Seattle Schools Community Forum

Thursday, October 20th Operations Committee Meeting from 4:30-6:30 pm at JSCEE.  No agenda yet available. Again, I see that last Saturday, October 15th, there were four community meetings with directors and yet this week there are none.  It continues to puzzle me that the directors cannot try to space out meetings so that there is at least one per weekend.  To note: the Mayor and the Superintendent met to try to talk about a new high school at Seattle Center as the City thinks about revamping that area. 

Another week, another Friday Memo . This week's memo has some interesting bits including:

From Goldy over at The Slog (I had been wondering about this myself): Two-and-a-half years after promising to build a million-dollar playground in exchange for replacing a beloved kiddie amusement park with a for-profit glass "museum," gift shop, and catering hall , Seattle Center director Robert Nellams announced today they will begin seeking proposals from local design teams to build the "Artists at Play" children’s play area on three remaining acres of the former Fun Forest site. The playground is now scheduled to open in the summer of 2014. But according to Nellams, we should apparently be damn grateful for the generosity of its corporate sponsors. “I'd like to remind everyone that this is a donation from the Wright Family, from Chihuly," Nellams offered the council, unprompted. So if you're a local artist or designer interested in submitting a proposal, go to the Seattle Center website for details , and be sure to complete your sub...

From the website : The 2013 Seattle Science Festival, an 11-day celebration of the science and technology happening in our community, runs June 6-16, 2013 . It features luminaries from the science world in opening and closing night events, a free Science EXPO Day featuring hands-on activities and special stage programs on Saturday, June 8 at Seattle Center, and a variety of Signature Programs  at venues around the region throughout the Festival.  Today is the Middle School Science Fair for SPS. Looks like lots of great stuff and Saturday, June 8th, Science EXPO Day is FREE (and includes, no kidding, "a bilingual inflatable colon."   Science EXPO Day is filled with fun and educational programs, including over 150 engaging exhibits , an introduction to Geocaching , the 2013 Laser Roadshow , "an Amazing Glimpse into Lasers, Optics, and Photonics!" and a full day of Stage Programming.

It is always my intention to learn so I read whatever is handy.  So I was in a business office this past week and there was the Puget Sound Business Journal (which I don't regularly read).   So I'm reading this article about how the EMP wants a break on its rent.  (Apparently Paul Allen might not subsidize it forever.)  EMP agreed with the City that there would be rent increases every five years from the time it opened in 2000.  But now EMP is saying they are a non-profit (albeit fronted by one of the wealthiest men in the world) and they say they do lots of "cultural education" to local schoolchildren.  It is also mentioned in the artilce that EMP has an exclusive liquor license that means no new potential restaurants or bars at Seattle Center can serve liquor.  (Talk about a benefit.)  So the City did offer them a rent break in exchange for giving up that exclusivity but EMP said no.   (To which I would say, then sink or swim...

What the word? First up, the hacked grades story in the Times.  Right now it looks like it's at Chief Sealth, Ballard and Ingraham (all corners of the city).  Apparently some kids are blabbing about this and I'm sure someone is going to get caught.  (I love when kids think they will never get caught and then go tell someone what they did.  Kids, loose lips sink ships.)  The Times also reported that the City signed a deal with the Space Needle Corp for a  Chihuly glass exhibition hall.  This includes a $1M for a children's playground (yay for kids) and again, some kind of educational tie-in with SPS. The deal was sweetened with the addition of the playground, as well as arts-education programs at the Chihuly museum in partnership with Seattle Public Schools and other arts organizations. The New York Times had a story about rigor in high school classes.  This idea is taking on Supreme Court visions akin to what the definition is of pornogr...

Dipping my toe somewhat outside of education (but related to kids), I wanted to ask you readers what you thought should happen to the Fun Forest and the area around it. As you may be aware, there is outside funding for a Chihuly Glass Museum to be placed there. I personally am against this idea as (1) I don't think his work is really art for the ages (2) EMP is already an expensive museum at Seattle Center and do we need another one (3) there is a glass museum in Tacoma already and (4) we need the green space. What I (and some others) are putting forth, for at least some of the space, is an adventure playground. These playgrounds take different forms. I have seen some in Europe that have these enormous sturdy rope climbing areas, others have imaginative play and others have ziplines. I sent an e-mail to the City Council on this issue and I had found some good examples so I thought I would pass them onto you as food for thought. I think having open spaces in downtown would be gr...