Wow.
We will go to public testimony.
The rules for public testimony are on the screen and I would ask that speakers are respectful of these rules.
I would also note that the board does not take public comments on items related to personnel or individually named staff.
The majority of a speaker's time must be spent on the topic he or she has indicated they wish to speak about.
I would also like to note that each speaker has a two minute speaking time when the two minutes have ended please conclude your remarks.
Ms. Shek would you please read off the speakers on the list three at a time.
Thank you.
Sure first up for public testimony we have Tiana Anderson, Miki Matsumoto, Carl Ingram and Hannah followed by Chris Jackins and Melissa Westbrook.
All right let's let's get it.
So the first thing we would like to talk about.
Sorry I'm Tiana this is Miki we're from Gar-Fith high school.
First thing we'll talk about is the fact that we only have two minutes to speak.
We propose that there is a student representative on the board.
I know Cedric has maybe brought that up once during your time but we think that the communication between students and the board is very very not it's very it's lackey.
Second thing we would like to talk about is the black lives matter curriculum week.
We the problems that we had with it were that teachers either didn't do it or they were thrown into it without any organization.
It felt very performative and it seemed like it was centered around white students feelings over black students lives and history and knowledge.
So we would like to propose that black lives matter week is required well more funded teachers are given more resources and training and students have more input or voice in it.
Something else that we would like to bring up is the increased security on our campus.
The problem around that is that kids really don't feel that safe with the added security measures on our campus such as the increased police presence.
And the locking of the doors and bathrooms are really inconvenient for a lot of kids and it causes them to congregate around the front doors and only go through the front doors which is extremely unsafe in the incident of a emergency.
The other thing about that is that we think effort should be more placed on helping kids through their mental illnesses rather than militarizing the school and making it feel like a prison for a lot of kids.
And if we're talking Realistically the last thing is about the new portables are going to be in place.
The portables will be taking away a lot of parking.
It's contributing to the overpopulation of Garfield and it disrupts a lot of the neighborhood around our school as well as it's not enough space for our staff students and other resources that use that area.
And that's two minutes.
My name is Chris Jackins box 8 4 0 6 3 Seattle 9 8 1 2 4 on Webster and Wing Luke.
Please vote no on these items on the warrants report.
Seven points.
Number one the district keeps certain financial information secret.
How do you know if there are potential conflicts of interest.
Number two on May 20th 2015 the school board voted to accept a 2.7 million dollar anonymous athletic program matching grant.
One condition of the grant was that the donor's name be kept secret not only from the public but also from some school board members voting on the grant.
Number three before voting on acceptance of the grant the superintendent and each board member publicly stated whether or not they knew the identity of the donor and whether they had any connection to the donor.
Number four the board is in the middle of a process to consider hiring a new superintendent.
Have superintendent candidates been asked to publicly disclose potential conflicts of interest related to the secret grant.
Number five.
Have you considered how conflicts might come up.
School sports issues are often in the news.
High profile coaches and students switching from school to school.
Problems involving a wealthy donor and Bellevue sports teams.
Professional sports team owners attending Seattle Public Schools sporting events.
Number six I made a public records request which the district responded to.
Number seven according to district documents the donor of the secret grant is professional sports team owner and retired Microsoft billionaire Steve Palmer through his foundation.
Thank you.
After Melissa Westbrook we will have Ted Nunning followed by Brian Terry and Gian Rosario.
Good evening.
Concerning the Lake City lease bar I had to smile at this one as several of us suggested this in the past and we were told it's too small a space and too costly to get it back.
The bar studiously avoids saying how much the district made when it created this lease.
That's a key piece of information that you should have.
What would the district use the rental money for?
Because what should happen with the money is it should be banked because when the district does need the building it will need renovations to be a school building again and that's not cheap.
Quote, the revenue from the rental operations will help recoup the costs associated with the lease back but only if the district uses the building as a rental for at least six plus years and the district would not make nearly $1 million a year they say it would make under just under 700 K.
The district says its search for land well if they really need space there's always oak tree and you could do with a lot more land than that.
Lake City might only be useful as an interim for smaller elementary projects and you still have to fix it up and where is the money for that?
So no to this idea.
To Memorial Stadium and the news that an O'Day boy scout and his friends cleaned up the area around the memorial that is the reason we have Memorial Stadium.
In a word shameful.
Because more than a decade ago I stood at this podium shoulder to shoulder with SPS grads who had classmates who fought and died in World War II who weren't happy that the memorial was overgrown with bushes and had trash all around it.
I'm thinking that most of them are dead now.
So who's going to speak up for them?
Me.
How hard is it?
How hard up is this district that for a modest amount every year you can't maintain a public memorial?
Some of you must have walked past it when you went to sign the MOU with the city.
I ask that you direct budget staff to add a line item to next year's budget that will allow this upkeep until such time that the stadium is renovated.
But if this is how you take care of it now I have not high hopes for what happens when there's a new stadium.
It's disgraceful.
It's disrespectful and again shameful.
Now members of the board you're on the verge of selecting a new superintendent.
I contend that having a superintendent who will strongly promote explicit instruction in mathematics is one of the most effective ways maybe the most effective way to reduce the achievement gap in our schools.
The school district administration has never been supportive of explicit instruction.
The administration to its credit did look into the fact that at three middle schools with high minority populations Mercer, Akikurose and Denny the achievement gap in math has been greatly reduced.
They came up with a report that I'm sure you've seen analyzing the results.
Again to their credit they did find that explicit instruction contributed to the school's success.
Here's the finding.
The math of the lessons is explicit and deeply grounded in state standards.
The state standards part is obvious.
You have to teach what the students will be tested on.
The explicit instruction part is what is important.
But this finding is downplayed in the report.
Other findings without justification are presented as more important.
Here's one of them.
There is professional learning in a coaching or team environment.
That one is cited as most important.
Here's another student teacher relationships are learning focused built on high adult expectations for students and accompanied by ample learning support.
It's clear to me that the use of explicit instruction method is by far the most important factor.
Here's why.
Teachers at these three schools have ditched the adopted middle schools, have created their own materials and used explicit instruction.
They broke the rules.
At most of the other schools, presumably, the rules were followed and the adopted texts were used.
So it's reasonable to conclude that explicit instruction made a big difference.
The other findings though describe what all the schools are already supposed to do and presumably most are doing.
So the mere fact that there is professional learning in a coaching or team environment doesn't show anything if both the successful schools and the failing schools are doing it.
Here's what I think.
There is indeed professional learning in a coaching or team environment going on but the success is not due to the mere existence of this is because explicit instruction is stressed as part of that learning.
Thank you.
Good evening.
Thank you for prioritizing equity in advanced learning.
District staff believe that our current service model does not meet the needs of most underprivileged highly capable students.
Universal test results make this clear.
If we were to test 600 white students roughly 80 would be identified as highly capable.
But when we tested 600 black students only six were identified.
Most highly capable black students were rejected because the service model was deemed unable to meet their needs.
This is the heart of the problem.
Federal Way has done a great job of addressing this.
They identify students in accordance with the WAC and then adapt the service model to meet their needs.
I know that changing the service model will be controversial but I also know that you are committed to making real improvements to equity in advanced learning.
Changing the service model is the only way to accomplish this.
Thank you for addressing this issue and ending three decades of racial inequity in our schools.
After Gian Rosario we will have Saj Ali followed by Tyrone Kenne.
Hello Seattle school board members my name is Julian Rosario a student from Rainier Beach High School.
Back in December there was a resolution made to better communicate the school board's opposition to any changes to the city land use code that would allow charter schools to seek departures from land use and zoning standards currently available to Seattle Public Schools.
So we may have temporarily temporarily stopped the construction of the Green Dot high school but it but it doesn't prevent Green Dot from combining the middle school that already has under construction and turning into a middle and high school.
When this news when this newfound information with this newfound information.
We have to call into question how they were able to build the charter school in the first place.
The Seattle municipal code 23.79 allows only Seattle public schools not charter schools to seek departures from development standards preventing Green Dot from obtaining approval for the proposed building.
Again somehow they were able to do this.
Under section 23.79.002 initiation of development standard departure procedure the Seattle school district may apply for development standard departure for public school structures.
This is only for Seattle school district not green dot charter school.
And under section 23.79.004 application for development standard departure a representative of the Seattle school district had to be a part of the committee and I hope they weren't but it states that the advisory committee that makes these zoning determinations must include a representative from the Seattle school district.
believe this did not happen so it was convened unlawfully by the Department of Neighborhoods.
Therefore the existence of the Green Dot charter middle school is illegal.
And we the students of Rainier Beach High School are encouraging the district to have tougher actions.
For example maybe file a lawsuit.
Thank you.
Well I come to speak on the Rainier school board because you know I sit back.
Can you introduce yourself sir please.
First of all my name is Tyrone Kenny and with God is non-profit.
Me and my wife we have a non-profit and we've been working with the Rainier Beach community school all last year and this year and we want to speak up for them this year you know because I sit back and look at these schools in Seattle Washington I'm not from here I'm from Georgia and we don't do things like that you know we sit back and look at this school and how you want to fund it how you don't want to fund it how you need to be doing things in the school for the school because the school is your future.
The school is the future.
If you don't put the future right, and you're talking about the gun violence, you took the Pledge of Allegiance out of the school, and you respect the bell, because you're not honoring God under this situation.
And we're sitting up here fighting battles that we made on ourselves.
Let's do the right thing.
Give them their funding.
We knew the school, because the school, you know, they fall down.
You can't teach nobody in no school that look all bad.
You come to school, you ain't got, then half of the school, that's a low income area.
We're not supporting that school correctly.
We're not supporting all the schools in this state good anyway.
And it's sad to see.
I've been here three years and y'all are not doing nothing correctly.
You need to get together and get your minds together because that's your leaders for the years.
This concludes the sign up list for public testimony this evening.
OK the board is going to take a 10 minute break and then we'll launch into the business portion of our meeting.
We have one action item and a plethora of intro items.
I I will do that after the 15 minute break.
Come on.
All right.