We’d like to welcome Schools Out Washington to the Excellent Schools Now Coalition. Schools Out Washington’s mission is to ensure all young people have safe places to learn and grow when not in school.
Parents and education advocates previewed the upcoming movie Waiting for Superman at The Seattle International Film Festival earlier this month. The documentary, by director Davis Guggenheim, also of An Inconvenient Truth, portrays some of the challenges facing America’s public schools.
A parent, who attended the movie, recently posted her take on the documentary on Seattle Mom Blogs.
At the Seattle International Film Festival this month I got an early look at a screening of the documentary Waiting for Superman by Davis Guggenheim. I think this film will change the way that people in America view the education system. I think it will cause a massive unrest. I hope it will.
It’s a film about the broken education system in America. It’s a film about trying to find hope when many signs point to hope being lost. It’s a film about great educators and loving parents trying to do the best for children and meeting road blocks all along the way. It’s a film about our future and whether we will get up and do something about it. Superman is not coming to fix it but someone needs to.
Washington State submitted its Race to the Top application on June 1, 2010 to compete for $250 million in federal funds to reform and innovate our public schools.
Included in our application are 265 districts across Washington – from the mountains and the deserts to the Sound – who are committed to education reform. These districts represent an impressive 97 percent of the student population across the state.
Finalists will be announced in late July or early August.
To read the application: Click Here
Watch the June 1 press conference at Nisqually Middle School, Lacey, Wash.: Click Here
The Olympian Editorial Board encourages Washington’s educators to get behind the state’s Race to the Top application in order to win up to a $250 million federal grant.
The two education leaders want all 295 school districts in the state to join the state’s application for $250 million in funding for education improvements — competitive grants awarded to states by the federal government. Last week, only nine districts were on board.
That’s wrong. All 295 districts must recognize that education reform is here to stay. They must get on board and unify behind Washington state’s application. It’s the right thing to do for the state and for students.
The following blog post is re-posted from the League of Education Voters blog by Heather Cope.
The Race to the Top (R2T) participation agreement and appeal letter sent to districts is now public. The appeal comes from Washington’s team, lead by Gov. Chris Gregoire, Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn and State Board of Education Chair Jeff Vincent. Together, they are asking all 295 school districts to sign participation agreements by May 17th.
Many parts of the participation agreements are required of any districts signing on (i.e. phase-in of common core standards, implement new four-tier teacher and principal evaluation systems). Other pieces are optional and grouped into “Innovation Clusters.” So-called clusters will focus on one of four areas: Teacher & Leader Development and Effectiveness; Persistently Lowest-Achieving Schools; Improving College and Career Readiness and Closing the Achievement Gap; and Improving Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Performance.
The R2T team is presuming a $250 million award at most, with 50 percent going directly to districts (per the grant requirements). The team promises all districts will receive at least $22/FTE student per year; and small districts will receive at least $50/FTE student per year (or $4,000 total, whichever is less). To give districts an idea of the funding they can expect, the last four pages include estimated per-student funding, total annual funding and four-year funding for each district. Seattle, the state’s largest district, is estimated to receive about $2.4 million per year, or $9.5 million over the four-year grant. Tacoma could expect $1.8 million per year, and $7.3 million over the four years. On the other end, tiny Benge could expect $350 per year, and $1,400 over the four years.
What will be interesting to see is which districts are willing to sign on in hopes of fairly significant funding, and which may pass because they don’t see it as fiscally appealing enough (or opt out for other reasons). Of course even more worth watching will be which districts vy for one of the Innovation Clusters.
Stay tuned.
