(Photos by Chi Krneta unless otherwise credited)
By Torin Record-Sand
Reporting for West Seattle Blog
Tuesday night brought new Seattle Public Schools superintendent, Ben Shuldiner, to West Seattle for the second to last meeting of his community engagement tour, a major opportunity to hear the voices of local SPS parents. The meeting was held at West Seattle elementary in High Point.
As a recent arrival in the district, Shuldiner is looking to get a better grasp of the district’s needs. In his own words, “Building trust is central to the work ahead, and I believe the best ideas come from listening to you and learning from your experiences in our schools.” The meeting series is meant to bridge that gap; especially key in times when budget-balancing has become a defining issue for the district.
(Photo by Torin Record-Sand)
Around 140 attendees were at the meeting, representing students and families from all schools across West Seattle, as well as members of West Seattle Elementary and general SPS staff. Superintendent Shuldiner was also accompanied by Bev Redmond, SPS chief of staff and public affairs, and school board president Gina Topp, the director of SPS District 6, which includes West Seattle, most of South Park, and Georgetown.
After a brief introduction by Redmond and Topp, Shuldiner quickly introduced the agenda for the evening. Much of the time was spent on small-group discussions at tables of approximately eight people each, with three simple questions: 1. What is going well? [for the district], 2. What is not going well?, and 3. What can SPS do to make things better? The audience was given 30 minutes to discuss, with around 10 minutes for each question, and then they were asked to choose a leader from their table to report back their consensus on each question to the whole of the audience.
On the side of the good, many in the audience highlighted the strength of teaching at schools throughout the district. “We have excellent teaching, and when the teaching is fantastic – it’s really fantastic.” said one of the communiry discussion leaders. Others pointed to the district having strengths in diversity and culture, especially in terms of access to dual language instruction programs. Many also said they were happy with the quality of after-school programs.
The negative side of things was more varied. The most consistent theme was the possibility of further funding cuts for the district, and how they could impact schools, as well as how they’ve impacted schools in the past. Some said they felt the district had so far preferred to cut school staff rather than administrators, while others were worried about whether extracurricular funding would remain the same. A large portion of parents were also concerned about technology use in classrooms, saying that policies against phone or tablet use in schools had not gone far enough. Finally, there were concerns related towards racial justice: one woman in the audience, who self-identified as Latina, said that there was not a good path for the Latino community to be represented in district meetings with the ever-present threat of immigration authorities. Another individual pointed at Shuldiner’s comments in an email to parents from a few days ago as insensitive; in particular, his use of the phrase “the soft bigotry of low expectations” referring to systemic issues BIPOC students encounter in the schools.
Suggestions from the community also featured a large amount of agreement. Many said they were happy with the interest the superintendent was showing in community outreach; and were hoping for even more opportunities for communication with the district. The technology issue was raised again, with many highlighting that they were hoping the district would make a stronger policy on both phones and tablets in schools, as well as the usage of AI. And, as also mentioned above, many hoped that if there were future cuts due to the budget deficit, these would be aimed more at administrators or district positions than staff members directly in the schools.
The superintendent’s tour concluded with an online sessioh tonight. Officials from the school district also said that, for anyone who was present at the West Seattle meeting, if they submitted comments via the digital form available to attendees, district staff will be working on taking in the feedback and making sure that every voice is heard.