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Plans for Failing Schools
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WASL scores were released this past week, and a number of schools did not meet the requirements for showing Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) under the provisions of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), commonly known as No Child Left Behind. Schools that fail to make AYP in the same category in consecutive years are subject to sanctions. These sanctions range from Step 1, in which the school district must offer low-income students the opportunity to transfer to a different school, to Step 5, which requires that the school be re-constituted.
There are two schools in Seattle with the long and consistent record of failure necessary to arrive at Step 5: Aki Kurose Middle School and the African-American Academy. These schools are now supposed to implement their reconstitution plan. Drafting this plan was a requirement when the schools reached Step 4 last year, so they should have their plan all ready to go. It's time to implement.
I have written to the District asking for copies of the restructing plans for these two schools. I haven't received an answer yet. I believe the plans are public documents and should be available.
Each of the schools got a new principal last year. Interestingly enough, these were the only two schools where the principal appointed by the Chief Academic Officer was someone other than the person named as the first choice by the school's hiring committee. The principal at Aki Kurose, Ana Ortega, recently resigned (for undisclosed but unrelated reasons - before the WASL scores were released). Aki will have an interim principal this year and a new permanent principal next year. The restructuring should be more than just a new principal, but it is likely to start there. Although Aki Kurose is one of the schools in the Southeast Initiative, it will be difficult for the school to turn around when it has a different principal for four years in a row.
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