By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

Sahnica Washington‘s new job is blocks away, and yet a world away, from the site of her first job.

As a teenager, she says, she entered the work world as a courtesy clerk at the former Safeway store at 35th and Roxbury (where Freedom Church of Seattle is headquartered now).

This summer, a few blocks east at 30th and Roxbury, she began work at Roxhill Elementary School as its new principal.

We reported Washington’s appointment in early August, and met her weeks later when the Seattle Police Guild leadership visited to “adopt” the school.

But before sitting down for an interview, Washington wanted to get the school year well under way, so we finally sat down to talk last week – her first official interview as Roxhill principal.

Much has happened in the school year’s first month – and yet, it all comes down to, and up to, one word:

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By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

“I cannot describe to you how much we want you to be our advocate.”

West Seattle’s elected representative on the Seattle School Board, Marty McLaren, heard that plea and a whole lot more during her two-hour community-conversation meeting on Saturday.

Before the meeting was over, she in turn asked community members to help her advocate for them – and that resulted in this whiteboard list of priorities suggested by the 20 or so who came to her meeting:

(Click image to see larger view)
The urgency of a priority list comes from the fact that within days, McLaren and other board members are expected to see the next draft of the Seattle Public Schools BEX IV levy. It doesn’t go to voters till February, but the board is supposed to finalize the levy proposal by early November.

While the group in attendance on Saturday was dominated by parents of students at K5 STEM at Boren – who are suddenly in turmoil over district administrators’ repeated refusal to say where they eventually will be housed, or even whether they are a “school” or instead a “program” to potentially be dispersed among campuses – the priorities were for the entire peninsula.

“This is so exciting,” McLaren enthused by meeting’s end.

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Tonight’s Seattle School Board meeting had two key points for West Seattle. First, though the BEX-IV levy was not on the board’s agenda tonight, it took up much of the public-comment period during the board’s meeting, mostly regarding moving up the timeline for the Arbor Heights Elementary rebuild.

That’s our video of all the West Seattle speakers – including one whose focus was on K-5 STEM at Boren. Ahead, text summaries of all the speakers – and the latest on the plan to reopen Fairmount Park Elementary, with a design-contract “emergency” vote tonight:

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Thanks to Schmitz Park Elementary PTSA president Mark Wainwright for sharing the photo of SP students gathered at the campus flagpole after taking part in International Walk to School Day. They even had a color-coded map of their routes!

Something to say to Seattle Public Schools about the latest draft of the BEX IV levy? After the most recent round of community meetings – including the one we covered last Monday – the district asked for feedback by September 30th. That’s tonight. So hurry up and send it to capacity@seattleschools.org. P.S. And if you want to offer public comment at this Wednesday’s regular Seattle School Board meeting, you have to sign up by phone or e-mail TOMORROW – as explained in this district document.

Are you a graduate of West Seattle High School? During this WSHS Homecoming Weekend, your fellow WSHS alum Jim Biava has a message, with a request:

Attention all West Seattle High School Graduates!

Congratulations to all West Seattle High School Alumni for having made it this far and for your successes, whatever they may be! Many of us West Seattle High School Alumni still live in West Seattle the place we call home. It’s a wonderful place to live.

The West Seattle High School Alumni Association benefits all of us in our community. The Alumni Association helps many students get the needed resources to continue their education to improve their lives. This year the Alumni Association awarded over $64,000 in scholarships. We facilitate keeping in touch with fellow classmates from whatever year you graduated. The Annual All-School Reunion, the Hall of Fame, the Scholarship Awards, the publication of the Chinook, and the Membership Chairperson who keeps us connected are direct benefits that the Alumni Association provides to all Alumni. The WSHS Alumni Association is the glue that keeps our community together.

The WSHS Alumni Association needs your help now.

We are the reportedly the largest High School Alumni Association in the country. However, we find ourselves with a few open and vital positions on the Alumni Board. We need people like you to join us and keep the Alumni Association the proud and benevolent association that it is. We need fresh new ideas and new faces to join us in keeping the tradition going that started many years and generations ago.

It takes a little time, one meeting a month, and some work. The personal satisfaction of helping your community and the camaraderie you receive are priceless!

Please contact Jim Biava at 206-387-2683 or e-mail to jim@JimBiava.com for more information on the opportunities. The Alumni Association is counting on you.

By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

Tonight is West Seattle High School‘s homecoming game – and it caps off a big week that included the first 2012-2013 PTSA meeting.

“It’s the first meeting of the year and we are really revving to go. I’m excited to be here because I think West Seattle High School is really turning a corner” – especially in terms of parental involvement -began the new PTSA president, Tracy Burrows. “Now, we’re just building on the foundation … of the last couple of years.”

The theme of moving forward and upward recurred throughout the meeting. Principal Ruth Medsker shared promising academic news; PTSA leadership spoke about goals for the year.

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West Seattle’s Co-op Preschools are among our newest WSB sponsors, and here’s what they want you to know:

“Kindergarten readiness! School success!” is all over the news! Kindergarten teachers consistently comment that kids who come from the Co-op Preschools are so ready to succeed. Yes, our preschools have changed with the times to make them more relevant to today’s parents and to keep up with new advances in early childhood education. But the basic formula remains: Co-op kids explore a rich curriculum, learn to think and make wise choices, practice solving problems, learn to treat others with empathy and compassion. ABC’s, 1-2-3’s—literacy, math, and science—are woven into play so children learn to approach learning with enthusiasm. And the fun and learning starts in our Parent-Infant classes through Pre-K.

Our tuition is much lower than other preschools. We can keep the tuition low because we are a nonprofit organization run by parents. Some people have heard rumors that co-op is “work,” but each parent gets to choose how much and what kind of effort they put in. Parents enjoy having their voices heard. And they enjoy getting to know other parents, seeing how their child does at school, and watching their child develop friendships with other children. Our preschool teachers follow educational guidelines established by National Association for Education of Young Children and WA State Early Learning & Development Guidelines 2012.

South Seattle Community College‘s parent-education component offers the latest in child development and guidance—someone there to share the normal joys and challenges of raising kids. Parent discussions are geared to the child’s age and the parent’s interests. We offer talks on things like: No More Diapers, Using Logical Consequences, Parenting in the Media Age, Kitchen Science, Math In The Back Yard, No More No’s, Solving Dinnertime Meltdowns.
Because parents are all learning together and have similar parenting styles they develop a community of friendships that lasts for years. As one parent says:

Both of my children were lucky to spend the first five years of their lives in the coop program. Co-op is so much more than just preschool. It is a community where both teachers and parents work together to create an environment filled with kindness, compassion, creativity, fun, and learning.

West Seattle’s Co-op Preschools have neighborhood locations in the Admiral, Alki, Lincoln Park, Arbor Heights, and SSCC campus areas, with some openings this fall (mostly for 3 and under right now and a few spaces in our Pre-K classes). Contact Judy Hall at 206-938-2278 or jkatalki@aol.com. And find out more at our website: sites.southseattle.edu/homelife

We thank the Co-op Preschools for sponsoring independent, community-collaborative neighborhood news via WSB; find our current sponsor team listed in directory format here, and find info on joining the team by going here.

The issue of school crowding is a big one in West Seattle’s public schools right now. But it’s an issue at some schools that aren’t necessarily overcrowded overall – but dealing with issues in individual classes or grades. A Sanislo Elementary teacher has a message for you, and an invitation, in this letter about what’s happening at her school:

I have twenty-eight students in my kindergarten classroom at Sanislo Elementary.

As a veteran teacher I can say that I have faced numbers like this before, back in 1984-85. But with the education standards of 2012 is this an equitable start for these 28 young children, these eager to learn, clamoring to be seen and heard, and budding students? My team teaching partner faces 29 students on her side of the room. Yes, I said ROOM. We are 102 A and B at Sanislo Elementary. Our building is designed in the open concept style.

The contractual class size limit in Seattle Public Schools is 26. For the time being, Ernie Seevers, our principal, has done his best to provide more assistance in our classrooms by assigning tutors to help us throughout the day. The tutors are incredibly kind and understanding of young children and they are very good at carrying out our quick directions to work with students on writing, reading, or cutting and gluing. But tutors are a temporary measure. Twenty-six students are the contractual number, and in all honesty, that number should be even lower. We need another classroom teacher at Sanislo to provide adequate learning opportunity for our youngest students.

In the 9-23-12 Seattle Times there was an article titled: Why Washington Kids Aren’t Going to College. The last line of the article quotes State Rep. Reuven Carlyle, D-Seattle, saying “Our kids are not getting the bug for learning.” Isn’t kindergarten where that ‘bug’ should begin? If you are a Sanislo parent, alumnus, or the parents of alumni, please join us at the community meeting with Superintendent Jose Banda on Tuesday, Oct. 2, at Concord International Elementary School, 723 S. Concord St. at 6:00 pm. The children can reach quite a volume in the classroom but they need you and I to make a din for them on the outside.

Teresa Goethe
Sanislo Kindergarten Teacher

(UPDATED TUESDAY AFTERNOON with the completed text summary)

(WSB video of tonight’s meeting in its entirety, unedited)
By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

In West Seattle tonight, parents with a school that’s not mentioned in the BEX IV levy plan gave district officials almost as much of an earful as parents with a school that is.

Parents from the new K-5 STEM at Boren option elementary wanted to know what the plan is for their permanent home – district answer, in short: there still isn’t one – and also took the occasion to voice complaints about a lack of supplies and incomplete facilities, saying it will be difficult to believe promises the district makes for the future, if they are breaking other ones now.

But the biggest contingent was from Arbor Heights Elementary, most dressed in yellow, some holding signs, recounting health, safety, and climate-control challenges on the campus, and pleading for the promised rebuild to be moved up.

Right now, it’s not scheduled to be completed until fall 2019 – toward the end of the levy’s lifespan.

Before getting to Q/A and attendee comments, district managers went through multiple levels of background explanation, including why BEX IV is a levy and not a bond measure. (All the explanatory documents are linked here.) Unlike previous BEX IV-related meetings, this time they added information about the ballot measure that will also be on the February ballot.

District communications manager Tom Redman emceed the meeting; the presentation was led by assistant superintendent Pegi McEvoy, with district capital projects/planning director Lucy Morello also participating, and brief appearances later by interim assistant superintendent Bob Boesche and executive director of school operations Phil Brockman. Also pointed out, though they did not speak, were School Board members Marty McLaren (who represents West Seattle) and Sherry Carr, and this area’s executive director of schools Carmela Dellino (whose former school Roxhill Elementary was not mentioned at all, though it is in relatively bad shape).

The feedback from this meeting and two others around the city will be taken into account for one more draft of the levy, to be presented at a school-board work session next month. We have much more to add to the story of what happened tonight (check back by midmorning Tuesday) – but are publishing this short version first, along with video of the entire meeting (above).

ADDED 12:53 PM: The rest of the story, ahead: Read More