Seattle Schools Community Forum

The hearing on 1497 (allowing the mayor to appoint 2 school board members) will be in the House Education Committee on Tues., Feb. 3 at 1:30pm in the House Hearing Room A in the John L. O'Brien building.    I would encourage anyone who cares to send in a message to your legislator or even come on down.  On the Federal Reserve building , apparently it DID go the eBay way. The Times is reporting that there were six bidders with the top bid being $7.6M.  We only know for certain that SPS is one of the bidders.  But the deadline - which was yesterday - has been extended because auction rules state that "the bidding continues until the highest bid goes unchallenged for 24 hours."  

On the Center School incident, one odd thing that I noticed yesterday when I received a press update: the principal has been replaced. 

As for the title of this thread, I am hearing some rumblings of a rather large change that may come to the district very soon.  I am trying to learn more and when I know for certain I will let you know.  I hesitate to say anything specific.  There are two reasons for me saying anything at all.  One, because I believe parents deserve a heads up early (if only to brace yourself).  Two, because I rarely get any credit or acknowledgement from the regular media, I'd like to be able to say I was the first one to raise the red flag. We have all seen the shifting sands of principal movement.   I asked the district some questions about this issue and here are the questions and replies.

From SPS Communications: Superintendent Banda made several principal appointments Feb. 7 , including: • George Breland, Cleveland High School ; • Maria Breuder, McGilvra Elementary School ; • Dedy Fauntleroy, John Stanford International School ; • Robert Gary, Madison Middle School ; • Jo Lute-Ervin, Kimball Elementary School ; • Mary McDaniels, Madrona K-8 ; and • Dan Sanger, Bryant Elementary School . I see a couple of principals who seem to rotate every couple of years.  I'll note in reading through the bios that some note that parents and teachers at some schools were part of the selection committee but not at others.  The district seems to be depending on "surveys" but don't say what the survey was specifically about in the first place.  Again, why is that? From Superintendent Banda: I am pleased to announce that Carmen Rahm has been appointed Executive Director of Technology. For the past 10 years, Mr. Rahm has been Assistant Vice President for I...

Word has come that Shannon Conner, assistant principal at Hamilton International Middle School , is leaving to become principal at McClure Middle School.  She has a child who will be attending there this fall. This year, like others past, certainly has been a principal version of musical chairs.  West Seattle seems to have been hit the hardest. Ex. Director Carmela Dellino is leaving (after a year in that post) to work for the City for the Families&Education levy. The next Chief Sealth International High School principal is Aida Fraser-Hammer; she's new from Kentwood High. Chandra Oatis is leaving Alki Elementary for Van Asselt Elementary Rhonda Claytor has been appointed principal of Leschi Elementary, leaving Gatewood. Henterson Carlisle is leaving as principal at Madison with Robert Gary, Jr. coming in as interim. Bruce Rhodes moves to Sanislo as principal from JSIS as ass't principal. Robert Gallagher is the next principal of Lafayette Elem...

There have been and will be a number of new principal appointments made for the coming school year. In some cases the school communities have been allowed to offer input on the selection of their principal. In some cases the school community has formed a hiring committee and interviewed candidates. In other cases, however, schools have been assigned a principal with little or no community input or engagement.

 Update: Here is the Personnel Report to be presented, as part of the Consent agenda, at Wednesday's Board meeting.  It has a number of comings and goings including the departure of Bob Vaughan from Advanced Learning. Madison is losing its principal, Carlisle Henterson, and he will be replaced by Dr. Robert Gary, Jr as interim principal.  Dr. Gary has been at Madison previously as a teacher and interim assistant principal.  No info on whether Mr. Carlisle is staying in the district. (By coincidence, Mayor McGinn will be at Madison tomorrow for a media event around health services at that school.  This from our friends at the West Seattle blog .) Beacon Hill Int'l School is losing principal Kelly Aramaki who is being appointed the SE region Executive Director.  He's a great administrator and I think this is a good choice. Jo Lute-Ervin has been named interim principal for Kimball Elementary.  She's been a principal at many schools. 

Here's Dr. Enfield's announcement on new (and moving) principals.  There are a couple of curiosities like why Olympic Hills will have a co-principal.  I didn't think they had gotten that big.  Also, no mention of Greg King so I will have to query Communications on why the Detroit Press had that story with his name as a new principal in one of their school systems. Looking over the appointments, I have to say these people, on paper, look very strong.  The new principal at Olympic View, Sandra Powell, looks especially impressive. Obviously, there are still some appts to be announced (for example, Lafayette). Thanks to a reader for this. Thank you to the staff and families who served on interview committees. Appointments made today: ·           Julie Cox  will be the principal at  Catharine Blaine K-8 School . She is now the interim assistant principal at Catharine Blaine. Previously she served in ...

The former Lawton principal, Christine Helm, has taken another job, assistant principal at Whittier Elementary, and the Lawton assistant principal since the start of school this year,  Dr. Neil Gerrans, will serve as the interim principal at Lawton. They will both be at the Lawton PTA meeting tonight to answer questions about the change. Does this change re-open the whole question of the structure of the Lawton Spectrum program?

The district is announcing that Rina Geoghagen has been appointed the co-principal of Lowell Elementary.  She will continue to oversee Lowell at Lincoln as well as work with Greg King for " success at both school sites. "  It is also stated, " In addition, Marella Francois will not be joining the Lowell staff ."  While this makes some sense, it costs more to have two full principals for any one school.  Given that it is "one" school but at two locations, I guess there was no choice but to make her a full principal.  It sounds like she has been doing a good job, both now and throughout the summer. 

The district announced the appointment of Dwane Chappelle at RBHS.    He comes to us from Arlington, Texas where he was an assistant principal (not sure of what kind of school - Google search shows it was a high school).  He started as a Special Education teacher.  He is African-American.  From the press release: Mr. Chappelle also worked as a juvenile detention officer for Dallas County, helping detained youth and developing programs in academics, group projects and life skills.  Mr. Chappelle said he considers it a privilege to serve the students and staff of Rainier Beach High School, as well as the community. Within the next two weeks we also plan to announce an Assistant Principal for RBHS. I am confident that with a strong team in place at Rainier Beach High School, we will see significant improvements.  I don't have any comment yet from RBHS PTSA leadership. Update Wednesday morning:   T he RBHS PTSA seems to be quite sa...

The district has announced another round of principal/assistant principal appointments.  (I'll list those below.)  But what about Rainier Beach HS ?  When we last left them, both of their current co-principals, Dr. Robert Gary and Lisa Escobar, were leaving to go to other posts (Interagency and Viewlands, respectively). Nearly every other school who has been searching for a principal as far back as RBHS has found one.  It's not for lacking of trying because they did form a search committee and did interviews starting back in early April.  But they still haven't announced a principal appointment. I've served on a principal search committee and it was very structured and, of course, that because you need to be completely fair to each applicant.  Same questions, from the same people, etc.  The district did an initial screening search to find candidates who would meet the criteria - both from their resume and the screening - to be a principal for SPS....