First Day of School (At Last)

We're finally starting the year tomorrow 9/17!  I'm excited enough to put this post out one day early.

Reminders:

1. Many activity signups have not changed despite the delay in the starting date. Most important for our purposes: the deadline for Advanced Learning Evaluation is coming up in only a few weeks (10/8)   SPS Advanced Learning.

2. Middle School Curriculum Project.  I have the following page  http://discussapp.blogspot.com/p/middle-school-curriculum-project.html permanently on the top of the blog. Now that middle school is starting, if you're interesting in documenting and improving the curriculum please log what your students are doing there.

3. Million Hits! This one is just for fun. But I've put the counter on the top for the next week or so because we're about to pass the 1 million mark.

So how is the first day going?

Teacher Strike

As of this morning there is still no agreed upon contract and one day left until school starts.

• The latest update from the union: http://www.seattlewea.org/index.php/bargaining

• The latest update from SPS: http://www.seattleschools.org/cms/One.aspx?portalId=627&pageId=1880819

News Stories:

http://www.king5.com/story/news/local/seattle/2015/09/07/seattle-teachers-strike-no-deal-wednesday/71856746/

http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Seattle-teachers-prep-for-strike-amid-last-minute-negotiations-325377371.html

http://mynorthwest.com/11/2807278/Seattle-school-board-preps-for-legal-action-over-teacher-strike

Just in:

http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/education/seattle-school-board-to-consider-legal-action-if-teachers-strike/ which contains the following info:

"The district hopes to decide by the end of the day Tuesday whether to cancel school on Wednesday, said district spokeswoman Stacy Howard."

Several news outlets are now reporting that there will be a strike tomorrow via twitter.

https://twitter.com/KING5Seattle Also there are several threads on http://saveseattleschools.blogspot.com/


Since the teachers have announced a strike schedule through Friday it doesn't look like
any settlement is possible until at least next week.

Please share your thoughts and what backup activities you're setting up for you kids.

Garfield and Ingraham Course Scheduling

Per a parent's request this thread is for discussing the difficulties in scheduling the desired classes at the high schools. 9th grade languages seem to be particularly affected. Although this issue is not HCC specific it certainly affects the cohorts.

I have 2 general  requests:

1. Please remember to be to kind to your fellow parents.  We're all in this together.
2. If someone would  be willing to email Ted Howard and find out an official position on language classes and repost it  that would be helpful.

2014-2015 Standardized testing results released

The statue superintendent just released the SBAC scores this morning.  You can follow the link  OSPI Report for Seattle Public and drill down by school.

August Open Thread

The new school is starting to get closer.  I'm sure there are some questions bubbling out there. Also if anyone has any resources they'd like posted I'll add them here. What's on your minds?

Info for the new year

Bios for the new staff hires at JAMS: newstaff
Lincoln School Supply List: supplies

Reminder: please use an alias if you post anonymously.

Lincoln Seismic Upgrades

As I mentioned I've dug up some of the data on seismic mitigation in the Lincoln building for those who are curious/worried.

Summary

1. Again to establish the context BEX IV has seismic work scheduled for 37 building in the district. So your neighborhood reference school may also be slated for improvements.
2. Back in 1997 the central and north wing were upgraded already this includes bracing, anchors, reinforced sheer walls etc. Note: the South wing which currently contains Licton Springs is unmodified. 
3.  As part of the renovation of Lincoln back into a high school there are 3.7 million dollars worth of updates expected. This is spread out among all 4 buildings on the property. 
4. Among the further improvements in the central and north section are more post and beam ties, additional load bearing columns to provide redundant support, masonry wall reinforcements, investigation of the veneer ties to see if they are adequate and other masonry repairs.

PCS 2009 Study Link coming soon when I hear back that its ok to repost - Note: the dollar amounts are not accurate.

July Open Thread

We're now in the midst of the Summer break. I hope everyone's having a great time. 

I've been thinking a lot about the new state budget: http://www.komonews.com/news/local/Gov-Inslee-signs-new-382-billion-state-budget-311196821.html.   This will bring some real changes to the education landscape.  Among them are money for class size changes, a special grant to help rehabilitate some school building in our district, and tuition decreases at the college level that have a significant effect on the GET program.

Update: the class size issue is still very much in the air:

http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/politics/lawmakers-in-limbo-over-class-size-cuts-biology-test-and-loose-ends-from-budget-deal/

What's on your mind?

Please remember to use a pseudonym when posting anonymously. I don't want to start moderating comments to enforce this rule.

Capacity Planning (peering into the tea leaves)

Since its come up again let's talk about capacity in its own thread.

Background

There has not been much official change in the plans for HCC on the north side. Construction has started on the Wilson Pacific site and the school board recently chose names for the buildings

http://www.seattleschools.org/cms/One.aspx?portalId=627&pageId=438255


Here's the project status page with the latest excerpt:
http://bex.seattleschools.org/bex-iv/wilson-pacific-elementary-building-and-middle-school-building/

May 2015

The City issued the Master Use Permit, the demolition permit and the grading permit. The notice to proceed was issued to Lydig, the contractor, regarding the early work bids for abatement, demolition, earthwork and murals relocation. The site has been completely fenced and abatement has begun in the gym and cafeteria buildings. Work continued on other construction documents and the easement application for 92nd Street on the west side of the site. Advertisements were made for the structural bid package. Lydig is prepping for the bidding process for mechanical, electrical and plumbing work.

And for completeness here's the Lincoln Building  schedule:
http://bex.seattleschools.org/bex-iv/lincoln-building/
Note: construction is still slated for June 2018

As you can see the current Cascadia building has less total capacity (660) already than next year's estimated student body size per Rina (800)

June Open Thread

There are only 2+ weeks of school left and probably only half of those will be instructional in nature given all the end of the year events. How did this year go? What were the highlights and are there any things that you wish to improve next year.

Admin Note: I'll try to spawn a new open thread when the number of comments crosses a threshold where its hard to view on a phone. Also I've put up a tracking page for the middle school curriculum at http://discussapp.blogspot.com/p/middle-school-curriculum-project.html. This is mostly for next year but if you're interested in starting now feel free to add some data points.

Also please either use an authenticated identity or at least a consistent pseudonym when posting.

IBx at Ingraham High School end of the year wrap up

A reader asked "The first IBx cohort is graduating from Ingraham on June 8. I would like to hear from the parents about how they feel about their and their child's experience. This cohort took a chance and I want to say that I appreciate the students and the amount of support I have received from the parents."

Let's expand that a little bit. For anyone in any of the cohorts not just the seniors feel free to add how the year went. I remember there was a bit of  angst over the English pathway at the beginning of the year. Did that end satisfactorily?

Moderator Introduction

Hi,
I've agreed to take over moderating this blog along with Julie as a backup. So I thought a quick introduction would be in order. First, I'd like to thank Greg for all the work he's done maintaining the site. I've found it invaluable over the last few years and I volunteered in order to maintain it as a resource for the community.  I think its extremely important at times to have a censorship free forum to discuss news and make connections.

I've been involved with HCC program for the last two years. I have a 3rd grader at Lincoln and my main (elementary school related) passion is mathematics.  As of this year, I started volunteering and running the after school Math Club for fourth and fifth graders. So if you have a rising third or fourth grader feel free to shoot me an email if you're interested. Julie is the mother of a student at Thurgood Marshall. So we'll have a representative of both programs.

Moving forward, I don't really plan to change any of the policies or type of posts that already are occurring. I've always posted under an authenticated identity myself and I would put out one plea that if you feel comfortable to do so as well or at least use a consistent pseudonym.  At the same time, if there is anything you'd like done differently, feel free to comment below. I'm open to suggestions.

Thanks and I hope to make some new contacts in this process.

Looking for a new moderator

When the district first said it wanted to split APP, way back at Lowell Elementary in 2009, Andrew Siegel started this blog. His goal was to provide a open forum for APP parents to discuss APP.

Later that year, Andrew added me as a moderator. I've mostly been running the blog since 2009. Now, we're looking for another moderator to add and mostly take over.

That moderator probably should be someone who does not already run a major forum (including the PTAs and APP AC), would continue to keep comments almost entirely unmoderated (aside from deleting spam), and at their core believes in the idea of making this a place for open discussion among parents to help parents.

The time commitment isn't much more than a couple hours a week, mostly reading all the comments that come in, occasionally deleting spam that gets through the filters and restoring comments that incorrectly get labeled as spam, and doing a posts on topics parents ask for, district policy changes, or open threads.

If you are that person and want to take this on, please comment here or e-mail me at glinden@gmail.com. Please also free to discuss this blog, moderation of the blog, and other good forums for discussion here in the comments.

How's the blended model?

By request, a thread to discuss how the new blended model (blending APP with Spectrum or gen ed) at Fairmount Park is going. Parents happy with it?

Open thread

It's May. Summer is coming up fast! What's on your mind?

School board candidates and advanced learning

There are several people running for school board. It's not clear if any will read this thread, but let's start a discussion assuming at least some of them might. What would you like to say to the school board candidates about APP/HCC and, more broadly, advanced learning?

Open thread

Here's a new open thread for talking about anything you like! Please use the two threads below to talk about trying to decide which school to pick and talking about appeals, but, anything else, chat about it here.

Decisions, decisions

Based on interest in the open threads, here's a new thread for talking about what school — public or private, APP or not APP — you are favoring for your children for next year. Please use this as well to ask and talk about the situation at a particular school with other parents.

Discussing appeals

Based on interest in the open threads, here's a new thread to discuss appeals, the appeal process, and receiving the results of appeals when they come in. Please also use this if you want to talk with other parents about not getting accepted but not appealing and maybe trying again next year.

Open thread

Other than test scores coming in (please use the thread below for discussing that), what else is on your mind?

Another open thread

Clearly what's on your mind is eligibility test scores coming in!

There's a large number of comments on this thread already from parents receiving test scores and wanting to discuss the scores and next steps with other parents. Let's convert this thread to be about that.

Please join in if you're interested in talking with others about the test scores or can help out some of the new parents who have questions.

It's March! What's on your mind?

Open thread

Early February, but it feels like spring in Seattle! What's on your mind?

Choosing APP/HCC

Some new parents seem to be wondering whether to choose APP/HCC right now, including what other good alternatives are available. Let's open a new thread to talk about that.

New parents, please ask questions. Current APP parents and other new parents grappling with the same questions, please chime in if you can help.

Capacity and facilities

There seems to be a lot of interest in capacity issues in the district, including whether where APP/HCC is placed helps or hurts broader capacity issues and where APP/HCC is likely to end up over the next 2-4 years. Let's open a new thread to discuss that further.

Open thread

How are things going?

More loss of Spectrum for blended classrooms

Looks like McClure Middle School is dropping Spectrum and honors classes. From a letter to parents:

Next year the McClure Language Arts Department will be joining the rest of our departments at McClure and mirroring the advanced learning policies within our feeder schools. We are establishing a "blended" or "clustered" model in which all of our students who have been Spectrum-identified and our General Education students will be blended into the same Language Arts classrooms. There will no longer be separate Spectrum and General Education classes.

There are many reasons behind this modification, not the least of which is our commitment to the concept of growth mindset - the researched-validated principle that we can teach students that their success in school is not stagnantly based on their past but, with grit and perseverance (and a supportive, intentional school environment) all of our students can and will grow. We have looked at testing, classroom performance and discipline data and found that the array of skills, behaviors and challenges in both of these "tracks" are similar. All of our Language Arts teachers are currently teaching (or have taught in the recent past) both sets of students and our curriculum for both Spectrum and General Education courses have already been aligned. Finally, our teachers are spending this school year and this summer to collaboratively develop differentiated lessons, assessments, projects and activities to support and challenge all of our learners.

As the letter says, they are mirroring the broader trend in Seattle Public Schools of eliminating separate classrooms for advanced learning (and especially Spectrum). What do you think?

Testing in and new parents

It's that time of year again when the district administers APP eligibility tests and new parents are considering whether to go into APP/HCC. As in most prior years, it sounds like there are issues with test eligibility letters arriving late or not at all.

Let's open a thread for new parents to ask questions about the tests, what APP is like, and anything else they have on their minds. Existing parents, if you could answer any questions you can in the comments, I'm sure the new parents would be grateful.

Update: Advanced Learning apparently said, "This year, we are processing more than 5,400 applications and are continuing to test students through the end of February. ... Additionally, testing results and eligibility letters will be sent by early March." Note that early March is after most school tour dates and when open enrollment ends, so this delay is likely to lead to other problems.

Open thread

It's 2015! What's on your mind?

APP, this blog, and 2015

I thought we might want to start a discussion about what we'd like this blog to do in 2015.

Andrew Siegel started this blog in 2009 to provide an independent forum for parents to talk about the Lowell APP split. Since then, it's been used to talk about the many other changes that have happened to APP over the last six years, the biggest of which were multiple splits mostly along a north/south divide, but also including changes to Spectrum, overcrowding and capacity issues, further splits in the north and out to West Seattle, the lack of promised curriculum and consistency between schools, changes to textbooks, loss of experienced teachers, and name changes.

I think it's a good time to talk about what we'd like out of this blog for 2015. I think that this, the Seattle Schools Community Blog, and the HCC-AC are the only city-wide venues for discussion of APP/HCC, not just at a specific school, not just in the north or south, but across the entire city. And, so, I thought we'd want this blog to stay as a discussion forum for APP/HCC issues city-wide, mostly unmoderated, and mostly focused on common issues and some effort at holding together the broader community of APP/HCC across all the splits and changes over the years.

Are there are other things we want for this blog? What else might be helpful to APP/HCC parents in Seattle Public Schools?

Checking in on math instruction

By request, a thread for parents to talk about math instruction, especially at the elementary level. How are your kids doing in math? How is the pacing? Are some classes having trouble with the curriculum, either finding it inappropriate for the age, awkward, or that too many students are behind while others are ready to keep going? Thoughts on what parents can do to improve the math instruction?

Open thread

Winter break is coming up fast. What's on your mind?

More splits coming?

In an open thread, parents highlighted a section of an update to the District's Growth Boundaries Plan:

"Highly Capable Services students within the Washington pathway continue to grow, limiting the space at Washington Middle School for non-Highly Capable Services students coming from feeder schools. Again, staff are reviewing Highly Capable Services student enrollment data, as the location for Highly Capable Services could potentially be moved from being housed solely at Washington to a combination of Washington/Meany/Madison or otherwise."

And others said:

Washington is doing a fine job educating APP kids... better break it up.
...
Any bets on how many weeks it'll be before we see that same sentence repeated, but with Garfield and other high schools instead?
...
The writing is on the wall for high school. The new AL policy says that all high schools will be equipped to handle HC kids. It's just a matter of time before the automatic assignment to Garfield ends and the options will be neighborhood school or opt in to IBX at Ingraham, Rainier Beach, and possibly Sealth, depending on address ... I don't see any other way to solve the capacity problems that are coming.

Doesn't sound good. Please discuss further here.

Open thread

What's on your mind?

The miserable state of facilities

By request, a new thread to talk about facilities. The request was to talk about facility issues at Lincoln, but let's broaden this to talk about facility issues at all HCC (APP) locations.

For reference, the "2014 Facilities Condition & Educational Adequacy Assessment" might be helpful. In it, I noticed that Lincoln and Washington Middle School have quite a lot of issues, though some of the other locations are in fairly good condition. While this thread is specifically to discuss HCC location building issues, the miserable state of facilities is a broad problem at many locations throughout the district, in part aggravated by years of delayed maintenance and poor capacity planning, so a broader solution like a bond measure and then investment in ongoing maintenance may be necessary to get beyond twiddles.

Purpose of HCC (APP)

There's a discussion in some of the recent threads about what the purpose of HCC (APP) is. Who is it for? What services should be offered? How big should the program be? Who is not being served that should? Are their children in the program now that might be better served by something else?

To start off the discussion, it might be useful to quote WAC 392-170-035

Highly capable students are students who perform or show potential for performing at significantly advanced academic levels when compared with others of their age, experiences, or environments. Outstanding abilities are seen within students' general intellectual aptitudes, specific academic abilities, and/or creative productivities within a specific domain. These students are present not only in the general populace, but are present within all protected classes

and WAC 392-170-036

Students who are highly capable may possess, but are not limited to, these learning characteristics: (1) Capacity to learn with unusual depth of understanding, to retain what has been learned, and to transfer learning to new situations; (2) Capacity and willingness to deal with increasing levels of abstraction and complexity earlier than their chronological peers; (3) Creative ability to make unusual connections among ideas and concepts; (4) Ability to learn quickly in their area(s) of intellectual strength; and (5) Capacity for intense concentration and/or focus.

This topic seems to come up a fair amount and doesn't seem to get a lot of traction each time, but let's open a new thread on it anyway since there seems to be a lot of interest. Please be aware that, every time we try to talk about this, trolls inevitably say that we should destroy HCC entirely and toss out personal attacks at all the parents and children in HCC, so brace yourself, be polite anyway, and try to have a thick skin.

HCS-AC on challenges to HCC

The Highly Capable Service Advisory Committee (HCS-AC, formerly APP AC) sent out an e-mail with links to its report to the superintendent and suggestions on improving HCC (APP). I thought I'd highlight a piece of them in this post so we all can discuss them here:

The two biggest challenges that face the Accelerated Progress Program today are: 1) the explosive growth in the number of students at SPS and 2) the lack of diversity in the program, which we believe is rooted in pervasive socio-economic inequity rather than explicit racial bias. As APP has expanded to new sites, we support efforts to standardize scope, sequence, curriculum, and teaching materials across sites, and caution against losing the rich, individualized pedagogy that has made APP so effective. We also believe that rigor should be available for all students in all schools so that APP is seen as an intervention rather than the hoarding of a scarce resource.

Your thoughts?

Open thread

What's on your mind, HCC/APP parents?

Drafts of new Advanced Learning policies

By request, a thread to discuss the drafts of Policy No. 2190 and Superintendent Procedure 2190SP for Advanced Learning.

Apparently, you have only three days, just this weekend, to submit comments, which must be sent "by the afternoon of October 13". To submit a comment, e-mail "advlearn@seattleschools.org and be sure to include POLICY – in all caps – in the subject line."

There is already a discussion on this over at Seattle Schools Community Forum so, to avoid too much duplication, maybe the discussion here could focus on examples of feedback you are sending in.

Open thread

It's definitely autumn in Seattle. And I guess I should start using HCC instead of APP now. What's on your mind?

First few weeks of school

Let's start a discussion between parents specifically about lingering issues after the first few weeks of school. Something that's not getting fixed? Or something you are wondering about? Chat with other HCC (APP) parents about it here to see if you can find out more.

Ingraham IB and Garfield

By request, a thread to discuss high school options for APP. Of specific concern was that the IB program at Ingraham is completed by APP students at the end of their junior year, leaving their senior year open, but without all the advanced classes they need for their senior year (such as no good full year of English option for APP seniors). But let's also open this to broader discussions of the APP options for high school any issues people are finding with them.

Open thread

What's on your mind?

Start of school

Let's open a new thread for everyone to discuss issues around the start of school. Usually this is dominated by discussion of transportation and issues with the buses, but feel free to bring up that and anything else that other parents might want to discuss as we all ramp back up into the new school year.

Open thread

It's now August and apparently monsoon season in Seattle. What's on your mind?

ALTF recommendations

Melissa Westbrook over at the Seattle Schools Community Forum has a post, "Advanced Learning Task Forces' Recommendations", that lists all the recommendations to come out of that task force.

To avoid duplicating discussion, please comment on the recommendations over there. But let's open a thread here to do something different. Let's say you could recommend just one change to advanced learning in Seattle Public Schools. Something in the recommendations or something you think is missing, either is fine. What would that one change be?

Open thread

Almost July, and here's a new open thread. What's on your mind?

Summer learning resources

By request, a thread to talk about resources for summer learning.

Hamilton APP issues

By request, a thread to talk about issues specific to Hamilton APP.

Open thread

Juneuary, ugh. But school is almost out! Let's have an open thread to talk about summer plans, the next school year, and anything else that is on your mind.

District priorities and APP

At a school board retreat on June 7, SPS execs presented the district priorities to the Board. Here is a new thread to discuss them, especially how they might impact APP.

Update: Let's expand this to also include the 2014-2015 budget and what that means for APP.

APP and Math in Focus

New thread to talk about the vote authoritizing a new elementary math textbook, Math in Focus, and what it means for APP.