I’m interested in learning more about the petition. Can somebody provide me with more info? Thanks!

ps. you can email me: radioruedig at gmail.com

The inability of Magnolia parents to organize and let their will be heard by the school board has enabled this situation to persist for far too long. It is time that Magnolia parents let the school board know that they have failed to provide our neighborhood with viable High School options. Let’s fix this problem now. Don’t wait until your kids are High School age and try to fix it then. It will be far too late.

and if you will read the legalese, you will notice that the board has included economic diversity to be a tie breaker. sounds like another court battle brewing!

What do Magnolia parents want? We are pretty unorganized. Ballard is fighting tooth and nail to be sure that their kids can go to Ballard. I get their concern…it is a neighborhood high school.

Right now our kids get put wherever they fit. The “Choice” system in place gives our kids a huge disadvantage, because what determines which kids get into which schools is distance. Our kids are more distant from Ballard, Ingraham, and any other north end school than kids in all the other neighborhoods. (Except Queen Anne, which has the same problem.) So our kids are at the very end of the line, and many don’t get into any school of their choice.

The new assignment plan will guarantee our kids a spot in a specific high school. Ballard parents are fighting hard to have our kids’ school be Ingraham, so theirs can go to Ballard. I get that, but that means a long bus ride for our kids, just because they are from Magnolia.

Anyway, people need to think about this and get on the record with the school board.

wow, when did magnolia become bellevue?

-whining about low-income housing “ruining” their property values/neighborhood

-whining about less than stellar access to proposed viaduct changes

-whining about adding bike lanes and creating safer streets

-whining about not getting to attend the high school of choice

oh the horror!

Mike, you don’t understand. Try to follow along here. No one is “whining about not getting to attend the high school of their choice.”

Under the old “choice” plan, our kids didn’t get to attend not just the high school of their choice, but any of their choices. All the kids in town except those in the QA/Mag cluster got a choice, but being farther from every school negated our “choices”. And although this has been going on for, I don’t know, 10+ years, it has not been fixed because, as has been reported by school board members in various community meetings, this community doesn’t make much “noise”. We are notoriously un-squeaky wheels, in this case.

The new assignment plan will benefit our kids because it will assign our kids to a school based on their address. We can still try to get into another school and maybe get in, but we have a guaranteed spot in “our” school. It’s not a choice we make, but a choice that is made for us. This loss of “choice” (a non-choice for our neighborhood) is actually a very good thing, so you see, no one is whining about not having a choice. There are many benefits of a predictable path for students and for communities, even though it reduces “choice”.

The only discussion here is whether or not Magnolia parents want to weigh in on whether or not we want our kids bussed past Ballard High all the way up to Ingraham. Ballard parents are fighting for their kids to go to Ballard, the school closest to them. Do we also want to fight for our kids to go to the closest school (also happens to be Ballard)? Or are people willing to go to Ingraham?

I don’t know the answer. Ingraham has an international baccalaureate program…don’t know how good it is.

It’d be interesting to see a discussion about this issue, but this blog does not generate the same level of activity the Ballard blog does.

So Mike, if you have an opinion on the issue, I’d really like to hear it. If all you want to do is throw rocks at parents for wanting to make sure that our kids are treated the same as any kid in any neighborhood in the city, please help yourself to a big steaming cup of STFU.

Kid’s should simply be assigned to the school that is closest to them. For Magnolia that would be Ballard.

The school district made the decision to close QA and Lincoln high schools. Maybe they should build a high school for QA and Magnolia students.

Roosevelt seems to be the next closest high school after Ballard.

I think it’s interesting that everything Mike listed directly affects the quality of life of Magnolia residents, so why shouldn’t we express our dissatisfaction when decisions on those issues adversely affect us? We’re taxpayers too.

Those of us who live in Ballard chose to live there ,in part, because of the schools. Why bus both Ballrd kids AND Magnolia and QA kids to high schools? Bus once–Magnolia and QA kids. Let the Ballard kids walk to their high school if they want. Keep the feeling of community for the Ballard families.

FB,
We need to get organized. Tell us what to do, who to contact, give us addresses, phone numbers, create a website, form a blog. Lets stop “whining” and take some action. Anyone ready/able/willing to lead this?

This should not stop someone from volunteering to organize this, but in the meantime, here is some relevant information:

You can send comments to the school board at
newassign@seattleschools.org

or write the Seattle School Board at
2445 3rd Ave South
PO Box 34165, MS 11-01
Seattle, WA 98124-1165

There is also a community meeting on Saturday May 9th from 10:00 to noon at the John Stanford Center
2445 3rd Ave South
Seattle, WA

I just needed to point out that the walk-to-school argument that kiki makes is a red herring. The percentage of kids who actually walk to their High School is minimal. Furthermore, those who live within walking distance will still be able to attend their neighborhood school. The school board needs to draw lines somewhere so that there is some predictability to where your children will attend High School. This is the only way to get communities to support their schools. Why support a school only to see your kids prevented from going there?

I understand the perspective of Magnolia (and Queen Anne) parents — because they don’t have their own high schools, they need a better option than long-distance busing and random school assignments for their kids. But should Ballard families have to pick up the slack, or pay the price for the school district’s mistake in selling Queen Anne HS? It doesn’t seem quite fair that Ballard kids who can see Ballard HS from their homes should be bused to a far-away school just to solve another neighborhood’s problem. It seems that the school district needs to step up and open a high school in the Magnolia/QA area!

Dear All:

Yes, this assignment issue has been going on for decades, ever since they closed Queen Anne High School. We have made a lot of noise! We, Parents Involved in Community Schools (a non-profit organization of parents and concerned citizens), sued the SDD in June of 2000 to stop using the racial tiebreaker. It went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court where we won. Since the District can no longer use the the racial tiebreaker, they will now use the socio-economic tiebreaker. This is still a form of discrimination. The fairest tiebreaker is a lottery. Please ask the school board to use this tiebreaker instead. Also, ask the school board to
move kids already in the public schools ahead of kids coming out of private schools. It should be a first come, first serve basis in the assignments when a school is over-subscribed.
That would be the fair thing to do. Yes, we all pay taxes. However, until a new comprehensive high school is built in the Queen Anne/Magnolia area, the problem will not go away. As you know, there has been a high birth rate lately. The high school seating capacity is only going to get worse. The only solution is a new high school. I don’t think another lawsuit is the answer. It is very expensive and time consuming. Organize now and demand change.
Change the board, through elections, and threaten to fail the next school levy (it kills me to write that) or find the money ($75 million at least) yourselves to build a new high school. Being nice and patient will get you nowhere with this District.

Our public schools are vital and worth fighting for. Every child, regardless of their race or SES deserves access to a great neighborhood school. Good luck to you all!

Kathleen Brose
President
Parents Involved in Community Schools

So the district is over 20 million in the hole and you want them to build a highschool…although I’d love it, it’s not going to happen.

10 years of discrimination against Queen Anne and Magnolia students…seems that’s the lawsuit waiting to happen.

Why hasn’t anyone suggested Ft. Lawton. as a H.S. campus?

They run a capital levy every 6 years. One is geared toward major capital repairs of existing facilities. The other is for new schools. So a new school type of levy comes along every 12 years. We had one a couple of years ago. So it will not be until 2012, I think (don’t quote me here, going from memory) before we can even vote on a new school. Assuming the levy seeks funds for an area high school, and assuming it passes, construction would start a couple of years after that, and be complete after that.

So while it is definitely worth fighting for a new high school, even in an old building (bringing the school on 28th up to code would cost enough to require it be in that big 2012 levy) is a long-term solution. If your kid is in Kindergarten this year, they might get to go to that school, if the stars align.

So we need a solution for the interim. And the new assignment plan is it.

Weigh in on that for now, and on a new school for the long term.

We need a new high school in Magnolia/Queen Anne. Until it’s fully funded and built, our kids should go to the Ballard High School if they choose, given that it’s the closest school to them.

All this whining from Ballard about “kids who can see Ballard HS” or those able to walk to school not being able to go there is a crock. The line’s pretty far north. For those kids, Ingraham is just as close.

I know a lot of Ballard families who chose to live in Ballard because there IS a high school. Ballard families should not penalized for the lack of a high school in the Queen Ann and Magnolia neighborhoods. Like I said before: bus once–the Queen Ann and Magnolia kids.

Magnolia parents have been engaged on this topic for years; we’re a big reason the assignment re-do is underway. If you care about this, check out the Yahoo group Neighborhood Schools Task Force, formed several years ago by Magnolia and Queen Anne parents around this very issue. Also, check in with your PTAs at Lawton, Coe and Blaine. They’ve been involved in this issue as well. ALL kids deserve to have a guaranteed school assignment; no child should be thrown haphazardly where there is leftover space. … And given the very harsh budget realities Seattle schools face, a new high school isn’t on the immediate agenda. We need to make best use of current sites and we need an assignment plan that works for ALL KIDS. (Magnolia isn’t the only neighborhood without a high school in it.)

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