WEST SEATTLE SCHOOLS: 4 portables proposed for Madison Middle School next year

From the agenda for tomorrow night’s Seattle School Board meeting: District staffers are expecting to need to add 26 portables at campuses around the city next year. The list shows some locations are yet to be determined – but one West Seattle school is on the list already, Madison Middle School.

As shown in that table from the agenda document, the district says it expects to need four portables for new classrooms next year at Madison, which is projected to add more than 100 additional students for 2018-2019. While that would bring the student population to just under Madison’s “right-size” capacity of 995, the district explains, “For secondary schools, classrooms are not utilized with the maximum number of students due to the class offerings and schedules. This could result in the need for additional classroom space although the enrollment is close to the right size capacity number.” The district document notes that at least some of the portables to be placed around the city will be repurposed from the former Schmitz Park Elementary School campus, which is just a few blocks west of Madison.

P.S. While the board is meeting at its usual time tomorrow (4:15 pm), SPS schools have no classes, because it’s the “day between semesters.”

Grumpy January 30, 2018 (5:35 pm)

It’s the same bump in enrollment from the same cohort at Schmitz 7 years ago. Successive cohorts have been as large or larger.

I’m sure SPS has the vision and resources to plan accordingly for this surge in enrollment.

EmilyC January 30, 2018 (9:37 pm)

Where would the portables go? I can’t imagine where they’d fit/make sense with Madison’s topography/layout.

Madison neighbor January 30, 2018 (11:01 pm)

I too wonder where they would go. I support the school keeping up with enrollment even if it means portables, but hopefully they will be able to fit them in someplace suited.

T January 30, 2018 (11:58 pm)

Seattle has been booming for a good 10 years. Time for SPS to take note, that means more kids. People used to move out of the city to start families but that hasn’t been true since 2006 or 2007 according to their own research. The district was caught off guard. I buy that excuse for the first few years but 10 years later? No. They opened Genesse Hill and it was full after the first year. Way to plan.

WSB January 31, 2018 (11:02 am)

Re: where the portables will go – two locations are shown on a preliminary “site plan” filed with the city, which I just found after a land-use permit application number showed up in the city system. They would be on the north side of the campus, immediately north of the building, just east of the north side of the athletic field.

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