Seattle Schools Community Forum:
Seattle Schools Community Forum
Good Thing on a Friday
Arbor Heights Elementary School's photo.A VERY big thank you to Softchoice for their very generous donation. Today at our monthly assembly Harry Turpin, from Softchoice's Seattle office, presented a check for $3,829.49 to purchase replacement computers (stolen Fall 2012). Softchoice employees held a variety of fundraisers to help raise the dollars donated to our school. We will always remain appr
Friday Open Thread
How to fund schools properly? The Stranger Slog offers up not one but two alternatives. It can be done and done without adding onerous bills (like grading schools) in order to say "we're doing something about education" before education is truly fully funded.Here's the district's "official" notice about proposed Transportation changes. I'll note a couple of things. One, the
JAN 09
Franklin and Thurgood Marshall are in "shelter-in-place"
From SPS Twitter at about 2:30 p.m.:Franklin HS and Thurgood Marshall Elementary are in shelter-in-place after shots were fired in nearby neighborhood. SPD looking for suspects.Students were released on time when school ended. For Thurgood students who normally walk home, parents were asked to come and pick them up.
Seattle School Board Meeting re: Later Start Times for Secondary
I do want to note a couple of items before attending to the subject of the thread.Director McLaren was not in attendance at last night's meeting. Also, the student speaker, Mallory Richey of Roosevelt, told the Board and Superintendent that they are working more on school pride and have "Rider Pride" cards that they send home with students to their parents, letting the parents know a goo
Dorn Unveils Bill to Fully Fund K-12 Public Ed
From OSPI:State Superintendent Randy Dorn today released a draft of a bill that would move Washington state toward the full funding of basic education in the event that the Legislature fails to do so by Jan. 1, 2018. Among other things, the bill calls for a one percent increase in sales tax, an increase in state property tax to $3.60 per $1,000 of assessed value and a decrease in local levy author
JAN 08
Seattle Schools Confirms Sports Change
Yes, all our comprehensive high schools will be moving to the Metro league (including Roosevelt, Ballard and Garfield). Roosevelt will be the second-largest in the league but keep in mind, they count ONLY the numbers of 10,11and 12th graders to decide school size. That's why Roosevelt will fit into the Metro league.Boy, that will save transportation dollars AND be one less reason to change to la
OSPI Terminates Agreement w/Seattle Times
I have just received word from OSPI that the data sharing agreement with the Seattle Times has been terminated. Don't get too excited as apparently a new one is being written.Details to follow.
NW School Unveils Rooftop
Here's how a downtown school for SPS might work. Good job, Northwest School.
JAN 07
Seattle Schools with Possible Bell Time Changes for 2014-2015
Update: this is a draft of Arrival/Departure times which, if those change, the bell times would change. I am seeking clarification from staff but it would be mighty helpful if things were clear from the start.End of update.Readers had been asking about possible changes to bell times previously discussed by Transportation. I could not find a link at the SPS website so I scanned it in. I had to
Math Adoption Update
From reader Rick B:Re: the K-5 Math Adoption. Here's a quick process overview and status update from the trenches:The Math Adoption Committee (MAC) has met three times so far. The SSD website has some basic info and minutes of the first meeting, but not for meeting #2 or meeting #3:In these meetings, the committee laid the typical process groundwork, developed selection criteria and weighting form
Live Blogging from Transportation Work Session
Update:I stayed about an hour (of the hour and a half allotted for the Work Session). It was mostly a complete waste of time for all involved. (I'll check and see if anything definitive finally came out but I doubt it.)Here's the upshot -later start times for secondary schools is NOT going to happen for next school year, 2014-15. It will likely not happen for 2015-16. The issue is that no sta
Tuesday Open Thread
An event perhaps of interest to you when we think about privacy and data - Town Hall is hosting Joshua Klein and his talk, Reputation and Your Online Footprint. It's this Thursday the 9th at 7:30 pm. Cost is $5. Got old electronics? Windermere in Ballard is having an electronics recylcing day on Saturday the 11th from 10 am to 2 pm. A good time to get those old items cleared out of your garag
JAN 06
A Start of a New Day for SPS?
I doubt it.I'm reading the presentation for tomorrow's Work Session on Transportation and School Start Times. Staff is explaining why they could not implement any change to high school start times in 2014-2015. There are valid reasons, of course, but then there are several references to "all stakeholders who will be affected need to be consulted and kept informed." You read that and t
Speaking out at the School Board Meeting
I am urging you to speak out - either via e-mail or via public testimony - to the Board about two subjects.One, student data privacy. We see from the agenda the RTTT item, some of which is about helping PreK-3rd grade students. It's a fine idea but again, that's exactly the starting age that many entities want to start data tracking. Will their parents be told this is happening (or asked if the
JAN 05
Seattle Schools This Week
Tuesday, January 7thWork Session: Transportation Service Standards and School Start Times from 5-6:30 p.m. No agenda/presentation available.Should be interesting given that many want a discussion on school start times and staff seems to be pushing back mightily. However, President Peaslee is not moving an inch on waiting to have that discussion.Special Education Advisory and Advocacy Council Me
What the McCleary Decision was About
It will soon be the start of a new legislative session in Olympia, which, of course, means that the Legislature will take another run at doing the absolute minimum they can do and still claim to be making progress towards their obligation under the McCleary decision.It also means that there will be a bunch of people - all of the usual suspects - claiming that the McCleary decision isn't just about
JAN 04
National Ed News Knocks at our Door
Here are some stories from around the country that will have more and more bearing on what we are doing in Washington State.From Ed Week, a top 12 list of stories from the past year. The majority of them are about Common Core as the fight goes on. Linked to Common Core (and you see this in story after story elsewhere) is student data privacy. I also note the presence of a story on grading schoo