Last month a very important step towards equality was taken by the Washington State School Directors Association or WSSDA. A by-law which had been in place since 1986, called the “weighted vote”, was eliminated. The results will be an equal voice for all school districts at WSSDA. WSSDA is the association that creates model policies for all Washington school districts. It sets legislative priorities and lobbies legislators for changes to laws. It also provides training and insurance for all school board directors in the state. The membership consists of one representative from each school district, and these members vote on the WSSDA board and committee members. Every September WSSDA … [Read more...]
K-12 Education alternatives in times of crisis (updated March 25th)
As we write this article the Governor of Washington State has canceled all K-12 classes/schools effective immediately through April 24th (which means Monday April 27th would be the first day back at school). That's 6 weeks or ~30 school days. Whether one agrees with the decision or not it's a done and we need to deal with the consequences. To that end we will keep this article front-and-center for the duration in a hope that the information shared will be useful. It's clear that neither OSPI's Superintendent of Schools Chris Reykdal nor the Governor nor School Board nor School Districts have any contingency plans for continuing education during times of crisis. Lots of planning and … [Read more...]
State Superintendent Chris Reykdal’s Education Plan
Recently our new Superintendent of Public Instruction, Chris Reykdal, issued a press release (http://www.k12.wa.us/Communications/PressReleases2017/Long-TermVision.aspx) in which he outlined his “vision” of the future of education in Washington State. We took the opportunity to email Mr. Reykdal to make some comments and ask a few questions. We got shuttled around between a few of his people but, in the end, we managed to get a few responses from Nate Olson, OSPI Director of Communications. We presume the responses represent Mr. Reykdal’s views and position(s). Below you will see the email we sent (our comments/questions in RED and their comments/responses in BLUE if we got … [Read more...]
Washington State Schools Push ‘Gender Fluid,’ Transgender Ideas on K-12 Kids
From a story at Breitbart - author is Dr. Susan Berry Children in kindergarten need to “understand there are many ways to express gender,” says a “core idea” in the newly released Washington State health and physical education standards. The standards name “self-identity” as a topic of the “core idea” of the K-12 curriculum, and define gender as a “social construct based on emotional, behavioral, and cultural characteristics attached to a person’s assigned biological sex.” That “gender identity” claim is a sharp departure from conventional education and civic norms, which assume that young people with male biology will and should see themselves as boys, and that young people with … [Read more...]
Randy Dorn Suing Washington School Districts – What Do OSPI Candidates Think?
On Tuesday, July 19th 2016 Randy Dorn, the outgoing Washington State Superintendent of Schools, filed a lawsuit against seven (7) school districts. In the lawsuit he claims "it is illegal to use voter-approved levy money to supplement teacher's salaries". He is angry that the State Legislature hasn't resolved (to his satisfaction) the school funding the State Supreme Court says needs to be supplied by the State. Mr. Dorn is NOT running for reelection this year. There are a number of candidates for the position. We reached out to them and asked for their thoughts on whether the lawsuit should have been done and whether they would have done the same. Following are the responses from the … [Read more...]
Washington State Superintendent of Schools – Suing School Districts?
Outgoing (he's not running for reelection this year) Superintendent of Schools Randy Dorn has announced he is going to sue several school districts to focus attention on the McCleary decision. In case you don't remember or haven't seen the McCleary decision it says, in simplistic terms, that the responsibility of funding education belongs to the State and not local school districts. Back to Randy. What is he going to sue some districts for? He says that the school districts are using levy money to pay teachers salaries and that they legally can't do that. It's interesting that (1) he chooses to do this in his final months of office, and, (2) that he thinks suing the school districts he's … [Read more...]
Do schools in Massachusetts perform better than Washington schools because they spend more money?
From The Washington Policy Center .... The Seattle Times recently published an informative article suggesting that students in Massachusetts learn better than students in Washington state because Massachusetts spends more money on its public schools. The Times is correct that students in Massachusetts achieve significantly higher scores on national tests, graduate at higher rates and attend college at higher rates than Washington students. Yet the reporting misses important policy reasons about why this is so. Massachusetts schools perform better because of the way they spend public money, not just because they spend more of it. Here is why: - Massachusetts provides parents with … [Read more...]
Meet the Human Rights Commissioners Who Gave Us Open Bathrooms
As of Friday, February 5th the House Judiciary Committee Chair - Ms. Jinkins (Jinkins.Laurie@leg.wa.gov or Phone: (360) 786 - 7930) - REFUSED to allow the House Bill 2589 to be heard. This means that the Senate Bill is worthless because the House refuses to allow a hearing. So, no action will be taken this session and the public is left hanging. So, we thought you would like to meet and learn a little more about the members of the WA State Human Rights Commission (HRC). Perhaps email each of the with your thoughts? Remember - your sons and daughters may have the opposite sex in their shower, locker room or bathroom The following information was originally posted on Family Policy … [Read more...]
How State Departments of Education Have Deliberately Deceived Parents about Common Core: Does the End Justify the Means?
Posted in Education Views - Dec 24, 2015 and a derivative article talking about Massachusetts at Newbostonpost on Jan 8, 2016 > > > One article discusses Virginia and the other Massachusetts. In the State of Washington there appears to be a similar effort underway. The Battle Ground Superintendent recently referred to the Common Core Standards as "Washington State Learning Standards" - BEWARE of sleight of hand and misdirection. > > > Sandra Stotsky – In December 2015, the West Virginia board of education adopted supposedly new standards for the state in a vote publicized as a rejection of Common Core’s standards. … [Read more...]
Stotsky: Local School Districts Should Eliminate Common Core, Adopt Stronger Standards
May 30, 2014 | Shane Vander Hart Dr. Sandra Stotsky wrote an article at Breitbart that was blocked at Facebook for some strange reason. I wanted to highlight it here. She contends that local school boards need to take matters into their own hands and not depend on their states doing the right thing. Below are the steps she believes boards should take: Here are possible steps for local school boards to take, depending on what the legislature has passed: 1. Local school boards vote to eliminate Common Core’s standards in their school district. This is as far as Oklahoma needs to go. In other states, parents and others may need to petition their local school boards to do this. 2. … [Read more...]