VIDEO: Going to Seattle Public Schools’ meeting tomorrow? Here’s what to be ready for

If you’re planning to go to Seattle Public Schools‘ meeting at Madison Middle School tomorrow night (Thursday, August 10th), you might want to take a look at that video. It’s the district’s recording of its first meeting in the series, last night at Garfield High School. These are the meetings that are supposed to help the district define “well-resourced schools” so it can decide which schools to close/consolidate (which, administrators reiterated last night, will NOT happen THIS school year – but might start in the school year that begins in fall 2024) as it grapples with a nine-digit budget shortfall.

The district’s video does not capture the full scope of the meeting because – after opening remarks by chief of staff Bev Redmond and superintendent Dr. Brent Jones, then ground rules from assistant superintendent Dr. Rocky Torres – most of the rest of the meeting consisted of discussions at individual tables, each with a district facilitator and several participants. There was nothing geographically specific about the remarks or questions – so though last night was supposed to be the “central” region meeting, as administrators acknowledged, it was intended to be identical to what’ll happen in the “southwest” region meeting tomorrow, and beyond. The district’s camera crew(s) did not record any of the table discussions, cutting between wide shots once the discussions were under way. We plan to record some of them tomorrow night (the district’s original media advisory said cameras would be prohibited, but we challenged that and they backed off).

Last night, all tables were directed by Dr. Torres to discuss the same questions, and none was sensitive or personal; the questions were along the lines of “What are your favorite things about your child’s school building?”, “How can we make resources/services at each school stronger?”, and “What kind of programs do you and your student value the most and why?” They promised other means of feedback/engagement beyond these meetings, and said everything would be funneled into a plan that Dr. Jones is tasked with presenting in November.

THURSDAY MEETING: It’s in the commons at Madison (3429 45th SW), starting at 6 pm, and the district says it too will be streamed via YouTube.

Admiral Mom August 9, 2023 (3:36 pm)

Looking forward to it. I think SPS should be way more intentional about reaching the most segregated communities in the city and in this case, West Seattle. This meeting should have been hosted closer to South Park and Georgetown as members of our community communicated our concerns to SPS. Yeah, there will be interpreters but most likely will be looking at each other because there are other barriers besides language for many of our families of color and multilingual families to attend.

Jessica August 9, 2023 (5:38 pm)

I’m not going to be able to go… but if anyone wants to relay my thoughts that would be great.1. Janitors, nurses, mental health counselors, ventilation- because health and safety of our children should come first.2. Smaller classrooms and disciplinary pull-out classrooms, because no teaching can be done with chaotic classrooms, and without classroom discipline.3. Special education assistants and nursing aids, because health and safety is top priority, and focused learning environments are foundational.4. Stop spending money on expensive, subscription based curriculums. Plain old textbooks can go a decade or two before they might need updating or replacing due to damage. There are very good and affordable textbooks on the market. Kids don’t need to learn “the latest and greatest”, they need foundational knowledge, and research abilities. The latest and greatest will be different by the time they graduate anyway. Basic knowledge in many domains will help kids more.5. Phonics in the early grades because literacy is important. 6. Civics and government, because our democracy depends on it.7. Stop spending money on technology, and initiatives. 8. Dual language classes would be nice, but given the number of languages spoken regionally I doubt that is possible.9. School lunches are helpful too, because hungry kids don’t learn.In summary: Healthy kids, knowledgeable teachers, clean and well managed classrooms, textbooks, paper, pencils, low absence rates (less illness), a chalkboard, or white erase, some instruments, some art supplies, some hands on science equipment and a printer for teachers. That’s it. That’s what they need for a well resourced school.

teacher August 9, 2023 (6:07 pm)

Yes, yes and yes!!! Jessica, I suspect you are a teacher because I am a teacher and that is my response to the questions given too!! At my particular school we defintely need lunch and lunch recesses covered by hourly workers as we do not have enough parent volunteers to cover them and it does not make sense to have our principal, reading specialist, librarian and counselor covering lunch and lunch recess duties (cleaning tables) when they could be working directly with kids on skills other than “please pick up trash” although that is an important skill too!Also, if anyone is not able to go, the invite sent out via email had a link where you could state that you could not attend a meeting but you could give your feedback there. I am really hoping that this administration really listens to the feedback and uses that as their basis for decision making.

Another Teacher August 9, 2023 (7:25 pm)

Jessica and Teacher thanks for your comments . Administrators and the public need to know all of this is important.I hope these points are discussed and taken into consideration.

Kyle August 10, 2023 (8:43 am)

Prediction: After the elections is when the situation will become “dire” and lists of school closures will be circulated.

WSB August 10, 2023 (10:52 am)

As noted in the story, Dr. Jones is supposed to present a plan in November. Meantime, they’re already painting the situation as fairly “dire.”

Heather August 10, 2023 (4:01 pm)

Jessica and the other teacher make great points about overemphasis on spending on the latest education technology fads, the critical importance of school meals for students in need, and the importance of literacy and social science education. I do want to point, however, that dual language classes are not just something that would be nice. Besides the fact that SPS already successfully offers the best practices approach of a true dual-immersion model (roughly 50% heritage speakers/50% target language learners), these programs in West Seattle and around the country exist to meet the constitutional rights of English language learning students (Lau v. Nichols, Castaneda v. Pickard are the main supreme courts cases that established this). As to the issue of the many different heritage languages of students in the district, by far the most common language of English Language Learners is Spanish. Accordingly, most of the programs exist with English-Spanish instruction (followed by Chinese). Moreover, these models are not limited in benefit to the heritage speakers of these target languages, but also support the English-only students who gain the many documented benefits of bilingual education. Not to mention, there are the benefits to the heritiage speakers of a non-target language (Amharic, French, Russian, etc) who benefit from dual-immersion classrooms focused on multilingual approaches with teachers trained in literacy acquisition across languages. Literacy is literacy. And moving towards a bilingual nation would serve us all well to improve greater particpation in civic life.

Sorry, comment time is over.