Seattle Schools Community Forum

Trump has selected Betsy DeVos of Michigan as his pick for the next Secretary of Education.  Who is she?  Well, for one, not an educator. 

I note that the next week is the Mid-Winter break but only Monday and Tuesday with school resuming on Wednesday, Feb. 17th.    Monday, Feb. 8th Curriculum&Instruction Policy Committee meeting at JSCEE, from 4:30-6:30 pm.  Agenda I note from the minutes of the last C&I meeting that there are now 21 Racial Equity teams .  It would be interesting to hear more about what these teams are doing and how much variation there is by school. I also see that the district is asking for a waiver of the 180-day school year requirement of three days so that elementaries and K-8s can have parent-teacher conferences.  This is nothing new but the one thing that caught my eye is that the district saves about $120K by not operating buses to elementary schools on those three days.  Wonder what they do with that savings? Looking thru the documentation, I see a document from the Alliance for Education that the district is accepting a grant via the Nesholm Family ...

Locally SOAR Charter Academy in Tacoma apparently did do all the corrections that the Charter Commission had required them to do and SOAR did open this week.  (I note that they already had an early-release day - that was fast.)  The Times is reporting that all eight charter schools opening this fall are full and had lotteries.  (There was no evidence given how the Times knows this to be true.) States Speaking of charters, wealthy ed philanthropist Eli Broad is doubling down in LA.  From the Los Angeles Times:

I'm sure most of you have heard of the right-wing think-tank, the American Enterprise Institute.  Their director of educational-policy studies is Frederick M Hess who, back in Fall 2011, wrote a lengthy essay, Does School Choice "Work ".  I would grab a cup of coffee if you intend to read the whole thing but honestly, it's quite illuminating to hear from someone who I might think I wouldn't normally read for information on educational policy.  To whit: A few years ago, the Manhattan Institute's Sol Stern — author of Breaking Free: Public School Lessons and the Imperative of School Choice — caused a stir when he backed away from his once-ardent support. Howard Fuller, an architect of Milwaukee's school-voucher plan and the godfather of the school-choice movement, has wryly observed, "I think that any honest assessment would have to say that there hasn't been the deep, wholesale improvement in [Milwaukee Public Schools] that we would h...

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...

My, but this was a year of change for Seattle Public Schools. Change at the top. The biggest news of the year was the sudden dismissal of the superintendent, Dr. Maria Goodloe-Johnson. The Board, which had dragged their feet from June to March in response to the State Auditor's report, acted expeditiously between their receipt of a report from an internal investigation of the Regional Small Business Development Program and their decision to fire the superintendent. We can make all kinds of conjecture about why the Board decided to fire her, but we need to give strong credence to their stated reason: they no longer felt that they could trust her. Dr. Goodloe-Johnson had been losing the Board's trust bit by bit in a number of other incidents over the course of the previous three years. The "Pottergate" scandal was just the last step - a big one - that took her over the line. Dr. Goodloe-Johnson was fired "without cause" and took a year's pay (over a qua...

Lots of interesting news stories out there, here are some of them. Singapore Math on the front page of the NY Times. Guess what? It's what they use at the school Obama's daughters attend. Singapore math may well be a fad, too, but supporters say it seems to address one of the difficulties in teaching math: all children learn differently. In contrast to the most common math programs in the United States, Singapore math devotes more time to fewer topics, to ensure that children master the material through detailed instruction, questions, problem solving, and visual and hands-on aids like blocks, cards and bar charts. Singapore math’s added appeal is that it has largely skirted the math wars of recent decades over whether to teach traditional math or reform math. Indeed, Singapore math has often been described by educators and parents as a more balanced approach between the two, melding old-fashioned algorithms with visual representations and critical thinking. Bu...

From the Candidate Scorecard thread, this discussion started: On 9/8/09 at 1:11 PM, tg wrote... As a new parent in the south end, I'm curious how the board will make an effort to keep families like mine in the public system if the assignment plan seems to be moving more towards keeping kids going to the schools located closest to their home. If my choices come down to sending the kid to a school with less programs and support, moving, or finding a way to pay for private school, I'll probably pick one of the latter two choices if Seattle's south end schools continue to lag behind the north. I never thought I'd send my kid to private school, but the more I read this blog and other things on Seattle's schools, the less inclined I am to stay in them, at least down here in south Seattle. At 3:04 PM, Charlie Mas asked... tg, I hope you're still around and can answer an open-ended question. What would it take for you to choose your neighborhood school? What would the...