Seattle Schools Community Forum

The Friday Memo for January 6 doesn't have much in the way of news, but it does form a pretty nice round up of the news from the past month. For example:

It was suggested to me to have a "Throwback Thursday"where we revisit what the district was going to do at a previous place in time.  (Luckily this reader also provided the topic.  Also, because district staff have a bad habit of not dating documents, I'll guess this was about 2009.) Here is the Future BEX IV list, circa BTA III. 

Here is the Excel sheet for the options for the NE middle school situation.  My understanding is it is a combo of ideas from staff and FACMAC.  During the Work Session the discussion went as follows: - They were first discussing what appeared in the presentation and what FACMAC was recommending. FACMAC was recommending an Eckstein split - North and South Annexes.   Director Peaslee clarified that this was really a split and not a temporary annexation.  The answer was yes. - There was also this discussion about Jane Addams and beefing up its middle school offerings to fill the school.   (They called this "mitigation.")  But, as Director DeBell pointed out, how long could that go on and how could the district afford it?  (And, if they did this for JA, why not all K-8s?) - One interesting thing is how the district seems very committed to making sure that Eckstein North would have the same things as Eckstein South.  Phil Brockman spoke ...

I'm attending the Work Session on BEX tomorrow (and hope to attend the community meeting next week). So what are your burning BEX/Capacity questions?  I think I've already heard a few: - what is your detailed plan for middle school issues in the NE? - what boundary changes might come for 2013-2014? - which schools can be renovated on-site versus those that will need an interim site?  (BEX staff recently stated at a Board ctm. meeting that they "had" to build with the school community moved but that is just not true in all cases.  It certainly isn't true for most districts in the U.S.  Most build with the school communities still on-site. What else? Update: Here's a link to the presentation . To note; I find the silence from FACMAC kind of interesting.   The district hasn't mentioned their input in a long time.  However the presentation does say they will be speaking at the Work Session so this should be good.  From the presentation...

Monday, March 12th Open Enrollment is extended through 12:30 p.m. today because of the power outage on Friday. Tuesday, March 13th North end community meeting on Arts Education.  SPS is partnering with the Seattle Office of Arts & Cultural Affairs and community arts organizations to create a comprehensive arts plan focused on increasing quality arts education access for all K-12 students. Ballard High School from 6:30-8:30 p.m.  Children welcome. Free supervised arts activities and snacks for school-aged children provided at the first four meetings. Space is limited; RSVP is required. Wednesday, March 14th Executive Committee Meeting , 8:30-10:30 am. at JSCEE.  No agenda available yet. School Board Work Session: Instructional Technology Guiding Principles .  At JSCEE from 4-5:30 p.m Thursday, March 15th  Curriculum&Instruction and Operations Committee Meeting of the Whole from 4-7 p.m.  No agenda available but it's always interesting w...

Not much happening this week in SPS meetings but many education events this month.

Do you know about City Year ?  I had vaguely heard of it and, of course, if you see a City Year member, you see a young person in a bright red varsity jacket and khakis.   They were particularly noticeable at the recent forum on SPS put on by Seattle Channel.  I recently sat down and interviewed the head of City Year Seattle, Simon Amiel, about who City Year is and what they do in SPS. After talking with Simon, I was very impressed and I want to raise awareness and support for City Year.  The reason I feel strongly about this is because in our high-need schools,  they are doing exactly what I would like to see happen throughout the district.  They are: in schools all day tutoring students building relationships with students and staff and community being role models to students This is the kind of intimate and direct intervention that many of these students need. First, from their website, a little background information: Twen...

As I started this thread, I went to look for the handouts that were available.  Here is the link to the agenda for the handouts.  However, I am very annoyed that I cannot easily locate the one that I thought was the most interesting.  What this means is tomorrow I have to call Tracy and then have someone send me the link because, of course, you can't find a darn thing at the new website.  This also means sending a letter to the Susan Enfield (and the Board)  to request that every single thing staff hand out be posted.   (Sorry to be grumpy but it's tiresome to have to do this multiple times in a week.)  More on the interesting handout at the end of this thread. 

From the Seattle Times, a story about a former Olympic rower, Portia McGee, who is helping students in three SPS middle schools learn how to row. It's the first year of the program which is a partnership with the George Pocock Rowing Foundation and the school district. It currently runs in 3 schools - Eckstein, Washington, and Aki Kurose - and is going to expand to 3 more next year with the program at nine middle schools by 2013. Not for me but a state legislator is sponsoring a bill to allow parents to teach drivers ed to their children under 18. This came as a surprise to me because I thought the main reason to take driver's ed is to perhaps receive lower insurance rates. Driver's ed is expensive so I can see why this could make a difference to parents (although the stress and the possible damage to your car are also off-putting). The Times has the details in this story. I think the Alliance for Education has a new look for its blog (I doubt they answer comme...

The Middle School Language Arts Instructional Materials Adoption page has links for a staff/student/family survey as well as info on applying for the Adoption Committee. Again, the end date on the surveys and due date for committee applications is Jan. 6th.

This is going to be a difficult thread to address and I will try to be clear about why I think it is important. There has been a heightened awareness in the last month or so over bullying at school over students being, seeming or being perceived as gay. It has been heartbreaking to hear what has been done to young people and their reactions (suicides). The most visible case has been at Rutgers University where a freshman, Tyler Clementi, was videotaped, twice, by his roommate in an intimate encounter with another male in his dorm room. The taping streamed live on the Internet. Tyler learned of this, contacted an RA but ultimately, for whatever reason, killed himself by jumping off a bridge. Interestingly, I wouldn't call that episode bullying. It's just a breathtaking lack of kindness/sensitivity and total lack of decency on the part of his roommate (and his woman friend) and a huge amount of cruelty and meanness to have done this to Tyler. Many have felt the perpetrato...

This story appeared in this morning's PI. The Oak Harbor School Board has rewritten their policy on cell phones to include allowing administrators to search the phones in order to protect the district against possible criminal charges around sexting. It's interesting because there are no real laws against sexting per se but there are laws around sending, receiving or storing photos of minors in a state of nudity on a cell phone (it's a felony). From the article: The first reading of the new policy, which was unanimously approved at Monday’s board meeting, states, “By bringing a cell phone and other electronic devices to school or school sponsored events, the student and parents consent to the search of the device when school officials have a reasonable suspicion that such a search will reveal a violation of school rules.” Assistant Superintendent Lance Gibbon presented the policy to the board. He pointed out that school officials already have the right to search...

I'm starting to hear about people who want to take their children out of their middle school math class and replace it with something else. There are a variety of reasons for their decision, and, I suspect, they are having a variety of success with the process. Perhaps we can share our situations here and share our understanding of the process and its requirements. Why opt out of middle school math? I've heard a variety of reasons including: 1. The quality of instruction is dreadful. A number of people have reported to me that the teacher just isn't very good and isn't communicating the curriculum. When last I heard, they were going to the principal as a group with their problem in search of a solution. In this particular situation there is also some trouble with the teacher's rude manner. 2. The style of instruction doesn't work for the student. No pedagogy works for all students, so there are, of course, students for whom the inquiry-based style of teaching ...

My son and I were fortunate enough to have tickets to see former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor last night at Town Hall. She gave a somewhat safe speech but she is a feisty woman with a good sense of humor. Her speech was on education but really about the importance of students learning about civics (remember that?). She gave some startling stats about how more people know who the judges are on American Idol than who are on the Supreme Court. What is interesting is that she, along with a large group of educational institutions and foundations, has created Our Courts : 21st Century Civics. It's a website for both middle-school students and teachers with interactive lessons and games. The teachers can get step-by-step plans with printable worksheets/guides for interactive lessons. This is not your old school civics with lessons like "From King to Constitution: Get Off Our Backs!" and "James Bond in a Honda". The students get on-line games whe...

Staff told the Board, at the September 23, 2008 meeting of the Curriculum and Instructional Policy Committee, that integrated grading policy reform would be brought before them in January or February. Then it was delayed to March or April. Then it was supposed to be introduced in May for a vote in June. Now we learn that it has been deferred indefinitely as the District's technology isn't capable of handling the 11 point GPA or whatever. In the meantime, high school credit for classes taken in middle school has been unecessarily delayed along with the rest of the package. If the Board does not act soon to update their policy and bring it into compliance with state law, yet another year will pass when students will not get credit for their work. The state law, RCW 28A.230.090, requires districts to award high school credit to students upon request when their middle school class is similar or equivalent to classes taught in the high schools. In Seattle this is primarily world lan...

So I'm at Bartell's and notice the magazine rack by the pharmacy counter has the local Seattle magazines. The current issue of one, Seattle Metropolitan, has an article on looking for middle school in Seattle (by Kathryn Robinson who used to write for the Seattle Weekly and is now writing for the Metro). Below is the link (I did this link differently thinking it would be more permanent.) Seattle Metropolitan Magazine / Current Issue / Detail Where to start? First, I'm sure Ms. Robinson thinks she is just hilarious but really, if you want this kind of frothing at the mouth, no one, I repeat , no one does it like Sandra Tsing Loh in her book, Mother on Fire (about the search for schools in LA - Denise G-W and I had the pleasure of her company for lunch one day last fall to discuss how Sandra and other LA moms try to steer new-to-school-parents in LA in the right direction). Ms Robinson starts by admitting she's actually ignorant about SPS but somehow, that just doesn...

As part of the presentation to the Board from Nutrition Services , came the news that they propose serving secondary schools - middle and high schools - from the Central Kitchen starting in Fall 2009. That means that the school breakfasts and lunches for the nine comprehensive middle schools (for some reason the slide says 10) and the ten comprehensive high schools will come from the Central Kitchen at the JSCEE just as 87 school sites are now served, including all elementary schools and special programs (Interagency, etc.). While pizzas will still be assembled at the school buildings and they will cook the grill items (hamburgers) there, anything that doesn't come prepared and pre-packaged will come from the Central Kitchen and only be heated at the schools. There are conflicting opinions about how this will impact food quality, but it will certainly reduce costs and result in lost hours if not lost jobs for the nutrition services workers in the buildings. It is possible, however,...

This article appeared in today's PI about later start times. It includes information from a study done in Lexington, Kentucky in 1998 that showed when the school district there pushed back middle/high school start times by an hour, two things happened; more sleep and fewer teen traffic accidents (this from the Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine). It did not establish conclusively that the change in start times led to the improvement of accident rates but there was a significant drop in the accident rate in the county where Lexington is located. From the PI article: "The National Sleep Foundation has conducted detailed studies into teen sleep. One statistic stands out: Three of every 10 students admit to falling fast asleep during class at least once per week." "Another stat from the National Sleep Foundation: Fifteen percent of teen drivers surveyed admitted to driving drowsy at least once per week." "In this study, when start times were delayed by o...

Communities and Parents for Public Schools of Seattle (CPPS of Seattle) has organized two opportunities next week for parents to talk with district staff about hot topics: middle school and enrollment . From the newsletter : CPPS Annual Meeting: " What's Up with Middle School Education in Seattle Public Schools ?" Panel & Discussion Wednesday , April 30 Meany Middle School CPPS Annual Meeting: 6:30 - 7:00pm Middle School Panel: 7:00 - 8:30pm Why do we find the middle school years so educationally challenging? What do we really want? Join us... We know that some district middle schools are considered "good," popular alternatives and others are not; some folks shy from the public middle schools altogether. What's up? What is present or lacking in Seattle Public Middle Schools? The panel includes: Ruth Medsker, SPS Middle Schools Director Bob Vaughan, Director for Advanced Learning Princess Shareef, Meany Middle School Principal Michael Tolley, High Schoo...