100 members of the McDonald School community gathered on Saturday at Bethany Church in Green Lake to discuss the school’s re-opening. School Board Directors Sherry Carr and Michael DeBell were available to address issues the group had compiled from community feedback, and State Senator Edward Murray observed the discussion.
Top issues were determined by reviewing results from an online survey, as well as comments discussed during previous meetings. These issues include:
- Use of the Lincoln High School site as an interim facility
- Curriculum program placement including language immersion, Montessori, Spectrum, and the Advanced Placement Program
- Principal and teacher hiring
- Sibling placement
- School boundaries
- Design team, PTA and other opportunities for community involvement
- Factors of primary concern to incoming kindergarten parents
Community members published issue papers for each of the seven topics, detailing the nature of the issues. Anyone may review those issue papers by joining the McDonald School Community Group on Yahoo
Director DeBell stated that a lot of the issues will be addressed by the end of January. By then, the Board will have voted on a transition plan that encompasses grandfathering siblings, transportation, etc.
The current Buildings, Technology and Academics levy (BTA II) will expire in 2010. A BTA III will be presented in which voters of Seattle Public Schools can approve a new six-year levy. The voting will take place on February 9,, 2010.
Both Directors Carr and DeBell acknowledged concerns about using Lincoln as an interim site. They mentioned that it’s been used as an elementary school in the past, including housing John Stanford students, during their school’s remodel. Director DeBell also said that there will be busing available to and from Lincoln. A school nurse will be available one day a week, shared between five different schools. The Seattle Public Schools policy is that full-time nurses are only available for schools with 2,000 or more children or schools that are classified as “medically fragile.” Schools, however, can choose to spend discretionary funds toward a nurse.
From a timing standpoint, Director DeBell said they expect to have a principal hired in late January, before school tours begin. Once a principal has been hired, a design team can be assembled, including members of the community to provide feedback with regard to the school. Director DeBell explained that ultimately, program placement is decided by the Superintendent, “Mainly because most of the programs are technical. Special Ed. Programs, A.L.O. Programs, Medically Fragile Programs, etc.—are those that have to be distributed throughout the city in a way that is cost-effective. Most programs are not necessarily the kind that we’re dealing with here–in that if we’re opening new schools should we have new programs or just use the standard curriculum?”
Director DeBell further stated that he and Director Carr believed the community should have a voice in determining the programs at a newly-opened school, and the way in which that will occur is through a design team. The stronger the team with organized goals, the more likely the community has a strong voice in program placement.
Director Carr indicated that the sibling issue was probably the one issue most brought up from people providing feedback. She said that “all of the School Board wants siblings to be able to be grandfathered in and go to school with their older siblings,” and that “everyone’s working to that objective.” In order to do that, she added, “We have to ensure we meet our obligations.”
Boundaries
The Board will vote on the final boundary maps on Wednesday, November 18. The question to amend the border back to 60th Street was discussed (it had been changed to 57th St.) as was the change between moving the southern border back from 46th/47th to 45th. But the boundaries in question may impact the grandfathering of siblings. Director Carr indicated it was likely the northern border would move back to 60th but unlikely the southern border would move back to 45th. Once the boundaries are finalized the question of grandfathering siblings will be answered.
Community Feedback
There is still time to provide feedback to the Board on any of the issues before they vote on Wednesday, November 18. Anyone can e-mail feedback to [email protected]
Finally, the McDonald Community is still seeking neighbors to complete this survey prior to the November 18 vote.
Margaret — It’s great to have you on board here! Definitely good timing for this subject matter. Regarding a statement above under Boundaries, the sentence “But the boundaries in question may impact the grandfathering of siblings” is a little out of place and unspecific. Can you expand any on what she meant by this? Obviously changing boundaries will impact the number of students projected and in the case of JSIS, they are adding more than 24 square blocks of homes, duplexes, and apartments. And, in the case of the McDonald boundaries, there are no siblings to grandfather in. So, this is a little confusing.
Sorry, what I should have mentioned in context was that initially, an issue was raised in the community for the JSIS boundary to bet set on 50th, instead of 45th. After receiving community input, the boundary was amended to 46th/47th since 50th would have simply overloaded JSIS and “would eliminate any opportunity to grandfather siblings.”
Thanks, that does make it more clear. This is in no way directed at you but, what I find puzzling is that the first set of boundaries was based on data that they must have spent a lot of time pouring over, obviously considering that the sibling issue was important (i.e. leave room for siblings). Then, the “community” says, we want the attendance area bigger (well, yeah, of course they do). Then, they decide to make it bigger based on community input and….different data? I sure hope they know what they’re doing!