Seattle Schools Community Forum

From  Seattle Spec Ed PTSA : first meeting of the year - Tuesday, September 27, 7:00-9:00 pm at t he John Stanford Center. There will be some time devoted to an open forum to discuss member concerns/ideas, Parent Partners will be joining us, our own Hannah Marzynski will present on the new SPS Spec Ed website and Wyeth Jessee will be our featured speaker talking about all the recent staff changes in special education. And there will be plenty of time for some Q and A. Please join us! From The Stranger on Mayor Murray's budget and public education: He's also pledged to "triple public preschool classrooms by 2018 and undertake several education programs focused on racial inequities." He proposes expanding “My Brother’s Keeper,” a mentoring program for African American male middle school students, increase slots in summer learning programs, and expanding efforts to improve attendance and behavior in schools.  No word on where he's going to put all t...

The Times is reporting that John Muir Elementary's PTA is buying school supplies for all the children at that school this year.  They had taken a survey and parents said this was a big issue for them.  Buying in bulk allowed the cost to drop from $75 per child to $15 per child. Across Washington state, schools are dropping their supply lists or trimming them down amid increasing costs of supplies — and an increasing number of families in need.  The PTA also asked the John Muir teachers what they needed for their classrooms for the upcoming school year and then ordered all those supplies, too.  The Times is also conducting its own annual drive for school supplies for low-income students.  Bravo to the Muir PTA for listening to its membership about how to spend that hard-earned fundraising pot of dollars. 

Remember that story in the Times a week ago about how Councilman Tim Burgess thinks the district is "evil" because all of the Level 1 elementary schools are in the south-end (with neither he nor the Times truly acknowledging all the reasons that may be?)  Well, somebody felt like this less-than-a story article needed more play and now they added a map of what level schools are where. Almost like someone picked up the phone and said, "This needs more attention - put in a graphic and get it back in the cue of local stories."  Almost like someone needs to get the drumbeat up about pre-K and getting more space in SPS. Interesting series from KCTS about portables .

Good News Mark Perry , the long-time principal at Nova High School, was honored by the Alliance for Education's Thomas B. Foster Award for Excellence as a distinguished principal.  Perry will receive a $50,000 cash grant for his school.  He has been principal at Nova for 16 years.

Monday, March 14th  Curriculum&Instruction Committee meeting from 4:30-7:30 pm. Agenda

I attended the Work Session on the City Pre-K last Wednesday.  An alert reader found this at the Seattle Schools' Facebook page just about a day ago. (bold mine) Seattle Public Schools is looking to expand our partnership with the City of Seattle, Mayor Ed Murray , and the Seattle Preschool Program to start up more preschool opportunities for families. In 2014, ‪#‎ Seattle‬ voters overwhelmingly approved an initiative to fund quality preschool throughout Seattle. Since then, SPS' Department of Early Learning and the City's Department of Education and Early Learning have been collaborating to operate three preschool classrooms. Right now, preschool is offered at Bailey Gatzert Elementary School, Van Asselt Elementary School, and Original Van Asselt. So first, when staff speaks of "Seattle Public Schools," doesn't that include the Board?  I'd like clarification on that because that was always my impression.

It's quite the mash-up of topics for this week's Board Work Session on Wednesday the 24th from 4:30 pm to 7:30 pm: Early Learning/Seattle Preschool Program 4:30 pm- 6 pm SMART Goal #4 - Early Hiring 6 pm - 6:45 pm SMART Goal #6 - Customer Service 6:45 - 7:30 pm Each of the presentations is quite different. Early Learning starts on page 3 of the agenda.  Staff claims that there are 60 students in the three SPS-located City Pre-K.  But they also claim that there is space available at all three locations.  Which naturally begs the question - what is the stated class size limit for these classrooms? (Answer: 20 students per class so I'm unclear how there is still space available.  (The graph shows 20 students in each location.)  They also don't say that it has taken months for the two City-enrolled SPS classrooms - Original Van Asselt and Van Asselt - to get to this level.   Then, there are pages of "data" that I'm not sure adds much to the...

Update: the BAR has been amended to a vote for a "preliminary approval of potential list" of 19 childcare classrooms that would be converted to "K-5" homerooms (meaning the Board is only giving tentative approval.)  Huzzah! end of update

Three years since the Sandy Hook shootings . The SEA , at their representative assembly last night, voted in a resolution in support of Middle College High School (MCHS) for its almost 25 years of serving students of color who are disenfranchised or in crisis.  They note that this means that six teachers of color have been administratively displace or removed from their positions. State that SEA’s position is that the historical focus of the MCHS program and curriculum on social justice and critical pedagogy at all sites must be maintained. We believe failure to do so would contradict the focus on equity agreed to by both SEA and the district during the recent contract negotiations; Los Angeles schools were shut down today over an electronic terror threat relating to backpacks and was directed at schools themselves (not places like buses.)

Did you know that the district has rank ordered programs/support activities in district buildings ?  The reasoning is two-fold - for enactment of 1351 for smaller class sizes in K-3 and the growth in Seattle Schools.  Here's the list from a letter that Flip Herndon sent on Oct. 13, 2015 to "Seattle Public School Partners:"

Update :   Mayor's press release Chappelle will seek to form stronger strategic partnerships with Seattle Public Schools, institutions of higher learning and other education stakeholders throughout the region, with an eye to improving outcomes for all Seattle children. Well, well, it certainly looks a Trojan horse coming thru that no longer needs its cover. From Dr. Nyland: We are so proud of Mr. Chappelle and are thrilled that the mayor has chosen someone with such integrity, accomplishment, talent and dedication to equity. Mr. Chappelle has been a positive, transformative leader at Rainier Beach High School over the past four years. He has worked side-by-side with students, families and the dedicated Rainier Beach staff to create a college-going culture, elevating expectations for students by bringing in the International Baccalaureate Program. Under his leadership, graduation rates have soared and enrollment has almost doubled. As Director of the Department of Educatio...

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 ...

Seen the new district website ?  I haven't used it yet but I think it looks much better.  (I do think their Facebook/Twitter/Instagram section is too big and too prominent.  Also,  the district calendar is way too hard to find. And again, why do they call Enrollment "Admissions?") Monday, June 1 Community Meeting with Director McLaren from 6-7 pm at the Southwest branch Library. Tuesday, June 2nd BTA IV Capital Levy Community Meeting from 6:30-8:30 pm at the JSCEE. This is likely the ONLY community meeting until the fall so try to make it if you want to give input.  I suspect that after the meeting we will know the preliminary ideas for this levy.  My stand will be if more than one-third is for technology, I'm not supporting it.  You will likely be asked - after their draft plan is presented - to weigh in via e-mail.  I'll get that info for you later this week. Wednesday, June 3 Board meeting starting at 4:15 pm at the JSCEE.  (T...

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? 

Guess the percentage of cable news educations guests who are actually educators?  From the Washington Post . Send this to your legislative reps when they ask, "Where will we find the money for McCleary and 1351?"   From the Puget Sound Business Journal, " Boeing CEO Makes More than his Company Pays in Federal Taxes."   Well, that didn't take long.   Buried in the Seattle Times Ed Lab comes news that our new City pre-k program WON'T pay for transportation.  And, since our City is largely segregated that will make having the mix of socio-economic backgrounds even more difficult. They also report that the levy has capital dollars that could help SPS "should the district become a classroom provider for the program."  What's odd is that this isn't new; those capital dollars were already embedded in the levy.  Of course, the City is trying to dangle as much bait as possible in front of the district.  How do capital dollars for preschool ...