Seattle School Board Meeting 562015

All right.

All right we are going to go ahead and get started.

It looks like it is 4.17 so past the start point time and I will start by welcoming everyone here in the audience and thank you for joining us.

I would also like to welcome Shirley Mendez who is a junior at Seattle World School.

She is down here to my left, your right, there we go.

She is getting a big Big round of applause.

Ms. Mendez immigrated to the United States from Guatemala three years ago and is currently the 11th grade ASB representative for Seattle World School.

So we are very pleased to have Ms. Mendez with us this evening and she will have an opportunity to provide some comments later in the meeting.

And welcome.

We are glad you are here.

Thank you for joining us.

All right with that why don't we go to the roll please.

Director Blanford.

Here.

Director Martin-Morris.

Here.

Director McLaren.

Here.

Director Patu.

Here.

Director Peasley.

Here.

Director Peters.

Here.

Director Karr.

Here.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And with that let's please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Thank you.

With that step completed we will move to recognition and this is National Nurses Week.

So tonight we will have National Nurses Week recognition.

I now invite Peggy McEvoy our assistant superintendent for operations to speak about National Nurses Week.

Thank you so much for this opportunity to brag about our wonderful school nurses program and some of the nurses that we have in this program.

I just wanted to give you some of our highlights.

We have about 80 nurses including 70 certificated and 10 classified nurses.

40% of our nurses are National Board certified in school nursing.

This is the largest number in any district within the state.

25% of all of our nurses in Washington, excuse me, the NCSN our favorite abbreviation for those nurses are currently employed by SPS.

40% of our certificated nurses are masters prepared.

Two have doctorates in nursing and eight are nurse practitioners.

One of the things that I think is remarkable about the program that we have is that when students come to see school nurses frequently they would like to go home because they aren't feeling well but 89% of the time when they come to see a school nurse they are returned to class with a plan and their illness or condition remediated and I think that's just a remarkable achievement because really what it's all about is making sure that our kids are in the classroom so that they can take off the opportunity to learn from the wonderful instruction that's going on in our classrooms.

So with that I would also like to now introduce Katie Johnson.

As you know she is one of our doctorate protect paired nurses and is leading the school nurse program and she's been with us here for about a year and made some dramatic changes within the program.

Thank you Peggy and thank you members of the board.

We really appreciate this opportunity to recognize the really outstanding nurses that we have in our department and appreciate your support for their work.

I would like to recognize several nurses today who have achieved some significant goals this year.

First of all recognizing Hillary Stevens who was published in the National, the Journal of School Nursing which is our national research journal.

It's a peer reviewed journal that has a very high influence rating.

Okay and then I'd like to recognize Tina Erso who is our newest nationally certified school nurse.

And national certification for school nurses is the result of a very rigorous exam that the nurse has to pass in order to be recognized.

So we have two school nurses that have been recognized as nationally certified.

Tina Erso and Helene Mansfield.

Tina works at, remind me, Gatewood and Highland Park and Helene works at Center School.

I'm sorry, Seattle World School.

Center School last year.

I'm giving her lots of work.

like to recognize Terri Helm Raymond who wasn't able to be here right now but we are very proud of her.

She was just recently selected as the school nurse organization of Washington school nurse of the year.

She works at West Seattle elementary.

So Terri, Terri serves students at West Seattle Elementary which is some of our neediest students in the district.

And she is also president of SNOW, she has been a president and officer in the professional organization for many years.

And she also was recently published, was a co-author on an article in the NESN school nurse entitled the seven C's of leadership.

So how school nurses are leaders in their community.

So, congratulations to Terry.

And then finally we would like to recognize Patricia Sander who is the Executive Director of the Coordinated School Health Program.

And Pat was recognized as the non-school nurse administrator of the year by the school nurse organization of Washington.

And this is not an award that is given annually it is one that is if there isn't a good candidate it doesn't get awarded so we are really really proud that Pat has been selected for this.

She has worked really hard in support of the health services program this year especially to address equitable access to a full-time nurse in the building.

So students whose health would be adversely impacted if they didn't have a nurse available at all times she has really helped us achieve that level of staffing.

So thank you to all.

I think you are going to come down now for a picture?

That's exactly right so if the directors could come down we will shake hands and do a photo and then we will remain down there for the next presentation.

I was waiting out there.

So I've asked the directors to go ahead and take the front row.

All right so before we have the presentation we have an impromptu add on to the agenda so I'm going to hand it over to Director Martin Morris.

Okay so just so that this gets read into the record because it's an appropriate thing.

This is from, this is to the Seattle school nurse association from the nutrition services staff.

We celebrate May 6, 2015 as school nurses day.

School nurses have served a critical role in improving public health and ensuring students academic success for more than 100 years.

Nutrition Services staff salutes and acknowledges the accomplishments of Seattle school nurses in their effort to meet the needs of today's students by improving the delivery of healthcare in our schools and offering and offer gratitude for the school nurses who contribute to our local communities by helping students remain healthy.

Thank you.

So next we are going to be hearing from a Cleveland High School STEM student and their teacher Ms. Teresa Scribner.

So I will invite you to come forward and I will join the rest of the directors here in the front row.

Hi I'm Ms. Scribner and I teach media and journalism classes at Cleveland high school.

I fall under the career and technical education umbrella so that means I come from industry and my goal as a teacher is to teach kids real-life work experience because that's my background so the projects that we present they are community-based and not just school community but also work that they could do outside of school.

The video that we are going to show you we did for our school auction.

So it's a little out of context because our auction was last weekend or a couple of weekends ago but you'll get the gist of it.

Yes, so my name is Eileen Isla and I am a senior of the SoEd School of Engineering and Design Academy for Cleveland High School.

And basically the video that I am going to show you guys is the importance of STEM and the experiences of students being part of a STEM school so yeah I hope you guys enjoy.

Welcome to the 6th Annual Red and White Oscar honoring Cleveland High School STEM Superstars with special appearances by Zach Brown, Cornelius Cambernero, Ramsey Castillo, Jade Christopher, Kai Domingo, Joyce Harrell, Eric McCurdy, Edmel Rancullo, Teresa Scribner, Asia Smith, Elena Winnick-Waggon, and Akilah Williams.

Now, here are some of Cleveland's finest to tell us about the importance of STEM and project-based learning.

So STEM is important to me because I feel like in our society, in the direction we are going right now, everything is revolved around STEM.

Like STEM is the ones that's leading companies, that's leading the future job and careers, and it's opening opportunities for everyone.

It's important for our students in our community to have kind of real-world skills of where jobs are at and where jobs are going to be, like the high-demand jobs, especially in the Seattle area.

We have Microsoft, Amazon, Expedia.

There's a bunch of new startups that are all in the STEM realm, and we need to teach our students skills that are marketable, and they can have some success.

I think it's the future, you know?

It's going to move the world.

There's a shift coming, and we're a part of it.

I want people to know that Cleveland is a school that is full of support.

And the reason why I say that is because we're not a big school.

We're not a huge school.

We're a pretty good sized school to where everybody is more of like a family environment to where everybody's kind of together and not separated through cliques or whatnot.

So I think that's the cool part.

It's a lot of diversity in here.

It's not like any other school, I would say.

It's not traditional.

The way we do, it's called project-based learning, or PBL stuff.

It's practical, it makes sense, and it's the way that our students are going to actually get a meaningful education.

It's not just sitting and being lectured by a teacher.

You're going to internalize and process things in your own way, so it clicks.

It's a really complete package to go to Cleveland because I've had a lot of fun being involved in athletics, but still focusing on my academics and career after college.

So that's why I like going to Cleveland.

Thanks for watching.

Now raise your paddles and bid generously to help Cleveland sustain its STEM program.

On behalf of the board I just want to say thank you, it's Eileen right?

To Eileen and to Teresa Scribner thank you for coming down here and sharing this with us and thank you for your work on this.

I think you missed an opportunity to send us the hyperlink to make the donation at the end of that.

Thank you again and if we could give them another round of applause.

All right the next thing on the agenda is to hear from our superintendent so Dr. Nyland I'll turn it over to you.

I'll turn on my microphone.

Thank you for the great presentation from Cleveland and now we're going to hear from Seattle world school.

So I introduce Concie Pedroza principal at Seattle world school.

So I requested to make a presentation to the board because I was in conversation with Mr. Blanford, Dr. Blanford and we were talking about how last year when I was presenting it was more in terms of our building But in 2010 I just want to remind everyone that the Seattle school board adopted the Seattle world school as a new educational model and so I am here to present our progress about our instructional model to you.

Especially in light recently because there has been so many questions about I still get questions in the community I think mostly because we haven't had a graduating class until this year.

So there's a lot of questions about the Seattle World School, do you graduate students, do you still have this SBOC and I just wanted to present four years later because after it's 2010 four years later where we are in terms of our progress.

So just a brief history the SBOC portion of the school was founded in 1980 but in 2010 after an ELL audit the team designed a new instructional international school model for the district.

And the goal was to add a grade level every year since then and we have worked really hard to bring in partnerships and cultural responsive training and partnerships along the way to be part of the Seattle World School.

I'm just, I'm not going to go over this long list but this is what the board approved were the essential items for the Seattle World School moving forward.

And also the strongly recommended items and components that were needed for the school.

And so I'm just going to share where we are right now.

And just of course as a school students are center and we work really hard on academic and language support.

So if you come to Seattle World School when you walk into classrooms you will see not only a content objective but you will also see a language objective in every classroom.

We have added all of the schedules in the core for graduation requirements.

And we have been working really hard in our extended day program for credit retrieval, arts and enrichment and then providing social emotional support with the school-based health clinic, our wonderful nurse, ICHS and all of our community-based partnerships.

Just some brief information we are currently at 283 students, 97.5% free and reduced lunch, 46 languages, 25% of our students are SIFE which means students with interrupted formal education and we have 15 languages spoken by our staff.

In talking about my staff, 95% of my staff and these are all the core teachers are dual endorsed.

So they are not only endorsed in their content area they are also ELL endorsed.

90% of my staff are bilingual.

100% of my staff is highly qualified, very important.

And 100% of my instructional staff are actually first-generation immigrants into the country.

Our focus on academics because as you know a 15-year-old coming in taking an SBAC or a test they have a lot to do.

So our staff we focus on growth.

We focus on growth, growth, growth and more than a year's growth every year.

It is what the teachers make their goal setting with me on every year so we talk about one and a half years of growth per year for students and because they can't make it if we don't do that.

But I just want to show, so these are last year's MSP results and comparison, I mean the map results comparison from Seattle World School to Seattle Public Schools.

And this is the reading growth from last year and then the next slide is our math growth and compared to the district.

So just to show you that we are continually working on that and that is something we are always telling the teachers that that is what we are striving for.

The students will get there, they will get there and we will do that.

year, every year at a time.

I just want to tell you where we are right now.

So four years later, so our school outcomes for 2015 we have a brand-new realigned college and career vision and mission statement that was done with goal-setting with Vietnamese Friendship Association, El Centro de la Raza, staff, parents, Riwa, they were all part of the goal-setting with me and so we now have a new vision mission.

We are just completed our high school accreditation visit from the state and they just gave us a wonderful, wonderful information about our strengths and where we can work on improvement.

My feedback with them was they are recommending that we be accredited and we are going to be presenting to the accreditation board actually on May 19. So that is very exciting.

We have really stronger community partnerships.

Seattle World School actually earned two awards this year with our community partner work.

We got one from ICHS which they were presenting to us on May 8 and we received one on May 17 from Vietnamese Friendship Association.

And then also we have a very strong and active family engagement action team that is working on really bringing in our families.

We have at least over 150 families at all of our events and we have to really plan that out how to communicate with our families to do that effectively.

Student outcomes, I just want to share where we are in 2015. So we've implemented three collection of evidence classes and we actually have an 85% passage rate.

So that's exciting because this is our first year doing that and that's pretty high average compared to what the average is at the state level.

We've identified 18 students for graduation this coming June so it will be our first graduating class.

Our winter map results we had about 85% of all our middle school students already meeting their end-of-the-year target and 50% of our high school students meeting their end-of-the-year target.

And then this is the exciting part that the accreditation board said to me, they said the most impressive thing that they said about Seattle World School was every student they talked to had a plan after high school.

And they said that wasn't really done in a lot of places but they were really impressed that all of our students had a plan for going to college or secondary learning and that's something we are really working hard to do.

So and I just wanted to end and share with you that we are really thankful for all of your support.

We are continually working on improvement and we are just really excited to continue forth our work and in collaboration with Seattle Public Schools.

Thanks so much appreciate the update and the good work.

Lots of recognition so join in the recognition of our nurses both those who are present and are especially recognized as well as all of the nurses across the district so thank you for that good work.

This is also teacher appreciation week and national teacher day was yesterday May 5. So we want to thank and honor all of the teachers and our instructional staff in the district.

Thursdays are the day that I get to spend mornings in the schools and delighted to see the good work that teachers are doing to engage students and prepare them for college career and life.

Governor Jay Inslee has sent a proclamation encouraging all of us to celebrate and recognize our teachers across the state and certainly join him in that.

On Friday May 8 is the Naramore reception at the Seattle Art Museum partnership with Seattle Public Schools.

We have 150 student artists that will be showcased.

Actually their art has been there I think for some time I think we actually saw some of it going up when we visited there a few weeks back.

Time honored tradition, I'm looking forward to participating in it and so I look forward to being able to recognize a lot of our young talent, talented artists.

Several current updates.

Seattle Education Association representing teachers, clerical staff, substitutes and IA's has voted to participate along with a lot of other districts in I think so far Western Washington.

in a one-day walkout.

I appreciate their working with the district to schedule that out a ways.

It's scheduled for May 19 to give us an opportunity to get letters translated and notify parents and work with our other union partners and work out all the details about what it means to have school closed on that day.

And then to extend the last day of school from the 15th of June to the 16th of June.

We do have some activities, well school will be closed on May 19th but we do have some evening events and athletic events and the plan right now is to go forward with those events and we'll have to work out all of the details to make that happen.

The city announced recently that they will be doing a transportation levy called the transportation levy to move Seattle.

A $930 million levy scheduled for November I believe.

And I think that that has the potential of helping with some of the student transportation issues that we've been facing and certainly anything that we can be done for transportation in Seattle is a help for all of us.

I look forward to that.

The preschool partnership with the city of Seattle continues to go forward.

We appreciate the voters that supported that levy not long ago and the city has been doing a lot of work to finalize their rules and regulations around that and then they have been meeting with us in Seattle Public Schools for the last several weeks on what a partnership looks like.

So, we continue to work on the details, we're excited about the opportunity to partner in terms of having more students come to kindergarten prepared and ready to learn.

believe that will really help with closing the opportunity gap and at the same time anxious to listen and learn and work with the City of Seattle as we figure out what that means and where the facilities are and what the enrollment looks like.

So a lot of those details have been worked out and that proposed partnership agreement will be coming to the Seattle schools.

Executive committee later this week and then going to the counterpart at the city of Seattle as well moving toward board and city council adoption.

On May 1st, Beacon Hill testing, on May 1st I sent a letter to the families at Beacon Hill International with an update on the investigation as to their test scores.

The investigation is continuing on, however we have confirmed that there were several breaches.

in the testing protocols for the MSP testing last spring by three of either our current or former employees.

So two of our employees, the principal and a support teacher are on administrative leave.

and the assistant principal no longer works for Seattle Public Schools.

We are fortunate that a former Beacon Hill principal Dr. Susie Murphy is serving as the interim principal for the remainder of the year so I have confidence in the Beacon Hill students and staff that they will continue to work through this spring.

I think we notified you last week that we have been for ELL we have been, I guess that's the right word, we haven't tested all of the students that need to be tested.

We have ELL student programs in 65 of our schools in Seattle and the students who don't attend one of those schools have had the option of opting out of the formalized programs and that's inappropriate.

We do need to test the students and we do need to make program available to them where they are in their neighborhood schools.

So right now that's a lot of testing for the spring to make sure that all students have that opportunity and then for next year that means a lot of work to figure out what that means.

If there's five students in a building the program won't be able to look the same as it would if we have 30-40 ELL students as we currently have in the schools where we are providing that service.

Several listening opportunities either have are underway or have recently passed.

Belltimes is underway.

Looking at what some alternative belltimes might look like to allow high school students the opportunity to come to school later in the day.

Several options are being discussed with parents and families.

There's a meeting coming up I guess right there on May 19th from 7 to 8 30 p.m.

at Dallard high school.

And there's also an online survey that's out there for families to participate in.

Moving toward I guess early fall discussions with school board about what some of those best options look like for bell times.

and then figuring out what implementation might look like as we roll forward through another year before a possibility of making that happen.

And then I guess we are nearing the end, I think we are all but at the end of the public input phase for the naming of the Wilson Pacific, the two schools to be built on the Wilson Pacific site.

One of those is naming of a new school and one of them I guess technically is a renaming of the middle school.

Nominations have been taken for both of those schools and we have a fairly long list of names for both schools and a lot of interesting rationale.

I can't remember the one that's really good.

Kind of a humorous one that we got from one of the one of the students.

But anyway that process is working its way forward as information that will be coming to my desk and then I'll be making a recommendation to the school board at one of the meetings in June with regard to naming of those two schools.

As I mentioned I love to do school visits.

This last week I had the opportunity to visit Graham Hill and Dearborn Park and Orca K-8.

Dearborn Park recognition was an interesting one.

We had the ceremony last August I think to name them an international school.

Marcy Maxwell the governor's representative for education was there and she was highly impressed with the school and so she orchestrated a visit by Governor Inslee this last week and not only that but they are very impressed with the number of community organizations that participate at Dearborn Park and with student achievement work that has been underway and so the picture that's up on the screen is the cover for the AWSP Association of Washington School Principals monthly principal magazine and that features the principal on the cover and Governor Jay Inslee brought that and gave that to the principal as a surprise and then visited in many of the classrooms.

a special day for the students and staff and especially for the principal Angela Bogan.

So proud of the work that Dearborn Park is doing and nice to see that recognition.

Lots of additional good news.

Garfield and Roosevelt are I guess either in New York or on their way.

for the essentially Ellington competition and festival May 7-9 in New York City, Lincoln Center.

Both of the schools have performed extremely well in the past, wish them both well and hope to see lots of good news in the paper on Saturday.

Good luck to both of them.

We had recognized recently many of our state athletic teams for basketball and many of those teams were unified teams with special education and Special Olympics and Roosevelt high school are filming students from Roosevelt high school for its international campaign this week so they've been filming yesterday and today.

It will become a public service announcement aired nationally I think for 18 months and recognized at the White House as part of Special Olympics.

So a lot of our students having the opportunity to shine in a national spotlight and nice to have that recognition for the good work that our athletic teams have done in partnership with Special Olympics.

Roosevelt High School also has senior Claire Nelson who won first place in this year's congressional art competition and she won a trip to Washington DC.

Ballard High School has won a top prize twice at the National Film Festival for talented youth, largest youth film festival in the world.

And five students from their digital filmmaking program won first prize with a mockumentary I want to see that I wonder what a mockumentary is.

They created that during the festival and then three other students won the audience award for their short film called clipped wings.

Other media recognition, congratulations to the media operations center for receiving the 2015 communicator silver award of distinction for their SCATS YouTube video featuring Dearborn Park elementary students and staff and kudos to the producer Michelle Mansfield and the SCATS teacher coach Ed Adams and all of the students at Dearborn Park Also later on the agenda tonight the board will be accepting a donation in the amount of $2.7 million over the next six years to pay for student participation in athletic programs and equipment for middle and high school athletics.

This grant helps support our commitment to equity and it eliminates the pay for play concept in our schools and allows for the district to gradually pick up that expense during the time frame for the event.

Yes we are definitely appreciative of that grant.

And then a long list of I guess teachers and students recognized for a variety of things.

CenturyLink Clark M. Williams Foundation's teachers and technology grants are designed to help fund projects that advance student success through innovative use of technology and recipients are I won't read all of them but we've got I think a dozen recipients there and then we've got a long list of scholarship winners from the Seattle school scholarship fund with a lot of lucky students and a lot of funding that will go to support those students and their families.

So thank you.

to the Seattle school scholarship fund for making that possible for all of our students.

I think that concludes my remarks.

A lot of good news.

Busy time of the year as we get ready to finish out one school year and celebrate and get ready to launch another school year with budget activities and all of the things that go with the start of a new school year.

Thank you Dr. Nyland.

Lots of great stuff to celebrate.

Bear with me one moment as I scroll forward.

Okay so the next item on the agenda is to hear from our student representative Ms. Mendez.

So if you would like to now make your comments we would be happy to listen.

Hello.

Okay.

So my name is Shirley.

I am an 11 graded at Seattle World School.

I'm originally from Guatemala.

I came to the United States three years ago.

I've been attending Seattle Water School since that time.

Seattle Water School it's an educational community where everyone belongs to.

No matter language culture or religion everyone is part of us.

When I first was asked to represent my school words cannot describe how excited I felt about doing it.

Sharing part of my story with you is just the minimum thing I can do for my school.

Saddlewater school has taught me to overcome my fears.

Most immigrants and students often feel afraid to ask questions or talk in public.

Of course because of the language and educational situation it is hard for us to communicate with others.

Saddlewater school pushes us to give our best in any situation.

We are very excited to have our permanent school building for the first time in 30 years.

We are also very excited to have our first graduating class this year.

I am attending a school where I look forward to achieve my challenges throughout my educational journey.

Where at the end of the school day I can tell how much I have learned through the day.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right so we have now reached the business action items portion of the agenda and I would ask directors if there are any motions to amend the agenda.

Director Peters.

Yes, I move that the school board amend the agenda to add an introduction item as the first item to be introduced to approve resolution 2014-15-19 to request that the state superintendent and state legislature suspend use of common core testing for accountability measures and to waive for the purposes of this motion only the requirements that the executive committee approve the item being on the board agenda.

board meeting agenda as discussed in policies numbers 1240 and 1420.

Is there a second for the motion?

I second.

Thank you.

All right so I now ask Director Peters if she would like to speak to her request to amend the agenda to include this item for introduction.

Yes, I would.

At this point we are just discussing whether to amend the agenda and should this item be added for introduction that would be the time to discuss the proposed content of the resolution.

Yes, thank you I appreciate this opportunity to explain why we are here tonight.

We are here tonight to present to you the latest version of our resolution concerning the new Smarter Balanced tests.

We came before the board with our original resolution on March 4, nine weeks ago before the testing window started.

We considered the matter urgent.

We initially wanted to suspend the tests altogether and instead administer existing tests to meet state and federal requirements.

Alarming new data brought to attention of the board in the February work session on assessments showed that the test vendors field test data indicated there would be an unprecedented high rate of failure expected from the new common core test.

As many as 60 to 90% of students were predicted to fail the new Smarter Balanced assessments.

That the students designated as failing at the highest rates would be our students of color, English language learners, special ed students and those living in poverty.

That the test was a graduation requirement for 10th graders.

That we did not have the technology to implement this entirely computerized test fairly, equitably and uniformly throughout the district.

Clearly something was not right with this scenario.

Clearly we needed to have an open and honest dialogue about the purpose and expectations of this unprecedented new assessment.

What its measurement would mean and how to help our students, families and teachers navigate such a mandate.

That is what Director Patu and I have been asking for.

Indeed on March 4 our fellow colleagues said they also wanted to have such a conversation but only after we took our resolution through standard channels of committee and asked for colleague input.

So we have done just that.

During those nine weeks we solicited feedback, took it to committee, curriculum instruction, we asked to take it to the executive committee and we revised it.

It has undergone many revisions since then in response to feedback from members of the board concerning legality and focus.

We had it reviewed and approved by legal counsel.

At that time some of the board said they would like to have that conversation.

We have tried for nine weeks to have this conversation.

Where is that conversation?

The school year is drawing to a close.

Here tonight is the opportunity.

We continue to have many concerns about the value, equity and validity of the test which we outline in the resolution and accompanying board action report.

What we are asking for at this point is that the new SBAC tests not be used for accountability measures at this time and until their reliability and validity can be established as mandated by federal law.

In fact, on March 31, the office of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction sent a letter to the Department of Education requesting a waiver from using this year's assessments as an adequate yearly progress measure that would result in further sanctions.

Our resolution supports this request.

For we, I'll speak for myself, for I believe that if this board or state is unwilling or unable to spare our students this test at the very least we should spare them from being judged by this unproven test.

So tonight we are asking to have this item added to the agenda for introduction only to allow for discussion of the issues herein, public comment and a vote in two weeks time as per usual with resolutions that come before the board.

As the largest school district in the state we believe we have a duty to weigh in on this local and national issue of the new common core test.

We need to acknowledge the hundreds and hundreds of students and families in our district who have expressed legitimate concerns about the test and are opting out of it in unprecedented numbers.

To ignore them would be an abrogation of our duties as determined by the strategic plan and board policy that puts students first.

I want to speak in a moment to the process.

Some on the board have expressed displeasure at introducing a resolution this way.

I agree.

Though our democratic process does allow for this.

This is not how it should be.

We should be able to take a board resolution that is supported by two or more directors to committee, discuss, amend and advance it to the full board at least for consideration.

Even if we don't all feel we can ultimately support it.

Ideally when multiple members of the board have concerns about an issue that affects all our students and go through the trouble of drafting a research resolution about it, it should be given the hearing it deserves.

In fact this is prescribed in our code of conduct which says that minority views shall be respected.

The fact is Director Patu and I are not in the minority on this issue.

There is a national debate going on about the Common Core and its tests.

Thousands of families, students and teachers nationwide are grappling with the exigencies of No Child Left Behind and the new Common Core tests.

We bring this before you today because we believe at minimum At minimum the largest school district in the state should have something to say about this important local and national issue that affects our entire district significantly.

At minimum we should be able to issue a statement of support for Superintendent Doran's request for suspending use of the Smarter Balanced test for adequate yearly progress for the school year.

This aligns with what was already in our resolution.

Other states and school districts have made this request or change.

California, Vermont, the Portland school board passed a resolution to suspend use of the SBAC for AYP.

The Gates Foundation, the biggest proponent and funder of common core state standards, recommended a two-year moratorium on using the common core test to measure students or teachers.

Why?

Because there are many issues associated with the test.

This is true of any new test but this one in particular is problematic because it is the first all computerized test.

We do not have uniform technology for our students, they are not all equally versed in keyboarding skills and have home computer access.

There is legitimate concern that the test is not equitable, that it will not be a fair measure of our students or our schools.

In the meantime it is robbing our students and teachers of precious hours of instructional time.

Hours are being spent practicing for the test, practicing how to take it on the computer, then hours administering the test.

Eight hours each in some cases.

As far as the precedent for how we do resolutions, I've looked over the previous ones to see what the precedent is.

Did they all go through committee?

No.

Did they all get board input?

No.

Were they all initiated by the board?

No.

The resolution to support the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind.

Did all board members support it?

No, but it was given the courtesy of going through the committee and on to the full board for a vote which is as it should be.

Not all board directors supported the bell times resolution but it was still allowed to come to the full board for a vote.

It passed 6-1.

The same is true for the downtown school resolution and the indigenous people's day resolution which didn't even come from the board but went straight to us and we all passed it.

But let's return to what really matters, how this new assessment is impacting our students.

Parents have approached me in tears and anger over this test.

Leaders in the English language learner community, special ed parents and other parents have asked why are we giving a test that their students are expected to fail.

They want to know if anyone on the board is listening to them.

Teachers are afraid to speak up but they know that endless testing is not why they got into the profession.

It is unconscionable to ignore these legitimate concerns.

Are we really going to ignore the unprecedented number of students opting out of this test?

And please do not blame the teachers.

I can tell you that parents and students are driving this because they've had enough.

How can the largest school district in the state be silent on this important local national issue?

There is bipartisan concern about testing and Common Core in general.

A bipartisan hearing was recently held in Olympia on Common Core and SBAC.

It was sponsored by Democratic Senator Marilyn Chase and Republican Senator Pam Roach.

I was invited to participate.

And I spoke there as an individual on these topics.

I know that our colleagues on this board care about our students, our families and our teachers.

I know that they are not afraid to have difficult discussions about complex issues.

That is why I urge them to support adding this resolution to our agenda and joining the national conversation and responding to our community.

Thank you.

Thank you.

So at this point I will call any questions.

Any questions the directors have about the motion to amend the agenda.

And again we're focused now on amending the agenda not on the topic itself.

I'm not seeing any questions so with that I'll open it up to some comments.

Do directors have comments?

Director McLaren why don't you go ahead and go.

So this conversation, I guess it's working, this conversation is really really important.

I am deeply frustrated that I've had little or no opportunity to work collaboratively with any other directors on the resolution.

However, I have spent a good deal of time pondering it.

I find that there distinct problems with the resolution as it stands and I do not support moving it ahead for discussion tonight.

I do firmly believe that this is a time for the district to make a strong statement about standardized testing.

I firmly believe that Seattle Public Schools may legitimately question the undue burdens and stresses that the SBAC places on teachers, students and schools.

I'm speaking for myself but I'm confident that I express the conviction of all.

Our teachers and building leaders have a right to know that the Board of Directors supports them in wanting to eliminate all unnecessary testing.

In wanting to reaffirm the values that we hold for our students and educators.

Empowering all students to achieve their greatest potential and a supportive, stimulating, richly engaging atmosphere in which the love of learning is a dynamic presence.

Director Peters your passion for addressing this need is evident.

However, no amount of sheer pressure will accomplish what needs to happen here.

We need to work together on this.

I have my own opinions of what should be in the resolution.

Others have theirs.

Your way of bringing this resolution forward has not led to a venue for collaborative development of a statement that expresses the will of the board.

This reveals either a lack of understanding or of adherence to board process.

or that we may have an inadequate process.

In either event we need to correct it so that the board may come together to address this issue.

Director Karr has put this issue on the executive committee agenda for tomorrow and I am very hopeful that after tomorrow we can move expeditiously on this.

For the record my own hopes for the content of a resolution would be A, to call for a formalized multi-level conversation in which input is gathered from all stakeholders to consider the uses and purposes of standardized testing and the uses and purposes of establishing arbitrary cut scores.

That is whether and how standardized tests and cut scores may be necessary or helpful.

B, conversation is also needed about the various kinds of hardships that standardized testing imposes on students as well as educators such as loss of learning time, unneeded stress and anxiety and so on.

This might lead to setting standards of necessity for assessments in order to eliminate those which are not critical.

Finally, we need a conversation that explores the ways that formative in-class assessments are useful and the possible ways that learning can and cannot be supported by such an assessment.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Other directors?

Why don't we go to Director Patu and then we will come to Director Peasley.

I believe that as we are talking about this smart balance test that this is not the first time that we have actually brought it up.

It is something that actually that we feel that it is very important mainly for the fact because it is not just us talking about this test.

Many parents and communities are quite concerned.

This test actually has a lot of effect on kids of color mainly for the fact because we have been told that 60% of kids of color have failed this test.

Talking to many parents in the community, many of them do not understand what the smart balance test is.

Many of them also feel that they were not prepared or given information in terms of what kind of test this was.

All they have been hearing is rumors from various parents that this test is not developmentally appropriate for their kids.

Many of them also do not know that they can opt out of these tests and because a lot of them are not informed in terms of what is happening in our school district.

If we are going to provide or give tests to a lot of our kids it is only fair that we provide in community engagement and parent engagement and a lot of transparency so many parents would have the opportunity to be able to know exactly what their kids are taking in school.

It always seems to be, this is one of the biggest things that we have is that most of the parents of colors do not get involved in the schools and a lot of times it is those kids that are locked out because they are not given the information that they need in order for them to be able to take these tests.

How do you prepare your community to understand that the schools are not you know are actually doing these so that way they can assess their kids.

What is the difference between assessments and actually just giving kids tests?

One of the questions that one parent asks is that since there are so many breaches within our district these tests are computerized.

When the kids push the submit button who actually corrects these tests and where does the test go?

That is one of the biggest questions that a lot of them are asking right now because we are talking about privacy information of their kids.

So if we are going to be able to move this test forward we need to look at all the minuses and be able to see what is it that we need to do to provide parents and community the best information that we can so they can understand exactly why this test is important and why do their kids have to take it.

Some of the parents are just beginning to understand what this test is all about and many of them are also signing and opting out on this test because they feel that their kids are not developmentally able or appropriate to be able to take this test.

So I hope as board directors that we can look at all our kids and not just look at some of our kids in order for us to be able to see success in all our children.

We know that 60 percent of the kids have failed and most of those kids 60 percent are kids of color.

So if we're going to talk about accessibility and equality for all children we need to look at all the phases of what this test involves in terms of every child so they can be successful.

Because if we're talking about we're here for all kids then it's only fair that we provide opportunities for every child that attends Seattle Public Schools.

Thank you Director Patu and we will go to Director Peasley.

The discussion we are having right now is not about how we feel about the SBAC.

The discussion we are having right now is whether or not we should amend the agenda to discuss this resolution in this school board meeting And I would just like to say that this resolution has in fact gone through many iterations and it's gone through many iterations where what it was asking for couldn't be accomplished.

The most recent version arrived in my email box on Friday and I had absolutely no input on it.

This is not how we create resolutions as a board.

The way we create resolutions as a board is we go through a process whereby everybody gets to weigh in on it so that the resolution has the input and the vetting and the support of the entire board or at least of all of those who care to support it.

So I and Director McLaren have both asked Director Carr to put this on the agenda for the executive committee meeting on Thursday so that we can create a process whereby the entire board can weigh in on all of the issues around the testing.

And this is, it's a very complicated topic, it's also very timely because the Senate and the House of Representatives, the US Senate and the House of Representatives are in the process now of considering the reauthorization of No Child Left Behind.

Senator Murray is behind this and if the reauthorization goes through the way it is proposed currently state legislators will need to change Washington laws around testing and the evaluation of teachers.

So it is extremely important that we as a board craft a very good resolution very well researched that reflects the views of the board as well as our leaders in Seattle Public Schools to inform the changes that our legislators are going to have to consider making.

This is not something that should be done in the manner in which this resolution has been moved forward.

It needs to be done in a very careful and thorough manner and I support that.

And I completely support the concerns of parents around the impact that this testing is having on our students.

We will take that on but it needs to be done correctly.

Thank you.

Other directors with comments?

I think I'll go ahead and make the last remark then before we go to the vote.

I would say that I agree with a lot of the comments that have been made.

I won't repeat them relative to what we heard from Director Peasley and Director McLaren.

I'd just add that to the point that Director McLaren made about pursuing this on multiple fronts, it's a very astute assessment.

We had the opportunity to participate as audience members, Director Blanford, Director McLaren, Director Martin-Morris and I when we attended the Council for Great City Schools convention in Milwaukee and it is very clear that there are leaders at the national level that are listening.

A well-crafted resolution will help enable and empower them to move this forward and I think there is a lot of interest in doing exactly that by this board.

I'd just say by way of process you know we said a month ago in response to the request from the other members of the executive committee that we would add this to the executive committee agenda tomorrow.

We've done that.

The discussion begins on it tomorrow relative to how we plot out that discussion that's more inclusive, more collaborative and will include an opportunity for public input.

take a look at the executive committee agenda for tomorrow if you are interested in understanding that one.

So with that I'm going to call for a vote and again this is a vote on amending the agenda.

So Ms. Baum would you call the roll please.

Director Blanford.

Nay.

Director Martin Morris.

Nay.

Director McLaren.

No.

Director Patu.

Yes.

Director Peasley.

No.

Director Peters.

Yes.

Director Karr.

No.

This motion did not pass 2 to 5. Thank you.

So with that we will go back to the agenda as published.

I know the last time we went through this we had a little moment of confusion as to whether we needed to approve the agenda.

Let me go back to my script here.

And so what we need to do now is just make the motion to approve the consent agenda as published.

Is that right Teresa?

All right.

Got it right this time.

I move approval of the consent agenda.

I second the motion.

All right all of those in favor please say aye.

Aye.

All those opposed say nay.

Nay.

All right and that as I counted was a 6 to 1 vote so the consent agenda has passed.

All right and with that we will move on now to public testimony.

Oh okay.

All right so it's been pointed out to me that I didn't ask about items to be removed from the consent agenda.

So I'm taking it by the fact that there was a 6 to 1 vote that I don't need to do that at this point but I will ask if anyone feels that I need to go back.

Erin Bennett or John Cerqui do I need to repeat that step?

Okay, one moment.

I thought I got it right this time.

I'll get it right eventually.

The recommendation would be to actually ask if an item needs to be taken off in order to allow for questions and comments on that item.

All right so we'll have a do over.

Okay do directors have any items they want to remove from the consent agenda?

And I'm not seeing anyone make eye contact so I'm taking that that no one wants to remove anything from the consent agenda.

So now all of those in favor of the consent agenda please signify by saying aye.

Aye.

All those opposed say nay.

I didn't hear anything on the nays.

Okay so the consent agenda has passed.

All right now we are to public testimony.

I'm just looking.

All right so we are now to public testimony.

So with that the rules of public testimony are up on the screen and I'd ask that speakers please be respectful of these rules.

I'll also note that each speaker has a two minute time slot to speak.

When the two minutes have ended please conclude your remarks.

I'll call names three at a time and we will begin with the first three speakers and I will apologize in advance if I don't land these names exactly correctly you can correct me when you introduce yourself.

So Apinya Abramson, Diane Casper, Catherine Darley.

So we will go with Apinya first.

Go ahead and when you are ready you may start speaking and the timer will start when you are ready.

Hi my name is Apinya I am a ninth grader and until two weeks ago I was the only Thai student in all of Seattle world school.

I have been a student at Seattle world school for the past year.

I would like to tell you a little bit about my experience at this school.

Seattle world school gives me confidence to speak English with other people.

Another good thing about Seattle World School is that all of the teachers know how to communicate with students so that we can understand.

I like the feeling that all the people here speak different languages because I can learn more about other cultures.

Now most of my friends are from China and they taught me some Chinese.

One challenge is that our school building is very old compared to other high schools.

Our computers are really slow.

I am very excited for us to have a new school building in 2017. Seattle World School also have many interesting after school programs that everyone can get in.

I joined drama and orchestra class after school and both of them are super fun.

I would like to learn more in orchestra if they come more often.

because they are only be able to come once a week.

But the good thing about that is they let us bring the instrument back home so we can practice by our own.

I feel like teacher and my friends are always there when I need help with my homework or classwork.

They are also happy to help me with my problems about my home life.

about friends or even about other personal problems that can get in the way of learning.

This school also provides me free dental care and free glasses which I really like because I have a lot of cavities.

I love Seattle World School and my teachers.

Happy Teachers Appreciation Week.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

I'm glad you're passing an academic calendar but as you probably guessed I'm really here to talk about bell times.

Specifically transportation which Start School Laters has been studying rather closely.

We prepared a six-page report for you detailing our findings.

You've got copies over there.

If you're interested in helping kids do their best and saving money and I know you all are, please read it.

What we found out is it's really expensive to put high school first and that healthy bell times are actually great for our budget.

Here's a short explanation.

Currently high school gets out at 220 the next elementary at 250 that's only 30 minutes later.

Rather than the 50 transportation is always said we need.

This creates an expensive short tier.

Somewhere between 60 and 90 buses are impacted by this short tier.

That is about $5 million that could be eliminated by simply putting elementary first and high school second.

Look at your own transportation estimates for the options.

About 5 million worth of buses are added to each estimate to account for the short tier problem.

But the modified flip option solved this problem so there is no need to add this cushion.

The modified flip would actually save us $4 million over the current system.

Modified flip two would save us about $2 million.

The extended high school day however does not solve this problem and in addition piles on an additional 83 buses and increases our cost by $6 million.

We need to consider the task force top rated options like two tiers.

that families have been clamoring for.

Using the district's own data and methodology two tiers would actually cost under $2 million.

And especially if we shake the Etch-a-Sketch which we desperately need to do the cost could be much less.

We have long heard that options would be changed before this goes public in September.

The best options must be fully explored.

Dr. Nyland, Board please look at the task force's top two choices.

They are much better for students, for family and for our budget.

We need accurate detailed and well thought out reality-based estimates.

And please look at these estimates looking at those critical thinking skills you want to instill in our students.

Only then can you make responsible decisions in the best interest of the kids which is healthy cost-effective bell times in 2016. Thank you very much.

Thank you.

As the next speaker is making their way to the podium and a reminder the next speaker is Catherine Darley.

The three following are Cynthia Jatul, Chris Jackins, Dora Taylor.

Hello my name is Catherine Darley sleep specialist and sixth grade parent.

As you know since spring of 2012 the Seattle community has asked the district to align bell times with the time secondary students are best able to learn, be healthy and safe.

This request originally came up in 2008, seven years ago.

Research has been conclusive that secondary students need about nine hours of sleep and that their body clock swings later making it difficult to fall asleep before 11 PM.

Therefore the majority of students are sleep deprived.

Being chronically sleep deprived decreases the ability to learn and make good choices, also decreases health and safety.

Unfortunately it is about 71% of parents who think that their students are getting adequate sleep.

That is far from the reality.

The research is also conclusive that when schools start later teens do get more sleep.

With more sleep learning is improved.

Please note there is no data showing improved gains with the current early school start times.

And I confirmed that statement with my peers at Swedish and Children's Hospital.

As a participant in the bell times task force my impression is that the process has not been as transparent and effective as it was intended to be.

A couple of examples, the task force was told starting in December that we would have the chance to review the survey before it went out.

There was no chance to do so and it is fairly poorly designed without any overview that shows the research data or the facts about teen sleep.

My request to share the list of the many endorsements in our community of this idea has been refused.

This submission encourages the task force to proceed with the misunderstanding about the broad base of support that this idea already has.

I request that a training on adolescent sleep be scheduled as soon as possible for the executive staff and the board.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Good afternoon I am Cynthia Jatul biology teacher and SPS parent and co-chair of Start School Later Seattle.

I would rather not be here tonight because as a member of the bell times analysis task force I entered that work on good faith that the task force would have meaningful involvement.

There are things I applaud.

The end-to-end video was made with considerable consultation with major stakeholders and presents a balanced overview of the issues.

However, I echo concerns raised by Diane Casper and Dr. Darley.

The categorical rejection of the two-tier option as an option for community input shouldn't have happened.

The two-tier option was the first choice of the task force.

The community outreach documents were all made without task force review are incomplete and biased.

I submit for your review the Bellevue district survey on start times which opens with a balanced and thorough overview of the issue.

Something missing from our survey.

The three options flyer and the option two and option three FAQs have a greater emphasis on potential negative impacts than they do on the positives.

The first points about the modified flip are about transportation issues.

The only positive is that it supports AAP the American Academy of Pediatrics research.

A bell time change would be in accord with the AAP recommendations.

An important distinction since we aren't asking the community to support research.

Finally in our FAQs we learn that we are tasked with building in 24 credit and 1080. It says the applications of solutions for these state requirements within a new bell time structure would be required for any option under consideration.

This is setting us up for failure.

In closing I would like to ask you to please investigate how the process is being carried out.

And I would like to tell you that in the last month we have been endorsed by the Seattle NAACP and the Urban League.

Thank you very much.

The next three speakers Chris Jackins, Dora Taylor, Sally Soriano.

My name is Chris Jackins Box 84063 Seattle 98124. Thank you for your discussion of testing today.

On the Wilson Pacific middle school resolution, seven points.

Number one the district plans to demolish the Wilson Pacific school site and construct two new schools at the site.

Number two, the district's own 2014 main study indicated renovation would cost only $19.1 million much less than the allocated middle school budget of $72.4 million.

Number three, the 2014 district report also states that quote, The campus could become a very attractive one-story multiple building contemporary middle school with proper design and typical modernization upgrades.

And the basic structures appear to be relatively sound." Number four, the board so far has not discussed these issues in public session. These demolition plans are disrespectful toward the native history and culture at Wilson Pacific. Number five, Wilson Pacific school is a city landmark with important native history and cultural associations. All of the buildings are landmarked specifically because of the significance of Indian heritage school at Wilson Pacific and principal Robert Eagle Staff and Duwamish native ties to the site and to Licton Springs go back centuries. Number six, the school district sued the city landmarks board in order to be allowed to demolish Wilson Pacific. This decision is bound to be reminiscent to some of the abrogation of native treaty rights. Number seven, the superintendent and every board member have been wrong on this issue. It is not too late to change. Please vote no on this project. Thank you.

All right I am not seeing our next speaker come to the podium so we will move her to the bottom of the list and go on with Sally Soriano followed by Alexandra August Lewis and Laura Gramer.

Thank you Directors Patu and Peters for your detailed work and your integrity in introducing the resolution on SBAC.

In my experience as a school board member all high-stakes standardized testing has been a failure and I think common core is going to be no different.

I was able to attend an all-school meeting at Nathan Hale where a student raised the question if our school is already a failure school, no child left behind, and 60% will fail the SBAC test then why would we even consider taking it.

Elizabeth Van Clark an Eastern Washington math teacher and parent recently wrote about testing that does work.

She said the people who teach our children and live in our community do a far better job of predicting success.

High school GPA proven to be a better predictor of college success depends on tests that teachers design and curriculum that is selected by the local school district.

Not a faceless group of people and corporations who their end goal is to make money.

Teacher tests aren't secretive, they don't cost billions of dollars and they really do guide instruction.

She continues, while Pearson Gates and McGraw-Hill are draining billions of dollars from our public schools they are giving us false promises that SBAC will make our children college ready and career ready.

The SBAC can't do that.

Recent studies have shown that even the SAT isn't even an accurate predictor of college readiness.

The high school students who have scored well on the SAT but did poorly in high school were more likely to drop out of college than students who did well in high school but struggled with testing.

If the SAT can't make these predictions then neither can the SBAC unquote.

For decades many of us have been working on pushing back on standardized punitive assessment and the handing over of public money to private corporations.

Isn't it finally time that those of us who support and defend public education and its teachers demand no more drinking from this toxic sludge.

The only people who think this type of ed reform is worth the money and anguish are those who are in some way profit from it.

Please conclude your remarks.

Thank you.

The next speaker Alexandra August Lewis is that speaker here?

I'm not seeing her come forward so similarly I will move her to the bottom of the list in case she comes in.

Laura Gramer, Tess McCain, David Fisher in that order.

Hi, good evening.

My family and I we just got back from a family camp this weekend.

This was a family camp for families with deaf and hard of hearing children.

It was actually a great weekend.

Can you hear me?

Yeah, could you get just a little closer please?

It was a great weekend.

We got to meet families from all over Washington and I interacted with families that practiced oral approach, speech approach and other ASL families.

It was an incredible weekend.

And I also want to share about our frustration with Seattle Public Schools.

And so I'm here again as usual to ask the board and Seattle Public Schools to please fix the deaf and hard of hearing program.

I'm also asking for you to approve of the deaf hard of hearing position.

We do want to have someone that has a deaf education background and able to sign American Sign Language to be able to communicate with family.

That's fine.

I do want to share a story with you because I know that Seattle Public Schools Due to their Friday memo the week of April 24th they want to merge the condition with vision and audiology services.

I don't have any issues with other disabilities but I feel that there's a lot of problems that need to be fixed before you can do some merging.

A story that I want to share with you when I was growing up I was in a public school in a different district where there was a deaf and hard of hearing program.

I always hated when there was square dancing week in gym class.

I don't know if they still do square dancing but it was a nightmare for me and other students with disabilities.

Deaf people were always paired up with blind people.

I.

It was a nightmare because I could see what was going on but I couldn't really understand what was being said.

The blind person couldn't hear what was being said but they didn't know which direction to go.

Can you imagine what kind of a nightmare we're trying to keep up and you know it's a fast pace.

Right now we didn't deceive because we didn't have the tools to deceive.

Right now I don't feel that Seattle Public Schools has the tools to make this decision.

The other thing I want to say that we have received very little communication from Seattle Public Schools about what's been going on.

I've been like hearing things but only through the Friday memo because that's because I check it out but I'm not hearing anything directly from Seattle Public Schools.

We're very frustrated with this lack of progress.

I would not be asking all these questions if I trusted Seattle Public Schools to do the right thing.

But I don't I don't trust that Seattle Public Schools because I don't know what you're doing.

The problem has been going on for so long.

And I have to say as a person with a disability and I'm sure other people with disabilities would probably say the same thing when it comes back to square dancing.

We were frustrated.

Why did the hearing non-disabled person pair up with people with disabilities.

They probably thought that was the right thing to do.

They didn't know any better.

Like right now I feel that People who are trying to put this together don't know what they are doing.

Anyway I do would like to extend my invitation to invite all of you to the deaf and hard of hearing community meeting.

It is on May 19. I just did get the email from Dr. Nyland about this walkout on May 19. I did contact the people in the deaf and hard of hearing program to see if it was still going on.

So I am sure you will find out, we will find out later if that meeting is still going to I hope that you'll come to the deaf hard of hearing community meeting.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi my name is Tess McShane and I am a parent of two boys in the Seattle school district, a fifth grader and an eighth grader.

I am here today to ask the school board to request OSPI and the legislature to suspend the SBAC Common Core testing.

For over two decades local, state and federal legislators asked parents and students to blindly follow their lead and trust in no child left behind high stakes testing.

testing that by any measure was an abysmal failure in both raising academic performance and narrowing gaps in opportunity and outcomes.

For over two decades teachers in classrooms in far too many districts struggled and continue to struggle to make ends meet on a budget that the Supreme Court has deemed does not meet our state's constitutional obligation to fund education.

Now students and parents and educators are being asked to continue down that same path with empty promises that this time it will work.

This time these tests are different.

But where is the proof?

What evidence have parents been given that this is the right path to choose?

Where were the parents voices in this process?

And who made our leaders believe that this was the solution to our education problems?

Over the last few years an ever-growing number of parents and students have been using both their feet and their voices to say we aren't satisfied with empty promises and testing that offers no valid evidence.

Once again our kids are being treated like guinea pigs in an education experiment.

And our federal government dangles money in front of states that are struggling to balance budgets using it like a carrot on a stick to lead us all down an unknown and uncharted path.

I respectfully submit and request the school board to ask the following questions to OSPI and the legislature requesting that testing be suspended until the following can offer adequate answers.

Can the legislature assure the credibility of these tests?

What was the research process and are the tests appropriately benchmarked?

What evidence can the state and local district provide to the public to show Common Core SBAC standards, testing and curriculum will close the achievement gap?

Where are these tests leading us and can you assure the public it is the right direction and path?

And how are Common Core federal funds directed to our local students and classrooms?

Thank you and I hope that the people I elected to represent my family's best interests make the right decision.

Thank you.

Next is David Fisher followed by Brendan Gramer and Cecilia McCormick.

Hello I am David Fisher I taught for 25 years in the Seattle schools most recently at Cleveland high school and I am currently an educational consultant.

First of all the test is not valid and if you don't know what it takes is a whole process to validate a test the SBAC is not validated that is number one.

Number two, you develop a curriculum and then you develop the test.

Number three, these high-stakes tests are not proven and secondly they create a negative environment in the classroom.

They create cognitive dissonance which is frustrating to the student and creates anger and behavior problems.

They are actually used as a military weapon.

If you want the research I will send it to you.

If you look at the test they are very frustrating.

I got frustrated taking the test and I recommend all of you take the sample test.

They have them out there on the internet and I recommend all of our legislators take that test and all school members that are on the administrative part.

Secondly, I would like to see there's better assessment tools.

For instance you need to look for a strong local focus of control in a student, a better ability to control impulses, a higher resistance to what are called immediate gratification and extended attention spans.

All of which do not come from computer and screens and two-dimensional devices.

They come from hands-on, handcrafts, musical instrument training, arts, performing and other and the research is there if you look.

As members of the school board you are supposed to be head of a scholarly or scholarship pursuing organization.

I suggest the school board needs to do their scholarship and look this up because this is real research.

The research is filled with the fact that music and math are so related.

Math students that have music far surpass anyone in the field.

That is at Stanford, anywhere you want to look for the research.

That is all I want to say for now.

Thank you.

Brendan Gramer is next followed by Cecilia McCormick and Jonathan Knapp as Mr. Gramer is coming forward.

I'll just invite anybody that still would like to speak you can go sign up here with Kathy Pham.

Thank you for letting me speak.

I'm here at the pen concerned about the deaf and hard of hearing program.

I'm frustrated with the lack of transparency and practice.

I appreciate the opportunity to be on the parent advisory council for the deaf and hard of hearing program.

I appreciate being on the parent advisory council for parents of deaf and hard of hearing children.

But I feel like we are being misdirected by issues and lacking Updates progress from the administration about what's really going on.

One example is the Friday memo.

I asked point blank what's happening with the DSA supervisor position.

I was given a non-answered denial.

That parent meeting was on April 21st.

I signed off the Friday memo on April 23rd.

And the message from Michael Talley to Larry Nyland mentioned they have started the recruitment and communicate with someone who's qualified from Arizona.

That conference was April 8th through 11th.

Like half a month ahead and they told me nothing from this event.

They do not know what the position will be.

I feel like we.

They're not being transparent.

What I would like for them to do is tell us what's going on.

Ask us for our input.

Do not distract us with other things like the missing segment.

Let us know what they are doing to make the program better.

And let us help.

guide them with our expectations so there are no issues going forward.

I would very much prefer that they take someone from the outside, that the person must be deaf, must know sign language, have a deaf education background, that murdering a physician was totally not with our consent.

Fix the program first before we start mingling with other services.

It's going to become a big mess and will never get fixed.

And it's better to fix each part as itself before we can start it again.

I learned at the chatter among the staff within Seattle Public Schools that someone internally had made it clear that she would like to apply for the position.

I do not agree with that approach for an internal transfer.

One that had not been thought in.

We do not know what the qualifications are.

And this person already making it clear that she wants to be in this role but does not have the background we as parents are looking for in someone with this position.

This is why I request that there be a review with the parent advisory council.

Listen what kind of candidates they're looking for.

And listen to our feedback.

Like they are with everything else.

I promise you we do not bite.

We love to help.

But tell us what's going on and we will help.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Cecilia McCormick followed by Jonathan Knapp.

I want to again thank the Greenbergs so much for coming to the meeting and you need to listen.

I'm going to say you need to listen to each other.

I mean I was here nine weeks ago when this discussion about smarter balanced testing was started and I heard excuses.

Now I don't take excuses from my child.

Why would I expect excuses from you saying well we did you think about this and can you add this to the resolution.

I've seen this resolution change so much over the last few weeks but yet I hear more objections.

That just rings hollow in my ears.

on the matter of well on SBA testing I won't let anyone hold my child to a standard that I have no say in.

She is a good student and she gets A's and B's and yet 90% of students in special ed will fail or well excuse me that will not meet standard.

What does that mean?

It means nothing to me but it appears to be so hallowed in this building and in this room that you won't discuss it.

I reject that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Jonathan Knapp is our next speaker as he's walking up I'll just do one more call on Dora Taylor and Alexandra August Lewis.

Good afternoon Superintendent Nyland, Board President Karr, Board Directors my name is Jonathan Knapp I'm the president of the Seattle Education Association the voice of Seattle's public school educators.

I'd like to make three comments.

I appreciate Dr. Nyland's recognition of all the great work that's going on.

I wanted to kind of add one.

The Washington Association of Educational Office Professionals honored their worker of the year this year and that's Vivian Belcher the Administrative Secretary at Ballard High School.

And Vivian has been a longtime union activist, former president of her department within the association, a great educator in her own right.

We are really honored that she comes from our ranks and that she is being honored statewide so I encourage you to stop in or give a shout out of thanks to Vivian Belcher at Ballard High School.

Two more comments.

I want to thank the board on moving ahead on finding a way of coming together for a resolution on testing.

This is absolutely perhaps the most critical issue in front of education right now.

I urge you to think about the work you are doing in terms of supporting the reauthorization work that Senator Murray is doing to really think about how to make a strong statement about this sort of wrongheadedness of high stakes testing both high stakes in all aspects whether it is for students or for educators or for schools or for systems.

There is a role for testing within our system but As we have seen in places across the country we really have scandalous results that result from injudicious application of high-stakes testing.

And finally I want to address the public on the issue of May 19. I really want to stress the issue that the action that educators in Seattle are taking on May 19 is not focused on the district.

We really are focused on the legislature.

We want the public to understand that we have been waiting and waiting and waiting for years.

You know the legislature is going to say they made some progress last year on McCleary but actually we moved all the way up from 47th in the nation in class size last year to what?

47th in the nation still in class size.

42nd in the nation still in per pupil allocation.

There is a lot of work to do.

We encourage all members of the public to come out on May 19 and join us.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And the next speaker is Michael and I can't read my own handwriting it looks like Alcantara.

Alcantara.

Did I get it right?

Hi everyone.

My name is Michael Alcantara.

I am a part of the first graduating class at the Seattle World School.

I immigrated to the U.S. from Mexico almost four years ago.

I'm glad to be here to thank you for funding our new building.

Also I would like to invite you to our graduation June 9th at 6 p.m.

at Seattle University.

Thank you for your time and for the support for our school and immigrants.

We had another speaker sign up and that is Michelle Pearson.

Hello I wasn't originally planning to speak tonight I came to support a friend.

But I just wanted to bring my experience to your attention.

I have a third grader in Seattle Public Schools who we have opted out of the SBAC.

because he was anxious about it and in his classroom his teacher needed to start giving keyboard instructions so that my nine-year-old could write a multiple paragraph essay for the test.

So we opted him out.

My fifth grader just clicks through all of the questions just to get the testing over with.

But we invited him, we made him take it anyway.

And what I would like to say is I am proud to live in Seattle because we have a culture here of doing the right thing and voting for for example $15 minimum wage and I would just like to invite our school district to let the federal level and the state level figure out what is the place of standardized testing and common core and I would like to invite leaders in our city to move forward with educating our students and our whole population by providing and focusing time and money on Implementing vocational schools again, language programs for all schools.

My kids are in fifth grade and haven't had, one is in fifth grade and hasn't had a language class yet.

And I'd like to ask you to empower our teachers by also maybe putting some more funding toward making it easy for them to advance their education and school our students in a holistic sort of a way.

and then let assessments catch up with that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

All right the next speaker is Noel Saraswati.

Hello my name is Sarah Sardino-Well and I am the math department head at Seattle World School.

I'm really excited to be here with my students and for them to have an opportunity to speak to the board.

We've been doing a lot of work and you also saw from our amazing principal that's really leading the effort at our school.

I'm really excited I'm also part of the race and equity team at work and I had the opportunity to see Dr. Blanford do an amazing job speaking to us.

And I'm also a career ladder teacher in the Seattle Public Schools.

I have been teaching at the Seattle Public Schools for three years at Seattle World School and I've loved every moment of it.

We're really excited to have our first graduating class.

What I also want you to think about is when you look at district funding allocations about the current model.

Funding us like other schools isn't going to work because we are a unique model.

We need smaller classes in order to have that 1.5 gain for our immigrant students which is what they need in order to catch up.

And we need to provide them that support if we are going to be equitable and if we are going to talk about race and equity we need to fund it that way.

But I do really want to thank you for your time and allowing my students to speak.

I wasn't planning on it but I just was so proud and inspired by them.

Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you very much.

All right that brings us to the end of public testimony.

So with that I will look to the board directors for comments and I'll take whatever order I see hands raised in or head nods or something.

Everybody's being shy.

Why don't we go with Director Patu.

I just wanted to say that it's really great to go elsewhere than Seattle.

I felt that the trips that I've taken out of Seattle actually has really cleared my mind and enabled me to really realize that Seattle is a great city and that you know no matter where I go I always want to come back to Seattle.

So it's been wonderful to actually to be able to take time out and be able to really clear your mind and really see things as is.

And because I actually did this with the passing of my husband I needed to get my mind back on track and realize that I am still on the school board and that there is a lot of work to be done.

So coming back has actually been great but you know it's also great to see other things happening in other cities so I really have enjoyed being away and hopefully that you know that it's always good to to go elsewhere and get your mind cleared.

I also want to say thank you to a lot of our principals that actually are doing a great job in terms of moving academics forward in a lot of the various schools that I have visited.

A job well done and also thank the teachers in the southeast who are actually doing a great job of really looking at academic in a different perspective and I see you know great work that's going into it and dedication that a lot of these teachers are taking and also the principal and so I wanted to say thank you so much for all the work that you do.

that I know that if it isn't for the hard work that all of you do together in the schools our children would not be where they are today.

So thank you staff and congratulations to the nurses for nurses days.

I also wanted to congratulate our staff which I didn't get a chance to say thank you to Teresa and Kathy for all the hard work that they do because I know without them At least I would not be able to make it because they are always picking up after me when things are not going where they should be.

So thank you so much for all the work that you do and I really appreciate it.

Director Blanford.

I'll start off with it's kind of a nice confluence of events when teacher appreciation and school nurses appreciation happen within the same week or so.

I celebrate along with Dr. Nyland I'm sure the rest of the board the fabulous work that our teachers do every day and that our school nurses do to make sure that students are ready to learn.

I want to give a shout out to particularly the student who was responsible for the Cleveland auction video to Concie Pedroza at Seattle world school for the presentation that she gave about the school.

She and I had the chance, I had the chance to visit the school recently and talk with her and hear all the fabulous things that are happening at the school and I'm glad that she's gotten a larger venue to have that conversation.

I also want to note the fact that she is finalizing her capstone presentation and will soon be able to call her Dr. Pedroza and I'm looking forward to that.

as well.

As has been noted earlier I got the opportunity to give the keynote address at the equity Institute which was six, I think six schools that volunteered to come and spend more time working on equity and equitable practices in their school.

They asked me to come for some reason and be the keynote speaker at the event last Saturday and had a fabulous conversation, lots of interaction with various teachers and principals and various other employees of the schools.

And for me it was validating and it gives me hope that equity is on the minds of our teachers and our schools.

and that they want to work on improving their practices and I want to do everything that I can to be supportive of that notion.

And then finally I had the opportunity to visit, do a couple of school visits first to Dearborn Park the day before the governor came and then this week earlier this week I had the chance to visit Olympic Hills and in both schools I saw students working hard.

Lots of students were telling me what they were preparing for the SBAC and some might call that a controversial subject to bring up but they were laser focused on doing their best on that.

I asked critical questions and they responded in a way that I know that both the students as well as the teachers are really focused on doing well on that and I appreciate that work and I look forward to seeing the results.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Others?

Director Peasley.

I just blanked on what your last name was.

Sometimes I forget to.

So I just want to address two issues.

One is the testing and we are going to engage in this conversation but I also want to say that changes to the testing are going to require changes in the law.

Seattle Public Schools cannot suspend the SBAC testing.

The SBAC testing is required by state law and they are addressing requirements of federal law.

But I would like to say, and this is, I am going to read this, whoops, shoot, no I just closed it.

This is from the National School Board Association.

The house HR 5 and Senate S 1177 bills to reauthorize the elementary and secondary education act which is also called no child left behind.

are awaiting floor votes in each chamber.

NSBA is engaged in ongoing discussions with the House Committee on Education and the Workforce and the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions regarding next steps.

As we await the House and Senate floor votes and subsequent House and Senate Conference Committee negotiations to reconcile differences between the two bills, please contact your members of Congress to encourage continued action.

So that is the appropriate action to take to address the testing.

Until the requirements change at the federal level Washington state legislators are bound by the current requirements.

We can You can petition your legislators to take whatever action you feel is appropriate but they are very constrained by federal requirements.

So this is all in play right now.

We will have our discussion, we will inform the discussion, we will come forward with a well-crafted thorough fact-based resolution.

But in the meantime This is all happening right now and I encourage you to contact your legislators.

On the issue of bell times I just want to clarify a few misunderstandings.

First of all any changes Any overhaul of scheduling or transportation need to address the state mandate for 24 credits as well as the state mandate for 1,080 hours.

We have to address this whether or not we change our bell times.

So it makes sense to include them in the same process.

I do believe that there have been some misunderstandings that it is the requirement of the task force to address these other issues.

It is not the job of the task force but it is something that we as a district need to do.

So I do hope that the task force can work constructively with our staff because our staff are trying to facilitate this process and ultimately it is up to the school board.

it is up to our vote to determine whether or not there are changes in bell times.

But we appreciate the input of the task force and it will be included in the process, the information that is brought to us.

As far as two-tier transportation We moved away from two-tier transportation because we can't afford it.

So it's unlikely that we're going to move back to it.

I'm sure staff will be happy to look at the information that's been brought forward to them but we already have thoroughly analyzed the cost of two-tier transportation.

So I just wanted to address those two points.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'm looking over this way why don't we go ahead and go to Director Peters.

All right I think I've got my notes in order.

Well thank you all for coming to speak to us and thank you again to the deaf and hard of hearing family to come and remind us about the concerns.

I also want to thank our guest student Shirley Mendez and all the world school representatives.

It sounds like great things are happening at your school.

Congratulations on your first graduation class.

A friend of mine volunteers in your school and she has nothing but great things to say about it.

And I appreciated the Cleveland STEM presentation we had earlier that's also exciting.

Exciting things that are going on.

Alright for my community meeting I had recently a couple of issues came up one of them was the bell times issue and as far as the two tiers suggestion I mean I know as a parent that is kind of the dream scenario is to have that.

and because it has come up because the task force did mention it and because we are hearing that it is not cost-effective or possible it sounds like there is some information that needs to be shared to that effect.

So if there is an analysis of the two-tier that explains why we can't do it.

I would be interested in seeing that I would be interested in being able to share that with the members of the community who do bring it up and as a parent myself like I said I confess I think that sounds like a fantastic idea if there is any way in the world we could do it I would certainly support that but I would love to see the numbers on that.

So I see Peggy shaking nodding her head over there thank you Peggy McEvoy for that.

All right nurses I can't say enough about how important the nurses are in our schools.

You know I have a child who has allergies and so of course a visit to the nurse's office is one of the first things we do before school starts.

They are invaluable and I very much appreciate them.

And of course I appreciate our teachers.

I have a little something to say about that at the end of my little talk here.

Let's see.

Oh I am very proud to be a member of the Seattle scholarship committee.

I am a trustee and we will be giving out the scholarship awards on Monday May 11 at 7 o'clock here in the auditorium.

Everyone is welcome to come and join us.

These are high school students who earned these awards by showing to us that they are, they have overcome some kind of challenge.

and they are headed towards college and we are giving them a little boost with a little scholarship fund of $2,000 each to go towards college.

And it really is a really moving and exciting ceremony.

I invite people to come and join us and see these kids, well kids, these young people as they make the transition from high school to college and it feels so good to be able to help them out.

I also want to point out that in the main Atrium over there we have the donors to the scholarship.

Their names are on a donor wall that have just been moved down to the main floor level so everybody can see.

We encourage everybody who can to donate to the scholarship.

It goes into a fund so we can continue to share the support with our deserving high school students.

Let's see.

Did I zip through everything?

Regarding the bell times again I understand it was mentioned in comments that there is a six-page report.

I would be very interested in taking a look at that and passing it along to staff and superintendent to see what they are offering us in that.

I always forget something so I just want to make sure I got everything here.

Alright well then I'll go on to, oh last meeting I forgot to mention where my community meeting was.

I mentioned the time, the date.

In general I meet either at the Queen Anne library meeting room or the Magnolia so if in doubt that's one of those two but it will always be on the school board website.

And I will be having another meeting in June.

The time and date to be determined will be a Saturday in one of those two locations but I'll have more information either up on the website or at the next board meeting.

So I would like to conclude with a letter and this is my way of honoring teachers.

Teachers have been so important to me in my life.

I loved going to school, I loved learning, I still love learning and teachers have definitely changed me for the better.

This is a letter from a former student to a teacher, a current teacher.

It says, Mr., I'm not using the teacher's name right now.

I had you as an English teacher in high school in the late 1980s.

I graduated in 1990. I was a TA for you as well during my last semester.

As I approach 25 years since graduating I often think back to important milestones in my life and remember fondly your teaching style.

I can remember you reading from Call of the Wild, Huckleberry Finn, and Up Mice and Men.

I remember the sense of pride I had when I passed the district writing proficiency in my freshman year, a direct result of the education you imparted to me.

The respect you showed your teachers, the passion and skill you demonstrated for the material you taught and your mentoring all had a lasting effect.

I moved on from high school and continued my education often in fits and bursts a class or two here another class there.

My ability to work and meet financial obligations meant not completing my BA until I was 42 years old just last year.

I laugh because it took 24 years for me to earn a four-year degree but once earned it can't be taken away.

I have continued on with my education and am currently working on an MS in environmental agriculture at CSU Chico.

I work as a deputy sheriff.

I am married and I have three healthy and active boys.

I have considered becoming a teacher over the years and as I get closer to 50, the retirement age for law enforcement, I consider it more.

One of the main reasons I consider this is because of the impact you made on my life and the value I place on being able to have a similar impact.

No matter what direction my life takes, it is better for having had you as a teacher.

Thank you for your service.

This letter is particularly touching to me because the teacher it was sent to is my brother.

My brother has been teaching in a large urban high school in the California public school district system for over 30 years and this is just a good example of what a great effect teachers can have and how much they can influence us and how important it is to appreciate them.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Other directors.

Director Martin-Morse.

Thank you.

First of all I'd like to personally thank the students from the world school.

Your stories are amazing.

The fact that in essence you just got here and to be able to stand up in front of us and TV cameras and the whole city.

shows what amazing confidence the school has instilled in you and it makes me very proud that we are able to offer that opportunity to you as students in our city.

To our nurses, I said after the recognition of the nurses to Peggy McEvoy she was smiling and beaming like a proud mama you know as the nurses were coming up.

They do you know you can't even put into words the work that they do for us day after day.

They really are you know when I talk about schools as communities there are really three pieces that make that work.

The custodians that keep the building together, the school secretaries and administrators that welcome you into that building and know everything about that building, and the nurse.

Those are the three pillars.

Not that teachers aren't important, not that principals aren't important, but those are the people that actually keep the wheels moving.

in a school community.

So thanks not only to the teachers but to the nurses and all of the staff that make that happen.

My community meeting is on May 16 from 11 to 1 p.m.

at the Montlake Public Library in their meeting room.

And I know it's a little premature, just a little bit, but I also am going to take a personal privilege and congratulate one of our own which is Clover Codd who has just completed her doctoral work and defense and I think in another week she will be Dr. Codd.

And so I want to congratulate her on an amazing amount of work that it took.

She attended Columbia, a little school back east that maybe some of you have heard of.

And we are expecting even more great things from her in the future.

And that's all I have for today.

So I want to thank each and every one of you for being here and particularly those of you who took the time and effort to testify to us.

It's very important and very much needed.

I also echo all the thanks and compliments for our nurses as well as the student presentations and those students who were highlighted and who cared to come up and speak to us.

I want to express my profound appreciation to and admiration for our teachers.

Our teachers are the pillars of the district.

And we can never do enough to acknowledge and honor their extraordinary work, care and achievement as they guide and support our students.

I also want to give a personal thanks to those teachers who have contacted me to give me their personal experiences with preparing for and administering the SBAC and also thanks to the parents who have gone to that trouble.

Regarding the bell times discussion I have particularly been interested in our outreach efforts and the neighbor-to-neighbor meetings and I just want to thank everybody who has been involved in that.

Other directors have spoken to the issues around that that are surrounding that whole conversation so I won't go into it here but the outreach to the community is a very very important part of this and so to everybody who is supporting that and trying to extend it I want to give my thanks.

And I will supplement what Dr. Nyland said not only is there a meeting coming up at Ballard but there is also another community meeting on the bell times discussion at Chief Sealth High School on May 12 from 7 to 830. And that links with the bell times discussion links with the subject of the 24 credit requirement.

And for those who don't know how this is all fitting together the state legislature mandated that all of our schools would have a 24 credit requirement for graduation It was actually, I forget what the dates are, we requested a delay in implementation of that so we have a two-year delay.

And in Seattle it means that we have to raise our credit requirements from 21 to 24 credits.

And I've had the privilege of sitting on the 24 credit task force for about the last eight or 10 weeks.

And it's an amazing collection of incredibly talented and knowledgeable people from both the school district and the community who have stepped up to do that work.

and it is intimately going to be connected if we do change our bell times.

At the moment the two discussions are going on separately and nonetheless the district leadership is acutely aware of the connection and the interdependence of the two.

So I just wanted to acknowledge the fact that these are interdependent conversations and my perspective is that there is outstanding work going on in both realms.

I also want as far as community meetings go my next one is June 1 at the Southwest library branch at 6 PM and I want to apologize to anyone who tried to attend my Monday meeting at the Delridge library it turned out that the library had double booked and so they called me that day and said that we would have to go up to Southwest.

So some people did manage to get up there and I hope there was nobody who was deterred from attending because of that.

Thank you.

Thank you.

I'll just make a few comments.

First of all I will echo the thanks of my colleagues for the public testimony tonight.

As always it's informative and instructive and appreciate that you are all willing to take the time to come down here.

teachers and nurses.

Wow you all do such, our teachers and nurses do such amazing work.

I've not really, I don't think I've ever shared this before but my grandmother was a schoolteacher, taught in a one room schoolhouse in rural Nebraska.

And she was born in 1895 and back in the early 1900s when a teacher got married she had to stop teaching school so she only taught for a few years but she was always very proud of being a teacher and that was something that she instilled in her children as well.

And my sister is a teacher she teaches in Washington DC area teaching students that have are not able to be successful in the DC public schools so she's I've got a high needs population of students and she's loving the work that she does so it's all personal to me as well.

And I would just add that as my daughter approaches her graduation from college and we talked about who to invite to her graduation celebration the first several names she listed were all former principals and teachers so that warmed my heart as well.

So thank you for the work that you all do.

A couple of other items, I would just urge everyone to keep a close eye on activities in Olympia as the state legislature has reconvened.

The discussions will start to heat up here eventually on funding for our public schools.

You heard the president of SEA speak to that earlier and their approach to sending their message and I would urge everyone to send messages to our legislators.

so that we are clear that we want them to fully fund McCleary and amply fund public education.

I can't read my writing.

My community meeting I think I mentioned the last time my schedule changed a bit for May and June.

I've been for years on this steady second Saturday of the month 830 to 10. The location I have been at for years has closed for construction.

I will be at the Hearthstone from here forward.

That's on the south side of Green Lake.

It's the Hearthstone retirement center.

And I will be there on May 23 at 830 and then the June date is also off schedule, off cycle but I don't have the number, the date right at the top of my head so we'll have to look that one up.

So that's the plan for community meetings.

Oh and lastly happy Mother's Day to all the mothers here in the room and to mothers at home.

you're all amazing.

We all know how amazing mothers are so thank you to all the mothers.

And with that I will stop and we will take a 10 minute break we're going to be punctual because we have two action items and 17 count them intro items so more to come.

Thank you.

Sign up for Kindergarten Jump Start.

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Get to meet the teachers.

Play on the playground.

Sing songs and hear stories.

This year it will be August 17th through 21st.

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For more information, email jumpstartatseattleschools.org or go to the Early Learning webpage.

Make sure your family gets all your paperwork in right away!

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Visit Enrollment Services at the John Stanford Center to apply for school.

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In order to enroll, here's what you need to bring.

Your admission form.

Your photo ID, such as a driver's license or Washington State ID.

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a copy of shot records for the official certificate of immunization status, two address verification documents, for example, a recent utility bill dated within the past eight weeks, or a rental agreement.

To complete the process, you can come to our office at 2445 3rd Avenue South, or fax it to us at 206-252-0761, or email your paperwork to the service center at seattleschools.org.

Congratulations.

We look forward to seeing your students at Seattle Public Schools.

Bienvenidos a Seattle Public Schools.

Pueden visitar a Enrollment Services en el Centro John Stanford para la matriculación de sus hijos.

Para la matriculación necesitan El formulario de admisión, su ID o pasaporte.

Comprobante de edad del estudiante, por ejemplo, su acta de nacimiento o pasaporte.

Los records de las vacunas para el formulario oficial CIS.

Dos comprobantes de verificación de domicilio muy recientes dentro de las últimas ocho semanas.

Por ejemplo, la factura de luz, agua, cable, banco o médico.

Para completar el proceso, pueden visitar nuestra oficina en la 2445 Tercera Avenida Sur.

Pueden mandar todo por fax al 206 dos cinco dos cero siete seis uno.

O puede mandarlo por correo electrónico a service center arroba Seattle schools punto org.

Felicitaciones.

Assalamu alaikum.

My name is Laya Harunta.

I am the Minister of Health and Welfare of Burkina Faso.

I am a driver.

I have a driver's license and a passport.

I would like to know where I am going.

I would like to know my passport.

I would like to know where I am going.

I would like to know where I am going.

I would like to know my address.

I would like to know my car.

I would like to know my cable.

I would like to know my gas.

I would like to know my electricity bill.

I have been in Iran for six weeks now.

That means I have been in Iran for three months.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

I have been in Sweden for three months now.

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To complete the procedure, you can fill out the form at the office address 2445, 3rd Avenue South, or by fax to 206-252-0761, or email servicecenter at seattleschools.org.

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We hope to see you all in Seattle, New York.

Welcome to Seattle Public Schools!

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The item number one academic calendar for 2015-16.

I move that the board approve the 2015-16 school year calendar as attached to the board action report.

I second the motion.

Thank you.

So this one came through the executive committee and it was recommended for approval by the full board.

So, I'll make that committee report out and then I'll just ask if there have been any revisions since introduction.

This is Jeff Miller the Director of Labor and Employee Relations there have been no revisions.

All right thank you.

And so with that are there questions from board directors about what's been proposed?

Comments from directors about what's been proposed?

All right I am not seeing questions or comments from directors so I'm assuming that means we are ready to take the vote so if Ms. Pham could please call the roll.

Director Martin Morris.

Aye.

Director McLaren.

Aye.

Director Patu.

Aye.

Director Peasley.

Aye.

Director Peters.

Aye.

Director Blanford.

Aye.

Director Harris.

Aye.

This motion has passed unanimously.

Thank you.

Great.

Thank you.

All right.

Action item number two is BTA III Queen Anne Elementary School North Queen Anne Elementary School.

I move that the school board authorize the superintendent to execute contract K5060 bid number B12437 with Bailey construction for the North Queen Anne Elementary school hazardous materials abatement seismic upgrades and toilet room improvements project in the amount of $1 million $6,800 including alternate numbers A1, A2, and A3 plus Washington state sales tax in the form of the draft contract attached to the board action report with any minor additions deletions and modifications deemed necessary by the superintendent and to take any necessary action to implement the contract.

I second the motion.

Thank you and if we could look to Director Patu to speak to the recommendation coming out of the operations committee.

This actually was recommended to go through the board for consideration.

Thank you.

All right so with that were there any changes since introduction from anyone?

Richard Best, Director of Capital Projects and Planning.

There's been no changes since introduction.

Director Geary.

Thank you.

All right so do directors have any questions about this action item?

Director McLaren.

So am I correct that the reason that the committee recommended it for consideration rather than approval was that at that point the numbers were not?

I think that wasn't there numbers that were missing when we actually have discussed this?

In the operations committee there were blanks.

We filled those in, introduced it at the last board meeting.

Okay well that's the reason why we said consideration.

All right any other questions?

Any comments from anyone?

All right seeing none I will ask for the roll on this please.

Director McLaren.

Aye.

Director Patu.

Aye.

Director Peasley.

Aye.

Director Peters aye.

Director Blanford aye.

Director Martin Morris aye.

Director Carr aye.

This motion has passed unanimously.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Oops I just went out of the agenda.

So that's it for action items for this evening and now we will move on to introduction items and there's a whole slug of them.

17 I believe so we'll need to be focused.

So with that why don't we start with item number one which is amending policy 2145 coming out of operations.

Pegi McEvoy assistant superintendent for operations.

Before you there will be actually three new policies that we are updating.

This is because we during phase 1 had updated them based on WSSDA language.

There's been some regulation changes and some new recommendations from WSSDA.

So all three of these next policies will be reflecting that for you.

And with that I would like to introduce Pat Semher.

Pat Sander Executive Director of Coordinated School Health.

I'm here this evening to bring before you the motion to amend policy 2145 which is suicide prevention.

Recent legislation requires districts to have a plan for recognition screening and response to emotional or behavioral distress in students.

The WSSDA recommendation recommended edits to address this legislation have been incorporated in the amended policy before you.

We have also included with this policy edited version of our superintendent procedures which have also been updated based upon the WSSDA model.

So if you have any questions.

Thank you.

First we will go to Director Patu and hear from the committee.

This is actually recommended by the committee to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Questions from directors?

Director McLaren.

So am I right that many of the things that are in this policy are things that people are already doing in our schools?

That's correct.

One of the additions to the legislation was that we identify staff training opportunities so that staff can be more aware of some of the behaviors that students might be exhibiting so that they can be in a mode to be able to seek support and help.

Other questions or comments from directors?

Director Peters.

It looks like the changes are adding a lot more detail and guidelines to staff on how to address indications of suicidal tendencies in students is that correct?

That's correct.

We wanted to make sure that staff had procedures that there were points of contact in the building that were well identified if students were in distress.

With behavioral exhibits if the tendencies were present what would be the lines of support immediate action to the school too.

I'm glad we are addressing this.

You know reading the bar it's pretty alarming to read that suicide is the leading cause of death in youth in Washington between the ages of 15 and 24. That's correct.

That's really alarming.

Above the national average.

Above the national average.

Okay.

I'm glad that you are taking another look at this and giving our staff more guidelines on this very important issue.

And we have our behavioral support team out of the safety and security office that work with schools on that very closely every day.

Beryl Miller is here.

Thank you.

Others?

Thank you.

Thank you.

I look forward to action in two weeks.

All right the next item, item number two, inter-item two amending policy 3115 also coming out of ops.

Hello my name is Dinah Ladd I'm the McKinney-Vento liaison.

And we are making amendments to policy 3.115 which is the education of homeless students.

WASA recommended us to address the new legislation that requires district to increase identification and support services for homeless students.

Staff is also recommending an edit to the policy to call out the unaccompanied youth as part of what can define a homeless student.

An unaccompanied youth and child is a young person who is not in custody of their legal parent or guardian.

Staff has also ensured that the power school system includes the identification of unaccompanied youth in order to meet the new reporting requirement of OSPI regarding unaccompanied youth.

When we reviewed the edits we also determined the edits would be best located in the superintendent procedures.

The edits include some of the following.

Calling out the work done by the McKinney-Vento liaison and other district staff in the identification and serving of homeless students.

We have implemented the following new best practice strategies and identification of homeless students.

Number one we started implementing the putting in the student housing questionnaire which was required from federal and state to give to all students in the district who are newly enrolled.

And also it is given out during the beginning of the year and the beginning of the year packet for all students.

We also have identified point of contacts in each building and programs for instance like interagency etc.

We also have been able to implement some staff training for the point of contacts and I have also trained and cross-trained with other departments within our John Stanford Center.

Gone out to some of the specialty programs like the world school, interagency, Southlake, and also just trying to be intentional about our identification practices and also ensuring that staff throughout the district and also within our John Stanford Center know about McKinney-Vento and the law and the federal mandates and what it entails.

So we work closely with enrollment and transportation as well as special ed.

And also that we continue the education of the staff members within our, it's a couple of us right now it's just myself and a coordinator but also as a state training is offered I am also active in that and I also go to some of the national trainings as well on homeless education.

Any questions from the directors?

We will open it up in just a moment but we would like to hear first from our operations committee chair Director Patu.

This also was discussed by the ops committee and they have recommended to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Other directors with questions?

Director Blanford.

Remembering back to a class that I had on special populations and how best to address them.

Identification is one key component but the other side of the coin is figuring out a way to not stigmatize the students who have been identified.

Can you speak to that?

To any efforts around that?

Yes, sometimes I am down here in enrollment working with them and we also train them as well and go to their staff meetings and so we have kind of been using the term families in transition so we teach them or we suggest to them that when they are working with these families how to talk to them to get the information that they need because it is very very sensitive.

A lot of families that are considered doubled up living with other people due to economic reasons or family members whatever they may not see themselves as homeless.

So then it goes back to that awareness piece.

What language do you use to get the information you need to help support the family and make sure the student gets enrolled immediately.

Same with transportation.

So the awareness piece is huge that is the other coin of identifying is knowing how to identify them but you need to know what it looks like.

It is not typically what we have seen in the past or what you have seen on TV or the stereotypical homeless picture of families or you know they are just not single vets or people on the corner holding up signs.

It definitely is a very wide range of homelessness and the way that we see them as not typically what other people think as homeless.

So that awareness, that education, remembering it is about the students, the kids come first.

I mean I am very adamant about that.

But you know the huge piece of it is knowing what it means to be homeless.

It is not the HUD version.

So the McKinney-Vento version is very different from what most people in the community know as a HUD version.

But we do, we are very sensitive with how we speak with them, how we handle them, how we work with them.

And we often use the language of families living in transition so I would say how long have you been in transition.

Or when I call them I'm like I work with families living in transition.

So I hardly ever use homeless within my conversations with them and then they might if they know more they often call me and say I'm homeless.

And so then you know we might dialogue a little differently but I still try to use transition more than I would use the word homeless.

And so we do have a Another title we call our program families in transition program or the FIT program.

So on our summer intake forms it does say families in transition.

On our student questionnaire it does say families in transition.

So we can just kind of get used to using the word transition because it is easier for people to understand that they are living in transition and it is okay and we can help you.

Any other questions?

Director Patu.

So I wanted to find out, I hear you saying interagency all the alternate programs but how are you educating schools in general in terms of homeless kids?

So that has been the challenge.

Being that we are the largest district in the state we haven't been intentional about identifying homeless students and so the capacity is a big challenge.

So it was just myself for a couple of years and now we have another person, a coordinator who is also, we separated she is intentionally working with middle and high school and some of those programs in our agency and then I work with K-8's in elementary but still it is still a bit of a challenge because we have over 100 programs in our district and just to get out there to some of them has been a challenge.

So we kind of had to focus on the areas that have a booming population and homelessness.

The schools that have their numbers have risen dramatically since 2006. So we end up just focusing on the high-need school, the areas where the students are impacting that building.

And each year changes with the boundaries of course and new shelters crop up everywhere.

So we have been, there's been opportunities to go to interagency and I think last year they had Fridays where they didn't have students so we would go and educate them about homelessness and identification and what some of the state legislation is wanting us to do at the district level.

Jolene did go out, she is the coordinator, Jolene Taylor.

She has gone out and worked with the intake process at interagency because there is only two places that can be flagged right now.

Interagency is the third area.

It is in our enrollment center which is very unique for any district.

And with us the two people, we have a temporary person that is also helping us flag and also interagency.

We only have three places right now where they can be flagged as homeless where we do the identification process and the validation.

But we haven't been able to get out to every single building but we have required, we have summoned our new point of contacts to come in and get some training.

We do have a person identified at every single building.

That wasn't implemented thanks to Pat until was it December or January.

Before that we never ever had that opportunity to have a person of contact at each building and even though OSPI has been recommending that for so long because we are so large we finally got that in place and I know we are just turning the ship and I don't expect it just to, we have done a lot of work in the past few years and now they are coming and asking for some of the things that we are doing at Seattle Public Schools and our homeless program and how are we working with these families and so I have to say we have made a lot of progress.

Let me also add that one of the handoffs that has been really important for us is the family support worker program.

Because the buildings that have our family support workers are the buildings that Dinah and Jolene can quickly hand off to.

We do training with the family support workers and we have the two secondary ones.

We have a family support worker at World School, our family support specialist and at Rainier Beach High School.

So, those individuals in that role and responsibility is really helpful in getting the services out there.

Can I do a follow-up?

Sure.

I know we were told that there's 2400 homeless students in our district.

Has that percentage gone up since the time that it was presented to us?

You mean the last operation meeting?

It depends.

kind of peaking down right about this time so as of today we had some kids that had either some kids transition out of our district and go to the district they are living in and so when I talked to Jolene today we are looking at the data we are down to 2350. of students that have been identified as homeless this year.

In December we were up to 2018 and I think since September to now there is probably about 600 newly identified students who are considered homeless.

And so again they come into our buildings in our centralized system and they can be identified there They are often identified at the building level as well when they are speaking to a counselor or sometimes principals call.

Of course if there is an FSW or a family support worker or a family advocate at the building they are more apt to give us a call because they are speaking with the families and getting more information than probably sometimes a teacher is not able to get that information.

Not all those students are receiving transportation.

That is requiring maybe a third of them are actually actively receiving transportation so I just, I don't want people to think that 2,000 of them are receiving transportation but they have at some point this year or the past few years been identified as homeless.

There is no timeline for homelessness and we are not able to drop them so we keep them in our system and then they tend to graduate or transition out of the our district or they self-identified as no longer being homeless.

We know about the permanent housing in the north end so we keep our pulse on that so we exit those students out.

So it is a lot of details involved in it but at the same time it is really our efforts to make sure students are able to get to school immediately and they are also not having any barriers in their enrollment process.

We have new shelters in the southeast part of Seattle so the numbers are much larger there.

I think Rainier Beach is the highest high school, they have the highest high school numbers in the Nisgard field.

And then Rainier Beach had 77 students have been identified as homeless and 30 of them were seniors.

So you know just thinking about where these students are moving to or where the shelters are traditionally you know 20 years ago when a law was enacted most of the shelters were all in the north end.

Now they are all over.

and we have quite a few in the southeast part of Seattle so it's impacting our enrollment and it's also impacting the needs of these students and so just again it's just changing with the times and the trends of what we see in our housing and in our nation.

Thank you.

Director Blanford.

I'm just wondering really quickly if you can share with us have you been tracking the United Way numbers because I know they have a pretty robust system of trying to track homeless people and if so if there is congruence between our numbers which seem to be going down and their numbers which may be going up from what I last heard.

Actually I used to be on the United Way committee for the youth homelessness task force but we haven't been really looking at United Way's numbers.

We do the one night count and we help them with that which is they are part of that as well.

The trend again has been that you know more people, we are seeing more homelessness because more people are able to identify it in our system.

United Way is tracking all homeless families you know and not even single homeless people.

Their view is much larger than ours but it's often you know I haven't seen the, I haven't really tracked that recently.

Again when I count it's the same thing they are looking at people that are not in shelters they are actually out outside on the streets and so there's kind of some you know differences you know apples and oranges in some ways.

So we don't always, I don't always look at their trends and what's happening because their sphere is much larger than ours.

Ours is just you know school-age children.

I'm not seeing any other questions.

Thank you.

Thank you for your time.

All right we will move on to item number three amending policy number 3417 catheterization also coming from ops.

Hi Katie Johnson manager of student health services and I just want to thank you for your recognition of the nurses.

I'm going to add that editorial comment they very much appreciate it.

Today I am introducing a motion to amend policy 3417 catheterization that was originally adopted in 2011. Since that time WSSDA has made changes to the policy to align it more directly with the language of the statute.

in correct direction in the earlier policy.

So this will say that non-nurse employees who have not agreed in writing as part of their job description may file a written letter of refusal to catheterized students.

Thank you and if we could hear from Director Patu on the committee recommendation please.

This item was discussed by the committee and it was recommended to move forward for board approval.

Thank you.

Questions from directors?

I just have one question of clarification.

I believe it said in the document though, I'm not sure I heard you say it, that they can write, teachers can write such a letter declining and that there's no consequences to them.

Correct.

Yes.

And we would not want to delegate a procedure to a person who was not willing to participate in that.

So it aligns with practice as well.

Thank you.

Anyone else?

Thank you very much.

All right that takes us to item number four on the acceptance of the initial naming of the Coe elementary school library as the Kearns library.

Hi there I am Virginia Turner I am the current principal at Coe elementary and I brought third grade teacher Brianna Bridges.

with me to talk to you about this and urge your approval of the naming of our library, the Kearns library.

This past June Karen Kearns retired from her position at COE as a reading specialist.

She had previously been a teacher in the district and also had worked in the office of teaching and learning here at the district office helping and mentoring teachers in the area of literacy.

It was much to our shock and surprised that this past October she very unexpectedly died.

When we came together as a community we thought about what we might do to honor Karen and the idea of naming our library after Karen came up.

But as we discussed it further we decided it can't just be Karen because what about Richard Kearns?

He spent 33 of his 45 years in teaching at Coe elementary as a teacher.

I want to tell you a little bit about Karen and Richard and then Brianna is going to tell you a little bit about the process that we engaged the community in.

Karen and Richard are exceptional people and educators and they are worthy of our admiration Their enthusiasm for education, for teaching inspires us.

As educators they were dedicated to literacy and the art of teaching.

It was clear that students from their classrooms placed a special value on reading.

You could not help giving them your best.

Students who worked with Mrs. Kearns in recent years would run to their reading groups.

They were proud of their accomplishments and would exclaim with pride Mrs. Kearns helped me learn to read.

Memories of Mrs. Kearns singing nursery rhymes with kindergarteners, reading rich literature that encouraged students to read more and teach young readers to love reading still rings through the hallways at Coe Elementary.

When people asked what they could do to help a child succeed she would say read to them, read to them.

Have them read to you.

Surround them with books.

we are missing her still.

Karen and Richard were an inspiration to countless students and families.

People on Queen Anne joke that Richard should be the mayor of Queen Anne.

You might still see him at Met Market.

But that would not be right because his term as mayor would someday end.

Naming the co-library after Richard and Karen is a more fitting tribute.

For all those whose lives have been touched by Karen and Richard, their legacy will live on through the Coe Library.

We want to honor them because they have enriched the lives of children, our families, our community to a degree that we can never repay.

This is but a small token of our gratitude and appreciation for the exemplary lives they have led.

Their legacy will live on as students enjoy literacy in the Kearns library for decades to come.

As a part of our outreach to the community to confirm that this is a great idea, it was easy to reach out to our current staff.

and to our current parents.

It was more challenging to reach out to former students and parents but we did that and we asked for letters and I have a whole file of them which I was asked not to share with you but I did include in your board packet, I hope you got them, three examples of letters.

And I just want to read one little tiny, I don't want to take too much of your time.

It's going to be a long night for you but one from David Elliott who is the current principal at Queen Anne Elementary but prior to that job was the co-elementary principal and knew Karen and Richard very well.

When I was headteacher at Bryant with my name in the principal pool I received a phone call from Dick Kearns.

I had never met him before but by the time our conversation was done I knew this was a man I wanted to know better.

For the next 15 years I came to know Dick as simply one of the best men I have ever known.

I wanted to name my new school Richard P. Kearns Elementary because of that fact and the fact that I knew there would never be anything in his life that would bring any negatives to our school or our district.

After 43 years of teaching, 33 of those years at COE, Dick was the teacher who was still bringing suggestions about more professional development, new ideas and new curriculum that he believed would move teachers professionally, improve student learning and make our school better.

He was a gift to both staff and students at COE and I believe this honor is absolutely appropriate.

He ends his letter The Kearns library is such a wonderful honor and recognition of two passionate and dedicated educators who devoted their lives to students and families of Queen Anne.

I fully support this proposal and I would ask the board to do so also.

I second that.

When we first had the idea to name the co-library the Kearns library we started going through a process and first we wanted to make sure that we had the staff support We crafted a letter and 100% of the staff signed the letter that includes principals, certificated staff, classified, clerical and custodial staff.

We then brought it to the BLT where we also got 100% support.

Virginia brought it to the PTA board and a general PTA meeting and it unanimously passed.

So as you can see we have overwhelming support for renaming or for naming the Kearns library from our community.

Thank you for your consideration.

Thank you.

Why don't we hear from the ops committee chair on this one.

This also came to ops and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Directors are there questions?

Comments?

Besides the PTSA did you reach out to the community as a whole?

We reached out to former alum students and families who would have known the Kearns.

So more or less you didn't have a community meeting, did you?

Where you invited everybody to come in and put in their comments, no?

No.

Okay.

Other questions or comments?

Director McLaren.

It is just always so good to hear wonderful teachers and educators celebrated so I really appreciate the fact that your community is going to this effort to honor these two people.

Other comments or questions?

Thank you very much for coming down here and for sharing the story with us.

Thank you.

Dr. Nyland we will see you tomorrow morning.

All right the next item is the item number five acceptance of the athletic program grant and in the sea of items from operations we will have a cameo from A&F on this one.

Good evening.

Charles Wright Deputy Superintendent I'm joined by Peggy McEvoy assistant superintendent for operations and Eric McCurdy executive director for athletics.

Tonight we are introducing a generous anonymous donation in the amount of $2.7 million over six years to pay for student participation in athletic programs and equipment for middle and high school athletics.

In 2004 the board adopted a procedure for competitive foods.

with the intent to promote more nutritious food including vending machine options.

This action resulted in a loss of revenue for the athletic transportation at each school.

In 2007 an athletic participation fee was implemented in order to recover some of those costs.

As a result many of our high schools witnessed a reduction of student participation.

And additional fees regardless of the amount can be a challenge for many families.

This grant importantly allows us to eliminate student participation fees for our middle and high school students.

The grant will enable the district to phase in its support for student participation fees.

16-17 the district would assume 5% of the overall cost.

Over time we would become increasingly responsible for assuming 75% of the cost through 2020 to 2021. And we will use baseline funds or find other sources to cover the cost.

I now turn to Eric McCurdy to provide more detail about the grant.

Thank you Charles.

To the directors, superintendent we are very excited about this opportunity to allow all of our student athletes equity and access to participate in athletics.

I remember about a year ago at a board work session the board asked us to be able to go out and try to find some monies to make that happen.

I know that Director Blanford asked to have a framework or a structure once we brought it in to be successful.

So I wanted at this time to thank some of our teammates.

I know that Peggy and Charles did a lot of the heavy lifting but I wanted to thank Aaron Bennett, John in legal and also Ken who came in to kind of help us through the process.

If you look at schools like Chief Sealth and Andrea Mock who is the assistant principal there and Coach Earnest the baseball coach and athletic director.

Once we reclassified our free and reduced lunch, kids that used to be able to participate in athletics no longer can.

So I believe this grant will allow us to move forward in years to come and have all of our students have the equity and access and the ability to participate.

Also by having more students participate or allowing them to participate through the equity lens we will be able to hold them to a certain grade point average which the Seattle Public School grade point average is higher than the WIA standard.

to have our students graduate that's our number one goal for our students to obviously graduate and be very productive in society.

I would like to thank our non-SPS Metro school participants.

Two weeks ago we had a meeting myself, let me make sure I have all the schools, President Kent Hickey over at Seattle Prep, Superintendent Faith at Bainbridge, President Tony DiSapio over at Blanchette, President Bernie Knowles at Lakeside, Oh, president and principal Jim Walker and O'Day and we decided that they also want to be part of our equity and access lens and they will be giving us a stipend starting next year for $5,000 per school.

It will go up $1,000 for the next five years.

So we will start at 35,000 next year and we will end five years from now at 70,000 and look at reorganizing that again.

That will come into the Metro league that will also allow our students to participate and have the same access as our other school members that are in the league.

At this time I will turn it over to Peggy McEvoy.

So I just want to take a minute just to talk about some of the work that's being done out of athletics.

You've seen all of the awards that are coming in and you've seen Eric leading the work for Metro and WIAA and in his spare time he is also doing development work and this is an amazing opportunity for our students and for our district.

We know that If we can increase the amount of athletic participation for our students that does engage them in schools.

We do see them have better attendance rates and better academic achievement.

So this is an incredible opportunity for us and we are both very proud of Eric and his hard work for getting this grant and certainly to the donor for this generous opportunity for our students.

Thank you.

Let's hear from our operations committee chair if we could please.

This also came to our committee and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for board approval.

And then I don't know if our A&F chair would like to make a comment.

Well we haven't met, we will be meeting, our May meeting we will be looking at this as well and we anticipate a most positive result from that meeting.

Thank you.

All right so questions of directors why don't we go to Director Peaslee.

I have a question for Eric.

First of all Eric thank you so much I know you have been working on this for a long time.

Thank you Director.

This is a great win for our students so thank you.

Can you please explain the little thing that you said at the end there about stipends and the leagues I just didn't follow that.

Yes so beyond our 10 high schools that participate in athletics in the Metro league we have seven other schools that are in our league.

I am not sure in the past what has happened or what the past practices were but as of next season those schools will also give monies into the Metro League that will allow our students to participate as well.

That's something that we agreed on and voted so that's going to be a great opportunity.

That will be monies coming into the Metro League that we can also use to help our student-athletes participate.

So are you saying that those other schools will be giving money to the league or will be getting money?

They will be giving money to Seattle Public Schools and the Metro League.

They will be giving it?

Yes they will.

Okay.

Great.

Thank you.

Other questions or comments?

Director Peters.

I don't know who this question should be addressed to but I would like to know what prompts the person to donate anonymously?

What is the general rationale behind that?

Charles Wright, Deputy Superintendent.

I think every organization has their reasons and they want to make it anonymously.

So this would be an organization not necessarily an individual?

It's an organization.

I just want to make sure that there is not any, this sounds like a wonderful gift so don't get me wrong I don't have any issue with that I just wondered why somebody wouldn't necessarily want to be associated with a gift like this.

Some people are modest.

Director Blanford wanted to jump in and I have a philosophy on it as well.

In my prior experience as executive director of a couple of nonprofit organizations and the recipient of several anonymous gifts the primary reason was just they didn't want, you know some people, there are an awful lot of people in the world who want to put their names on everything and there are other people who give generously who don't want their names on things.

There are other folks who don't want to be barraged with similar requests and I can imagine in this case every district in Western Washington probably in all of Washington State and probably in several of our surrounding states would be interested in making a pitch to get a similar gift.

The question I had when I heard you ask that it prompted in my mind Are there any constraints associated with this gift that we need to be aware of?

So the primary constraint is it is a matching grant and so you will see in your materials there is a table or chart that lists the district contribution and so the donor will not disperse the funds to the district until the district has demonstrated that it has quote unquote pay to chair and in that way it really is meant to be a replacement or elimination of student participation fees and is not intended to be a six-year kind of supplement and then we go back in year seven and start to charge student fees again.

And there are no other constraints?

No.

That and anonymity.

Other questions or comments?

Director Martin Morris.

I know that Eric, the amount of Herculean effort that you put in to make that happen and I want to publicly say how appreciative I am of the fact that you heard loud and clear you know go forth and do and you did indeed go forth and bring home the bacon as it were.

So thank you for that because I personally know that every student that participates in an after-school activity including athletics the outcomes for that student increase exponentially and among all kinds of things in terms of risky behaviors, in terms of academic success, all of those things and the fact that you have been talking about the key phrase for me student athlete and you always talk that way and I appreciate that and I'm sure that the donor heard that loud and clear that that is what we are really talking about here.

This is not really for athletics it is for our students to participate in athletics so thank you for that.

Thank you and I hope that the donor will continue to work with us in the future after the six years.

We will go to Director Patu next.

I would also like to say thank you to Eric for a job well done.

We all know that athletic department has really gone downhill since I've been on the board.

But I've seen so many exciting things happening with athletic departments and just getting this grant is like the icing on the cake.

And I want to say thank you and congratulate you for, you know, you are a hustler.

It takes courage.

Thank you director.

Not in a bad way.

I meant that you work hard and you push until you finally got it that's what I meant.

But thank you for all the hard work that you do.

Keep it up.

Director Blanford.

I want to add my thanks as well and I heard you go through the list of people who have been involved in accepting this gift and the question about anonymity came up and it prompted in my mind a thought around how transparent we are and I heard I think in that list of people that you mentioned that John Cerqui was involved.

Yes he was.

Okay because the thing that I am concerned about is ensuring the donor's anonymity given that we operate in a transparent environment I could imagine someone doing a request for information on this and want to be sure that that anonymity is protected because I think that is key to being able to accept future gifts is the assurance that the donor's wishes will be honored.

Yes, sir, I agree.

Director Blanford, John Cerqui, Acting General Counsel.

So we can certainly receive the gift anonymously that's appropriate for us to receive a gift anonymously.

What the public does to want to push to try to find out who this generous donor organization is really is outside of our control and we may have to release certain information but I hope that we would respect on this generosity for our students that somebody has requested the anonymity.

All right so with that I'm just going to make a couple comments and then I think we're going to move on to the next item.

And I just want to echo the thanks to the staff team on this.

This whole situation of not having money to fund athletics was here when Director Martin Morris and I arrived.

And the previous board when they passed the nutrition policy one of the consequences of it was the loss of revenue on the vending machines.

And I remember Jan Kumasaka coming to me and imploring me at one point to work to get this thing shored up.

I was then the Seattle Council PTSA president and so we're in 2015 but we're getting there so thank you so very much for the work that you've done here.

All right with that we will move on to item number six.

That's six out of 17 just as a reminder.

Approval of a request for proposal 1544 phone circuits.

Yes this is fairly standard stuff so hopefully I can keep this brief.

It is basically a giant phone bill for the phone circuits and the phone numbers that the district uses.

It totals over $250,000 over three years so we are in front of you.

Long story short it was a standard RFP process.

We selected the lowest cost bidder.

There were no protests.

It is the least expensive vendor.

They are $8,100 a month average instead of $8,500 a month average which works out to about $5,000 saved a year.

It's not huge but at least it's down and not up.

The contract is three years instead of five years like the previous one and in part that's because telephone costs come down over time and so we didn't want to get locked into paying higher rates for longer.

And one other thing that's different in this contract than it was the previous is it allows us to change technologies.

My phone gear is well old enough to drive.

And some things aren't possible yet but will over time and so this allows us to change from sort of an older circuit style to a newer circuit style without paying a penalty and actually hopefully saving some money.

And that's it.

All right so let's go to our operations committee chair for a recommendation.

This also came to ops and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for board approval.

Thank you.

So directors with questions we will go to Director Peasley.

Are these just our landlines or does this include our cell phones?

These are landlines.

The cell phone is a different contract.

Well I just, I have to ask a really stupid question.

I have to keep my phone, my landline in my house to keep my internet costs down otherwise I wouldn't have the phone at all.

Doesn't that same sort of price structuring exist for large organizations?

So the phone circuits are paid for differently than the Internet circuit.

The Internet circuit is done through the K-20 and it's a dedicated 10 gig circuit between here and the K-20 state system.

It's actually routed through the University of Washington.

We pay that completely separately from the phone bill.

Well that's just too bad that they somehow cannot be integrated.

Well I'm not sure you'd want them integrated.

They are rather different technologies.

Our phone system is quite old, it's 16 years old and I wouldn't want to be running on a 16-year-old Internet system.

So this is basically the old circuits providing support for the old phones and over time hopefully we will move to something that is more modern to your point.

Okay thank you.

Other questions?

I just commented to our superintendent it sounds like a future BTA project.

Unfortunately yes.

All right with that we will move on to the next item and say thank you very much.

All right item 7. Management and operation agreement for Memorial Stadium parking lot.

Good evening Bruce Gowra, Director of Facilities.

Facilities is requesting the school board approve a new three-year contract with Republic Parking for the management and operation of the Memorial Stadium parking lot.

Republic Parking is currently the vendor under contract and has been a high-quality vendor for us.

The new contract represents a 1.49% reduction in the current management fee so we are saving money and it is a good proven vendor.

All right so with that we will hear from operations please.

This also came through ops and it was recommended to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Do directors have questions or comments?

We will bundle them.

Director Peters.

Well I appreciate that the fee went down but do we have an obligation to put this out for bid?

For other proposals?

I don't know that we have an obligation it's best practice to bid it every few years so that's what we did.

Oh okay so you did put it and they came back with the best offer.

Yeah there were a total of three other bidders and public parking was the lowest bid.

Okay.

Which was a benefit because they are a current vendor and have done a great job for us.

Okay thank you.

Other questions or comments?

Director Blanford.

I am just curious if the bid was competitive with the market in that area?

It was.

Other questions or comments?

Going once.

Going twice.

All right.

Thank you very much.

And we will see you at action time.

OK item number eight.

If I skip one somebody is going to have to call me on it which is BEX IV award construction contract for Kimball elementary elementary school seismic upgrades.

Good evening board members Mike Skutek senior project manager capital projects and planning.

Tonight before you you have the board action report to award construction contract P5050A to a yet unnamed contractor for bid number B10428.

and I think there is a typo in the board action report that is, that number ends in 28. This is for seismic improvements at Kimball elementary school.

Board policy 6220 requires that contracts in excess of $250,000 must come before the board for approval.

The scope of work as outlined in the title is seismic improvements at Kimball elementary school.

I am happy to report that the bid opened yesterday.

And although we don't have the blanks filled in we will by the May 20 board action.

We had three bidders, the low responsible bidder was at $272,853 so this is a relatively small project.

construction time frame will be over the summer of 2015 when school is out, completed by September of next year.

And the recommendation is for the board to authorize the superintendent to execute the construction contract so we can proceed with the work.

All right and may we hear from the operations committee please.

This also came to ops and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for consideration for full board approval.

Thank you.

Questions from directors or comments?

I would just make a comment that's really going to be maybe more toward my fellow directors.

We have a really long list of construction items and some of them don't have the information here today.

I'm just going to really urge us to as the next agenda gets posted that we are in there looking at them and getting questions to staff.

early like over the weekend Mondays so that they can have an opportunity to turn them around or we are going to have a very long meeting when we go through these.

And some of them will be put on the consent agenda if we can rationalize doing so and so another reason to signal to directors to be looking at them.

All right and so I'm betting you're staying for the next one?

All right.

Yes I have seven actually.

Yes number nine is, would you like me to continue?

Please.

Okay.

This is another board action report toward construction contract 5057 to Bates roofing for bid number B10427 for roofing replacement and seismic improvements at Muir Elementary School.

So again policy 6220 requires that contracts in excess.

Of $250,000 must come before the board for approval.

The scope of work is a complete roof replacement and selected seismic upgrades.

We had eight bidders.

The low responsible bidder was $664,912.

There were no alternates accepted.

and the construction timeframe will be again the summer of 2015 so this coming summer.

The recommended motion would be to authorize the superintendent to execute the contract, the construction contract so we can proceed with work.

Can we hear from our ops chair please.

This also came to ops and it was recommended to move forward for full board consideration.

All right and with that what questions do directors have?

Okay looks like none so we will move on to item number 10 which is the multifunded Seattle world school at TT minor modernization project.

So Director Card the next four items are for TT minor they are OSPI requirements for state funding assistance.

The first of which is a constructability review report and the ask is that the board approve the constructability report completed by Rowan and Associates on January 8, 2015. The action is again a requirement of the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction for state funding assistance.

The specific board policy would be 6100 which states the policy of the Seattle School Board to pursue funding opportunities that are consistent with district priorities.

The scope of work involved with constructability is it's a third party that reviews the bid documents prior to going out for bid so it's a quality control cost control measure.

They try to identify any errors or omissions or discrepancies in the bid documents prior to bidding and have those items corrected.

So the attachments that you see are items listed by Rowan and Associates that are identifying discrepancies or errors or omissions and then the second column is a response by the architect to take care of those items.

The funding impacts would be an estimated $2 million in state funding assistance.

Thank you and if we could hear from Director Patu please.

This also came to ops and it was recommended to move forward for full board approval.

All right so we will open it up to questions and we will go to Director Blanford.

I am just curious what is the cost of a constructability report in this case?

How much did it cost us to contract with Rowan and Associates to produce the constructability report?

I don't have that specific number I will get it to you but I can tell you that it is well worth the effort.

They do hire, it is a prescriptive review so it is some five specialists that spend 40 hours in review of the contract documents.

I think it is around $20,000 to $40,000 but I will get you the number.

prior to the board action.

It seems to me that that should be included in the document in the BAR.

Maybe I'm wrong but I would imagine that if we are accepting a constructability report that we know the cost of the constructability report.

Yeah I think it hasn't been because it's under the $250,000 but you could certainly include it for informational purposes.

So I think we would be glad to find that information and include it but you're not really approving it you're approving the report and the fact that we've done the work.

to make sure that we are getting good value out of the millions of dollars that we are spending.

So we are accepting the report at some point we didn't approve it because it was under the $250,000 amount.

I still would like to see it.

All right other questions or comments on this item?

All right.

So with that why don't we move on to item 11 which I believe if I'm counting right is the second world school item.

Number two of four in the OSPI approval.

So this is for resolution 2014-15-23 again for world school TT minor modernization project.

It is the five-year, 30-year use.

So it is a requirement of OSPI again.

The bar is consistent with board policy 6100 which states that the school board would pursue funding opportunities that are consistent with district priorities.

And the resolution certifies that the project will extend the useful or the project as designed will extend the useful life of the building for at least 30 years and certifies that the facility will be used for instructional purposes for at least five years after completion of the project.

Again there is $2 million of funding available through OSPI state assistance.

And if we could hear from Director Patu please.

This also came to our committee and it was recommended to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Questions from directors?

I have one.

Is this a different $2 million than the $2 million from item number 10?

It is not.

All of these are requirements for the same $2 million worth of state assistance.

Okay.

Thank you.

Other questions?

I'm really interested in these $2 million savings.

If we can get more of them that would be great.

Any other questions?

All right.

So with that let's go on to item number 12.

12 is also a resolution it's number 201415-24.

It's for world school again for a modernization project and it is titled the intent to construct.

This is again a requirement of OSPI and in a nutshell what it is certifying is that the modernization at the TT minor building will be completed according to the purposes for which state matching funds are being provided.

So up to this point we have provided up to a D9 we provide all the odd numbers D1, 3, 5, 7 and 9 and within those D forms we describe what we are going to do so what this resolution will do is to confirm that we will comply with what we said we were going to do.

Thank you.

Director Patu.

This also came to Ops and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Questions on this one?

Seeing no eye contact on that one I will go to the next one which is oh my now I've lost track.

Are we on 13?

Okay 13. Thank you Teresa.

13 is asking for approval of resolution 2014-15-29 for Whirlschool at TT minor.

This is titled the new construction, new construction in lieu of modernization.

So there is a small portion of the project which is new construction so how you apply for that square footage state assistance is different than the modernization bar that was asked for I think under number 11. So this is a requirement of the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction.

It is consistent with board policy 6100 and the resolution really details the demolition of 3371 square foot of space and then the reconstruction of additional admin space, additional theater, stage space and multi-purpose space to handle the unique requirements that Whirls School has and I included in this BAR some backup of the previous ask for additional funding which outlines what those requirements are for additional admin space and multi-purpose rooms etc.

There is $2 million at risk here as far as state assistance with approval of this BAR.

Same $2 million.

So if we can hear from Director Patu please.

This also came to our committee and it was recommended to move forward for full board approval.

Questions from directors?

So is this a different $2 million or the same?

The same $2 million.

Questions from anyone else?

I have two.

One of the questions I have and I admit that it's going to be all-encompassing of all four of these actions.

So we get these reports or people do these evaluations but in particular the first one of the four there's information there that could tighten the requirements of the project and conceivably result in a better project or a cost savings or fixing something that might have been otherwise missed right?

Correct.

So this isn't just a matter in all four instances of checking a box that we did a thing there could actually be.

Either an opportunity to avoid an error or mistake or a miss or reap some benefit from it that is not included in the cost of what we paid for the report or in the $2 million.

Correct.

Yes and Director Karr for instance Thornton Creek the Thornton Creek project is not receiving state assistance.

We did perform constructability on that project we didn't have to bring it to the board for approval but we did do that constructability effort to ensure that we had a quality project going out to bid.

All right and I will withdraw my other question.

Any other questions?

All right that brings us to number 14 which is BEX III and BEX IV final acceptance of the contract for Fairmont Park Elementary renovation and addition.

Are you staying on with us for this one?

I am.

So this is a change of pace, this is final acceptance of construction contract P5030 with allied construction and associates for the Fairmont Park elementary school renovation and addition project.

It's a board policy, well for the purposes of avoiding disputes over the timing of filing liens it is best management practice that the board accept the work of a construction project as finally complete prior to the release of retention.

It basically starts the clock on any potential liens that are out there and this venue as a public forum complies with the RCWs that outline or govern that process.

So the scope of the work included the modernization of the existing Fairmont Park facility and a 12 classroom addition.

The facility opened in September of 2014 and has a 500 seat capacity.

Funding source was BEX III and BEX IV and the project was completed under budget and the appropriate closeout paperwork are attached to the bar as attachments.

So the recommended motion is to accept the work performed under BEX III and BEX IV public works contract with allied construction associates for Fairmont Park Elementary.

school renovation in addition.

If we could hear from Director Patu please.

This also came to the committee and it was recommended to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Questions from directors?

Okay looks like no.

Thank you very much.

All right number 15 Bexfork award construction contract for Franklin High School roof and seismic work.

Good evening this is Eric Becker with Capital Projects senior project manager.

I'm here to speak about a board action report to award contract P5063 to Western Ventures construction for the Franklin High School roof and seismic work.

This board action report is to execute the contract with Western Ventures for the Franklin High School roof and seismic work in the amount of $2,010,729.

This project consists of seismic upgrades including the right roof diaphragm, a new roof and seismic upgrades in the attic of the building and the parapet bracing of Franklin High School.

The project was publicly bid on April 30 and it received six bids.

Western Venture was deemed a low bid contractor and Bassetti Architects recommends the acceptance of the bid.

A copy of the bid tab is attached.

architect's recommendation and also a placeholder for the contract.

Thank you.

Director Patu.

This also came to ops and it was recommended by the committee move forward for consideration for full board approval.

All right thank you and we will open it up to questions.

We will start with Director Blanford.

Yesterday we had some conversation about Franklin and about the terracotta structure that we had previously started work on.

There were additional findings requiring additional work.

This is not that.

This is not that, no.

This is the roof.

The roof separate from the terra cotta.

Yes.

We do have an assessment of that work and we will be able to do that in the current contract of phase 1 contract of Franklin High School.

I'm sorry.

We will be able to do some of that work in the current contract that we have for Franklin High School.

There are two phase contracts for this project.

but we can expect to see another bar at some point about the terra cotta?

It's actually on a, it will be within a current contract that we have for the school.

Director Martin Morris was next and then we will go to Director Peters.

I just want to bring to attention the thing that I know that that terracotta was a surprise but I also want to recognize the fact that our budget for this project initially was over $3 million and the bids came in significantly lower than that.

So that gives us some room to be able to do some of those other things.

with the dollars in the savings too so there is a little bit of wiggle room to do some things and still stay I think under budget.

The terracotta thing we don't know what that's really going to mean yet in terms of actual but there is some dollars already in budget that will cover part of that.

Director Peters.

I have a question concerning the memorandum from Bassetti Architects regarding the references for Western Venture.

At the bottom of that document it mentions a couple issues that came up with the references having to do with closeout.

Do you know which document I'm talking about?

I would have to read it.

I'm not extremely familiar with it so I would have to review it and respond to you probably separately.

Okay.

I mean the final sentence says general consensus was that with a proper push from owner and architect a successful project with Western Venture can be expected.

Is Seattle school district considered the owner in that sentence?

That's correct, yes.

And so what I'm interested in knowing is what the proper push is, what the definition of that will be to ensure a successful venture here.

So is this something that you could send to us in response by email or something once you look at the document more closely?

I think it would probably be, there's not an appropriate definition for it but we can probably explain what is meant by that word.

Well what I mean is that whole paragraph I would like some reassurances because apparently some things were found in the references of this company that need to be addressed in order for this to be a successful venture so I just would like to know a little bit more about that.

tack on to that I would ask what are we going to do as the owner, what does our proper push look like?

Not so much what does it mean but what are we going to do because they are kind of signaling here that there can be an issue if we are not on top of it.

So as the people approving it it would be helpful for 2 plus million that we know that we've got something in place there.

You'll have to take a look at that last paragraph.

We'll take a look at it.

Other questions or comments?

Thank you for the comments.

Director Martin Morris.

I would add to that both of these companies are companies that we also have a pretty good track record with over time.

These are not new to us.

So and they have done many projects for us successfully as well so we have a relationship already so the word push relative to us probably is not a big deal to us that's just good project management.

It is good project management and that's really what the terms are is that proper project management and we are familiar with this contractor and they do provide successful projects for the school district.

So I appreciate the remarks I will just remind those of us that were here that once upon a time we previously didn't pay attention to a little red flag in a report called the Souter report and that came back to haunt us so I'm with Director Peters I would like to just have something that explains to us how you're going to provide that extra push or oversight given that there's a little red flag here.

I don't think it's, like Director Martin-Morris I'm not alarmed by it but I would like to know that there's something that's going to be done there.

Other questions or comments?

All right we are to item number 16 and that is certifying the resolution around Wilson Pacific intent to construct.

Yes this is very similar to some of the items that Mike spoke about for intent to construct.

This is for the Wilson Pacific project and it is a resolution to certify the intent to construct for that project.

Board approval of this resolution is required for the Washington State Administrative Code and is part of the OSPI D form approval process.

This resolution is a requirement of OSPI's D9 application.

This board approval will help to secure up to 4.5 million in state funding assistance.

The Washington State Administrative Code requires school districts to state by board resolution that the projects authorized to receive state assistance funding will be completed in accordance with the purposes of which state funding assistance is being provided.

The attachments include the resolution and an example of the Washington Administrative

Thank you.

If we could hear from Director Peters please.

I'm looking right at you and I get the wrong name.

At least I didn't use my name.

This also came to ops and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for full board approval.

Thank you.

Questions from directors or comments.

All right I'm not seeing anyone with a hand in the air so let's go to item number 17 and the bottom of the agenda items.

If you could proceed with that one.

Okay thank you.

This is also for the Wilson Pacific project.

This is a certifying resolution that the district intends to comply with RCW 39.10.

The office of OSPI form D5 funding and assistance requires that the school district sign a resolution that the district intends to comply with 39.10.

Board approval of this item or the GCCM was approved in September 2013 and now a resolution is required for the D form process.

And this also helps to secure up to $4.5 million in state assistance funding.

It's the same $4.5 million that we mentioned before.

And just there's a paragraph in the background information I'd like to read real quick.

On August 12, 2013 the board approved the GCCM delivery method for this project and the construction contract.

At the time the board approval the signed resolution was not included and OSPI requires the district submit the resolution to comply with 39.10 for alternative works construction procedures.

All right and with that let's hear from Director Patu.

This also came to ops and it was recommended by the committee to move forward for full board approval.

Questions or comments from directors?

I don't have any questions but I just want to make the comment that I'm very excited that this is moving forward.

The fence is up and the permits are in and I'm very excited that the project is moving forward.

We are very excited.

We are getting very close to starting.

All right so thank you for the introduction of this item and as I said that brings us to the bottom of the agenda and staff predicted an 8 p.m.

ending and my iPhone says that it is 7 57 so well done.

Thank you.

You