Big news! Our revised bell times have been approved for next year as we move to John Marshall School in Ravenna! This is allow more time for students to get to the school.
The SPS Board of Directors voted to establish QAE's bell times for 2018-19 as follows: Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, Friday - 8:50am Welcome Bell - 8:55am Classes Begin - 3:25pm Dismissal Wednesday - 8:50am Welcome Bell - 8:55am Classes Begin - 2:10pm Early Dismissal Planning Transportation for 2018-2019: QAE PTSA will work with SPS Transportation Department to begin planning bus routes for 2018-2019. All information updates will be shared here on the PTSA site as we work on this planning process together. If you have any questions, email Janine at jbroy@seattleschools.org or call QAE at 206-252-2480. Principal Roy sent this note out to QAE families today:
----- Dear QAE families: Based on today's Seattle Times article: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/education/seattle-school-bus-drivers-to-strike-wednesday/, there is the possibility of a bus strike which may impact QAE's bus students starting tomorrow. For those families who may need to drop students off before 7:35 am, additional morning supervision will be in place starting at 7 am in QAE's cafeteria and will be in place daily for the duration of this strike. Students who need to be dropped off before 7:35 am should go to the cafeteria, and then they will be supervised on the playground as usual starting at 7:35 am. Please email me if you have questions, as I want to do everything possible to support our impacted QAE families. Janine Roy, QAE Principal jbroy@seattleschools.org Thanks to the more than 280 families responded to the survey about next year's bell times. During our school’s remodel in 2018-19, we will use the John Marshall Elementary School as our interim site for one year. It is located at 520 NE Ravenna Blvd. in the Green Lake area. This will require additional travel time for students. SPS is working on the transportation plan, but we do know that any student currently in the QAE bus zone will have transportation provided. We wanted to provide guidance to SPS on the preferences of our QAE families. Here's the results:
These results are only intended to share with the school district. Final decision will be made based on many factors. See our Building Renovation page for more details about move. The Seattle School Board is working on the next revisions to the Student Assignment Plan. Details on the current proposal for 2018-2019 can be found here:
http://www.seattleschools.org/cms/One.aspx?portalId=627&pageId=744707 There will be a series of community meetings to discuss the changes. How students are assigned to option schools, how advanced learning is managed are some of the topics. **Community Meetings** The district will host open house style meetings to share proposed updates and gather community feedback. All meetings are from 6:30 to 8 p.m. Monday, Oct. 23, 2017: Eckstein Middle School lunchroom (3003 NE 75th St) Thursday, Oct. 26, 2017: Ballard High School common (1418 NW 65th St) Monday, Oct. 30, 2017: McClure Middle School gym (1915 1st Ave W) Wednesday, Nov. 8, 2017: Cleveland High School lunchroom (5511 15th Ave S) Thursday, Nov. 9, 2017: West Seattle High School lunchroom (3000 California Ave SW) Seattle Uptown Alliance is hosting a forum for candidates for three open seats on this Fall's Seattle School Board election. Following opening comments by the 6 candidates for the three positions, the public will be invited to ask questions. It's a great chance to get to know the candidates and make your voice heard about what's important to your family and our school community.
When: Tuesday, Oct. 10th, 7-9pm Where: St Paul’s Episcopal Church, 15 Roy Street (across from Counterbalance Park) Forum takes place in the church's lower level. Enter through the gate on Roy Street. For more information, see the Uptown Alliance's Facebook page Note -- the QAE PTSA isn't affiliated with the event, we just are sharing an event that may be of interest to our community. The QAE PTSA and other parents from our school attended the June 19th community meeting on the Magnolia School Boundaries. There was a large crowd including parents from all the schools in Queen Anne and Magnolia. Here are our notes from the meeting:
Boundaries Survey - Great Response from the QAE Community! SPS sent out a survey at the end of May to all families who attend schools in the Queen Anne and Magnolia areas. Queen Anne Elementary had 287 responses, the second most amongst all the schools. Thanks to our community for being so involved! QAE's overwhelming choice amongst the 13 options was Scenario C with 71% of our families selecting it as one of their top three options. Top Boundary Options from the Survey Ashley Davies, Director of Enrollment Planning at SPS, presented the scenarios that received the most votes in the boundaries survey. She said that nothing was final, but the original 13 options were likely narrowed down to these 5 or 6 options. She did mentioned that any of them could be tweaked as needed.
Impacted Students by Scenario After the meeting, SPS published details on the number of students affected by each scenario (A-M). It ranges from a low of 306 (for J) to 816 (for M). Magnolia School Construction Costs & Potential Delay SPS received bids on the Magnolia School construction that were approximately $5 million over budgets. The district will likely re-look at the project and see where they can cut costs and get new bids in the fall. This likely means that the opening of Magnolia may be delayed from the beginning of the 2018-19 school year to the 2019-20 school year. This change to timeline might take away some of the sense of urgency in drawing new boundaries. There was a concern from the audience that if new boundaries are drawn this Fall, they might have to change again prior to the school opening. Fort Lawton Development Discussion Some members of the audience brought up the planned development of new housing on Fort Lawton by the City of Seattle. This will add more children to the Queen Anne/Magnolia area. Audience members were advocating that the school district and the city consider using some portion of the Fort Lawton area for a new STEAM (science and environment, technology, engineering, arts, math) school. The QAE PTSA will continue to do our best to advocate for our community and share the latest developments. See our Boundaries Info page for the latest as well as SPS's page about the meeting. UPDATED: SPS originally had next year's start time listed as 8am for the second bell. That has been changed to 7:55am (same as this year). See below for the updated 2017-18 schedule!
------- You may have heard, but the Seattle City Council approved a one-time grant to the school district to make the conversion from three bell times to two. That's just part of the changes coming for next year with the longer school day and consistent early dismissal on Wednesdays. This means that starting in 2017-18, QAE will have the following schedule:
See details from the email sent out by SPS below! ---------------- Final School Bell Schedules: Starting next year, there will be two tiers of bell schedules, and the school day will be 20 minutes longer. This change will result in more than two additional days of instruction for students. Changing to a two-tier bell schedule will eliminate the latest or third tier of school start and end times, which has been a hardship on many of our families. The City Council voted June 14 to approve one-time funds to move us to this new schedule. Thank you to Mayor Murray and numerous family advocates for bringing attention to this issue and to the City Council for finding a thoughtful funding solution. I also want to thank and recognize the many families who shared their perspectives and concerns with us. In response, we were able to make small modifications to the final two-tier bell schedules. These changes address possible loss of high school instructional time, maintain the current school start time for many elementary and K-8 schools (while also adding 20 minutes to the school day), and eliminate the third tier, ensuring that all students begin school by 9 a.m. The final schedule reflects the varied needs and perspectives of our families, students, staff and partners. 2017-18 School Calendar: The full 2017-18 School Year Calendar is now available including school breaks, holidays and early release days. The Seattle Education Association and the district negotiate the school calendar. To learn more about the calendar development process, please visit our School Year Schedule Update Announcement. Early Release Days: Currently, the district has a variety of early release days during the school year to support staff professional development. Next year, students and families will have a consistent weekly schedule. Students will be released 75 minutes early every Wednesday (except for the first day of school). This schedule change supports teacher collaboration and instructional planning. Dedicated time for teachers to collaborate and plan together is one of the most important strategies we use to ensure high quality instruction in every classroom. Thank you for your understanding as we make this important system shift. We recognize childcare is a challenge for many families and the need may increase because of the weekly early release day. Childcare options and resources can be found here. We will continue to update the childcare webpage throughout the summer in partnership with our many school-based providers. In closing, I believe these system changes will benefit our students and support our mission of ensuring every student is college, career and life ready. Thank you again for your patience as district staff, the School Board, our labor partners, the City and many others worked together to find the best possible schedule solutions for our families and students. Sharing information with our families in case you want to share your opinion:
On Wednesday the Seattle School Board voted in favor of the shift to two start times, but it's contingent on the City Council voting to provide the necessary transportation funding. This vote is on Monday. There has been some contention about this vote in Council meetings. If you believe we should switch to two bell times from the current three times, you should write to your Council members by tomorrow. See their emails below. The Council is voting whether to pay for a one-time funding request of $2.3 million so that SPS can reorganize buses to support the simplification of bell times. Current three tier system: Most elementary schools will run from 7:45 to 2:15; Middle and high schools from 8:35 to 3:25; K-8s and some elementary schools from 9:25 to 3:55. Proposed two tier system: Almost all elementary school will run from 8 to 2:30; Middle, high schools and most K-8 schools will run from 9 to 3:50. Email addresses of Seattle City Council members: bruce.harrell@seattle.gov, lisa.herbold@seattle.gov, rob.johnson@seattle.gov, debora.juarez@seattle.gov, mike.obrien@seattle.gov, sally.bagshaw@seattle.gov, tim.burgess@seattle.gov, lorena.gonzalez@seattle.gov, spsdirectors@seattleschools.org Below is a copy of the email being sent by the PTSA to our families on May 31st, 2017. See our Boundaries Info page for more details.
------------------ Dear QAE families, As you know, Seattle Public Schools sent out a survey last week to all families in the Queen Anne/Magnolia area regarding scenarios for boundary changes that will happen as part of the opening of Magnolia Elementary in 2018-19. This survey included 5 new scenarios that had not previously been shared with shared with the community. After studying the different scenarios, the QAE PTSA recommends the following:
The survey also asks about the three most important considerations about school boundary changes for your family. We encourage you to pick what's most meaningful to your family, but here are four that we believe are important and are in sync with our support of Scenarios A-F:
You can read more about the issues on our Boundaries Discussion site, which we will continue to update. We have also asked SPS to provide details on the the number of students impacted by each scenario and whether grandfathering would be part of the scenarios. We will post responses when we get them. If you didn't receive the email from SPS, here's the direct link to the survey. The QAE PTSA recognizes the complexity of changing school boundaries and fixing capacity issues. Fixing overcrowding requires hard choices, and will necessarily disrupt some families in our neighborhood. We will continue to do our best to work with SPS and the larger QA/Magnolia community on a solution. If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to contact us at boundaries@qaeptsa.org or via the PTSA Facebook page. In service, Queen Anne Elementary PTSA boundaries@qaeptsa.org Dear QAE families,
Seattle Public Schools sent out an email survey to all families in the Queen Anne/Magnolia area regarding various scenarios for boundary changes that will happen as part of the opening of Magnolia Elementary in 2018-19. The QAE PTSA believes that our status as an Option School is central to our learning culture and benefits all families by giving them an alternative to their attendance area school which also relieves overcrowding. We had planned to share the scenarios that best support our school’s mission and are least impactful all kids in the area. The survey includes 5 new boundary scenarios that had not been previously shared with the community, so our group of parents focused on this issue need some time to dig into their impact. We need some time to do this research. So as a PTSA, we suggest:
If you’ll already responded to the survey, no problem, thanks for taking the time to advocate for our community! Have a wonderful, safe holiday weekend. More from the PTSA soon! In service, Queen Anne Elementary PTSA boundaries@qaeptsa.org If you haven't yet, please complete Seattle Public School's Family Survey that is sent to the families of all district students. It's an important tool for the district to track progress and understand what needs to improve and what's working well at all our schools.
Each parent should have received an email with a unique link to take the survey. They ask that only one parent per household fills in the survey. If you have questions or didn't receive the email, see the Family Survey site. SPS Explanation of the Family Survey The Family Survey is administered each spring to families of K-12 students. The survey provides an important opportunity to reflect on your child's school and the district as a whole. All Family Survey responses are confidential. Surveys are also administered each year to all school staff and students in grades 3 through 12. Results from these surveys are used to guide improvements at the school and district level. Below are notes from the May 1st meeting at McClure regarding the proposed boundary changes to schools in the Queen Anne/Magnolia area. For more context and other details, see our Boundaries & Option School information page.
Timeline/ Next Steps:
What can YOU do!
Meeting Recap The meeting had three sections: Opening Remarks, Break Out Sessions, and Comment Period. Opening Remarks: Ashley Davies – Enrollment Planning for SPS
Break out session: Posters of the currently proposed 8 boundary scenarios (A-F) in the attachment were on the walls around the room. Attendees were encouraged to view each scenario and write comments on a comment sheet about what they saw as the pros and cons for each scenario. A bit more info on Scenarios G and H:
Open Comments from Attendees:
Principal Roy passed on the message below about an important meeting regarding QAE's option status and boundaries. Not familiar with the issues? See the PTSA's info page on Boundaries and Option Status for more details. The two actions you can take as an advocate for our school:
Invitation to Community Meeting on May 1st, 2017
Please join Seattle Public Schools at a community meeting on May 1 about the opening of Magnolia School. The district’s Enrollment Planning team will share an overview of responses received about possible boundaries for Magnolia School, share data related to various scenarios requested by the community and the School Board, and learn more from community feedback. No decisions have been made on Magnolia boundaries, or on boundary or program changes for other schools. The goal of this meeting is to share information and hear additional community feedback. Date: Monday, May 1, 2016 Time: 6:30 to 8 p.m. Location: McClure Middle School Gym, 1915 1st Avenue West Background: Magnolia School is undergoing renovations and will open in fall 2018. The district is currently exploring scenarios for setting boundaries for the new school to help relieve current and future crowding at Catharine Blaine K-8, Coe Elementary, and Lawton Elementary. A community meeting held in March was primarily attended by families from those three schools. Based on community feedback and requests from the School Board to include all Queen Anne elementary schools in the discussions, additional meetings were held with the Queen Anne Elementary and the Hay Elementary communities. For a summary of what we heard at these meetings and more information on the Magnolia boundaries, please visit http://seattleschools.org/cms/one.aspx?portalId=627&pageId=20911803. (For information on the renovation project, please visit http://bta.seattleschools.org. You may also share your input by emailing: growthboundaries@seattleschools.org. Seattle Public Schools is offering a FREE SUMMER PROGRAM for any student grades K-4 who are below grade level in literacy and/or math. It runs from June 28th through July 28th and includes transportation as well as meals. See the Summer Staircase site for more details. A .pdf version of the application is available below which also has more information.
This message was sent from the QAE PTSA to our community on Friday, March 24th. We hope to see you at the meeting on March 29th! See the Boundaries and Option Status FAQ page for more details...
Dear Queen Anne Elementary families, If you believe that Queen Anne Elementary should continue to be an Option School located at its current site on Boston Street, please attend a meeting at QAE on Wed. March 29th, at 6:30 p.m. in the cafeteria. Wait, what??? In the 2018-2019 school year, Seattle Public Schools will reopen Magnolia Elementary School. Seattle Public Schools (SPS) has worked with the city to plan and coordinate Magnolia as an attendance area school. SPS is having community meetings to engage families as it redraws the boundaries of Blaine, Lawton, and Coe to balance enrollment and alleviate capacity issues at each existing school. At the first community meeting, on March 13th, SPS presented six scenarios of different boundary lines. Four of those scenarios would mean that some students who live on the west side of Queen Anne hill and are currently zoned for Coe would be part of the new Magnolia School zone. At that meeting and also in emails directly to SPS, a group of parents (not from QAE) who want to prevent changes to the current Coe boundaries have suggested that QAE be changed from an Option program to a neighborhood school. Other parents have suggested that the QAE Option program be moved to the Magnolia School when it opens in Sept. 2018 so the QAE campus can be used as a neighborhood school. If QAE was changed from an Option School to a neighborhood school the innovative programs that QAE offers might be at risk. Option School status provides "programs of choice" and for QAE that includes our 5 Pillars and technology focus. No decisions have been made, but our community coming together on March 29th, being present and participating in this important conversation will relate a strong and clear message to SPS that we’re invested in decisions that affect our school and families. The not-so-distant future of QAE is dependent on our parent voices now. Principal Janine Roy, Central Region Executive Director of Schools Sarah Pritchett, SPS Director of Enrollment Planning and the QAE PTSA Board will all be in attendance. SPS Director Sue Peters has been invited to the meeting. We hope to see you at the important meeting at 6:30 p.m. on Wednesday, March 29th at the QAE Cafeteria. The PTSA has created a FAQ page with more details about how we got here, our concerns, details about our Option program. |
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SCHEDULE2023-24 On-Site Schedule
7:55am - School Day Begins 2:25pm - Dismissal Wednesday Early Release 1:10pm - Dismissal |