Seattle Schools Community Forum

Analysis I am going to believe the Superintendent as he tells principals that Math in Focus in the sole selection for K-5 math and will be used in the fall.  I am disappointed that he said in the letter, "I know many of us are frustrated about the process."  It's an odd statement given the district - not the Board - designed the process.  The actual vote on it was designed by the State Legislature (meaning the Board has the final, legal say on the curriculum). I am going to believe the Superintendent when he says that MIF will be funded to be "fully implemented" including professional development. Updates -  Clearly, someone from above was trying to maneuver the BLT process .  I say this because I heard from three different people at three different schools about a math adoption survey.  It was the same survey .  Now how could that have happened, I wonder. It was also a strange survey asking parents what is important to them in math curricu...

Here's the latest that I have gleaned from various sources: - Michael Tolley did indeed, in front of Director McLaren, say that "in effect there is a dual adoption."   This is stunning.  I believe now that if this push to have schools - in effect vote on which math curriculum they want - blows up in staff's collective faces, they will then say, "Oh, we interpreted the Board vote as dual because we have a math waivers policy."  That may have been why the Superintendent repeatedly told me yesterday that the math waivers policy was important in this discussion. I'm not sure that CYA will work but good luck.  At the worst, someone may be out of a job and at the least, a very bitter wind will continue to blow through this district.

In case you didn't notice, the number of MAC members who filed their own opinions went up from 1 teacher to 3 more on the committee. I believe there may be three certain votes against the adoption of enVision.   I think there could be a fourth vote but again, hard to discern. My concern is not that some members of the Board will agree with the recommendation (or the process used to get to this point) but they will hear the eternal siren call of the staff "hurry up, gotta get it done, money will be lost."  It seems to work for some Board members every -single - time and I have to wonder why. My hope is that if the Board goes along with the staff rec, that at least some of the Board will state that they will no longer accept work that is not objective and complete from staff within a stated timeframe on any future votes. It appears that the principals group board (PASS) is supporting the recommendations of MAC. The SCPTA board is taking a more nuanced view...

Tuesday, September 20th @ 7:30 pm the 43rd Legislative District Democrats will be voting on endorsements , including three School Board seats. The 43rd LD meets at University Heights Community Center, 5031 University Way NE  Wednesday, September 21 Community Meeting with Director Sundquist , from 11 am to 12:30 p.m. at the Delridge Library, 5423 Delridge Way SW Presentation by PASS (the principals' association) to the School Board on goals for this school year, from 5:30 -5:45 p.m. at headquarters (right before the School Board meeting) School Board meeting, 6-9 p.m.  Agenda is fairly short so it shouldn't be three hours.   There are some facilities acceptance items, approval of the High Point Promise Neighborhood application (which seems like a good deal as the money, $455,472 is "in-kind" from existing grant dollars and is for services at West Seattle Elementary and Denny Middle School), the postponed Conditional Certification for two TFA teachers, in...

One, don't forget that LEV is having a live on-line chat today at noon about charter schools.   Two, the BEX Oversight Committee meeting tomorrow morning has been moved to Chief Sealth High School (likely because they will be doing a Denny walk-thru) at 8:30 am. Three, I'll be doing a thread on the Executive Committee meeting yesterday but there was mention of the furlough day for SPS staff coming up on August 31st.   Here's the letter that was sent out: "On that day [August 31], all SEA and PASS represented staff as well as all non-represented staff will be furloughed and prohibited from working.   I need to stress this IS NOT OPTIONAL.    The federal Fair Labor Standards Act states that if you are a non-exempt employee (which is how all employees are defined during a furlough week regardless of position), you must be compensated for ALL hours worked during that week. Having to compensate someone for working on a furlough day runs counter to ...

There were a couple of new op-eds in Crosscut this week.

Last story: shocking news but all this turnaround and transformation? It's just dawning on some ed reformers that it might not be so easy to find replacements for principals. This was also in the NY Times. The Obama plan for turning around low-performing schools has hit a snag: That policy decision, though, ran into a difficult reality: there simply were not enough qualified principals-in-waiting to take over. Many school superintendents also complained that replacing principals could throw their schools into even more turmoil, hindering nascent turnaround efforts. And, guess what? They have to slow down the machine, allowing principals in place to stay on for three years instead of two. Although the program created an expectation that most schools would get new leadership, new data from eight large states show that many principals’ offices in failing schools still bear the same nameplates. About 44 percent of schools receiving federal turnaround money in these states still have t...

Flying under the radar, we finally have a 3-year principals contract that has been approved by PASS, the principals' representative group. It needs to be approved by the Board at Wednesday's School Board meeting. I attended a meeting where Director Sundquist and Howard Pripas, the Director of Labor and Employee Relations went over the principals contract. It is quite an interesting contract. Here's some highlights: Steve says the key change is the principal evaluation process which is being worked on and is due to be done by April 1 by the Principal Performance Evaluation Task Force. The evaluation would include student and school growth. To get the increase in pay, this evaluation system has to be completed by April 1, 2011. This contract takes principals from a 3-step salary range to their salary (beyond base pay) being determined through the annual opportunity to earn both a Performance Increment and a Student Achievement Bonus. The district had done assessm...