Seattle Schools Community Forum

Our friends at the West Seattle blog have some good stories from West Seattle schools.

What the word? First up, the hacked grades story in the Times.  Right now it looks like it's at Chief Sealth, Ballard and Ingraham (all corners of the city).  Apparently some kids are blabbing about this and I'm sure someone is going to get caught.  (I love when kids think they will never get caught and then go tell someone what they did.  Kids, loose lips sink ships.)  The Times also reported that the City signed a deal with the Space Needle Corp for a  Chihuly glass exhibition hall.  This includes a $1M for a children's playground (yay for kids) and again, some kind of educational tie-in with SPS. The deal was sweetened with the addition of the playground, as well as arts-education programs at the Chihuly museum in partnership with Seattle Public Schools and other arts organizations. The New York Times had a story about rigor in high school classes.  This idea is taking on Supreme Court visions akin to what the definition is of pornogr...

First up, congratulations to Green Lake secretary, Debbie Passi , the Washington Education Association's Educational Support Professional of the Year.  Also, congratulations to Sandi Whiton, the Academic Intervention Specialist at Chief Sealth High School who received an award from the private college, Whitman.  Her award is called the Distinguished Elementary/Secondary Teacher Award and is given at their commencement exercises to honor an outstanding teacher who contributes significantly to the intellectual development of students.  My puzzlement comes from two places.  One, Ms. Whiton is an academic intervention specialist and what does that mean?  This is something every middle and high school should have.   As I mentioned previously, at the Alliance Breakfast they showed a Denny Middle School video that mentioned an "early incident specialist" who works there.  So obviously these intervention employees exist at some schools but which ones ...

Monday the 21st Reminder of the lecture on water tonight at by Robert Glennon for the Chief Sealth Int'l High School World Water Week.  Doors open at 6:15 for music and refreshments with the lecture at 7 p.m.  Robert Glennon is the author of "Unquenchable: America's Water Crisis and What To Do About It." Tuesday There is a discussion at Jane Addams about serving their advanced learners .   This meeting is a Jane Addams school community discussion around how best to serve their advanced learners. Current Jane Addams families, and families considering the school are welcome to join the conversation.  It runs from 6:30-7:30 p.m. in the library.  Please note this is school event (not district) with the discussion about Jane Addams only. Wednesday Oversight Work Session on Human Resources Department from 4-5:30 p.m.  This should be interesting as I haven't seen a work session on human resources previously.  Then there is an half-hou...

Directors' Community Meetings on Saturday, the 19th: DeBell , from 9-11:00 am, Caffe Appassionato, 4001 21st Ave W. Martin-Morris , from 9:30-11:30 am, Diva's Espresso, 8014 Lake City Way NE Maier , from 10:30 am-noon,  Bethany Community Church, Brick Room,     8023 Green Lake Dr. N. Events early next week: Chief Sealth is doing quite a great week-long event next week called World Water Week to promote global water conservation and awareness.  It is being organized by a senior, Molly Freed, and teacher Noah Zeichner, and a group of 50 other Sealth students and teachers.  Freed and Zeichner were selected last summer as Bezos Scholars (2 of 24 across the nation) to attend the Aspen Ideas Festival. From the SPS news release: Monday, March 21 : A free public lecture by Robert Glennon at 7 p.m. accompanied by a special video message from Alexandra Cousteau. The event will kick off with a water resource fair at 6:15 p.m. and follow with introduct...

We have to stay positive so I want to hear some good news, big or small, from your corner of the district. First up, Chief Sealth's boys basketball team is rolling on at the state championships. To that end, a great story on their inspirational coach, Colin Slingsby, from the Times' Steve Kelley. Just like all great coaches, it's not just about what happens on the court. Here's a guy who wants to be a teacher: When Slingsby began his coaching career at Sealth, he worked the night shift at United Parcel Service, punching the clock from 9:30 p.m. to 4 a.m. He also went to school, an undergraduate at Washington before getting his master's degree at Seattle University. "He's a new age, old-school coach. A retro Father Flanagan," assistant coach Greg Kalina said. "A lot of coaches profess to do it, but he walks the walk 10 stories higher than I've ever seen anybody else do it." Of the 40 players who have stayed in his program since he ...

This story appeared in the Seattle Times of January 24. " Chief Sealth point guard Tre'Von Lane has a unique senior project — coaching the West Seattle high school's freshman team " Note what turned things around for this young man - the active involvement of adults in his education. One-on-one concern.

Let's go through the Transition Plan amendments being proposed by Board Directors. Harium Martin-Morris I move that there be a one-year special program preference for Thornton Creek 5th graders applying to Salmon Bay as their first choice school, without transportation, with tiebreakers applied in the following sequence: 1.Sibling 2.Special program preference for Thornton Creek 5th graders 3.Geography 4. Lottery So this would keep TC students flowing to Salmon Bay. Of course, without transportation, how many will be able to make this choice? Maybe someone at TC could let us know what they think the rough numbers might be. Salmon Bay is less difficult to get into than it used and if more TC students didn't go, there'd be more spaces for other students. The accompanying chart shows that it truly varies from year to year where TC 5th graders go for middle school. Oddly, either the number got left off, but they give no numbers for how many TC 5th graders went to Eckstein f...

There are two new SPS schools on this year's state list for low achievement; AS#1 and RBHS. Now SPS, trying to put a good spin on it, makes it sound like this is a great thing for them to be able to apply for state grants (ranging from $50k to $2M a year over 3 years starting next fall). Sealth is also on the list but SPS is NOT going to apply for a grant for them" because the school is well into implementation of a plan to ensure a high‐achieving school. “While additional funding would be helpful, we do not want to disrupt the momentum that has been created.” Again I say...what? There is a chance for money to help a school that is still getting its footing and is going to be transitioning to a joint campus with a middle school and we aren't applying for the funds? How is more money "disrupting the momentum?" Districts that participate have to choose from four federally designated intervention models and SPS, in 2010, chose "Transformation." This ...

UPDATE: Here's the Powerpoint link. Following up on my Summary thread, here are the highlights of the discussion. Steve started with a bit of a monologue about Board's role versus staff's (I'm going to have to have him repeat it for me). He did say something interesting that I'm not sure the rest of the Board would agree with, namely, that if the Board asked more questions than staff could answer in this Work Session, it is the job of the Audit&Finance Committee to prioritize them. It is unclear to me if he meant that if some of the lower questions didn't get answered, it was okay. It seemed that way. Frankly, with this kind of climate and for a budget, I think ALL Board questions should be answered. Overall themes: a struggle over what will take priority; the Strategic Plan or WSS for schools. frustration by several Board members but mostly Sherry and Michael over the lack of clarity in this presentation. The Board seemed very frustrated ove...

So in advance of the upcoming tours and open houses at both public and private high schools, Seattle Metropolitan Magazine latest issue has several articles about high school education with 78 public and 50 private schools graded. Among the articles: The New School Plan - about the NSAP One Size Fits Some - about the LA alignment Talk Supe - about who else? (We'll have to discuss this one because she flatly denies saying something I heard her say out loud at a meeting.) Geek Boot Camp - about STEM at Cleveland (I'll have to take them to task for this title; no, no, and no.) Smart and Smarter - about a West Seattle mom who worked to get IB at Chief Sealth 6 Ways for Seattle Schools to Score Higher - hey, this one's by me and Charlie Parents as Search Engines - mostly about applying for private school (but boy does the district take a ding here) Private Lives - about a couple of private schools Grading our High Schools - the listing and grades of area high school...

Look, I get that most of you don't have the time or inclination to fact-check as Charlie and I do (and we still get it wrong sometimes). But please, please do NOT say something as fact unless you can give actual valid numbers. There was a great discussion going at the thread about Garfield being overcrowded and whether this means the high school APP cohort should be split and where they might go if they had a two-high school cohort or even just shoot them off to their area high school. I think there were some great ideas/analysis (and I hope the district/Board reads it and considers it). However, there were a couple of places where I read things stated as fact (without real numbers backing it up) and assumptions (without explanation of why that assumption could be true). To whit, there was this: "Splitting up APP at the high school level would make many more AP classes available in different high schools." Of course it would be a plus if more high schools had more A...

Just to note, the district is taking a Community Input on Student Use of Information Technology survey. It asks about your child's usage at school and how much you know about it. Outside of knowing that my kids learned keyboarding and PowerPoint at school as well as some research skills, I have no idea what they have been taught. This is particularly true of ethical issues (which they ask about). Also, the last School Board meeting for this school year is next Wednesday, the 7th . They will vote on adopting the new budgets. As well the Board will be voting for the supplementary levy measure for $48.2M in November. The so-called "community engagement" process for this levy was a complete sham. They did not let parents and community know about this in any real way. But the Board doesn't care so I guess it really doesn't matter. I just wish they wouldn't even bother putting it on the motion. As well there will be votes on a the renewal ...

I had heard about this happening but was waiting to post it. On Wednesday, the Ballard High School SEA had a straw vote of no confidence in Dr. Goodloe-Johnson's leadership. The count went as follows: 35 voted no confidence 1 against the vote of no confidence 2 abstained I would think that once this gets out among the general membership of the SEA that more votes may take place at other schools. I have to applaud the teachers of Ballard for their courage to even get together and discuss a vote, no less taking one. But there comes a time when people have to stand up and be counted. We did this with the two community surveys on the Superintendent and now the teachers are chiming in. In some ways, it is more serious that teachers are unhappy as they work for the district and yet don't have faith in the direction/leadership of the district. You don't get the best out of people who are not inspired, feel unheard and not supported. Question is, will the Board listen?

First off, I really like West Seattle. I'm not a native so let me know if I have this wrong but what I always heard is that SW Seattle is considered "West Seattle". So that area has two high schools, two middle schools and a number of elementaries that serve their area. And, since West Seattle is a somewhat isolated area, most families stay in that area for school. Second, I really like the West Seattle Blog . They do such a great job of covering that whole area like a little mini-city. There seems to be such a sense of community over there. They also getsome pretty interesting reader comments on their stories. I was checking out what was being said about the departure of Bruce Bivens, the current principal at WSHS. Just as you would expect there are differing thoughts about his departure but then some tension crept in over the differences between Chief Sealth High School and West Seattle High School. Here's what one commenter had to say: Currently have s...

I'm not sure what this means and I'm not sure what community engagement was involved (if any), but according to a press release: Superintendent Maria L. Goodloe-Johnson, Ph.D., has announced the designation of Chief Sealth High School as the district's first international high school, completing a K-12 international program pathway in West Seattle that reinforces Seattle Public Schools' commitment to international education. Here's the whole press release: Seattle – Superintendent Maria L. Goodloe-Johnson, Ph.D., has announced the designation of Chief Sealth High School as the district’s first international high school, completing a K-12 international program pathway in West Seattle that reinforces Seattle Public Schools’ commitment to international education. In 2009, Concord Elementary and Denny Middle – both in the same attendance area as Chief Sealth – received International School designations. Now all three schools will offer major components of an internation...

Open House Come learn about Queen Anne Elementary at the Open House, at the Lincoln High School site, 4400 Interlake Ave. N., Saturday, March 6, 10:00 am to 12:00 noon (no child care available). It was reported by one of our readers that they will have a "tech" focus (not Montessori) but their web page doesn't reflect that. If you go, please report back what you see and hear. From SPS Communications: Seattle Public Schools filed an appeal today (March 3, 2010) of the King County Superior Court decision on the District's adoption of the Discovering Series math instructional materials. The judge's decision, which was a surprising finding, must be appealed by Seattle Public Schools for the following reasons: • The court decision was not confined to a review of the record that led up to the Board's vote to adopt these materials; • The court disregarded a yearlong instructional materials process that the School District followed prior to making its decisi...

Sorry so late but I just saw this at the West Seattle blog: Start the New Year off right by attending the next Madison PTSA meeting, to be held on Wednesday, January 13, 2010. We will be holding a panel for parents, guardians and students called “ High School Choices for Your Tween .” At this PTSA meeting from 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm, come and hear from various high schools in the areas about their school and the programs it has to offer. High schools who will be attending thus far include: West Seattle, Cleveland, and Chief Sealth. There will also be time at the end for Q & A (questions and answers)! The PTSA is looking forward to seeing you and your child at this meeting! We’ll also have time to discuss the early dismissals and its impact on this school year 2009-2010, as well as next year’s schedule & early dismissals for 2010-2011! If you have questions or concerns, feel free to contact Kim Early at ann8726@aol.com or 206-328-9335. Note that Cleveland will be there. This comes ...

Thanks to reader Yumpears who linked us to the update from Steve Sundquist's last meeting before the vote tonight at the West Seattle Blog . Steve said he was not "inclined" to change the boundaries except for one (far south end of California SW) and that there would be an amendment for that. (It's still not on the website but they can introduce them without them actually being on the agenda. At least that is what has happened in the past.) He said some pretty interesting things about high schools. He was trying to make people feel better about their assigned high school saying that many kids from areas all over West Seattle/SW go to either high school. Here are the stats from the article: SEALTH 1,000 students - 550 from its “drawing area,” 200 from northern West Seattle WEST SEATTLE HS More than half its 1100 students come from southern West Seattle (574) DENNY Most from its “drawing area,” 136 from north West Seattle MADISON Even split - 449 from north West ...