Seattle Schools Community Forum

I've had several emails from parents pleading for info on waitlists.  I truly have none beyond what the district says but I did hear from someone in the know.   Here's an opening remark: The waitlist is a dead end! Do not give parents and students false hope with the creation of a waitlist. 

Monday, Nov. 16th Community Meeting on Assignment Plan at Rainier Beach High School, starting at 6:30 pm.  This is the last of the meetings on this topic.  I still maintain this was window-dressing and not about staff getting and receiving real input on this topic.  I'll have a separate thread on what readers have said but it seems clear that the waitlist is still an issue. Wednesday, Nov. 18th Board meeting starting at 4:15 pm.  Something of an end of an era for this particular make-up for the Seattle School Board. Agenda . I do want to publicly say thank you to each of the Board members who are leaving - Harium Martin-Morris, Sherry Carr, Sharon Peaslee and Marty McLaren.  I walked Fremont with Sherry Carr to help her get elected.  I worked on the campaigns of both Sharon Peaslee and Marty McLaren (her first one.)  It takes courage to even stand up and run for office and even more courage and energy to serve.  I certainly have disagreed...

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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...

There's a story getting national attention about a mother in Ohio who was convicted of a felony and jailed for using a false address to send her kids to a safer/better school. Now that the Seattle School District is making it even tougher for families to avoid their neighborhood schools, one has to wonder if we'll be seeing more of these sort of enforcement actions around here. I'm finding some of the comments about this story on several news sites to be instructive and frightening.

There were two items from the Board's discussion of the assignment boundaries that referenced APP and I think it would be best if we tried to contain the discussion of those two items to this thread specifically for discussing those two points and off the main thread discussing the meeting. First, Director Chow went off - why isn't she gone already? - on how there is no high school APP so why should APP students get assigned to Garfield ahead of neighborhood kids? Here are some fun facts: despite what Director Chow may think, APP DOES continue through high school. The District has always said so, both in its public documents, in its annual reports to the State (which Director Chow has voted to approve four times), and in its annual grant application (which Director Chow has voted to approve four times). Let's not forget that Cheryl Chow was the principal at Garfield for a time. It's no surprise that the program was not well-supported during her administration. That was ...

The Student Assignment Plan page has posted the Community meetings for the boundaries for the new student assignment plan. They stretch over nearly 4 weeks (and thank you to Tracy Libros who had the smarts to realize that fairness dictates giving parents a large window to give input). Interpretation and sign language interpretation will be available at some meetings. The meetings start on Monday, Oct. 12 and end on Saturday, Nov. 7th. The comments page is at this link . The boundary maps will first be seen at the Board Work Session on Tuesday, October 6th from 4-8 p.m.

Lots of Board Executive Sessions over the next week. First, there's a 3-hour one on Wednesday about "negotiations" which I take to mean the SEA contract. Then, on June 3rd, there's an hour-and-half session about the Superintendent evaluation (oh, to be a fly on the wall). Note: executive means just the Board and not the public. On Wednesday, June 10th, there's a Public Hearing on the Student Assignment plan at 6 p.m. (no site noted, I'll check). This is likely to be a good overview of where they are to date. That's the good. The bad is that they are unlikely to allow any discussion and maybe just some questions (ones you write down). I hope not but this is how many meetings are done. However, since it is a public "hearing", we might be able to stand up and say, "look, we want to be heard and we want everyone to hear". There should be some airing of grievances (okay, concerns) a la Festivus for parents.

So I was trying to get up to speed on the new Assignment Plan. At the Assignment Plan page , there is an FAQ page. On the FAQ page, there are FAQs relating to different topics as well as a " As Heard on the Grapevine " page to help dispel/clarify what you might hear at the supermarket or at the playground. Each section comes with a Comment box to send in new questions. Good stuff. Among the interesting things I learned: - Spectrum will be available at all comprehensive middle schools. - According to this page: At the School Board workshop on March 25, we will seek guidance from the Board on the variables that should be considered when updating attendance area boundaries. Based on that guidance, we will produce initial options for school boundaries. That clearly didn't happen; we still don't know the boundaries. - There will be an English language-based program within all international schools for families seeking that option; this program will run in parallel to...

Folks, we are coming down to the wire on the Student Assignment Plan. Neither Charlie or I did post on the last community engagement (and somehow it just got away from me and I will try to this week) but what I came away with is that Tracy Libros, head of Assignment, want to know what is confusing to parents in the plan. Again, she wants to know what is confusing in the plan . That says to me that the plan is hardening and that there may be no major changes to the preliminary outlines. I urge you to go to the district website and consider all the materials there. We are heading into summer which is a parent down time (I don't blame anyone for wanting a break). However, work at the district goes on and when we head back to school in the fall, the Assignment Plan will have its final look complete with boundaries. And that's when the shouting will start. If there are things beyond boundaries that you care about, read up and let Tracy know NOW. A Board Work Session is schedul...

"Staff, families and community members are invited to attend quarterly community meetings on May 5, 6 and 9 for discussions and updates on the School District's Strategic Plan Excellence for All, development of the new Student Assignment Plan, information about upcoming levies, as well as other key topics. Tuesday, May 5 , 6:30-8:30 p.m. at Ingraham High School Library, 1819 North 135th Street Thursday, May 7 , 6:30-8:30 p.m.at the Filipino Community Center of Seattle, 5740 Martin Luther King Jr. Saturday, May 9 , 10:00 a.m. to noon at the John Stanford Center , Auditorium 2445 3rd Ave" This was on today's News and Calendar page: "Sunday, May 3: New guidelines from Public Health - Seattle & King County were issued today. Public Health will no longer order schools to close based on one case of probable and/or confirmed H1N1. + Seattle Public Schools is working with public health officials to decide whether there will be a change in status for Madrona, Aki Kuro...

Well, well, well. This certainly is a big, important Board meeting coming up this week. On the agenda are action on such long-discussed topics as: High School Math Adoption Revised Student Assignment Policy Transfer of another $1.45 million to the Garfield capital project A technical amendment to the Transportation Service Standards (for introduction and action) Also introduction of high school grading policy reform and the annual Reduction In Force. There are a number of capital projects on the agenda. I believe that a number of them are related to the Capacity Management project. If you're going to this Board meeting, I suggest you pack a snack. It's going to be a long one.

I checked out Urban Impact, the location of Tuesday night's Assignment plan/Math adoption meeting. As I posted in a previous thread, I wondered why the district chose a non-district location in a faith-based building when there are other school buildings nearby. I had to drive around a bit (for reasons that will become clear) looking for this building. I managed to overshoot it and passed Dunlap, South Lake AND Rainier Beach High School. (And FYI, the new South Shore building for New School is HUGE. I couldn't believe how large this thing is and they aren't even done. That's one school opening I'm going to attend.) So the reason I couldn't find Urban Impact is because the name on the green sign in front of the building is "Emerald City Bible Fellowship, Mission Outreach". Urban Impact is nowhere to be seen on the outside of the building so keep that in mind as you look for the building. I went inside to see the meeting room and a very nice pia...

Charlie and I (and a handful of others, about 20) attended this morning's district meeting. There were plenty of staff including interpreters. (I was really glad that one determined Latina mom sat at our table and had the interpreter telling her everything. Her concerns were quite revealing.) (Charlie, Leslie, anyone else that was there; help me if I get anything wrong.) I don't have a lot to say about the math adoption except that a recommendation has been made to use the Key Curriculum Press' Discovery books. The Math Manager, Anna Maria de la Fuente, did note that one study had said it was not a good series but that other math experts had said it was fine. I asked and she said it was used in the Lake Washington and Everett School districts. There is a Board work session on it March 25th, with introduction at the Board meeting on april 8th and approval/or not by the Board on April 22nd. I do have quite a bit to say about the new Assignment Plan. Here is a link t...

Upcoming Meetings Quarterly meetings with the public on Excellence for All are scheduled for March and May. The dates for these meetings are listed below. Locations for May meetings will be determined at a later date. Topics: Student Assignment and Math Update Saturday, March 21, from 10 a.m. to noon John Stanford Center, Auditorium 2445 3rd Ave. S. Seattle, WA 98134 Tuesday, March 24, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Urban Impact, Main Office 7728 Rainier Ave. S. Seattle, WA 98118 Thursday, March 26, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Ballard High School, Library 1418 N.W. 65th St. Seattle, WA 98117 º Tuesday, May 5, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. º Thursday, May 7, from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. º Saturday, May 9, from 10 a.m. to noon (=I was wondering about the location for the meeting next Tuesday, Urban Impact. Why not a school? I don't know. Here's what Urban Impact's website says: "The mission of Urban Impact is to strengthen families and raise servant leaders by building life-changing relationsh...

At a Board work session today from 4-5:30 pm, the revised assignment plan framework is being discussed. And, based on what I see in the presentation , the details are definitely beginning to be fleshed out. **************** 4:30 pm I'm at the Board work session now. I'm impressed by both the types of questions the Board members are asking and the respectful way they are asking them. They're not getting any answers yet...it's more like Dr. G-J is presenting info and collecting questions, but not really attempting to answer them. There is a Recorder who is taking notes of everything. 4:45 pm Tracy Libros talking about tie-breakers now. (slides 23, 24, 25) Amusingly, she started to answer a Board members' question and then stopped herself saying "Oh, I'm not supposed to answer now." So I guess that's the official plan for this session. 4:50 pm Open to general Board questions. DeBell says "there needs to be a linkage between the assignment plan an...

From the District's Assignment Plan page Public invited to quarterly community meetings to discuss updates on Strategic Plan, high school math materials adoption, Student Assignment Plan, and other key topics Seattle Public Schools' strategic plan, Excellence for All, establishes the framework for moving the District toward the goal of all students achieving at high levels and graduating ready for college, career and life. Upcoming quarterly community meetings will provide updates on the strategic plan’s progress and an opportunity to discuss key topics with our community. Included will be updates on the implementation of Excellence for All, high school math materials adoption, and development of the new Student Assignment Plan. All staff, families and community members are welcome. Interpreters will be available. Dates, times and locations are as follows: Saturday, March 21 , from 10 a.m. to noon John Stanford Center, Auditorium 2445 3rd Ave. S. Seattle, WA 98134 Tuesday, Marc...

Let me see if I can keep all this straight. We have a number of balls in the air right now and I want to have a sense of what's going on with a diverse set of issues. Please remind me of anything I've left out. 1) Follow up and fall out from Capacity Management Plan A) Design Teams are meeting but their authority - relative to the principal's authority - remains unclear. In the absence of a clear sense of their authority, their purpose remains unclear. There's a rising concern that they have neither. B) Open Enrollment has been delayed and the School Fair has been cancelled. C) There is supposed to be a second phase of Capacity Management for high schools. But no one is talking about it, when it will start, or how it will work. D) The Capacity Management Plan was flawed in a number of ways, but there is no sign that anyone in the District leadership is interested in fixing those flaws. 2) Work on the new Student Assignment Plan continues. A) It has supposedly completed ...

So I'm checking the Seattle Public Schools website and I click on information about capacity issues in the north end. They've updated it since the last Board meeting where, apparently, COO Don Kennedy presented an assessment of the different options. And boy, is it through. My head is spinning with the possibilities (and I'm still not sure what their recommendation is). I mean they give conclusions for differing scenarios but what they really think isn't clear (however, there is some spin to their rationales). And they also ran through a number of things to carry-over to the assignment plan that had been one year deals. I don't really have a problem with this (and is unclear to me if all of them passed but I suspect so). But a couple really stand out. One is the end date for waitlists. Instead of end of October, it may be moved to end of September. That's just about 3 weeks after school starts which is a pretty short time. The way the waitlists curren...

I'll just be brief on these upcoming meetings (the first this Thursday at Ingraham High School at 6:30). It is my understanding that these are to be informational meetings. There will be some historical overview given as well as our system now and what some of the issues are around how kids get assigned to schools. I stress informational because I doubt any real specifics will be discussed. You can bring them up but I'm not sure any real answers will be forthcoming. I attended a meeting (by invitation) at the district to talk about the format of these meetings (I believe Charlie attended another one as well). It was a bit confusing because I left not really knowing what the district was trying to get out of these meetings and what parents should leave with. I may try to attend one of them but if I don't get there, I hope someone else will let us know if they learned anything new from attending.