On Could 8, the Seattle Faculty Board voted unanimously, with no debate or deliberation, to approve a plan that requires closing 20 elementary colleges within the 2025-26 faculty yr. This flawed plan, constructed on defective assumptions, was rushed by way of with out consulting households. Dad and mom ought to demand the Seattle faculty board abandon this plan and work collaboratively with the general public to seek out options that tackle Seattle Public Colleges’ price range deficit.
SPS’ “plan for a system of well-resourced colleges” is constructed on three deceptive or outright false claims: that it’s going to cut back our price range deficit; that it’s going to assist children and shut fairness gaps; and that it’s the results of a consultative course of with Seattle mother and father. None of those claims are true.
First, this plan won’t get monetary savings and received’t assist us shut our price range deficit. At no level has SPS introduced severe monetary evaluation displaying “how” closing colleges will decrease working bills. In reality, Superintendent Brent Jones himself instructed that the financial savings can be minimal and take two to 5 years to materialize. In actuality, most of SPS’ working prices are individuals, like lecturers. Merely transferring these individuals from one constructing to a different doesn’t cut back prices. In reality, closing colleges creates new transition and upkeep prices. The one manner this plan can materially cut back SPS working prices is that if it’s a covert solution to lay off lecturers and reopen collective bargaining agreements. If that’s SPS’ actual intent, they need to come out and say so.
In 2013 Chicago closed 50 small public colleges within the hopes of lowering price range deficits and shrinking prices. It was a failure. Enrollment continued to fall, and shuttering colleges created new prices with out decreasing others. Because of this, Chicago’s colleges deficit grew by nearly 25%.
Second, closing colleges will damage children, not assist them. This plan will disrupt the schooling of 1000’s of children, a lot of whom lived by way of the chaos of the pandemic and distant studying. Despite the fact that consolidations aren’t slated to happen till the 2025-26 faculty yr, households will stay in limbo for months, unsure of their baby’s faculty placement. SPS claims that larger colleges can be “well-resourced” and staffed with extra artwork lecturers and nurses. However after all that is in direct battle with decreasing prices. In actuality, the ratio of scholars to assist employees and lecturers would be the similar on the finish of this plan, however we’ll have misplaced distinctive neighborhood colleges and lived by way of years of disruption.
Right here, Chicago’s expertise can also be instructive. Evaluation by the College of Chicago, the Chicago Occasions and WBEZ discovered that children from closed colleges had worse academic outcomes. As one pupil wryly famous, “All of us have the identical quantity of scholars [and teachers] educating the identical stuff.”
Lastly, SPS will declare that this plan is the results of group engagement. It was not. Final summer time the district held a collection of group conferences on “well-resourced colleges.” At every assembly, Superintendent Brent Jones opened by downplaying the danger of college closures, after which employees led a collection of extremely structured discussions about what assets mother and father wish to see at their faculty. At no level did the district degree with mother and father concerning the actuality of its plans or ask communities to weigh in on the thought of closures.
Not solely is that this plan primarily based on deceptive and false claims, it would deeply harm our metropolis. This isn’t actually a plan to shut 20 colleges, it’s a plan to upend 20 neighborhoods, and a few of these colleges are 100 years outdated. Children who walked to highschool will now face lengthy bus rides or want a experience from a guardian. Households will depart SPS for higher choices elsewhere. As a substitute of abandoning neighborhood colleges as a result of they’re “underutilized,” we should always embrace them as a supply of variety and energy.
Seattle is a superb metropolis, and we deserve nice public colleges. However nice colleges would require a brand new imaginative and prescient for public schooling that’s really inclusive, the place each household in Seattle sees public faculty as an thrilling possibility for his or her baby, and our colleges are supported by a broad coalition of deeply invested mother and father. When that’s true, we can have the political will to demand systemic funding change in Olympia.
The superintendent’s plan isn’t just a distraction from that larger imaginative and prescient, it’s a deeply divisive step backward. As a substitute of a broader coalition, we can have a narrower one. As a substitute of engaged mother and father preventing for an ideal schooling for all, we can have neighborhoods preventing one another to spare their faculty from the chopping block. As a substitute of well-resourced colleges we can have impoverished ones.
The Seattle Faculty Board ought to reject this plan. We deserve higher.
