EDUCATION: 1 month to go in Seattle Public Schools’ year; 2 more days to answer survey

June 19th – one month from today – is the last day of the year for Seattle Public Schools. No decision yet about what school will be like in the fall, though the governor has said he’s optimistic that in-person classes will resume. In the meantime, SPS is asking its families and staff to answer a survey “to gather feedback on how things are going and inform additional supports and future planning.” It’s open through Wedneday (May 20th); the family survey is here, the staff survey here, the school-leader survey here.

7 Replies to "EDUCATION: 1 month to go in Seattle Public Schools' year; 2 more days to answer survey"

  • MercyMoi May 19, 2020 (4:11 pm)

    Thank you for promoting this survey! We need to talk now about what we can manage IF school is not meeting in person this Fall…

  • W Tele May 19, 2020 (10:00 pm)

    I know my child will not be returning to school in the fall unless the infection rate is well below 1 AND the King County positive covid tests are below 10 per day.  That is the minimum requirement.

  • SPS Parent May 19, 2020 (10:57 pm)

    SPS have done a horrible job of educating students during the pandemic.  Giving them an “F” would be generous. Case in point – Elementary school kids get one hour of zoom meetings (now Microsoft teams) per week. The remainder of their “instruction” is premised on the self-directed reading of learning packets and doing assignments online or in hard copy. SPS – this is what failure looks like. The sooner SPS embraces live/interactive remote teaching, the better. As the saying goes, there is no substitute. SPS needs to admit and embrace it, because that is the reality it keeps hiding from. In short, one hour of “live” instruction per week is totally and completely unacceptable. Two hours per day could possibly be doable (with a lot of parent guidance); but one hour per week is abject failure and just giving up. And yet, we see SPS taking vicotry laps and patting themselves on the back like they are getting or right or at least really trying. A side note – the teachers are amazing; but they are being held back by administration. In sum, SPS needs a material readjustment of it’s views on effective remote learning before our kids waste an entire year of “school.” 

  • Coastie May 20, 2020 (3:50 am)

    SPS has been eliminating direct instruction and practice for decades. Remote schooling has just exposed the sham of “student directed learning”. This is not a new problem, you are just seeing what a misguided educational philosophy looks like, because you are now home to witness it.

  • disappointed May 20, 2020 (6:51 am)

    SPS Parent, I totally agree. I have a high school student, and I’m not sure what we will do if SPS continues online learning for the fall. If it looks like more of the same, my kid is doomed.

  • Bummed w/SPS May 20, 2020 (11:09 am)

    SPS Parent and Disappointed, I 100% agree with you. I cannot understand WHY they are not offering more virtual learning/teaching and identifying creative solutions (i.e. share the workload among teachers and have bigger Teams meetings w/more students). I have 3 kids at 3 different public schools and maxed out the comments in the parent survey. They also have plenty of other districts around the state to model/get ideas from that are doing virtual learning in a much more meaningful way. There are a small handful of teachers that are being creative, working hard and giving it a full effort and I appreciate and applaud them. But overall, I agree with the “F” grade for the District. 

  • YES2WS May 21, 2020 (4:32 pm)

    The struggle is real.https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/21/business/coronavirus-teachers.htmlI wish this article had been published sooner. It’s likely going to be buried at this point and not seen by many of the public education bashers. Honestly, I know we’re all struggling but at least try to understand how hard we’re trying and how much we’re up against as teachers.

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