Trying to follow the policy review project
The Seattle School Board has launched a big project to review and update all of their policies. Phase I of this process is complete - they have renumbered the policies to conform to WSSDA conventions, they have added some non-controversial policies that other districts typically have but Seattle was missing, they deleted some non-controversial superfluous policies, and they have done some work to thoughtfully re-write the governance policies (series 1000). They are now in Phase II in which they review and thoughtfully revise other policies. Many of these revisions will be the subject of some contention and people should try to pay attention to the Phase II process as it occurs.
You should try, but they aren't making it easy. The information provided about Phase II of this process is badly out of date, incomplete, and inaccurate. It's hard not to take this as a sign of the Board's minimal interest in community engagement.
Here is a link to the Policy Review project web page.
The page has two links, one to the Phase II Policy Review Calendar and one to the Policy Book Preamble. Only the link to the Policy Book Preamble is dead and the Policy Review Calendar is out of date. That doesn't make it
The Board's Community Engagement
You should try, but they aren't making it easy. The information provided about Phase II of this process is badly out of date, incomplete, and inaccurate. It's hard not to take this as a sign of the Board's minimal interest in community engagement.
Here is a link to the Policy Review project web page.
The page has two links, one to the Phase II Policy Review Calendar and one to the Policy Book Preamble. Only the link to the Policy Book Preamble is dead and the Policy Review Calendar is out of date. That doesn't make it
The Board's Community Engagement
There is no school and no department in Seattle Public Schools that has worse community engagement than the School Board.
Their primary community engagement is the public testimony at the school board meetings and it is a near total failure as community engagement. Can you imagine a principal who conducted their community engagement in this way? Can you imagine a principal who held a community engagement event twice a month where no more than twenty people were allowed to speak for no more than two minutes each? The principal then did not respond to anyone who spoke - not at the event, not after it, not at all. Would that be acceptable community engagement for anyone?
Want to hear something ironic? If someone uses their two minutes of public testimony to speak to the Board about enrollment, or advanced learning, or school lunches, they will get a response. If the person responsible for
Their primary community engagement is the public testimony at the school board meetings and it is a near total failure as community engagement. Can you imagine a principal who conducted their community engagement in this way? Can you imagine a principal who held a community engagement event twice a month where no more than twenty people were allowed to speak for no more than two minutes each? The principal then did not respond to anyone who spoke - not at the event, not after it, not at all. Would that be acceptable community engagement for anyone?
Want to hear something ironic? If someone uses their two minutes of public testimony to speak to the Board about enrollment, or advanced learning, or school lunches, they will get a response. If the person responsible for