Seattle Schools Community Forum

November 19, 2014.   Mark it on your calendar or in your journal.  Because today, to my mind and experience, marks the beginning of the reform movement of our district.  (I say "our" district meaning the parents and taxpayers of Seattle.  I leave out staff because they have unions and contracts to protect them.) In a couple of days, if you watch the meeting online, you might be puzzled.  Sure, it's a packed house (and very few who came to the meeting actually got to speak about their issue) and sure enough, droning reports from staff, so what's so different? The difference is - as Charlie points out - that lawlessness has taken our district.  The manipulation of district processes are now being controlled but surely not by the Board. The Board had to vote - under Board policy 6114 and 1620 - on the Gates Foundation Preschool grant.  That Action Item, so lovingly written as to make it sound like the district had to fire this shot against the inju...

Update: The NY Times had an article on the decline of science fair participation. At his State of the Union speech, President Obama said something to the effect of it being just as important who wins the science fair as who wins the Super Bowl. It got a good round of applause. Pondering this, though, I have to wonder. In SPS, it seems like there is a ton of work and effort all towards the goal of academic achievement for our students. But: We have a gifted program that gets spotty attention from the administration and attacked from within/without (people in the program worry about quality and loss of the program, some people outside the program wish it didn't exist). There are individual school programs that compete in academic programs like debate, Latin and robotics but only in competitions outside the district. Schools are spotty on whether they have honor roll in middle and high schools. When my son was at Eckstein, I was told they suspended it because "it hurts k...