A literary week at Alki Elementary – not only did one of their Global Reading Challenge teams come home from the citywide final with medals (as reported here), but Thursday was Young Authors Day. Teacher Anna Coghill shares photos and this report:

(Thursday) Alki Elementary celebrated student writing with a Young Authors Day. The day included visiting author Paul Owen Lewis. Mr. Lewis started the day off with an assembly about his personal experience with writing. Later he met with smaller groups to continue the conversation.

Students celebrated their own writing by sharing in groups throughout the school day. It was a wonderful way to recognize the hard work students have done this year.

Last month, author Lewis (a Northwestern Washington resident) spent a day at Arbor Heights Elementary, as reported here.

The Design Team for the new K-5 STEM at Boren option school opening this fall in West Seattle has now met twice. We covered its first session (here’s that story) but were unable to go to the second one last night; a community member who did, Kathleen Voss, offered today to share her notes, and we took her up on that offer. Here’s her report:

The design team for the new STEM Elementary School at Boren met for the second time on Wednesday at the John Stanford Center in SODO. With the exception of the new incoming principal, Dr. Shannon McKinney, all design team members were present. Also in attendance were eight community observers who represented parents of prospective students, teachers from a local elementary school, as well as some who described themselves only as “interested community members.”

The meeting began fairly shortly after the 6:15 scheduled start time and opened with an opportunity for public testimony. It was stated that in future meetings, the public testimony portion of the meetings will occur at the end, rather than the beginning, of the allotted meeting time. Only one observer stood to offer commentsm which consisted of a reminder to the design team that there are many interested and committed individuals who are eager to assist the design team in whatever way possible. She suggested that a volunteer coordinator might be helpful in connecting skilled volunteers to some of the extraneous tasks that will emerge and lighten the load of the design team members. The team was also reminded of the fully functioning Yahoo group (groups.yahoo.com/groups/K5STEM) that currently boasts more than 70 links to local STEM resources, numerous research articles, as well as an events calendar.

Public comments were followed by a report from assistant superintendent Dr. Cathy Thompson regarding the Steering Committee’s recent walkthrough of the Boren site.

Thompson said all were pleasantly surprised by the current state of the building after years of hearing horror stories regarding its disrepair. As stated in earlier public meetings, all of the flooring will be replaced and walls will be freshly painted. Discussion is ongoing regarding a space that can be utilized for before- and after-school child care. The school will contain two computer labs (with one located in the library) and two science labs (most likely configured for K-2nd and 3-5th grades). The extra space in the administrative office area may lend itself to a family resource center.

The majority of the meeting was spent identifying and discussing the Key Program Features of the school. While the core values and mission statement will wait until Dr. McKinney’s arrival in early April, the design team took on the task of identifying the “Big Ideas” and big tasks to be accomplished before September.

The first priorities for the next two months are hiring faculty and choosing curriculum materials. Materials needed in September will have to be ordered in May. This timeline includes any waivers needed for non-district endorsed materials.

After hearing a multitude of ideas, Aurora Lora, the Executive Director of Schools for West Seattle, was able to identify seven key areas of focus for the team going forward:

Curriculum
Role of technology
Staff
Community/family engagement
Diverse learning community
Teaching the whole child
Becoming a leader in STEM education

Other items of discussion:

What is project-based learning? Is is the model we want to use?
Subcommittee needed to focus on grants to assure deadlines do not get forgotten.
List of questions to ask when visiting other STEM schools.

Kathleen says the district promised its notes will be up on its website by the end of the week (sometime tomorrow). She also says the team has added a Saturday meeting, 8:30-noon April 7th, and that several members will tour the state’s only currently operating STEM-focused public elementary school, in Bremerton, on April 27th.

One week from today, Seattle Public Schools will bring its touring meeting about the BEX IV levy to West Seattle. That levy is meant to generate construction money – as BEX III did (with its projects including the Denny International Middle School rebuild and Chief Sealth International High School renovations). Some of the ideas proposed for West Seattle are new, as first reported in Melissa Westbrook‘s coverage of a School Board work session yesterday on saveseattleschools.blogspot.com.

From the presentation, which you can see here, possibilities include building a new school at Arbor Heights Elementary and merging Roxhill Elementary and Arbor Heights there; building a new school for Schmitz Park Elementary on the Genesee Hill campus; reopening Fairmount Park Elementary (maybe as a permanent home for the school opening this fall as K-5 STEM at Boren); reopening E.C. Hughes (also a possible home for K-5 STEM), which is currently leased to Westside School (WSB sponsor); building an addition to West Seattle Elementary.

No one possible “scenario” includes all of the above; the district is trying to settle on a philosophical direction for the levy. Of the scenarios currently on the table, the cost range for voters would be between half a billion and $855 million dollars. We have a message out to West Seattle’s school-board director Marty McLaren to ask about the briefing.

In the meantime, if you are interested, the BEX IV feedback meeting for West Seattle is next Thursday, April 5th, 6:30 pm, at Denny International Middle School (see the original announcement in our events-calendar listing). Whatever form the levy takes, it will go to voters next year.

ADDED 11:38 PM: We haven’t heard back from Marty McLaren yet, but a WSB’er did forward us a post on her public e-mail discussion list in which she addressed the BEX IV proposals (we didn’t know about the list but we’re subscribing now – subscription info is here). Read on for the entirety of her post, which includes a little more background on the AH/Roxhill merger rationale, and dates/times for her 3 upcoming community conversations:Read More

Amy French from Explorer West Middle School (WSB sponsor) shares the story of a “living history lesson” this week: Suma Yagi is an EW student’s great-aunt, and visited the 7th-grade American History classes to read her poetry and talk about what she went through during the World War II internment of Japanese-Americans 70 years ago. Amy writes:

When Suma was 14 and a freshman at Garfield High School, war broke out with Japan and President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized the internment of Japanese Americans across the Pacific coast with Executive Order 9066 on February 19, 1942. After having eight days to pack-up and leave their Central District home, her American-born family faced internment for over three years at two camps.

After her family was released, she moved on with her life as a high school student and her family rarely mentioned their time in the internment camps. Only when Suma was in her sixties and taking a writing class, did she start to capture and share these stories. Suma finished each classroom session by answering a series of questions that the students had prepared. The Explorer West 7th graders had been studying WWII and had completed some background reading on the internment.

The Explorer West community respectfully thanks Suma for so graciously sharing her living history with the 7th grade students.

There’s more about her story and her visit on the school’s website.

More big news from Alki Elementary School (in the wake of last night’s big win) – after five months as interim principal, Chanda Oatis is now its permanent principal. Here’s the letter families are receiving, from interim district superintendent Dr. Susan Enfield:

Today I am delighted to announce that I have appointed Chanda E. Oatis as the principal for Alki Elementary. She has been serving as Interim Principal since October and has been a great fit for the community.

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From Denny International Middle School principal Jeff Clark:

Last night, we held a successful Somali Family Night here at Denny International Middle School and Chief Sealth International High School. The event went well with over 65 parents in attendance. Workshops were held on topics including school involvement and supporting your child academically.

We are always so impressed with the results when we reach out to our community — parents shared new ideas that we will use to make our connection with them even stronger.

Principal Kinsey and I would like to extend a special thank you to the following people for their help in making this event a success:

Christine Mattfeld, Leticia Clausen, Mohamed Mohamud, Abdirahman Ahmed, Burhan Farah, Mohamed Roble, Farhiya Omer, Martha Lemberg, Jol Raymond, Vanessa Garcia, Jeff Smith, and many others.

(Cheering capacity crowd just before the competition began)
“These are not the Hunger Games,” quipped Mary Palmer, emceeing tonight’s Global Reading Challenge citywide finals at the Seattle Public Library‘s Central Library downtown. “Nobody’s going to die tonight.” And, she added semi-sternly, if anyone came for the thrill of “winning,” they’re not in the right place either – as the kids repeated after her, they’re all already “WINNERS!”

(Arbor Heights team at top left, Alki in black in the middle, Roxhill is the far-right team in blue)
And that, they were – though in the end, only two of the ten competing teams scored high enough to move on to the final round of competition, a video-linked competition next month against Canadian students. And one is from West Seattle – George’s Magician’s Treasures, from Alki Elementary! (added – photo courtesy Kathleen)

GMT and the team from Adams both scored 120 points. (added) Here’s our video of the announcement of all teams’ scores (including WS’s other 2 contenders, from Roxhill and Arbor Heights) – in the last minute or so, you’ll see how Alki celebrated:

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3 notes about the new West Seattle public elementary school K-5 STEM at Boren, opening this fall in the two-years-closed Boren building on Delridge:

ENROLLMENT: We’ve been asking Seattle Public Schools about an update from open-enrollment applications submitted for the new school, since it’s been a couple weeks now. They won’t give us an exact number – processing isn’t over yet – but here’s the reply forwarded by SPS spokesperson Teresa Wippel:

We are continuing to work with the data in processing Open Enrollment applications for schools around the district. Because this work has not been completed, we are not prepared to release data that is still in process. Assignment information will be available on April 16 for schools and families. However, since K-5 STEM at Boren is a new program, we are tracking that data in particular, and can report that applications have surpassed the 200 mark.

NEW ONLINE DISCUSSION GROUP: In case you missed this announcement in the WSB Forums or the comment section following an earlier story – Families who applied to – or are considering applying to – the new school have formed an online discussion group, open to anybody interested. It started briefly on Google and then moved to Yahoo! Find it at groups.yahoo.com/group/K5STEM – anyone can read the posts, but you have to join in order to participate. The group’s e-mail address is K5STEM@yahoogroups.com.

NEXT DESIGN TEAM MEETING: The school’s Design Team, discussing issues and making decisions to help shape it, has its second meeting at 6:15 pm Wednesday (March 28), at district HQ downtown. Here’s our report on the first one.

Thanks to Chellie at Roxhill Elementary School for sharing the news (and the photo):

Sixteen first through fifth grade students (and one parent!) from Roxhill Elementary School competed in the NW Regional Sport Stacking Tournament in Auburn. This was our school’s first representation at the tournament. We had a blast. The day began early with preliminary rounds where students tested their skill in three different stacking events. After lunch we learned which of us would go on to the finals. We were happy that five students and our competing parent moved on to the finals and brought home medals. It was a terrific event that we will be attending again next year. We are proud of all of our stackers. Great job!

The Alliance for Education has announced this year’s Philip P. Swain Excellence in Education Award winners. Of the six winners citywide, two are from West Seattle!

Huong Nguyen teaches math at West Seattle High School. From the nomination form sent by principal Ruth Medsker:

‘Ms. Huong’ works tirelessly to ensure that all students entrusted to her succeed. She teaches Intensified Algebra, which is our most supported extended block math class, Algebra I and Advanced Placement Calculus. Ms. Huong is blazing the trail at West Seattle High School for Standards Based Grading. She is currently in the process of developing performance rubrics to help students understand what their learning outcomes need to be. When students do not meet standard on a learning target, she provides additional support for the student to relearn the skill and opportunities to demonstrate mastery. An example of her relentless push to standard is a letter she is sending home to families this week. Each Algebra student who has a C or lower and a MAP score of 240 or less is getting a letter and a call inviting the student to after-school tutoring/support. Our data shows that these students are just under where they need to be pass the Algebra End of Course Exam.

Also, she “has invented a math tool to help students learn basic numeracy skills. The Numero Cube System helps students learn place value, base 10 number decomposition, Factoring, Multiplication/Division, among other things.”

From Denny International Middle School, meet Swain Award-winner Leticia Clausen, photographed with some of her students:

From Denny principal Jeff Clark‘s announcement:

It is a great pleasure to announce that Ms. Leticia Clausen is a winner of the 2012 Philip P. Swain Excellence in Education Award! It was an honor for me to nominate Ms. Clausen for this award for the following reasons:

When Denny became an international school, Ms. Clausen quickly volunteered to serve as our dual-language Spanish teacher. This program is intended to give our scholars, who are fortunate enough to already speak Spanish, a chance to learn social studies and language arts in Spanish at school. This approach will help our students to be bilingual and bi-literate, while mastering academic concepts in both languages.

Even though we were starting this program without curricular materials in Spanish, Ms. Clausen was excited to start right away (without a year for planning). She did this for one reason: she knew this was what was best for our kids and knew that they didn’t have any time to waste.

We are now in our third year of Spanish dual-language. Remarkably, Ms. Clausen teaches this block class at all three grade levels! The program is flourishing—academic achievement is rising—and our families are thrilled to have this opportunity!

The Swain Award description, as also shared by Denny’s principal: “The yearly award is given to Seattle Public Schools secondary teachers or counselors who exemplify the qualities and values that distinguished Mr. Swain’s years of community stewardship. Teachers or counselors who are nominated are staff who inspire a love of learning in students while helping them reach their highest academic potential.” All six citywide winners will be honored at the Alliance’s community breakfast March 29th, and each receives a $1,000 prize.