeting its “Paramount Duty” to fully fund education. He will also talk about the latest “contempt” decision on holding our legislators accountable. Andrew Nicholas  from the WA State Budget and Policy Center will talk about the challenges of financing basic education and the reforms to the revenue system that can make that possible. Event is FREE, but seating is limited.  RSVP at:  https://paramountduty2015.eventbrite.com Wednesday, Jan 7th School Board meeting, starting at 4:15 pm.   Agenda

First up, the Board retreat on the 6th.  Apparently, I had been expected because Director Peaslee said something to the effect of, "wait for Melissa" and Director Peters and Michael Tolley (who ostensibly must read the blog and knew I was not coming) said, "She's not coming."  I'm sure there was a sigh of relief that no one from the "angry community " was there. I also learned via public disclosure documents that at least one director feels the need to pass on many of my e-mails to the Board to senior staff .  To note, there are about 13 people who get the e-mails you send via "schoolboard@seattleschools.org."   These include the Board, Legal, the Superintendent, Communications, a couple of cabinet people and a person in the Board office.  So now, if I'm writing to the entire Board, I'll just send it to the main e-mail address because it seems my e-mails get forwarded on anyway.  I don't really like it this way because I...

I attended yesterday's Audit and Finance Committee meeting which had several fascinating discussions (and non-discussions). In attendance were Chair Sherry Carr and members Sue Peters and Harium Martin-Morris.  Also in attendance was Superintendent Nyland. I had wanted to attend because of a couple of issues of interest to me.  And naturally, one item on the agenda that I really thought would be dry and not-so-vital turned out to be great.  That's why I go to these meetings - you really learn a lot. The items I had wanted to hear about were: - MOA with Africatown - MOU with the Alliance for Education So what turned out to hold my attention? The presentation on Nutrition Services given by Nutrition Services staff, led by Wendy Weyer.  First, kudos to Ms. Weyer.  While her presentation was long, it was detailed and well-organized.  She laid out the information to the Board in a manner they could follow and then connect the dots.   ...

Monday, Nov. 10th Curriculum& Instruction Policy Committee meeting , 4:30-6:30 pm.  Agenda Among items of interest: Items Requiring Board Action on Nov. 19/Dec. 3 - BAR for Policy 3201, Disciplinary Appeal Council (McFadden/Sander) - BAR for Policy 2190, Advanced Learning (Martin)  - BAR for 24 Credit Waiver Application (Heath/Stoen)  Standing Agenda Items - MTSS - Special Education RC-CAP Also, policy on attendance, Native American Education Report, waiver of basic instructional materials,program evaluation&assessment, research activity and test administration and selection/adoption of instructional materials. That's a lot of ground to cover in two hours. Tuesday, Nov. 11th Veterans Day - No School

Update :  Superintendent Nyland announced this event at the School Board meeting but also announced that a SECOND State of the District will be the next day on Nov. 18th at JSCEE. Seems like that's backwards - why isn't the FIRST announcement of the State of the District AT the district , not at some business' headquarters?  Maybe it's to keep the riff-raff out of the high-level event that the Alliance puts on? Keep in mind, you can go to the Alliance event - it is public.  (If you go and can't get in, look for me.  I'll make sure you get in.)   end of update. Interim Superintendent Dr. Larry Nyland will present the annual State of the District from 4:30-6 p.m. on Monday, Nov. 17 at the Group Health Headquarters, 320 Westlake Ave. N., Suite 100. Dr. Nyland will give an overview of the district’s successes and challenges, and highlight progress on the district’s five-year strategic plan: Every Student. Every Classroom. Every Day. This event is sp...

Summary: it appears that most of the Board, both as a group and individually, have real issues with the Alliance.  It is not to the point where they don't want to work with them but the issues are both irritants and concerns.  It would appear that the many on the Board believe that the Alliance oversteps its grounds (in relation to its work with the district) and the Alliance's insistence on being a "critical friend" may just be too much for the Board.  More support, less criticism and attempts to steer direction for the Board.  In a frank discussion at the Work Session on Tuesday, much was heard and learned about what the next MOU with the Alliance might look like. I am left to wonder - if the Board and the Alliance have a hard time figuring out where to meet and how to talk - will there be an MOU?  Because with the Alliance's increasing strong stands on what needs to get done in the district and the Board wanting to set the goals (and the Alliance can fol...