Agenda
1. A talk from Stephen Martin head of Advanced Learning which touched on enrollment, the new testing procedure for screening this year and the West Seattle Pathway focus group.2. The beginning of the planning process for the report to the superintendent for this year.
3. A call for unfilled positions on the committee.
Links
Note from Advanced Learning on the Saturday Testing (look on the middle of the page)
Key Takeaways
1. Garfield may max out of capacity next year and there are some early meetings going on at JSIS about this. Note: none of the decision making on pathways etc. is controlled by advanced learning.
2. Spectrum is going to be renamed to the more straight forward Advanced Learning over time. This is solely a nomenclature issue. Note single domain Advanced Learner qualification is starting this year.
3. Prior to the WAC requirements the district didn't even track how many HCC students there were past Middle School. They are now doing so.
4. Screening for qualification is being moved to Thurgood Marshall and Cascadia because of difficulties booking the space in JSIS. They expect to screen 650 kids a day over a series of Saturdays. It is possible to arrange special arrangements if that schedule is not possible. For the younger children the screen process will be used to keep the testing time around hour and there will be a callback for the rest of the test if the screen is passed. Interestingly AL is directly consulting with the CogAt test author (David Bowman?) on the proper use of the instrument. The result percentiles will probably be normed to either regional or national standards and not local ones which are considered too high.
5. Advanced Learning is moving forward on setting up West Seattle High School pathway. "Eventually this will not be a choice." There is no timeline associated with this effort yet. Its possible an equivalent to Ingraham's program will be established at Sealth as well. This as I mentioned before sounds like its still in the early discussion phase.
6. Staff at Ingraham are contemplating changes in the 2020 class timeframe or later to the IBx program. Essentially based on the current cohorts feedback they want to delay entry into IB until junior and senior year and have the cohort do a tracked set of classes in ninth together and then in tenth take pre-IB and honors classes This was motivated by the feeling that an extra year of maturity leads to better outcomes and among other things this would solve the difficulties in creating a workable senior year. There was talk at the meeting about letting students accelerate on an individual basis. This is also still in the discussion phase.
7. If you're interested in volunteering on the committee there are open positions for Secretary, Washington MS rep and Diversity rep.
52 comments:
I have a few questions.
Is Madison's HCC program going to be self-contained or blended with Spectrum?
Do parents really want a self-contained one-class per grade program for middle school?
Did the parents who demanded this at Madison realize they were giving up access to the rigorous program offered at Garfield? (Assuming they'll still have that option.)
Is it only West Seattle students who will lose access to Garfield? (For the sake of equity, kids in the SE and Queen Anne/Magnolia will have to be sent to their neighborhood high schools too.) How can those 30 or so students per grade be provided a program equivalent to the one other students receive at Garfield? What would this look like if those 30 students are split between West Seattle High School and Sealth?
How can Ingraham be considered an HCC school if it doesn't offer anything different for those kids?
What will students at Ingraham do with their extra year in high school? Will the school be able to provide challenging English, History and Science courses to fill in that 10th grade year?
How many HC students will choose Ingraham (with no accelerated program and less flexible class options) over Garfield?
I don't like any of this. The kids in West Seattle are being cheated of a meaningful, challenging middle and high school experience. Ingraham won't offering highly capable services anymore.
Thank you for providing a summary of the meeting. The discussion around high school pathways does bring up a lot of questions. Part of me wonders if otherwise capable students have been so ill served in middle school that the IBX just doesn't work for many students, and rather than fix middle school, they are doing away with IBX. For those that need more acceleration, losing the cohort and accelerating on an individual basis doesn't seem ideal. Without a cohort of students on the same pathway, would they have to resort to independent study for senior year? Would they encourage early graduation? So many questions...
To add some more color re:IBX. First bear in mind this was a discussion by a non-decision making advisory committee about a possible change. So nothing is set in stone and I assume there will be wider talks with more of the community. But I did find the several parents comments who were in the program's comments interesting. One point raised was that IB is inherently just as rigorous as the AP track so assuming a cohort attends the school this will be essentially equivalent to what occurs at Garfield where you start in ninth grade with various honors classes and end with lots of AP courses in the last 2 years. There were a few questions about whether there would be a rigorous set of courses prior to IB which is probably the crux of the issue. The issue of achieving competency in a world language on an accelerated schedule has fallen mostly on families to supplement. The other point brought up was that Running Start may be a better use of an extra year than trying to create college courses in High School. This was due to the constraints on who could teach in the building and the expertise of the current teachers vs. what's available on a campus like UW. FWIW: I thought the discussion was thoughtful and I think if you're currently considering IB you should go talk with the current parents and staff.
I find it telling that the only thing AL is doing with Spectrum is changing its name. The program continues to sink like a stone tied to a stone.
AL parent
Benjamin,
Thank you for attending the meeting and posting your notes.
I'm surprised to hear the screener is almost an hour for the younger kids. My 5-year-old child is not going to sit still that long to take a written test...plus there's MORE on another date if they pass the screener?
Now I understand why parents secure private testing. Sigh.....
- Testing this Year
Back when West Seattle parents were demanding that an elementary program be built closer to home, without much concern for the impact it would have on Thurgood Marshall, there was discussion here about "be careful what you wish for."
Vocal WS parents made it clear that they priotized closeness to home over large cohorts of HCC kids. The capacity crisis has been moving up the grades for a long time now and it's long been known that guaranteed access to Garfield would not last forever. It was always clear to me that starting an HCC elementary in WS would eventually lead to an entire continuous pathway there.
So creating HCC MS and HS programs in West Seattle is both logical and consistent with what parents asked for, and it seems to be necessary given that there are literally hundreds too few HS seats in the north end of the city. Northend HCC kids cannot be returned to their neighbohood schools because there is no room. None. Rainier Beach has room and they could easily put some portion of HCC there to take advantage of IB, and maybe that's where some kids will end up? Lincoln will be another potential spot for part of HCC, but it doesn't open until 2019, and the need for relief at Garfield will occur sooner than that.
And remember, we should all be thanking the families who opted to be trailblazers and enroll into IBX at Ingraham. Without them, Garfield would have broken sooner. They didn't lament that their kids were being cheated. They took a chance to build something attractive for their kids and those still to come. No reason West Seattle families can't do this too.
Longtimer
Longtimer, why assume that West Seattle has to be booted from Garfield right now? It has closer proximity to Garfield than most north of the Ship Canal. Those populations are the ones overburdening Garfield. More logical is make Ingraham mandatory for North End APP and add Lincoln too in a few years. Central, South and West stay at Garfield. Another split in a few years, yes, with West Seattle in Sealth or WSHS. But only after HCC numbers grow substantially.
Ingraham IB is a great program. North enders should enjoy their entrance to the program that has been built and keep it at that.
Another viewpoint
Thank you, Benjamin!
Any idea what they are using as a screener cutoff for the K-2 students? My understanding is that the Cogat authors recommend a lower cutoff than required for the full test.
K parent
The result percentiles will probably be normed to either regional or national standards and not local ones which are considered too high.
This will mean the number of students who are admitted to HCC will be even larger than today, which is much larger than it was 10 years ago. I'm puzzled how parents think one thing should not change (Garfield preference for HCC) when the numbers in the program have changed exponentially. The writing has been on the wall for this issue for a few years. At least they are having discussions at JSCEE now rather than waiting til next spring when the enrollment is projected and another infamous SPS fire drill commences.
Another old timer
Another old timer, why would this increase numbers? Advanced Learning has never used local norms for the Cogat. Regional norms would be more rigorous than what is used now, as would be the use of a preliminary screener.
Current parent
The Spectrum program has been a big disappointment so far and seems effectively worthless. I was told that my first-grade Spectrum student would be able to walk to math and have appropriate 'just right' reading books. However, he was not allowed to walk-to-math because he missed the telling time questions on the initial assessment (his old school hadn't taught analog clocks yet, but I spent about an hour over the weekend with him and he knows how to tell time now). However, he's stuck in first grade math doing work he was doing a year ago. He is already saying that the work is too easy and too much like kindergarten and is getting increasingly disengaged. He is also stuck with books that he was reading easily a year ago, he reads them to me without any errors but isn't being given any harder material. Spectrum is offering my son nothing so far. He tested at the 98% percentile last year.
--looking for private options next year
"...north of the Ship Canal. Those populations are the ones overburdening Garfield."
That comment sounds like you're blaming northend children for this situation, which seems really unfair. The district's inability to manage capacity is what is causing many schools to be overburdened. Children aren't the ones in charge of enrollment! Don't blame the students and paint some as "deserving" and others as the "problem," please.
This whole HS thing is going to get very ugly...
Ingraham cannot absorb all of the north end APP. They are apparently going to be put on the next levy for a 500 seat expansion a few years from now. But short term, no, they cannot become the mandatory assignment for all the north end kids currently at Garfield.
So given that north end schools are completely full, and that Garfield needs relief very soon, and that schools like Rainier Beach and apparently some in West Seattle have some wiggle room, who most realistically should be moved out of Garfield? Should kids in the central part of the city have to go to Beach so that WS kids can stay at Garfield? That doesn't make sense to me.
Longtimer
Benjamin, Thank you so much for shedding light on the AL meeting for those of us unable to attend. I do have a question about the testing at the middle school level, as I will put my older child into the queue. Your notes raised this question for me: You explicitly called out that the younger kids will be getting the COGAT screener. Does this mean older kids will be taking the full COGAT? I don't have philosophical feelings on this, but I do want to mentally prepare my daughter that she'll be taking a longer test than what I'd told her. Great classroom student. Long standardized tests, not so much, so she'll need to digest the news.
Can you confirm? Thank you.
Mom of MS kid
Mom of MS kid, the screener is only for K-2. The full-length test is given to everyone else through 8th grade.
According to googlemaps:
WSH to GHS - 7.7 miles, 22 minutes
WSH to RBHS - 10.6 miles, 21 minutes
GHS to RBHS - 6.4 miles, 20 minutes
Given that HCC is the only non sped high school population that receives yellow bus transportation from the district (state) and that the population that would be displaced from Garfield to RBHS (to make room for all HCC who choose GHS) would be high FRL and kids of color, it would seem that both practically and politically, HCC should be the moveable piece. There is no provision for the displaced kids from GHS to receive any transportation beyond metro. Could we really mandate that a couple hundred students that fall into the "underserved" category be forced to get on metro and travel from their neighborhood to RBHS (a trip much longer than the 20 minutes by car googlemaps indicates) to make room for the preference HCC feels entitled to at Garfield? It is unsettling that this could even be a thought to solve the capacity problem at GHS. Let's think out of the box, folks, and not chase the neighborhood out of Garfield.
oh my
Thank you to the commenter above. Somehow I missed that fact! I'll be saying mea culpas to my child. Such is life.
Mom of MS kid
IB at Ingraham should be a choice, not a forced placement. It is very different from schools offering a selection of AP classes.
As a west seattle parent looking towards HS next year, I started a quick spreadsheet comparison of Garfield & WSHS course offerings. Mostly with an eye towards AP courses in the core subjects. While there is a broader selection of electives at Garfield, the LA, SS, Math & Science offerings are pretty similar in terms of available H and AP classes in those subjects. Now, I have no idea if all the classes offer the same rigor, since so much depends on the teacher and level of cohort in the class. But it did make it seem like a possibility. And even more so when I started looking at the private schools and realized their tuition equaled 90% of our household income. (I had thought I'd add those offering onto the spreadsheet - ha!)
We've been through all the splits, started at Lowell - and so clearly see the writing on the wall in terms of Garfield's capacity issue.
So tired of SPS Admin shenanigans,
WShouse
WShouse-
The issue is how many sections of the AP classes are offered - at Garfield a certain AP class will be offered for 2-3 periods to accommodate a larger cohort of kids who are taking those classes (which includes HCC kids and non-HCC kids), so scheduling is easier to fit them all in. I have heard of high schools having to cancel sections of a class if they don't have enough kids to justify holding the class, or alternatively, your child can't make the schedule work because both the AP Science class and the AP Math class they want are only offered during one period a day and they are on Yearbook staff - so not everything fits.
It is the mass of kids at Garfield who are taking these classes that make it possible to have flexibility.
I would guess (hope) that kids signing up for these AP classes at all of our high schools are very capable students, so the class would be comparable to Garfield or any other AP class in the city. I do think the kids in each class certainly drive the discussion level in class - but our kids are finding that a diversity of kids in the class from different backgrounds make for far better discussions than a bunch of APP kids who have known each other since 1st grade typically do.
Good luck with your decision!
-GHS Parent
GHS Parent, thank you for the clarification on sections and schedules at Garfield. I can see how the increase in volume would allow for a certain degree of higher flexibility. However, I have heard that sometimes courses at Garfield were too full for some students to take the World Language of their level and choosing and that they have to do lottery for the Oceanography course. Actually, I think it was in a discussion on this blog or the SSC blog.
I would imagine that there is going to be scheduling and capacity issues in all sought after classes, regardless of site.
What diversity does Garfield have that you think wouldn't be present at WSHS? The economic diversity is pretty similar - FRL 35.7/33.9. Racial diversity is spread differently with 10% higher white at WSHS, but also slightly more hispanic, native and mixed percentages than at Garfield. Both schools reflecting greater racial diversity than the City of Seattle itself. SPED is higher at WSHS. Pulled this from OSPI
Trying to predict the shifting sands of SPS! Garfield is going to be changing, WSHS is going to be changing. Hope we predict right and find a great 4 years of HS learning for our kid!
Does anyone have any other ideas for high school options? Raisbeck, Ing IBX...?
WShouse
WHhouse -
Exactly my point about the rigor of the AP class - I believe that the diversity makes the class better. So diversity at GHS or WSHS would be a GOOD thing and a positive for your particular local high school.
And you are right, capacity makes scheduling and getting the right classes difficult everywhere. Our kids have actually been pretty lucky at Garfield and have been able to get all of their classes - but not the first time their schedules come out. It takes some effort and perseverance - but because there are multiple sections, it typically works out.
The World Language at Garfield leaves a lot to be desired - both in availability and rigor in a lot of cases.
-GHS Parent
All I can say is I hope the district gets its act together soon and moves beyond these so-called "early talks" down at JSCEE. Nothing may change for current 8th graders, but it sounds like today's north end HCC 7th grade cohort may be in for some big changes. Will they have access to Garfield and its rich AP offerings? Probably not. Will they have access to an accelerated IB program at Ingraham? Probably not. Will they be forced into IB at Ingraham, even if it's not appropriate? Perhaps. Or maybe they'll be sent to their neighborhood high school, whether it can meet their needs or not.
Changing high school pathways is a big deal and will take a lot of planning and preparation. It should also involve a lot of community outreach if this is going to significantly change the nature of kids' high school options. Current 7th grade north end HCC students will be making high school selections in a little over a year. SPS needs to have this figured out BEFORE then.
HIMSmom
I wouldn't be so sure about this year's 8th graders not being impacted. GHS has a 500 plus freshman class this year, with another one entering next year. And the year after that. If they do away with IBx, it sounds like more APP/HCC students will choose GHS than are currently. GHS is built for 1600. The crisis is now. For JSCEE to be talking about this now should be a good indication that it is urgent.
Skeptic
WSHouse - If private school tuition is truly 90% of your household income, then you can expect to receive significant financial aid. Do not rule out private school for price reasons alone. Try Lakeside's financial aid calculator, available on the Lakeside admissions home page. If you make less than $75,000 per year for a family of 4, your average tuition at Lakeside is projected to be less than $2000.
-- South End
I heard talk about capping HCC enrollment at Fairmount Park in WS as it was expected to become too large a group in the next year or two. I guess the overflow is forced to go to Thurgood Marshall. I heard of a west Seattle family not being able to transfer to fairmont park HCC even this year due to capacity and being forced to stay at Thurgood. How can we have a WS pathway for HCC if we have already met capacity at the elementary level and we are still below the cohort needed for Missdle school? It doesn't make sense.
WShouse- Don't forget running start or home school with enrollment at your local community college. Community college gives much more transferable credit than AP coursework and may save you a couple years tuition and time at a 4 year, saving money. Think long term.
West Parent
There is still not a full HCC class in every grade at Fairmount Park. That is not enough students for a self-contained program. If access was limited for HCC students, it must be because there is not room for both HCC and the neighborhood students in the building.
By the time they reach middle school, children should be broadening their social network a bit - not signing up for three years of science, ELA and social studies with the same 30 students. If they are also taking music classes, there's little chance they'll have any separate classes.
Wow thank you so much BL. This information is very important and concerning. Change is coming but meaningful change is not necessarily what SPS has in mind.
first WS. Sorry you guys are great and live in full other part of town that you chose to live in long before any glaciers changed things and with an understanding of your child's needs. Sorry.. Sorry ... Sorry. But chasing WS is a singular board members dream to the determent of the entire program. There aren't the HC numbers over there to do this. Not at any grade level! In two years WMS looses 1/3 of its students with no plan to replace them. At the same time the bubble of HC is inching towards HS and there are only a smarting of kids in WS that have qualified.
We need to be focusing on the NW and NE not west seattle.
Cascadia is going to have to be split.
I would think you would have Magnolia/QA + Cap hill/mountlake go to Lowell Elementary
I would think you would have Lowell feed into WMS with all others
I would think you would have a north HC designated site at Lincoln HS.
This whole WS thing was for reelection not for equitable services and I know the HC-AC said it's not a great idea.
It's still not. Fairmount park is ok. It should end there.
-reality
reality - You're correct. Washington will be below capacity in a couple years and Madison will be overflowing. This makes no sense for the HC students of West Seattle and it will increase the capacity problems at two middle schools.
As for high school, there are 20 or so West Seattle students per grade at Garfield. Shoving them out isn't going to make a great enough improvement at Garfield to balance the harm done to these kids.
A north HCC high school site at Lincoln, if they do that, is still a long way off. In the meantime???
Just a plea to MS parents- please keep the updates coming about MS (JAMS, HAmilton etc). As parent of 5th grader I am stressed about where to go from here? Go with allocated HCC MS, go with reasonably well-regarded gen ed, try for private (even if we can't afford). What happens to a HCC kid who goes to a gen ed MS - has anyone done that? I guess it could be OK for math or would they not offer appropriate level? What about LA? WOuld kid lose HCC designation for HS? HCC MS offerings, so far, sound hardly worth it. SO eager to hear the good and bad to help with decision making.
Open ears
Lincoln is expected to open in Fall 2019. All high schools will have to deal with the overcrowding until then.
If your child isn't enrolled in the cohort (so at WMS, HIMS or JAMS) in the 8th grade, they lose guaranteed access to Garfield for high school. That won't be available to everyone three years from now anyway. I'd be concerned that Lincoln will become the north end Garfield and you won't be able to get in.
The above poster is correct. Then again, when your kid enters HS, Lincoln will be a brand new school at that point, and it's unclear how robust the honors and AP offerings will be. It's possible the options will be more comprehensive at the local schools--or at least they'll be less of an unknown. Not being able to get in to Lincoln (if it becomes an HCC site) might not be such a loss, at least for the first few years.
Does anyone have experience with how high schools start up here? What can we reasonably expect for Lincoln, from Day 1? It seems that they'll pull kids from elsewhere and fully populate it at all grades upon opening (vs. a roll-up), so would they do a lot of planning to make sure they have all the classes kids need, whether pulling them from Garfield, Ingraham, or elsewhere? How likely are they to start strong, vs. taking several years to ramp up their programming?
1. Everyone here understands that the coming capacity crisis isn't just APP@Garfield, but for all SPS HS students, yes? Lincoln is not enough.
2. yes, WS kids will be forced into an "advanced learning" "option" that may mean they are warehoused in a school that has an advanced learning label and no real learning options for them. Michael Tolley believes kids are best served "learning" near their home address!
3. north end kids aren't "ruining" it for anyone. There are too many kids and not enough seats. This is not the fault of the kids. Advanced learning has grown (in a canary in a coal mine sort of way) because good north-end neighborhood schools grew too crowded for actual differentiation. Growth in AL is a direct outgrowth of the district capacity crunch. People don't actually want to put their 2nd grader on an hour+ bus ride. It's not for the prestige. It's not for weird competitive parenting. It's so their kid has a snowball's chance in hell of learning AT SCHOOL. As all kids should be able to.
4. Lincoln will be well-funded and seemingly well-run for years 1 and 2. Years 3 and 4 the district will reduce funding and they'll be screwed. Have fun, and hope for a well-funded PTA/ASB.
- SPS Drinking Bingo
"Back when West Seattle parents were demanding that an elementary program be built closer to home, without much concern for the impact it would have on Thurgood Marshall, there was discussion here about "be careful what you wish for.""
Longtimer, West Seattle parent's didn't "Demand" that an elementary program be built close to home.
What happened is: There has been a belief in the District administration that HCC services should be offered at Neighborhood Schools and not centrally offered as the program is currently. A few years ago, the district did a survey among the TM parents and the results reflected that many parents would prefer an equitable program closer to home. The district was already working on a WS option, and this survey validated the idea. Then, a vocal group of WS parents (who did no have kids enrolled in APP at the time) that emerged who emphatically said they would enroll in said option.
The deal was sealed when Julie Breidenbach volunteered to move to Fairmount Park (note she put up her hand and said she wanted to move to FP). Once that happened, most WS families at TM followed her. Without Julie and all of the great teachers who followed her to WS, I don't think Fairmount park would have had the initial draw that it has. I have heard Julie directly say as much - with an experienced leader to start the APP program, the odds of success were great and parents got behind the school.
The district led this initiative (vs it being demanded by parents) and yes, people ultimately supported it. Fairmount Park has turned out very well. There are only a handful (7) of WS kids still at TM, mostly in 5th grade. TM is still a fine school, so it is seemingly been a win-win.
The District also sent an email to West Seattle HCC Families last May, announcing that Madison would open HCC in 2016, and that "eventually" WSHS would be an HCC school. So, this has been in the works for awhile - again, District led, not a bunch of parents "Demanding" services.
The questions is, how long is "eventually" and can the district pull off the same success for a MS and HS option in WS - or at any other North End/South End MS or HS? And will this solve for the capacity issues that the district HS's currently face (are there enough WS kids enrolled in HCC at Garfield to solve the immediate crisis?
- Yet another Longtimer
From Seattle Schools blog:
enrollment trends to a given school based on assigned neighborhood school (not HCC specific)
To Ingraham
-from Ballard (130)
-from Garfield (14)
-from Roosevelt (150)
-from Nathan Hale (92)
To Garfield
-from Ballard (48)
-from Roosevelt (50)
-from Ingraham (11)
-from Nathan Hale (23)
-from Franklin (107)
-from West Seattle (79)
More numbers are included in the SPS file:
http://sps.ss8.sharpschool.com/UserFiles/Servers/Server_543/File/District/Departments/Enrollment%20Planning/Reports/Annual%20Enrollment/Section%204%20(1).pdf
76% of Garfield's current enrollment is neighborhood students (compared to 63% for Ingraham). West Seattle students (79) constitute 5% of Garfield's enrollment this year (and the data does not specify they are HCC qualified, so the percent of WS HCC could be even less). 8% come from North Seattle - Ballard (48), Ingraham (11), Hale (23), and Roosevelt (52). Once again, the numbers are not HCC specific. Another 8% come from Franklin (107) and Rainier Beach (20).
I believe you cannot get into Garfield from outside the assignment area unless you are in HCC. You can use an address that is not yours (it happens) but then you would still be included in the assignment area count. If a GHS student moves out of the assignment area, and tells the district, they are moved to the new assignment area high school. So most of the students coming in to GHS from outside the assignment area boundaries are HCC. Also, a large number of HCC kids live in the assignment area boundaries of Garfield. I'm always amazed at how many in my neighborhood (in the boundaries) qualify. A function of the water, an incredibly bright neighborhood or a really not great local school? A lot of Montlake kids qualify, which is a demographic similar to North Seattle (university/hospital staff/close to 520 Microsoft commute). So 76% of the kids at GHS are neighborhood, but a good percentage of those are also HCC.
HCC is a powerful community at Garfield, a huge add in terms of academics, spirit, leadership and legacy. Hopefully the fix to the capacity crisis will not cast all HCC to neighborhood schools. Garfield would be broken if that is the fix. It's a conundrum.
Wild
Looking at that breakout of numbers it's not exactly hard to guess how AL will be split if Garfield is deemed too full. (And I don't think AL gets a say in it.) North of Ship Canal stays north. The North students are about 1/2 the non-Garfield-assignment-area AL population. Franklin and Rainier Beach are approximate in numbers to the North students. West Seattle students are a bit less at 79. But one can see the build up beginning. Prediction: North, Central/South and West students stay in those respective assignment areas sooner rather than later. Don't argue with me. I'm not pushing for this. But better to get out ahead of staff than be left behind a la Lowell-to-Lincoln.
reader
reader,
North APP high school students can't be redirected from Garfield because there are no seats left in the North End. The only school with capacity is Rainier Beach. Either students overall will have to be shifted south or high schools will have to run extended schedules.
Wild said "I believe you cannot get into Garfield from outside the assignment area unless you are in HCC."
This is not true. Students that are not HCC qualified and were not enrolled in HCC in 8th grade, but have an HCC qualified sibling attending Garfield are admitted. They live outside the Garfield reference area.
-Junie
@ Lynn,
Are you sure north-end HC students can't be redirected? How much overcrowding is feasible before we go to split schedules or alternate calendars? Almost 2500 students at GHS doesn't sound realistic, but could they manage 2000, even if super crowded and incredibly unpleasant? Could Roosevelt get by with 2000 for a couple years? I have no idea, but I've heard people talk about very high numbers for some schools historically...
If 2000 or so kids is feasible--and again, I'm not saying it is--they could potentially start rolling up north-end HCC kids to Roosevelt in a couple years, building it up as another HCC north-end site. Roosevelt is projected to lose a lot of neighborhood kids when Lincoln reopens.
Could they be thinking along these lines?
That's not true that siblings of HCC qualified kids are admitted to Garfield if they live outside the assignment area. We have friends whose younger siblings did not get in. Maybe they are prioritized on the waitlist...I'm not sure about that??? But it is not an automatic assignment.
-GHS Parent
Roosevelt as a north HCC site? Crowding aside, ask yourself if that is consistent with any previous APP/HCC placement.
I also know people who have siblings who did not get into Garfield who live outside the attendance area. They used to get sibling preference before the NSAP, but no longer. The waitlist at Garfield hasn't moved in years. Maybe a couple of kids get in that way, but waitlist priority is the only way I can imagine sibling preference plays out. And not for every sibling, because the waitlist barely moves.
Wild
It might not be Roosevelt. It might be Lincoln Ingraham, Nathan Hale. It's clear to me that the kids will be sent somewhere other than Garfield soon. In fact, I doubt it's Roosevelt. SPS doesn't tend to put AL students in schools with economic resources. Roosevelt with more resources than the other schools in the north is unlikely to be the selection historically speaking.
reader
Do Ingraham and Hale have room?
Lincoln would make sense since it's new, but where can they put kids before then?
-GHS Parent and Wild
I did not say that every sibling of an HCC student at Garfield receives an automatic assignment. I simply said that I know of students who are not HCC qualified and live outside of the attendance area that were admitted to Garfield. These students happen to have an HCC sibling at Garfield. I only know of a few admitted last year and I don't know if they were waitlisted or not.
-Junie
This is the answer on sibling preference for out of attendance area students, including those with siblings at Garfield, from enrollment services -
By applying for School Choice on time, siblings are given “sibling preference.”
Sibling preference does bring students with siblings currently attending a school to the top of the wait list.
Unfortunately, being placed on a wait list is never a guarantee of placement at a school.
The only guaranteed school is the student’s designated neighborhood school.
Wild
And given the projected growth for Garfield, if the waitlist has barely moved in years, it is certainly not moving going forward.
Wild
Hi all, I have a gifted, motivated, self-directed 8th grader currently attending a private school. Roosevelt is our assigned neighborhood school. Will it meet his needs? Currently he is in Algebra 2 and a strong writer. It sounds like the AL cohort at IHS would be his style and he would like the diversity, but the hoops we are jumping for testing, facing capacity, etc make me wonder if it is worthwhile. I hear good things about Roosevelt but I worry he will not be challenged and I wonder if a private school downtown would be more diverse than the RHS population. ???
--Mazerunner
Hi mazerunnner,
This thread is almost dead. You'll have better luck if you repost when I open up the nov. open thread
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