Seattle Schools Community Forum

Mainly just the calm before the storm of school starting up but there are several happy events; namely, the ribbon-cuttings and tours of new schools.  (I am going to try to go to all of them). Thursday, September 1 - Thornton Creek K-5 - 11am-noon - Hazel Wolf K-8 @ Pinehurst School - 1-2 pm Friday, September 2nd - Seattle World School @ T.T. Minor School -11am-noon Saturday, September 3rd  Community Meeting with Director Peters Magnolia Library, 2801 34th Ave. W 11 am-12:30 pm   Tuesday, September 6th - Arbor Heights - 11 am - noon - Genesee Hill - 1-2 pm Update: story from SPS Communications on the new Arbor Heights school.

Thanks to reader Rocky for this info. The City is having a meeting tonight at 6:30 pm in the Thornton Creek Elementary cafeteria to discuss SPS' request for a waiver from City zoning regs for the new school. From the City's press release: The School District is requesting changes to City zoning regulations for the following: 1) Greater than allowed building height. 2) Less than required on-site parking. 3) Continuation of on-street bus loading and unloading.  This meeting will include a presentation before the Development Standards Departure Advisory Committee, a group composed of neighbors and School District and City representatives, on the requested changes to the development standards (zoning). There will also be an opportunity for the public to make comments concerning the request.  Following public testimony, the committee can recommend a waiver, recommend with conditions, or deny the request; or it can decide to hold additional m...

Even though school is out there are several important meetings this week. Tuesday, June 25th Work Session on Growth Boundaries , 4:30-6:30 pm, no presentation yet available. This is the Work Session that Tracy Libros referenced in her remarks to the Board at the School Board meeting last Wednesday.  She mentioned that Lucy Morello of BEX would also be presenting in conjunction with capacity management. Community Meeting about the Wilson-Pacific projects , 7:30 pm at W-P Wednesday, June 26th Work Session on Strategic Partnerships and Communications , 4-5:30 pm  (I have no idea of how anyone thinks there could be any real discussion of any of these departments in this amount of time.  It's just ridiculous unless, of course, the idea is to NOT have discussion.) - Government Relations presentation - Office of Public Affairs and Communications presentation . - School and Community Partnerships Department presentation .  Oddly, this one includes the new - - - ...

I couldn't stay long (darn cold) but I did make some remarks and heard other interesting remarks. First up was Wayne Barnett of the City Ethics department who gave a concise and lively wrap-up of what has been happening with this joint ethics venture between the City and the district.  This is a mid-term report as they are in the middle of the 3-year process. He said that everyone at JSCEE had been given the ethics training as had all the principals. In terms of advice, as of now about 80% of the contacts had been via phone or e-mail.  He said they have slightly less active than at the City level but that is to be expected (given the relative sizes of each). Investigations.  He stated they received their 100th call this week.  He said about a quarter of all calls had launched investigations.  He said about 60% of those calls did not fall under their jurisdiction but that the City had been pleased to act as a liaison between the district and the callers t...

For those who don't know, McGilvra is a small (269) thriving elementary in Madison Park. Because of the dedication of their parents and being in a fairly well-to-do area, McGilvra has high test scores and a PTA that raises roughly $260,000 a year. Yes, a year. They fund 3.6 FTE. InJuly of 2000, bought 2 portables for their school to lower class size and to increase the overall capacity of the school. When they bought the portables, they and the district signed an agreement about their use. So what's the problem? It's a dual one. First, under NCLB, students at schools that did not meet AYP were allowed to leave their school for another school in their same area. McGilvra could not get out of this federal regulation and may have had to take in some students (although it seems like it must have been very few). This is not discussed anywhere at the McGilvra website but I know from other research that it was an issue. Second, of course, was the New Student Assignment Pl...

Let's go through the Transition Plan amendments being proposed by Board Directors. Harium Martin-Morris I move that there be a one-year special program preference for Thornton Creek 5th graders applying to Salmon Bay as their first choice school, without transportation, with tiebreakers applied in the following sequence: 1.Sibling 2.Special program preference for Thornton Creek 5th graders 3.Geography 4. Lottery So this would keep TC students flowing to Salmon Bay. Of course, without transportation, how many will be able to make this choice? Maybe someone at TC could let us know what they think the rough numbers might be. Salmon Bay is less difficult to get into than it used and if more TC students didn't go, there'd be more spaces for other students. The accompanying chart shows that it truly varies from year to year where TC 5th graders go for middle school. Oddly, either the number got left off, but they give no numbers for how many TC 5th graders went to Eckstein f...

(Did anyone attend Tuesday's? I think Dorothy said she did. I looked at the PowerPoint and there is a lot of stuff that I wish I had heard presented. I'll have to tease it out in another thread. Here are my notes from the PowerPoint of the 2nd of last week's "integrated" work sessions (a mash-up of budget and transition plan). I did not stay until the end so help me out if you did. All the Directors were in attendance as was Dr. Goodloe-Johnson. They started at page 45 of the previous day's work session. They started talking about program placement and the new possible Accelerated IB program in response to the overcrowding at Garfield. It would be modeled after the program at Interlake over in Bellevue. (I'll just say here that I think it's done. The community would have to rise up, en masse, to prevent it. I just think there's way too much work already done for this to be just a "possibility." The question is whe...

Questions and Answers - NSAP Q: Jane Addams only has a 3-year commitment as a K-8. There is concern that we won't be able to attract parents in January if they don't believe the program will continue. A: Dr. Goodloe-Johnson initially seemed confused (even though it was a pretty clear question, maybe she forgot where she was or the circumstances in the new JA creation). Anyway she said there were 3 factors to consider. One, the comprehensive school report. Two, enrollment at JA. Three, we are going into year 2 of the NSAP. Geographic zones are going to be drawn for option schools. There may be a boundary issues for Garfield. Between November and January we should know. (So the enrollment number analysis plus the geographic zones created should give us the answers to what tweaks may occur for the NSAP. This would be a good time to stay tuned in and not zone out during the holidays.) Q: Will boundaries for neighborhoods be redrawn? A: That's always a question mark...