Seattle Schools Community Forum

One of the BEST things ever written about public education here at The Answer Sheet at The Washington Post.   This is a guest post by Jeff Bryant, a marketing and communcation consultant for nonprofits.  He writes about public education policy. Here's his bottom line (to me - emphasis mine): Furthermore, nothing about school choice, regardless of the form, guarantees parents get the kind of school quality they desire . Studies have shown that in a typical school choice program, the private school services that parents mostly desire — small class sizes, well-rounded curriculum, individualized services — will still be out of reach for most parents. He  talks about people getting a laugh over the Texas GOP's education plank of their platform but goes on to say we really should be worried about Dems.  He's right.  If Obama doesn't watch out charters/TFA will be his NCLB (as NCLB is the tattered legacy of George W. Bush). Speaking of Bush, here's...

Rep. Reuven Carlyle has come out on his blog with a post that firmly aligns him in the ed reform camp.  This is his choice to make but it is not what I have heard from him in the past.   He also says some very unfair things and uses straight-out-of-the-book ed reform jargon.  (Seems he's starting getting the daily faxes from Stand on talking points.) I predict this divide is going to really be sharply felt next legislative session.  I think it is going to make for some really hard feelings (and hard choices) for many Democrats, both voters and elected officials.  But frankly, so be it.  I just wish that the ed reform side had the courage and courtesy to make some real acknowledgments about the other side - the "there are plenty of other things we can do" side. But I just want to go through Carlyle's piece and point out a few things: He completely echoes Nick Haneur on many points and I suspect these are the new talking points that are being passed ar...

Over at Publicola, they report that WEA president, Mary Lindquist, wrote an open letter based on what Nick Hanauer had to say about public education in the state of Washington. You can read the whole thing there but she says several things I find I can agree with her on: And yet, in a single email, he has managed to align himself with a politician who is antithetical to all of those progressive values. First, it must be clearly understood that it is the voters of Washington – not the WEA – that have rejected charter schools on three separate occasions in recent years.  Voters know that for charter schools to be imposed, advocates like Hanauer would need to poach funding from local neighborhood schools and districts. In the 2010 legislative session, WEA pushed the adoption of SB 6696. Now we are engaged in a collaborative process with districts across the state to pilot new evaluation systems. We see signs this system will make a real difference for students. We look f...