February 9, 2016: Community Brainstorming Session

Members of the community were invited to share their thoughts on the Challenge program and many other aspects of the Middle School Grade Reconfiguration plan at a Community Brainstorming Session  on February 9, 2016 in the Community Room at McMenamins in Bothell.  Thank you to all the community members, parents and students who attended this meeting.

Several Middle School Models were presented on large paper around the room with space for participants to write-in any Considerations, Pros and Cons for each model. Participants were also given the opportunity to vote "Go (green)" on any particular model they thought would work well and "Stop (red)" on any particular model they felt would not work at all. The models presented were a mix of those presented by the Academic Subcommittee at their last meeting and others added by the Save Our Challenge Group. Several other models and ideas created by the community participants were added to the wall during the night. In order to create no bias for models based on a numbering or lettering system, models were given a color designation.

Models presented (in no particular order other than the rainbow):

1. Option Pink - Increase to a 7 period day to allow more time for exploration of subjects and structural supports for struggling learners.
2. Option Red - Self-select Challenge classes available in grades 7 & 8 for all core subjects. 6th Graders in Heterogeneous/Mixed ability classes like they are now.
3. Option Orange - Challenge Classes available in grades 6-8 in all core subjects for students who qualify (no self-select).
4. Option Green - Heterogeneous/Mixed ability classrooms in all core subjects. No separate challenge classes. Challenge curriculum with differentiation used for all classes. No opt-out
5. Option Blue - Self-select challenge classes available in grades 6-8 for all core subjects
6. Option Purple - Create Choice Schools that focus on various areas of interest
7. Option Brown - Multi-Age Ability-Based Classrooms in all Core subjects
8. Option Grey - Separate classes for students who struggle
9. Option Black - Larger class sizes for challenge, smaller class sizes for Gen Ed

For full public comments click here

Save Our Challenge will be compiling best practice data from other middle schools, data from our own district and community feedback from last night's meeting as well as any feedback sent to saveourchallenge@gmail.com or any feedback left in the comments section on this site into a proposal to be presented to the school board. All feedback sent by email or left in comments by 2/19/2016 will be included in the report. 

Please feel free to share this post and the email address saveourchallenge@gmail.com with any other interested or concerned parents, students, teachers and community members. We would love to hear from as many people as possible before finalizing this proposal.