Seattle Schools Community Forum

From this week we see that Dr. Enfield, at least in the case of TFA, wasn't open to listening to parent/community input at all.  That she would mock/laugh with a TFA rep at input from those in opposition to TFA is quite disturbing.  I'll be interested to see if she ever addresses this issue with me or anyone else.  We also have yet another wealthy person who wants to make over public education in the form of hey! he's from Microsoft, Scott Oki.   As former School Board director, Steve Brown, once said to me, "Why is it that wealthy people always want to start new things and not help fix our existing schools?"  Next week is the last full week of summer for our kids.  I'm sure it's a melancholy time for some of you and others can't wait.  As a reminder, Kay Smith-Blum is having her community meeting tomorrow from 10-11:30 am at the Douglass-Truth library.  Her agenda has a large number of items and Executive Director Nancy Coogan will als...

A story in Crosscut ("The Parents Union: A new force for education reform?") describes an effort by Scott Oki ("self-described 'serial entrepreneur' and community activist") to form a "parent's union" to counter the strength of the teachers' union and promote public school reform in Washington State. What an idiot. Mr. Oki has no idea what he's doing or what he's talking about. The article makes that pretty clear. * He says that the teachers' union blocks reform, but all of the other folks in the article acknowledge that the WEA is supportive of reform. * He says that the problem is bloated central bureaucracies, but the teachers' union didn't create and doesn't maintain those. * He says that parents should be able to send their child to the school of their choice - as if we have never tried that - but he has no solution for when 5,000 families choose Garfield. * He says that school families have no voic...