Last night, students, parents and education advocates attended the Seattle School Board meeting to show support for the tentative agreement between the district and teachers union.
Sebrena Burr, a mother of a Seattle Public School student and PTSA Co-Chair at South Shore School, gave public testimony in support of the historic agreement. Here are her [...]
Tag Archives: teachers
Parents show support for historic agreement
Tentative agreement reached on contract, called “historic”
From The Seattle Times:
Seattle Public Schools and its teachers union reached a tentative agreement Wednesday on a contract that allows student test scores to be used as a trigger to more closely evaluate teachers when their students score poorly.
Union leaders called it a “historic” agreement, one that recognizes the need for a better system to [...]
Blowing My Ed Policy Mind
I go to a lot of meetings. And I mean A LOT. Sometimes they have different names: meetings, conferences, work groups, seminars, hearings, work sessions, colloquia, assemblies, conventions, workshops, appointment, rendezvous… but whatever they are called, they are pervasive in my work and life.
So I have gotten really good at tuning in and tuning out. [...]
A motivated, caring, innovative, knowledgeable, effective teacher in every classroom
(This blog post is written by Connie Gerlitz, one of LEV’s key activists and longtime education reform leader and activist, in response to the Seattle School Board meeting on Wednesday.)
We cannot confuse our love and respect for good teachers with the fact that their efforts are not universally replicated in our classrooms, and our children [...]
Who’s on First
Last night’s meeting of the Seattle School Board was a raucous affair. Except the part where everyone agreed. Kids first. No, seriously, kids first.
Orange t-shirts and messages on flyers and public testimony all aligned, put kids first in the teacher contract negotiations. There was also pretty unanimous agreement that the most important element [...]
The truth can set you free
Tonight the Seattle School Board will hold an executive session to discuss the current teacher contract negotiations. Afterward, the public will get their chance to weigh in on the contract and other issues at the public meeting.
It’s too bad that it’s not actually “the public” who are weighing in. The arcane rules for [...]
LA Times looks at teacher perfomance
In case you missed it, the Los Angeles Times reported this story over the weekend, diving in to using value-added student test scores as a way to look at teacher performance. The teachers in the article, all identified with their real names, and real student test scores, responded to their respective test scores in a [...]
Seattle, Seattle, Seattle
Remember that Brady Bunch episode where Jan gets all pouty and sniffs, “Marcia, Marcia, Marcia….?” All ancient cultural references aside, Seattle, Seattle, Seattle. You may ask yourself, “What’s all the fuss about Seattle, isn’t LEV statewide?” Yes. Indeed. Statewide.
So why all this Seattle ink? Here are a few reasons.
Seattle is the largest district [...]
Comments on the comments on the teachers’ contract
Well, well, well. We’ve started quite a conversation here with the post about the Seattle teacher negotiations yesterday. There were some really thoughtful responses and a few ticked off folks blowing off steam. Your comments inspired me to continue the conversation and to clarify a couple of things.
Here we go:
“LEV sides with the Seattle [...]
Report on funding pensions (cue head explosion)
Employee pension systems, especially those of state employees (and thus state $$$), are no laughing matter. They are, however, quite complex and make my brain hurt when I spend more than 5 minutes thinking about them. Even so, it’s worth the time (and headache) to understand pension systems and how the states fund them.
Getting to [...]
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