Subcommittee Updates
- May 16th is when the task force will discuss the public input survey data. The task force has a portion of the survey in handout and should read and process.
- Elective Subcommittee Update
- Mostly focused on 6th grade program since 7th and 8th have robust elective offerings
- 4 quarters of electives
- 1 semester of Health/Fitness
- Strongly support a 7 period day or an 8 block schedule
- O: Might be an issue with the master schedule, will you have so many singletons to lock the schedule? Smaller number of students makes it harder to schedule
- H: principles have flexibility each year
- Fist of 5 Vote: 5 members vote 5, 9 members vote 4
- Academic Subcommittee
- Yes no vote
- Friday document will be sent to SB + exec summary +research documentation
- Board meeting on Tuesday night 26th
- Study session 5:30 Tuesday 26th - H and G will answer clarifying questions
- H: Documents were sent to TF members, now we will break up into different rooms with a subcommittee member in each room
- (observers followed groups to different rooms)
- Notes from room 201
- L: How did the subcommittee come up with these options?
- P:
- Tasked with coming up with options based on AMLE
- drew straws to see which options we wrote about
- asked not to advocate for one or the other
- 4 options, pros and cons, tweaking , opportunities and impacts
- Board asked for 2 additional options, #3 and #4
- L:
- I have an issue with Challenge For All unless we test every student for the HiCap program. I don't think we can get rid of Challenge
- I've heard from the community about teachers who don't like AAP and won't recommend it to parents
- So we have to test every student so kids don't get lost
- P: everyone is in challenge with option 1, that removes that problem
- L: My daughter's not in challenge. She doesn't want it
- S:
- 6th doesn't have challenge now
- by law you have to have HiCap
- so some do testing, some do self select, but most other school districts don't do both.
- We are legally meeting the needs of the law
- State assessments are available to all and the data shows what's happening. 6th grade is on par and 7th and 8th scores go down. This might be because of challenge.
- I think there's a better solution out there
- P:
- misconception that challenge is all like minded kids
- anyone can sign up, you get the spectrum
- why not have all classes be challenge classes?
- Blending makes less of a division
- hopefully bring all of the curriculum up to same as challenge
- I worry about the kids, more could be doing more
- This increases rigor in all classes
- bringing 6th in to the mix will start the division earlier
- L: there are kids who should be in HiCap but don't make it
- P:
- teachers will have more support of colleagues so we can share ideas and strategies
- More interdisciplinary teaming will be possible
- S:
- Scheduling nightmare to have challenge classes. Add band and orchestra and it's harder
- Same curriculum in challenge
- not helping anyone, only hurting on the counseling side of things with some kids and not balanced classes
- P: composition analysis become loaded in unbalanced ways, lots of special ed kids in one class
- S:
- girls and boys aren't balanced either
- there's no choice on the demographics on individual classes because girls want to take challenge
- What's the goal of the current program
- P:
- It's not just my school it's all over
- HiCap impacts the schedule too
- S:
- Option 1 is very effective in neighboring districts like Lake WAshington
- there aren't many of our size with Jr Highs anymore
- P: this is the most interesting subcommittee I've ever been on
- S: members of the subcommittee were so amazing, one parent used to be a teacher
- P:
- There are so many moving pieces, lots of populations to consider
- It's about choices
- We just recommend, someone else makes the decisions
Notes from Room 208
- Question: Should we go with Option 1 (Challenge for All) since academic subcommittee recommended it?
- L: No. Not all the docs were given to the subcommittee. This option will increase the achievement gap and will not serve bright FRL kids. Differentiation in current classrooms does not work. I will not ever vote for option #1 [Struggling kids] feel stupid being class with smart kids.
- Blue Stripe Shirt: But isn't that because of Teacher/Curriculum problems?
- L: Talked to curriculum task force. Not using the curriculum in the right way. Kids are bored and not being challenged. Not rigorous enough. Kids start defining themselves by what classes they take.
- Blue Stripe Shirt: Kids start defining themselves at age 10 or 11. We don't want them tracking themselves.
- L: Kids start defining themselves in 4th grade. It's already too late by middle school. If we remove Challenge, the kids won't have the level, pace, and peers that they need.
- White Shirt: Challenge promotes a fixed mindset. And General Ed classrooms have become special needs classrooms.
- L: I am wondering if the Danielson Framework is coming into play here and influencing teacher's decisions?
- J: No, Danielson theory is about empowering teachers to (ask themselves what is working and what is not working, using student data, making their own decisions to determine where they need to grow, and administrators support them in those decisions. It doesn't have anything to do with this.
- K - If we give all kids challenge classes they will rise to the challenge.
- Blue Stripe Shirt: Some parents push their children into challenge classes.
- L: Well, that's unfortunate, but not a reason to remove Challenge.
- ? .....[there is the option to] give parents a chance to opt out.
- B: It seems like L's objections are related to operation. But we've been given the directive to focus on the conceptual today. The operational can be worked out later.
- L: I don't see how the academic subcommittee could have ranked academics LAST, and high school readiness next to last?
- Blue Stripe: They were trying to align with the subcommittee objective.
- I don't like the opt out option. How do you do a master schedule with opt out?"
- K - We aren't doing the curriculum for challenge?
Notes from Room 202
O = member of the Academic Subcommittee
Other MSTF members D1, D2, and X
- O: Any Qs about the recommendation from the subcommitte?
- D1 “No questions. I have lived it. I have listened to teachers and kids.”
- O clarified that MSTF will vote on all 4, all wil go to school board.
- X asked what option 4 (opt-out) would look like for kids. Would it be Family choice of School’s choice to opt them out (to lower track)?
- O: It would be Family choice, maybe after meeting with counselor.
- O: We are calling it a Challenge class to catch underrepresented groups who aren’t ready.
- D1: What are the justifications for THESE 4 options and not others?
- O answered regarding the subcommittee process. Chair of committee broke subcomm into groups, and assigned one group to create a theory of action for “challenge for all” (heterogeneous classes) and one to self-select challenge for grades 6-8. The other 2 groups were to come up with models in between these extremes. Three models were presented to the school board in a study session. The school board wanted another option Option 3 was added by school board – heterogeneous classes for grade 6, and self-select Challenge for grades 7-8. “These 4 were given to us as a subcommittee, with the considerations to ranks these for relative value ranks. Then we assigned points to each (out of 100) for each consideration.”
- Question: Were the 5 considerations given by the school board?
- Answer given by chair of subcommittee, who was now sitting in: These first showed up at the school board study session.
- Question: Will we be voting tonight?
- O: Yes, we will vote yes or no on each.
- D2: Growth Mindset was #1 criteria voted on by Academic Subcommittee?
- D1: Expressed desire to vote on the criteria in the same way.
- O: Not enough time to understand the criteria
- D2: The voting was so elegant! Option 1 was #1 for Equity, Growth Mindset “Remarkable”, “This is what we value”, That’s awesome”, “A lot of work”
- D1: Is there a voting strategy? I don’t want to vote “yes” on all – what is my MESSAGE?
- O: You can vote “yes” on all or “no” on all.
- D1: You must have been gratified that option 1 came out so far ahead.
- O: Yes, considering how close the criteria were.
- X: What about Equity of option 2 vs 3?
- O: “Hard to know what #3 would look like.”
- D2: What about option 4– “challenge for all” 6-8 with opt out in 7, 8
- O: Now that I know what it is to be in challenge in 6, I could opt out in grade 7.
- O: Teacher belief that special ed don’t belong here [not sure what the question was.]
- D2: Wondering why option 3 had ANY points for Equity at all – “2 people must have has “extra” points to give, it should be zero.”
- Chair of MSTF: Any last minute questions?
- D1: “So incredibly detailed!”
- H: Anything to say before voting?
- level of support for each option
- will display anonymous results
- 14 voting members, 1 remote vote
- URL on paper with 4 options, yes or no to each
- option 1: Challenge for all heterogeneous classrooms - 13 yes votes, 2 no votes
- option 2: Self select challenge in grades 6-8 - 3 yes votes, 12 no votes
- option 3: self select challenge in grades 7, 8 with Challenge for all heterogeneous in 6th grade - 7 yes votes, 8 no votes
- option 4: Challenge for all heterogeneous classrooms with ability to opt out into a gen ed class - 5 yes votes, 10 no votes
- results forwarded to school board on friday
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