LETTER - submitted under "comments", by Kathryn Reith, 8/29
Einstein and Redmond Elementary Schools are both very good elementary schools that serve diverse families and students well. Unfortunately, the federal No Child Left Behind Act has created a system that is confusing and arbitrary.
If a school does not make Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP), that does not at all mean they are "failing." According to federal law, if a school has 30 students in any one of eight subgroups, and a lower percentage of that subgroup does not meet the standard in either math or reading, then the entire school is labeled as not making AYP. The rest of the school can be succeeding spectacularly and the school is still branded with this label.
This year, 60 percent of schools in the state of Washington did not make AYP, including schools that made the Newsweek list of top high schools in the country. I encourage parents to look much more closely into the data for the total results of a school and to look carefully at their student's results before coming to any conclusions about what AYP means for their school.
There is a more complete Q&A on this subject posted on the school web sites for both Einstein and Redmond Elementary in addition to the link that Bob provided.
Kathryn Reith
Communications Director
Lake Washington School District
kreith@lwsd.org
August 29, 2009 2:36 PM
Quite frankly you are giving the parents at Red El very little credit for understanding the community of this school or AYP/NCLB. My child has been attending Red El and I have been an active parent in this community. I am also very knowledgeable about assessments, AYP and NCLB. I am in complete agreement that AYP is not the full measure of a school. However, you need to look more closely at this school and its problems. Parents have been speaking up about Redmond El and its problems for years. Letters have been written, phone calls made, but the district has virtually ignored these issues. The PTA has rallied and has supported this school for years. Grants have been written by parents, lessons have been taught by parents, children have been supported by parents. But, this school has continued to fail many of our kids. No one at the district level has been able to explain to me why there is a pattern of failure at this school. When you analyze the data, you can see clearly that children's scores decrease as they move up grade levels at this school. If you compare this school to comparable schools in Bellevue (with similar SES, ELL and SpEd populations), the differences are startling. I am shocked that you would use the phrases "succeeding spectacularly" and "very good school" when nearly the entire PTA board has chosen to remove their children. Lake Washington has failed our children - please don't condescend to telling me that I just don't understand AYP...fix this school.
ReplyDeleteJust because a school "can be succeeding spectacularly" does not mean that it is. The failure to meet AYP at Redmond El is a small symptom to major problems that the district should not be trying to sweep under the rug. So many of the involved parents are leaving that we need more support from the district now than ever before.
ReplyDeleteSubmitted by email, 8/31
ReplyDeleteBob, Things are very divisive at Redmond El now. Many of us are leaving, looking for a better place for our kids -- willing to go a long way and through much trial to get away from some of the teachers at that school and the total lack of coordination. (Hopefully the new principal will make good changes, but the teaching staff has a lot of power there). I daresay the majority of the school's involved parents are taking their kids elsewhere. Some are staying behind and I suspect are feeling abandoned. Things will get much worse at this school before things get better.
Redmond El Parent.
I stopped by Horace Mann today (8/31 @ noon) and they had already received 25 transfer students from Redmond El and I'm guessing that there will be more. My son's 4th grade class is already crowded with 27 students! How many more will be added?
ReplyDeleteIt is obvious from parent comments that Redmond El has had problems for a long time that the district should have been aware of. The arrival of inadequate WASL scores that led to this sudden decision to allow the flood of transfer students into Horace Mann makes me wonder about the competence of the district administrators.
What does the district plan to do to help the Horace Mann teachers and students adjust to the sudden influx of new students? Additional teachers? Additional aids? Anything?
-Horace Mann parent
Watching a mom walk her kids to MANN this morning I asked if she knew about the transfers. She nodded yes, saying class size adveraged 18 students last year.
ReplyDeleteOn May 28, 2009, Redmond El PTSA elected 13 people to fill 15 positions (2 positions were left vacant).
ReplyDeleteOn September 1, 2009, after students transferred to public choice schools, only 6 PTSA board members were left standing. The president, secretary, and several vice presidents all left.
May 28 Board of Directors
http://www.redmondelptsa.org/about/docs/2009-10%20PTSA%20Board%20of%20Directors.pdf
September 1 Board of Directors
http://www.redmondelptsa.org/about/leadership.html
This school needs your support and attention!
Since Mann Elementary could not accomodate all the Redmond Elementary students requesting a transfer, the district offered spots in several other schools meeting AYP goals in the area. As a result, as of next week my block will be serviced by five school buses going to Rush, Mann, Franklin, Redmond, and Audubon Elementary (maybe more?). Had the student transfer been planned and executed more wisely, a ton of money could have been saved to improve student learning.
ReplyDeleteA reluctant Redmond El parent whose kid could NOT transfer to Mann, the school of choice.
To my understanding one of the mayor issues has been that non-native speakers have not been able to take part in ESL classes to become totally fluid in English. The process of learning a language is longer than most of us think and placing together native with non-native speakers at an early age does not mean that are at equal grounds. Being parent of a child with a bilingual background makes me understand that the program is more challenging when parents can't help with homework.
ReplyDeleteThe current system is based on excellent reading skills and if a child has not have time to develop them, it will definitively fail in the long term.