Seattle Schools Community Forum

That's a simplistic question - clearly - but part of the discussion of this column at Slate by Sara Mosle. You'll recall that I wrote a thread about an article in the NY Times about the movement of younger teachers in and out of of the classroom, particularly TFA teachers. So Ms. Mosle, a former TFAer (20 years ago), gives an interesting perspective (bold mine): The Times article, however, neglects another downside to charters' emphasis on youthful hiring: Many schools launch with few or no adults on staff who know first-hand what it's like to be a parent. If you aren't a parent, maybe this won't strike you as odd. It wouldn't have struck me that way more than 20 years ago when I joined Teach for America in the program's first year and taught for three years in New York City's public schools. I was single, childless, and clueless about even the most basic aspects of child-rearing. My students' parents seemed like creatures f...

From our friends at the Stranger Slog , what librarians are saying: Laurie Amster-Burton, who spoke on behalf of librarians, says she actually switched schools in part because of how invasive MAP testing had become in regard to library time and space. The district has told educators that it thanks them for their concern but it needs time to work out a solution, but Amster-Burton says that these problems have existed for years, and educators have been bringing them up with the district the whole time . She brought with her a letter to Superintendent Banda, signed by 35 Seattle school librarians, in support of the Garfield teachers and in opposition to the MAP test. Excerpt from letter: Librarians, whose role is to teach information skills and support reading instruction, have been required in many schools to spend weeks and weeks as testing clerks. In many schools the first time a student visits the library is not to check out a book or research a topic, but to take a...

Education Week highlights a new publication, Promising Partnership Practices 2012 , with 92 ways schools are partnering with parents and community.  The publication is for sale but individual stories are available as PDFs for free.  "Me 2! Getting Parents into Middle School," explains how Park Middle School in Kennewick, Wash., created the expectation that parents would volunteer for two hours a year at the school. The campaign included tracking progress on the 1,800-hour goal and "talking up" the expectation with students. "The A.S.P.I.R.E. Survey" is used at Bassick High School in Bridgeport, Conn., to find out what talents volunteers can share with students. More than 160 parents and community partners have gone through the small-group sessions to identify their skills and talents, which are matched to the needs and requests of teachers, administrators, and students. At Scott Elementary School in Naperville, Ill., 350 students and their...

The stars aligned last night and Charlie and I were once again in the same place - the CPPS event on parent engagement at Lincoln High.  This event was great because there was evidence that the work CPPS is doing around parent engagement is reaching the right people. Also, I feel this may be a signal or a golden moment for parents to seize upon; this based on what the Superintendent had to say about parent input AND the CPPS idea of "training" parents to be advocates for their child.   I only wish this wasn't coming at the end of the school year when people are starting to dial back. Credit goes to all the CPPS staff but especially Stephanie Jones .

I have a couple of items to note about work I'm doing around Seattle public education.

The Southend and the struggle for better schools. This has been an issue since I started as a parent in the district. So I have some questions for anyone who works there, lives there, grew up there or has children in schools there. 1) When we say "southend" do we mean southeast, southwest and West Seattle? I perceive those 3 areas as fairly different (with SE and SW more alike than West Seattle). 2) Regardless of what hasn't happened in the past, if the Board and the Superintendent said they would grant 3 things they promise to do for at least a year that schools/parents want, what would they be? Would schools say the same things as parents? Or is there a big gap between what parents want and schools want 3) What was working in the past that got taken away? 4) Would stronger principals at all these schools make a difference? 5) What is the main thing(s) that parents could do? 6) What is the main thing(s) the communities around the schools could do? 7) What is the m...

I was reading the Washington Post Answer sheet (about education) and the question was ask, "What's the number one thing parents can do to help teachers?" The answer was, in an admittedly small survey, make sure your child gets adequate sleep . I was a little surprised, not because it isn't important, but that it would be the main thing that teachers thought of as an answer. Teachers, what do you think? On the subject of parenting , I read this article in the September O Magazine with suggestions from a teenager about how to talk to teens. It's useful info but with some cavets: "When I talk, please turn off the tv, phone, computer - it's frustrating to have to compete for your attention." "Bring up dicey subjects in a natural way; don't interrupt breakfast to ask if I'm taking drugs." "Because I said so' isn't helpful; if I don't know why I shouldn't do it. I'll probably do it again." "Yes,...

So most of you may have heard that the LA Times is doing a huge multi-part story about teacher evaluation. One of the biggest parts is a listing of every single public school teacher and their classroom test scores (and the teachers are called out by name). From the article: Though the government spends billions of dollars every year on education, relatively little of the money has gone to figuring out which teachers are effective and why. Seeking to shed light on the problem, The Times obtained seven years of math and English test scores from the Los Angeles Unified School District and used the information to estimate the effectiveness of L.A. teachers — something the district could do but has not. The Times used a statistical approach known as value-added analysis, which rates teachers based on their students' progress on standardized tests from year to year. Each student's performance is compared with his or her own in past years, which largely controls for outs...

This article in Crosscut about the teacher layoffs and the pending contract negotiations got me to thinking about our discussions about meeting as a group, organizing, etc. This is because CPPS is quoted and seems to be sort of a de facto "official" parent group when I would have thought the writer might have gone to the PTA. (The article in and of itself is interesting but I'm not going there on this thread.) I have been silent on this topic despite requests here to meet because I wanted to think about it and investigate a couple of groups. I don't want to get involved in organizing a new group. I think there are already several to choose from with organizations already in place. As I have said previously, I totally support the PTSA. Our PTAs do the frontline work at our schools and give support that makes many good schools great. I personally wish there was a way to organize a PTA in every school (I sure there is but how the Seattle Council approaches this I...

Danny Westneat of the Times had a column today about CPPS's efforts on RiFed teachers. From the column: "But the decision this month to lay off 165 of Seattle schools' newest teachers in a "last hired, first fired" manner has got some of liberal Seattle suddenly sounding more like a conservative red state. More than 600 school parents have signed an online petition, at supportgreatteachers.com , that calls out the teachers union for causing "great distress and upheaval" in the schools. At issue is the policy of choosing who gets laid off solely by seniority. "Wake up and see how union refusal to consider merit is damaging the profession and our kids," wrote one parent. "We want the best teachers, not the oldest, teaching our kids," wrote another. "Teacher unions are an anachronism," said another. The organizers of the petition are a group of parents called Community and Parents for Public Schools. They agree wha...

Thanks to Dorothy for the link to a Washington Post article (and follow-up letter ) on parent activities and their growing clout (at least for the parents in this article). I thought it deserved its own thread. From the article: "For a new generation of well-wired activists in the Washington region, it's not enough to speak at Parent-Teacher Association or late-night school board meetings. They are going head-to-head with superintendents through e-mail blitzes, social networking Web sites, online petitions, partnerships with business and student groups, and research that mines a mountain of electronic data on school performance." This reporter, Michael Chandler, then refers to these parents as "parent insurgents". Hey! Victories? "In recent weeks, parent-led campaigns helped bring down a long-established grading policy in Fairfax County and scale back the unpopular practice of charging fees for courses in Montgomery County. They have also stoked debate...