Student achievement to dictate some funds

Seattle city officials will tie some funding for Seattle Public Schools nurses, social workers and other employees to annual student-achievement goals, including the percentage who pass state reading and math tests.

The city holds the purse strings on the seven-year, $116.8 million Families & Education Levy, which voters approved in 2004 and funds not only district programs but community activities for youth. The $4 million that the school district will receive this fiscal year pays for about 65 employees in four programs.

City officials say the targets for the 2005-06 fiscal year fulfill Mayor Greg Nickels' pledge to voters to ensure levy funds demonstrably improve student achievement. The arrangement, reached this week, signifies a new, more aggressive reach from city hall into the public schools.

Holly Miller, director of the city's Office of Education, said the new rules aren't punitive. The city must use some districtwide measure for accountability, Miller said, and standardized tests, such as the Washington Assessment of Student Learning, are already being administered by the district.

"Everybody who was working on reauthorizing the levy this time said we need to be much more accountable," Miller said.

All the levy-funded programs now have to prove they contribute to children's readiness for school, academic achievement and attendance in school. The agreement, which has not been finalized in writing, establishes "milestones," or monthly benchmarks; indicators of progress; and targets. Of the 25 percent of funding tied to performance, 15 percent will be based on programs achieving milestones and 10 percent on student achievement on standardized tests, Miller said.

But some educators are fuming over the city's tying these targets to funding. They say teachers are responsible for student test scores, not social workers. If test scores are the yardstick, funding should be based on improvement in scores and not on one year's result, principals say.

"I don't have a problem with accountability," said Wendy Kimball, president of the Seattle Education Association, the union that represents the workers. "But it has to be reasoned accountability."

Lin Carlson, who negotiated the deal for the school district, said he was confident the district would achieve the city's targets.

Here's how the new rules would evaluate the district's social workers, known as family-support workers, who historically have focused on ensuring that families have food, shelter and clothing:

• Milestones include the total number of parents who attend parent-teacher conferences and the number of parents who received home visits.

• Indicators include the number of students improving their attendance and staying in the same school for more than a year.

• The target for the 2005-06 year is that 160, or 8 percent, of 2,000 students served by family-support workers will pass the Washington Assessment of Student Learning in reading and math or meet the Developmental Reading Assessment for their grade level.

Based on this example, if fewer than 8 percent of students pass the WASL in reading and math, Miller said, a portion of the family-support program's budget would be set aside to try something more effective.

The agreement delays for one year the expectation that the family-support and health-services programs will meet the city's academic-achievement targets. Employees in the other two programs — middle-school support workers and family-involvement coordinators — must meet their goals this school year.

Principals say they're dismayed at the new rules and the impact they could have on children.

"They're just mandating things without an idea of how it impacts the school," said Van Asselt Elementary School Principal Hajara Rahim. "It sounds good on paper and looks good, but it's not realistic and it's not implementable."

Some workers, whose funding was to expire at the end of this month, were relieved that a deal was reached, coming less than two weeks before the opening of school.

"I'm just pleased we can all come back to our jobs," said Adie Simmons, manager of the family-partnership program.

Sanjay Bhatt: 206-464-3103 or sbhatt@seattletimes.com