Four terrific additions to the Alliance for Education's Board of Directors

We are thrilled to share the news that four outstanding community leaders have joined the Alliance for Education's Board of Directors today! The addition of Lisa Chick, Nate Miles, Estela Ortega and Bob Peters bring leadership and expertise in community service, finance, and public policy. “We are delighted to add such experience and diversity to our board,” says Alliance board chair Pam MacEwan, Executive Vice President for Public Affairs & Governance at Group Health Cooperative. “This group of individuals will strengthen our organization in innumerable ways and help further our mission to ensure every child in Seattle Public Schools is prepared for success in college, career and life.”

Lisa Chick is Vice President and Senior Regional Director for City Year, Inc., leading the success of City Year sites in Columbus, Denver, Los, Angeles, Sacramento, San Jose and Seattle. City Year focuses on addressing the high school drop-out crisis in America by engaging AmeriCorps members in service to our highest need schools. Chick is a Seattle native who began her community volunteer service in high school. She spent three years teaching in public schools in California before joining CityYear as a Service Director. Chick was a member of the Leadership Tomorrow class of 2002, was honored as one of Seattle’s “40 Under 40” by the Puget Sound Business Journal in 2009 and was awarded the Marshall Memorial Fellowship in 2011.

Nate Miles is Vice President for Strategic Initiatives for Eli Lilly and Co. In this position, Miles leads the company’s public policy and community outreach initiatives nationwide, working with legislators, grassroots organizations, labor partners and many others. Over 30 years, Miles has held positions in both the public and private sectors and is passionate about effective public-private partnerships. Miles has been recognized by local and national leaders as a driving force in Washington state’s business and nonprofit communities and as a powerful advocate for children and public education. Miles is a native of Washington State, a University of Washington graduate, a Leadership Tomorrow honoree and one of Ebony Magazine’s “30 Leaders of the Future.”


Estela Ortega is the Executive Director of El Centro de la Raza, a leading Seattle-based civil rights, human services, educational, cultural and economic development organization. In this role, Ortega oversees the strategic and operational management of the organization, which has 80 employees and an operating budget of $5 million. Ortega began a career of service and community organizing as a young adult through participation in a number of advocacy, voter registration and anti-war initiatives in her hometown of Houston, Texas. She went on to join the peaceful occupation, in 1972, of the old abandoned Beacon Hill Elementary School that would later become El Centro de la Raza. For thirty-eight years, Ortega has actively engaged in coalition building and political advocacy. In 2011 Ortega was presented the Women of Valor Award by Senator Maria Cantwell.

Bob Peters is the Senior Vice President and Market Executive for Bank of America’s Commercial Banking business in Western Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, and Western Canada. He also serves as the Seattle and Washington State President for Bank of America. In his capacity as Market Executive, Peters is responsible for more than 600 corporate relationships with companies in the region. He began his banking career with Seafirst Bank in 1985. As the Washington State President, he leads the company’s corporate social responsibility activities including philanthropic grants, community development lending and investing activities, diversity efforts, arts and culture projects, associate volunteerism and environmental initiatives. Peters currently serves as an Executive Committee member of the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and as co-chair of The Chamber’s Education Task Force. He is a director of the Washington Roundtable where he serves on the Roundtable’s Education Committee and he also is a sitting member of the Community Development Roundtable.

The Alliance for Education awards Nathan Hale High School principal Jill Hudson with the Foster Award

(left to right) Sara Morris, President & CEO, Alliance for Education;
Jill Hudson, Principal, Nathan Hale High School;
Judy Runstad, Foster Pepper, PPLLC &
Alliance for Education Emeritus Board Member

This morning, the Alliance for Education was delighted to award the Thomas B. Foster Award to Principal Jill Hudson of Nathan Hale High School. For ten years, we have granted this award to an exceptional secondary school principal. Included is a $50,000 cash grant to the school to be used at the principal's discretion. 
At an energetic all-school assembly in the gym, District & Alliance leadership, school staff and a lot of Jill's family and friends surprised her with the award. Please see below for details on her accomplishments on behalf of students.

From everyone here at the Alliance, we extend huge congratulations to Jill on such well-earned recognition. Thank you for everything you do! What a great morning! People like you put a spring in all of our steps. 

Principal Hudson will be formally honored at the Alliance for Education's 10th Annual Community Breakfast on March 29.

More information:

• About the Foster Award
• Seattle Times story
• KOMO News story

The Alliance for Education Joins “Everyone Gives” Global Giving Event

On Wednesday, February 22, 2012, the Alliance for Education will participate in a revolutionary eight-day global giving campaign spanning more than 60 countries around the world. “Everyone Gives” promises to be the most extensive and inclusive global giving event ever attempted, benefiting more than 200 non-profits around the globe.

This is an easy way for our supporters to donate to the Alliance and to tell their friends and family about why our work is important to them. Donating is simple and secure, and one hundred percent of all donations made through Everyone Gives go directly to the non-profit selected by the donor.

Participants make a small donation, as little as $5, to the Alliance through the Everyone Gives website and then tap into their social networks via email, Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook to invite friends, co-workers, clients and family to support the Alliance. “I think of it as a giving tree,” explains Doug Frye, President of Colliers International and a founding sponsor of Everyone Gives. “One donation becomes five, five becomes 25 and 25 can become hundreds. And you can track your giving tree and your friends’ giving trees on the Everyone Gives website.”


HOW DOES IT WORK?
1. Start your giving tree at www.everyonegives.org (click on "Start Your Tree" in the top right corner).
2. Donate $5 to a charity of your choice. (We'd love it if you chose the Alliance - just search for "Alliance for Education" when adding a charity!)

3. Ask two people to give to your charity or to select a charity of their choice.
4. Ask these two people to reach out to two more people, creating a giving tree with exponential growth potential.


LEARN MORE ABOUT THE ALLIANCE

LEARN MORE ABOUT EVERYONE GIVES

2012 Legislative Bill Summaries

Two bills focused on education were introduced in the Washington State legislature yesterday. One centers on promoting instructional excellence, the other on transformation zones and charters. The Excellent Schools Now Coalition (of which the Alliance is a member) has endorsed the former and has not taken a position on the latter.

Summaries posted here for your convenient review...

Bill #1: A Bill to Promote and Support Instructional Excellence in Public Schools

The single biggest in-school factor affecting student success is the quality of instruction. Establishing policies that support and advance educators, based on professional evaluations of performance, will help ensure every student has the opportunity to achieve academic success and earn a family-wage job.

Washington is currently piloting an evaluation system for educators that will be completed in June 2012 and implemented statewide in the 2013-14 school year.

This legislation would put in place a system that uses the new evaluations to help determine school, classroom, and educator needs. Evaluation results would be used to identify professional development opportunities to support educators who need additional help and bolster the skills of high-performers.

By supporting educators who need additional help, and bolstering skills of high-performers, we hope to ensure improved educational achievement for every student.

Key elements of the bill include:

• Supporting teachers and principals by aligning professional development activities with individualized needs identified in their performance evaluation. 
• Using multiple measures of student learning in the evaluations of teachers and principals. 
• Allowing principals to hire and place teachers based on performance and skills match, as well as seniority. 
• Using locally bargained polices to layoff teachers and principals based on performance. 
• Granting continuing contracts (“tenure”) based on performance. 
• Establishing a rigorous but fair dismissal process for teachers and principals rated ineffective if they have not improved after receiving targeted, individualized, intensive professional development, coaching and support. 

To support the implementation of the evaluation system and these polices, the state should provide resources for:

• Training principals to use the evaluation system and how to objectively evaluate teacher performance. 
• Training teachers on the evaluation system and how to participate most effectively. 
• Expanding principal mentorship to ensure good leadership at the school level and effective use of the evaluation system. 

Bill #2: A Bill to Close the Opportunity Gap

In Washington, students from low-income families and students of color have fewer academic and economic opportunities than the population as a whole – and the problem is getting worse. The opportunity gap is created by inequitable access to quality schools, educators and educational programs, as well as the inequitable allocation of resources across communities. Too often, a student’s zip code dictates the student’s academic and career opportunities.

No student should be forced to stay in a chronically under-performing school. Additional opportunities should be given to these students, through two proven, outcomes-based alternatives.

Establish a Transformation Zone. Build on Washington’s existing intervention authority in the lowest-performing schools by creating a Transformation Zone. This zone should oversee the supervision, development and encouragement of school improvement efforts, which includes:

• Contracting out the management of low-performing schools– to proven learning management organizations. 
• Requiring the use of performance contracts and revoking contracts if building managers fail to meet them. 
• Allowing flexible use of funds to implement innovative reforms, such as strategic staffing, longer school year, longer school days and technology-based learning. 
• Recognizing employees’ rights to collectively bargain. 
• Attracting the best teachers by providing increased support and autonomy. 
• Attracting high-performing principals to work in Transformation Zone schools through increased autonomy and flexibility to manage budgets, time and curriculum; and to hire, assign, reassign and dismiss staff. 

Authorize Public Charter Schools. Forty-one states allow public charter schools; Washington does not. In many of these states, non-profit charter management operators (CMOs) have succeeded where traditional public schools have not—especially at closing opportunity gaps.

In recent years, the research on charter school effectiveness has grown, enabling us to identify effective providers and practices through data. The data show that, if properly managed, charters are an effective alternative for students in chronically under-performing schools.

Washington should establish a public charter school law that learns from other states’ experiences and replicates best practices:

• Require the majority of public charter schools to focus on serving educationally disadvantaged students. 
• Require public oversight by, and accountability to, the State Board of Education. 
• Recognize employees’ rights to collectively bargain. 
• Require open student enrollment to prevent discrimination or cherry-picking 
• Require admission by a fair, a transparent and an equitable lottery system, when demand is greater than capacity. 
• Allow only qualified, public benefit non-profit organizations governed by boards of directors, to operate public charter schools. 
• Limit the number of public charter school authorizers. 
• Establish a public charter school cap. 
• Establish a rigorous process for closing poor-performing public charter schools. 

Save the Date: The Alliance for Education Community Breakfast

At our last breakfast, 900 community members raised over $220,000 to support the Alliance's work to prepare every child in Seattle Public Schools for college, career, and life. We invite you to join this outstanding group of education advocates at our upcoming 2012 community breakfast:

DATE: March 29th, 2012

TIME: Doors open at 7AM, Program 7:30-8:45AM

WHERE: Sheraton Seattle Hotel (1400 Sixth Avenue 98101)

There is no cost to attend the breakfast, though we hope to inspire guests to make a gift in support of our work.

To reserve your place at the Alliance for Education's Community Breakfast, CLICK HERE.

Alliance for Education statement on Interim Superintendent Enfield's announcement

Seattle – December 16, 2011 – The Board of Directors of the Alliance for Education has released the following statement concerning Dr. Susan Enfield’s announcement today.

Interim Superintendent Susan Enfield’s leadership over the last nine months brought tremendous energy and focus to the work of the district. Her announcement today that she will not seek the permanent Superintendency is deeply disappointing.

We are now on pace to have our third Superintendent in five years.

The Seattle Public Schools family – of students, parents, teachers, principals, staff and community supporters ‐ deserves stability and quality. We know this is possible. Indeed, the positive academic momentum demonstrated this year – both system wide and at many individual schools – is proof of what can be done with intentional leadership. But today we fall short of our shared goals.

The task now falls to our community to determine how to move forward. Over 48,000 students attend our public schools – three out of every four children in Seattle. Our obligation is to them, and to providing the excellent education they deserve. In this city of gorgeous natural resources, brilliant entrepreneurs, devoted public servants and generous, engaged citizens, we should expect no less than the best. A new conversation begins.

Finally here! Footage from the State of the District Address

Dr. Susan Enfield, Seattle Public Schools' Interim Superintendent, delivered a very strong State of the District report at the end of November. The achievement gains and operational improvements cited give great reason for hope and confidence in what can be accomplished. While much work remains to deliver on the promise of a college-ready education for all, the forward momentum is palpable!

Reference was made to potentially lowering the 2013 outcome goals. The Alliance believes that this should not be considered an option. Instead of having a conversation around whether and how far we should lower our goals, we should be having a conversation around what we - as an entire community invested in the success of our public schools - need to do faster and better to meet or exceed the goals that have been set.

"Attacking Gaps, Raising Expectations Everywhere" means just that. Lowering outcome goals flies directly in the face of the spirit of AGREE, which is a very compelling rallying cry.

The individual schools cited in this presentation demonstrate just how much progress can be made in a short period of time under strong, deliberate leadership. Let us look to those and other high achieving schools for the path forward, rather than be content to lower our sights and ambitions on behalf of school children across our city!

For more information in on the data referred to in Dr. Enfield's presentation, CLICK HERE.