Happening now: Superintendent @ Denny for briefing, dedication

For the second consecutive year, West Seattle is in the Seattle Public Schools spotlight on the day before the new school year. At left, that’s interim superintendent Dr. Susan Enfield, presenting a citywide back-to-school briefing to the media right now at the new Denny International Middle School, which she will help dedicate next hour. (Last year, her predecessor was here on the same day to help dedicate the renovated Chief Sealth International High School next door.) We’ll have coverage of both events later, including video of Dr. Enfield’s briefing in its entirety.

ADDED 2:18 PM: The big moment, as the ribbon was cut – that’s Denny principal Jeff Clark in his famous bright-blue suit:

Full story to come, separately – including an appearance by a descendant of the school’s namesake, David T. Denny, the first member of the Denny Party to arrive in what is now Seattle.

DBP September 6, 2011 (1:28 pm)

Ms. Enfield: You could get some great publicity for Seattle Schools (and save yourself a lot of trouble) if you would assign someone to follow the neighborhood blogs for questions/problems relating to enrollments.
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I see thread after thread here with people complaining about enrollment problems, but I never see an official response from anyone at Seattle Schools. As a result, people just keep griping and the District looks worse and worse in the public’s mind.
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Do yourself a favor and start reading the Blog.

Aman September 6, 2011 (4:11 pm)

DBP:
I’m sure your suggestion is well intentioned but I fear perhaps over-reaching given short-handed school admn. staff and (already)established channels of communication for enrollment issues.

Personally, I’d rather have my tax dollar spent on another teacher’s-aide or teacher than a “WSB reader” for the school district.

WSB September 6, 2011 (4:16 pm)

The public officials who truly care do read the major neighborhood news sites, including this one. Latest and probably oddest evidence of that – I’m watching the live City Council Viaduct briefing, and for some reason Councilmember Tom Rasmussen called the project team’s attention to the fact that the West Seattle Blog (yes, he mentioned us by name) had a video mashup of Mario and the latest viaduct animation. To which the Viaduct team replied, they’d already seen it. (Which we knew, from comments and Twitter.) What, haven’t seen it yet?
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https://westseattleblog.com/2011/08/yes-the-viaduct-is-serious-business-till-mario-kart-drives-up
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I agree with Aman that I wouldn’t want to pay for somebody “extra” to run around reading BUT frankly, there are not so many serious, much-read, discussion-laden (both in comments and in Forums) neighborhood news sites around the city that it would take a lot of time for public officials to check in from time to time. With some well-placed Google Alerts, or at least occasional Google Searches, your attention can be called simply to what interests you, when it turns up … TR

madashell September 6, 2011 (4:57 pm)

Over-reaching? Short-handed staff? Sorry, but the district has no results for the lazy summer days at JSCEE! Try to get an email or phone call answered. It takes an act of Congress (which doesn’t say a whole heckuva lot!)

karen September 6, 2011 (8:30 pm)

I just want to add to this thread that we appreciate all the hard working teachers and staff at SPS. I know there are problems but there are some really dedicated people working for way too little money! We had an issue with our son’s class placement. Today The day before school and the day of the ribbon cutting ceremony) we went to Denny and spoke with four separate people who all stopped what they were doing to prepare for tomorrow – to help us! Every person we dealt with made time to listen and help solve the problem. Way to go Denny staff!!

ZippyDogs September 6, 2011 (10:23 pm)

Dr. Susan Enfield is one of the smartest people I know. We are lucky to have her at the helm of SPS. We all should stop complaining and step up to the plate and help. Susan is powered by optimism, smarts and wants students to succeed.

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