Seattle Schools Community Forum

Good morning on the start of this Memorial Day weekend.  Please consider taking a little time to explain to your children why they have Monday off from school and the sacrifices that have been made for all of us by service members in our armed forces. Interesting article on the growth of Montessori-based public schools (both traditional and charter.) As a complete opposite to the Washington State Supreme Court, the Texas Supreme Court is taking a decidedly hands-off approach to school funding in that state.  From NPR:

From SPS Communications: The Washington Art Education Association (WAEA) announced two Seattle Public Schools’ teachers as Educators of the Year for the elementary and middle school levels. Jennifer Lundgren of Montlake Elementary School and Jennifer Heller of Eckstein Middle School received the award based on their accomplished teaching.

The reporting on the School Board meeting will be in two parts as there was major discussion around the Gates grant for a preschool at Bailey-Gatzert and discussion around funding a downtown school building. Part One. It was an evening of back-and-forth about the Gates Foundation grant for a preschool at SPS, curious claims on room at that school (for preschool AND for downtown kids) and not one, but two, mariachi performances.  Director Blanford was not present for the majority of the meeting (but came in later).

I've now heard of two neighborhoods that are not happy with boundary changes. Members of the Hawthorne Elementary community is not happy about having their middle school assignment changed from Mercer to Aki Kurose. Members of the Georgetown community are not happy about having their elementary school assignment changed from Maple to Van Asselt.

This can be an open thread on issues at your school .  I've heard from several schools that have concerns about academics and growth boundaries. UPDATE:   I am also hearing that hours for nurses are being reduced at schools to about 1 day a week (or less).  I'll have to check into this because while I love the idea of health centers at all the comprehensive high schools (and a couple of middle schools) via the F&E levy, I am dismayed that other schools will barely register a medical presence.  Anyone hear anything about this at your school? First up is Garfield .   The president of the Garfield PTSA contacted Director Smith-Blum with worries over class assignments at Garfield.  Apparently there aren't enough classes - in biology and Spanish - to help all the students trying to fulfill graduation requirements for college admissions.    Some students only have four classes and want to have a full compliment of classes. It seems to be ...

Reminders for Saturday: Board Community Meetings: DeBell from 9-11am at Cafe Appassinato Family Symposium / Road Map to College Event at Chief Sealth High School from 10 am- 3 p.m. Good News in SPS: Hawthorne Community raised more than $11K to "reimagine" their library. Roosevelt High School's Hands for a Bridge program received the World Educator award from the World Affairs Council.  The program is being recognized for " its dedication to increasing global awareness and fostering dialogue about issues surrounding social justice." SPS's LGBT Families Dinner is Thursday, November 9th from 6-8 p.m. at NOVA/World School at Meany.  Dinner is provided.  Questions and RSVP to Lisa Love at 252-0982 or llove@seattleschools.org with how many people in your group or for more information.  What's on your mind?  

I visited Hawthorne earlier this year when they opened their Family Support room.  The Times has a story about the energy surging through this school from both parents and staff.  This is how a community retakes and rebuilds its neighborhood school. The story I was told was that a couple of neighborhood parents, when their kids were preschools, thought, "why wouldn't I go to my neighborhood school?" when neighbors tried to warn them off.  Undeterred, they enrolled their children and had potlucks and neighborhood gatherings to talk about how to support the school and what incredible diversity they would be giving their own children (not to mention being able to walk to school).  These are real parents making a real difference.  Their principal is totally supportive and works with all groups.  This is how you do it.  I am also aware of efforts at Northgate Elementary for parents in that neighborhood who want to have a neighborhood school and will...

I attended part of the Board retreat last Saturday and part of the (kind of funny) School Board meeting last night.  If you've been around this district awhile, you could definitely feel a change. 

So how's your day going?  Mine started at the computer at midnight trying to get onto the Target site.  (If you have been keeping up, you'll know what I mean; otherwise, carry on.) Later on, when there was daylight, I had a great talk with Mary Linquist, President of the WEA, and Becky Pringle, the Sec-Treasurer of the NEA .  The NEA does these across-the-country school tours and this year's tour was part of their new campaign, Priority Schools .  This campaign is in support of the work of NEA members in SIG schools across the country.  Ms. Pringle came to Seattle to see West Seattle Elementary and Hawthorne Elementary (Cleveland is another one but not enough time).  She and Ms. Linquist were very impressed with both schools, both with the staffs AND spirit at each school. They both agree that these were two of the best SIG schools they had seen in staff enthusiasm, planning and outcomes.  It was nice to hear and kudos to those two schools.  ...

The stars aligned last night and Charlie and I were once again in the same place - the CPPS event on parent engagement at Lincoln High.  This event was great because there was evidence that the work CPPS is doing around parent engagement is reaching the right people. Also, I feel this may be a signal or a golden moment for parents to seize upon; this based on what the Superintendent had to say about parent input AND the CPPS idea of "training" parents to be advocates for their child.   I only wish this wasn't coming at the end of the school year when people are starting to dial back. Credit goes to all the CPPS staff but especially Stephanie Jones .

A round-up from all over (thanks to Maureen for this story from the My Ballard blog): Ballard High School students are learning how to handle oil spills. On Thursday, students in the school’s Maritime Academy conducted an “oil spill drill” as part of their Sophomore Maritime Survey. The fictitious spill took place off Port Angeles where one oil tanker collided with another vessel. “The students had to demonstrate their familiarity with different types of spill response equipment (containment boom, skimmers, etc.), nautical charts, NOAA oil spill response software, tide tables and federal guidelines for spill response.,” Foster tells us. “Within an hour the teams were able to locate the spill, predict its trajectory for the next three days, organize and stage equipment to respond, and set up a decontamination station for effected personnel and animals.” If you’re not familiar with the Ballard Maritime Academy, it is a three-year program at Ballard High School with a hands-on...

From the blog , " The Adventures of the Kidde Woodward Family" , a SE family's view of the School Reports. It's long but filled with great examples, musings and anguish for what can be done. A few excerpts: First of all: I feel like your relentless reliance on quantifiable data is obscuring some of the things that really matter to me. Now, I know it's important to have specific goals and to track measurable results. But in order to get data tell you anything useful, you have to understand its context. You have to know where the numbers came from, and what their limitations are. You have to ask yourself how (and if) what they're measuring relates to what you think is important. You have to put the data in the service of human connections, experience, and judgment -- instead of the other way around. (bold mine) About South Shore's low scores last year: Do I sound like I'm making excuses? I'm not making excuses. Nor do I mean to imply that...

As you may have noticed from the tv ads, school is going to start up soon in some areas of the country. Here, SPS will be starting up again on September 8th. (Although the Board calendar shows that Hawthorne and West Seattle Elementaries will start on August 31st.) We won't see the Board in action again until the August 18th Board meeting. That should definitely be interesting as I would expect them to say something, anything about the audit report. There will be many Board committee meetings this month but no Board member district meetings. (There is one Board workshop this month about Families and Education levy and budget goals.) I think one of the best places to hear the Board hash out the coming year will be at the Board retreat on September 11th. But it sure has gotten heated over at Harium Martin-Morris' blog on the issue of the audit. Harium asks one anonymous person to watch their tone (and I would agree). Don't ever post in anger even if you are angry...

There was an editorial and an article in the Times today of interest. The editorial , titled Education: Congress Needs a Clear Plan, Not a Blank Check , refers to the $23B Congress had planned to send to states for emergency public school aid. Arne Duncan says that 100,000 to 300,000 education jobs are at risk (includes support staff). The choice is keep teachers or increase class sizes. The Democrats are sponsoring this measure in both house of Congress and the Republican response is that throwing more money at a problem without seeing results from previous money spent isn't the answer. Ground zero is California with a $19B budget deficit. Their school budget ends summer school, music and art classes, bus routes, days in the school years and teachers. The Times seems to feel that there aren't going to be that many teachers laid off (maybe not in Washington state but what about elsewhere?). They rightly point out this will increase the national debt. I would give cr...

You may recall that three of Seattle Public Schools were the recipients of a large federal School Improvement Grant (SIG), Cleveland, Hawthorne, and West Seattle Elementary. These schools were all identified as persistently under-performing and they were all supposed to get GOBS of cash from the federal government if they would agree to a turnaround plan. Four turnaround plan options were available, but the District (and the SEA) agreed to use the Transformation solution for all three schools. The Transformation plan at Cleveland is well-known, it will become STEM. Cleveland will be transformed by replacing the current population of unmotivated and under-performing students with other students who are motivated and high performing. But what are the transformation plans for Hawthorne and West Seattle Elementary? No one knows. There are no plans reported at all to date. There has been absolutely no effort at community engagement about any of it. These two elementary schools are supposed ...

Unlike the last round of closures that had lots of South and Southeast schools involved in the proposals, this round has relatively few. The Rainier Beach / Aki Kurose proposal for co-location I believe has merit. There is some research that 6-12 schools can be good for helping students otherwise at risk of dropping out reach graduation. Rainier Beach staff and teachers seem to be working very hard to improve the academics and keep a small community-school environment where the teachers know everybody. I believe a 6-12 configuration would address the concerns about the building capacity and allow those teachers to continue their good work, while also bringing Aki Kurose, a school that needs to be restructured according to NCLB, into a school that is on the upswing. I'm surprised that the African American Academy closure proposal is not receiving more opposition than it is. We may still hear more, but from what I have read and heard from south end parents and activists, some peop...