Seattle Public Schools

Seattle Public Schools will let high schools scrap the MAP

Gabriel Spitzer — Tue, 14 May 2013 00:36:38 +0000

Seattle public high schools will be able to opt out of the controversial Measures of Academic Progress, or MAP tests, starting next year.

The policy change comes after teachers at Seattle’s Garfield High School staged a boycott of the MAP tests in January, blasting the tests for giving unreliable data and for sucking up classroom resources. A half-dozen more Seattle schools have since signed on, and the protest has drawn national and international attention.

Seattle’s most troubled high school gets elite academic degree program

Gabriel Spitzer — Thu, 28 Mar 2013 22:33:00 +0000

Rainier Beach High School will become the third Seattle school to offer the International Baccalaureate program, district officials announced.

Seattle schools freeze hiring, spending as deficit looms

Gabriel Spitzer — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 22:51:06 +0000

Seattle’s school district has frozen hiring and spending in anticipation of a budget shortfall next year. But since officials say the change won't affect actual classroom resources or essential personnel, you might say the district has put hiring and spending in the fridge.

Seattle schools chief reinstates suspended curriculum on race

Gabriel Spitzer — Sat, 09 Mar 2013 00:29:48 +0000

Seattle Public Schools is reinstating a high school curriculum on race and social justice after suspending it over a student’s complaint, but the controversy is likely to continue.

Seattle schools cope with crowding

Gabriel Spitzer — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 17:18:18 +0000

Seattle Public Schools is set to stop bussing students to schools outside their neighborhood next year, but that move might cost more money than it saves. The situation dates back to Seattle's move to a system of neighborhood schools instead of district wide school choice. The district continued to give some kids rides to their old schools during the transition.

King County school districts bag $40M federal grant

Gabriel Spitzer — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 01:07:05 +0000

A pack of King County school districts has won of slice of the federal government’s Race to The Top fund, worth $40 million dollars over four years. Seven districts applied for the grant together, as the Road Map District Consortium. They said they’ll use the money to beef up preschool programs, enrich science and math learning in the primary grades, and offer training and testing subsidies to high schools.

Seattle's science experiment: A STEM school for the early grades

Gabriel Spitzer — Mon, 26 Nov 2012 14:00:00 +0000

Many jobs of the future will be in fields that go by the shorthand “STEM”: Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. But these are precisely the subjects where many American students are falling short. Educators are responding by creating STEM-focused schools, and in Seattle officials are breaking ground by pushing that emphasis back into younger classes, all the way to kindergarten.

Principal Shannon McKinney is in charge of figuring out how to build one of the first STEM elementary schools in the Northwest. K-5 STEM at Boren, as it’s awkwardly named, is in West Seattle, but any elementary student in the district can apply for a spot here.

As the school wraps up its first semester, McKinney and her team are still working out what a STEM education for Seattle’s youngest learners should look like.

Want to weigh in on Seattle schools' billion-dollar ask?

Gabriel Spitzer — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Seattle Public Schools will ask voters next year to approve more than a billion dollars in taxpayer funding, and this week the public will have two chances to weigh in on the district's proposal and its priorities.

Report: Seattle schools scandal went deeper than thought

Gabriel Spitzer — Tue, 18 Sep 2012 00:02:44 +0000

The Washington state auditor has uncovered another batch of questionable spending by Seattle Public Schools in recent years, widening a scandal that cost a former superintendent her job. The new investigation found that former district official Silas Potter, Jr. made even more inflated payments than was previously known, spending millions of taxpayer dollars on work that was never done or grossly overpriced.

New Seattle schools chief: We'll fight disparities with data

Gabriel Spitzer — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 01:17:37 +0000

As students around Puget Sound begin a new school year, administrators are pushing hard to close disparities in student achievement.

New Seattle superintendent wants flexibility for schools, just not too much

Gabriel Spitzer — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Seattle’s new superintendent of schools won’t be voting for the charter schools initiative on the November’s ballot. He doesn’t care much for “site-based management” that gives lots of autonomy to individual schools and he’s leery of letting schools more easily opt out of controversial curricula, such as “discovery math.”

Court blocks Seattle's "Creative Approach Schools"

Gabriel Spitzer — Fri, 06 Jul 2012 00:39:41 +0000

Backers of a measure to allow charter schools in Washington are scheduled to turn in their petition signatures Friday. Meanwhile, a pilot project designed in part to short-circuit the argument for charter schools was blocked Thursday in court.

Advertising will be allowed in Seattle schools

The Associated Press — Thu, 21 Jun 2012 15:10:03 +0000

The Seattle School Board voted Wednesday night to allow some commercial advertising on school grounds.

The vote reverses a ban that was imposed in 2004.

Seattle finds "virtual" band-aid after axing summer school

Gabriel Spitzer — Mon, 18 Jun 2012 12:00:00 +0000

As Seattle Public Schools begin their final week of classes, the district is turning to technology to rescue some summer school programs it cut last year. SPS will offer online courses at Franklin and possibly another high school, and three others plan to extend their school-year virtual learning into the summer. Cleveland and Rainier Beach high schools will have limited classroom programming.

A graduate's journey from rural Tibet to Ingraham High School

Gabriel Spitzer — Thu, 14 Jun 2012 12:00:00 +0000

You might say the Dalai Lama was his guidance counselor.

When Choega Thundrup dons his cap and gown Friday, it will be thanks to the spiritual leader who set him on his path, and people who risked their lives to help him get there.