Seattle School Board OKs ambitious goals

The Seattle School Board approved a five-year plan Wednesday that sets specific targets for raising test scores, graduation rates and even the number of credits earned by ninth-graders.

By 2012, for example, the district wants 88 percent of third-graders to pass reading on the Washington Assessment of Student Learning, and 95 percent of the 10th-graders to do the same. Some of the most ambitious goals are in math and science, especially a passage rate of 80 percent on the science section of the 10th-grade WASL. In spring 2007, 33 percent passed.

To reach those and other goals, the plan calls for everything from better math and science instruction, to more consistency in what's taught from school to school, more tests to track student progress, and hiring teachers earlier so classes don't start the year with substitutes.

District officials have described the goals as ambitious, but achievable. And some of the most ambitious ones simply match what's required under the federal No Child Left Behind Act, or reflect increasingly tough graduation requirements for high-school students.

Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson at Wednesday's School Board meeting said her plan doesn't cover everything, but that a strategic plan is meant to focus on "deficits."

The plan is the first major initiative from Goodloe-Johnson, who arrived in Seattle last summer from South Carolina. It draws from internal and external reviews of the district, some of which were under way when she arrived. Those reviews identified the district's strengths as well as its warts.

Financial management was one strength, with auditors noting that the district has recovered from its financial crisis of seven years ago.

Math and science performance is on the lists of challenges, as is the lack of consistency in how the district supports struggling students and schools, and new teachers and principals.

How much it might cost to carry out the plan has yet to be fully determined, and Goodloe-Johnson noted there will be tough decisions ahead about what to cut to fund the plan.

The board approved the plan on a 6-0 vote. Board Chairwoman Cheryl Chow was absent, due to the death of her mother, Ruby Chow.

Before the vote, a few people commented on the plan in public testimony but many who spoke protested closure of the district's Office of Equity and Race Relations. Goodloe-Johnson told them the work of that office would be continued in other ways.

Those who commented on the strategic plan urged the district to keep community members involved as the details are fleshed out. Some of the board members talked about the desire to do that, too.

"This will be a community effort as we do the truly hard work of implementation," said Peter Maier.

Michael DeBell, the board's vice president, said he is pleased the plan will attack inconsistencies among schools, which he said arose out of the past practice of allowing individual schools to make many decisions about what to teach.

But he noted that the district will have to carry out the plan without "the cavalry riding over the hill with $100 million."

He also said he's daunted because the plan "only begins the work. But it's work we have to do."

Here's some of what will happen now:

• By this fall, the district will complete a detailed plan to strengthen math and science teaching, and to ensure consistency from school to school.

• Also by this fall, a new test, called the Measures of Academic Progress (MAP), will be piloted, with the idea that it might be phased in districtwide starting in 2009. The district says it wants tests that allow educators to track student growth, and get results sooner than they do with the WASL.

• By December, the district will decide how to set academic and nonacademic goals for each school, and decide what to do if those goals aren't reached. That is part of a bigger goal to infuse more accountability throughout the district. Schools would be judged on improvement and overall achievement.

Linda Shaw: 206-464-2359