Seattle Schools Board Special Meeting Dec 3, 2025

001[Music] i [Music] All right. Good afternoon. and we will be calling the board meeting to order in a moment and SPSV will begin broadcasting. Folks, want to find a seat All right. Good afternoon everyone. This is President Topp and I am calling the board's special meeting to order at 4:30 p.m. We would like to acknowledge that we are on ancestral lands and the traditional territories of the Puet Sound Coast Salish people. We have with us directors of the Seattle school board. We have Vice President Briggs. Um, Director Clark will not be joining this evening. Director Hersy will not be joining this evening. We have director Misrai. We have director Ranken. Uh, director Sarju is not here will not be joining us this evening. We also have director Manglesen, director Masudi, and director Yun. And as

002I said before, this is president top. Um the superintendent is present as well as staff. And we will be do we will also be joined this evening by our newly elected directors. This afternoon we will be swearing in our recently elected school board directors, Jen Laval, Kathleen Smith, and Vivian Song um and director or Joe Miseri. Following the oath of office, our new directors will have the opportunity to make a few comments and then we will take a brief recess to celebrate and reset. Following the oaths of office and and the reset, we will be moving into actual board business. We will have some an opportunity to do our progress monitoring. So, you know, we're going to put board directors to work right away after the swearing in. Um, I am very excited for this

003evening. This is kind of a a moment for us to pause sort of some of the dayto-day noise and bring us back to why we are here. Um, kids, their stories, their potential, and their future. And I just want to start with this is honestly, especially for the new directors joining us today, the hardest job I have ever done. It stretches you, it tests you, demands humility and courage every single week. and the responsibility is enormous. We're talking about roughly 50,000 students, 50,000 individual lives moving through our schools. So, thank you so much for your dedication for being here, for willing to to not just run a campaign, but then be sworn in and and dedicated to the work ahead. So, with that, I'm going to pass it off to Superintendent Podesta, who will administer

004the oaths of office. Thank you, President Top. We'll begin with Jennifer Levali. Jennifer, could you please step forward? >> I your name. >> I John Le >> Dubai here. uh solemnly swear >> Dubai solemnly swear is >> press pull it towards you. I, John Lavali, do solemnly swear >> that I will support the Constitutions of the United States >> that I will support the Constitution of the United States >> the state of Washington >> and the laws of the state of Washington >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> of Seattle School District number one >> King County State of Washington >> to the best of my ability. >> Congratulations. >> Thank you. [Applause] That's right. [Applause] microphone. So, where did the second microphone

005end up? >> Thank you. >> Joe, Miss Rahi, could you please step forward? I >> I >> do hereby solemnly swear >> that I will support the Constitutions of the United States >> that I will support the Constitution of the of the United States >> and the State of Washington >> and the laws of the state of Washington >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> of Seattle School District number one >> King County Washington >> to the best of my ability >> to best of my abilities. >> Thank you. Congratulations. [Applause] This way. [Applause] Kathleen Smith, could you please step forward? >> Thank you. Repeat after me. Iith >> I, Kathleen Smith, >> do hereby solemnly swear >> that I will support the

006Constitutions of the United States >> that I will support the Constitutions of the United States >> and the State of Washington >> and the laws of the state of Washington >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> of Seattle School District number one. of Seattle School District. Number one, >> King County, State of Washington. >> To the best of my ability. >> Thank you. Congratulations. [Applause] That's it. [Applause] Vivian Song, could you step forward? >> Please repeat after me. I >> I Vivian Song >> do hereby solemnly swear >> that I will support the Constitutions of the United States >> that I will support the Constitutions of the United States >> and the state of Washington >> and the laws of the state of

007Washington >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> and to faithfully perform the duties of director >> of Seattle School District number one >> King County State of Washington >> to the best of my ability. >> Thank you for your service. Congratulations. >> Thank you. [Applause] >> Back to you. [Applause] Have one more round of applause for our four newly sworn in directors. Um, we will now have an opportunity to hear from each of the directors. Um, so I will call you up individually, allow you to share a few remarks. Uh, we'll start with with Director Lavali. Um, if you want to come on up, um, Jen or come on up. One of the things, um, that I don't know if you remember, but you came to one of my very first community

008meetings. Um, and I think this was probably long before you considered running for a school board. Um, but you brought data, a ton of data and thought awful questions, and you stayed after to chat with me to make sure I knew what families were experiencing. And I love the fact that you bring to this board healthy skepticism, hard work, and consistency. So, so excited to work with you, but give the floor to you. >> All right. Thank you so much. Hi, my name is Jen Lavali. I'm truly honored to step into this role today. I want to begin by thanking Brandon Hersy for his deep dedication to our students um in this seat before me. He led through a pandemic and a time of major uncertainty and it was no small task. I appreciate the

009knowledge and the care that he brought to the board during this challenging time. I want to thank everyone who supported me through the campaign, but especially my family. My parents, both children of educators, instilled in me a belief in the power of public education. My father served on the school board in the district where I grew up and taught me brought me into conversations about advocacy from a young age. and to my husband and my children who have supported me and spent so many nights without me at home as I've been doing this work. Um, I thank you and I hope that you're excited about the work that we're doing together. Throughout my campaign, I asked families what they loved most about our schools. And in my South Seattle community, I overwhelmingly heard our teachers,

010our diversity, and our community. I am so grateful to be have my kids at our local school where those things are all true. But I also know that not every student is experiencing the excellence that we aspire to. As we move forward, we must raise the floor for all students because every child in Seattle public schools is capable of greatness. Families are asking for more. More academic rigor, more diverse and robust programs, more access and meaningful opportunities. schools that are both safe and responsible to their ch and responsive to their child's needs. Our community does not expect perfection, but it expects progress. It wants partnership and clear communication and people that show up. With this new board and our incoming superintendent, I'm excited to broaden our vision and shift the narrative together. As Superintendent Ben

011Schulinger said, let's make Seattle public schools the greatest urban school district in the nation. And now, let's get to work. [Applause] Thank you. Next, we'll hear from Director Misrai. Uh, Dire Director Miseri, I think I've said this many times. I'm in awe of all the work that you do. You are strategic. You're calm under pressure and you understand how large systems move and how to move them. So, we're so lucky to have you as a board director. Director Ms. Rahi. >> Thank you, Gina. Thank you, Superintendent. Um, so I was sworn in about a year and a half ago only. Uh, I'm back up here. Uh, and in fact, it was so soon that my uh three uh my three daughters who are in Seattle public schools uh have a very reasonable policy that they'll

012only come to us swearing in every two years. So, we haven't crossed that threshold yet, so they're not here. So, I'd like to thank my family, like Jen thanked her family, but I can't because they're not here. Um, so too bad for them. No. Um, uh, well, when I was sworn in a year and a half ago, by the way, I did not know that we were supposed to give speeches. Uh, which then I checked my email and Julia had told me we were supposed to give speeches. So, I hadn't prepared anything. Uh, so I prepared a little bit more. But, um, you know, a year and a half ago when I spoke, I said, you know, off the cuff really. I was kind of vamping. But uh what I said was that uh we

013have a phrase in organizing in my day job. I'm a union organizer and we have a phrase in organizing that I always come back to which is it's not complicated. It's just hard. And when you think about organizing people can come up with all sorts of you know complicated things. We're going to do these like subgroups and we're going to create this new organization. No, it's just about talking to workers. It's not complicated. It's just hard. And I think there's a lot of truth to that with our school system as well. There's a lot of problems in SPS. There's lots of things we need to fix, but it's not complicated. It's just hard work. Um, something that I said a lot on the campaign trail, so I apologize for my fellow candidates who are with

014me because they're going to hear it again, but I believe it uh to be true. One of the hard things about campaigning is that you spend a lot of time focusing on the problems with any system. That's what people want to talk about when you're on the campaign trail. How are you going to fix something? What's broken? Um, but by my nature, I'm a very optimistic person. So, it's a little hard for me. Uh, and I actually want to be leading with optimism. And I'm going to say what I'm optimistic about, which is in my year and a half on the board, one thing I've seen that is um very true, is people have deep passion and commitment for their schools. People love their schools. They maybe don't love the district. They maybe have problems

015with what the district's doing. They maybe see the district sometimes as a barrier to the greatness of their school, but people really love their schools. And that tells me that we're actually not as far away as we might seem from what our new superintendent talked about building the greatest urban uh school district in the country. Uh because that's a shorter bridge to gap than if it were the opposite problem. If people said, "Well, the district seems okay, but I hate my school." That would be a huge problem, right? So the fact that people love their schools shows that we are doing something right and we have a really strong foundation uh to build off of. So, I want to lead with that optimism and really lead with this notion that it's just hard work that

016we have to do. We have to build uh back our trust with the community. So, that's not complicated work. That's just hard work. It's about listening to people. It's about having authentic engagement, about having authentic conversations with the people who care about Seattle schools. We have to boost our enrollment. That's not complicated. It's just hard. It's about giving people the programs that they've told us that they like. Uh we have to stabilize the budget, and that might be complicated and hard. I'll be honest about that. So, that might be one of those things that's complicated and hard, but uh you know, I I do I'm hugely honored by the faith that Seattle voters have shown in me. I'm hugely honored by all the people who did so much work, volunteered, donated to my campaign, to

017my family, who's not here, but who did a lot of work and and sacrificed a lot of time with me uh to help me pursue this. uh and I and and I think a lot of people uh were encouraged by that optimism and I want to continue to lead with that because the last thing I'll say the other thing we talked about in organizing is that the opposite of loving something isn't hating something. The opposite of love is apathy and one thing we can say is that the Seattle public is not apathetic about their schools. And that is also a great foundation to build off of. Thank you. >> Thank you. Now, we will have an opportunity to hear from Director Smith. Uh Director Smith brings a perspective as a parent with young kiddos. You'll

018see she's got a slew with her tonight. Um I think two of them are her own. Um the the grounding that matters. She listens and asks smart questions and makes decisions based on information. And that's what students need. So, Director Smith, [Applause] hi. Um, so I I did know there was a statement. I have a short statement and just riffing a bit off of what Director Mrai said. Um, I think I'm describing things simply, but I don't want to give the impression that I I don't think the work will will be hard. Um, I want to begin by thanking my supporters, my family, and this community for the trust you've placed in me. It is an honor to serve here on the Seattle School Board. I know this role requires humility and a willingness to

019listen and learn, and I am committed to doing just that. I am dedicated to Seattle's students, families, and educators, guided by values of transparency and clear communication, collaboration that brings diverse voices to the table, and centering human connection while making thoughtful, data-informed decisions. With these values, I will work to strengthen public education as a foundation of equity, opportunity, and community. Looking ahead, I share our incoming superintendent's optimism that together we can make Seattle school Seattle's schools ex um excellent. I am excited to work as part of the new leadership team and with communities across Seattle to realize that vision. Thank you. [Applause] >> Thank you, Director Smith. And last, we'll hear from Director Song. uh Director Song uh served on the board with me previously and uh before my first board meeting um when everything

020is all crazy and incoming. She was the only director who reached out to me um and and asked me, you know, well, can I can I help you with the agenda? Can I ask you any can I answer any questions for you? And I think that just talks to the kind of person she is. So, Director Song [Applause] I often think I'm in good company uh with my new colleague, Director Mazari, but I'm surprised to also share tonight that my two middle schoolers uh said to me, "Didn't we just go to that and didn't want to come tonight, so I don't have my family here either, but I see some of my uh supporters here. So, thank you for coming today." This oath is both an honor and a responsibility that I feel deeply. And

021before anything else, I want to acknowledge that this moment is not mine alone. I want to thank first my family, my children, Ben, my parents, and our extended family. Campaigns and public service ask a lot of families, and mine has supported me in ways big and small. I also want to thank the many caregivers, educators, labor partners, community organizations, current and former elected leaders who supported this journey and who will remain essential partners in the work ahead. After my last oath of office, I shared about my grandfather. He grew up under occupation. His education was disrupted by war. He spent his entire adult life dreaming of coming to the United States and becoming a citizen, something he achieved at 77. We studied for his citizenship exam together, and our first election was together. His first

022vote, and my first vote was for our local school district levy. Four years ago, I said he would feel particular joy knowing all the many personal sacrifices and risks he made as his granddaughter made an oath of commitment to the Constitution and to promoting the interests of public schools. I feel his presence today, but with a particular weight. As someone who has spent decades volunteering with immigrant communities, public service takes on new significance in this moment during the Trump administration when so many families feel anxiety about belonging, safety, and opportunity. To take this oath today is to say clearly, our public schools are for everyone. But I stand here today not because of my story. I stand here because of what this election said about our community. Seattle voters did not merely vote on individual

023candidates. They voted on the issues that mattered to them. And for those of you who may not have attended the candidate forums, there was remarkably little daylight between candidates on the big questions. Academic rigor, the harm from school closures and other short-sighted budget cuts, and the governance approach this district needs. Voters sent a clear message. We cannot meet this moment by repeating the same patterns, the same decisions, the same processes, the same approaches that have not worked or that run directly against community expectations. I have the courage to do things differently and I expect the same from those that share the stis. This is especially true as we welcome our new superintendent. I know that some of my colleagues supported him because he brings an ambitious vision, a desire to make Seattle the greatest urban

024school district in America. That is a bold and worthy goal. But as his board, we must also recognize and internalize a simple truth. We cannot fulfill that vision if our current families, staff, and school communities are not listened to. A great district is not built on press releases or strategic plans. It's built on trust, follow-through, and the daily experiences of students and educators in our classroom. In my first term, I visited more than 40 schools. I saw firsthand the brilliance of our students and dedication of our educators. And I also saw the gaps, the inconsistencies, and the inequities that our families talk about. That is why I have chosen to return to this day. The talents and commitments are there for Seattle to become the best urban district in America. And it's up to district

025leadership. It's up to us to make the needed change. So today, after taking this oath, I commit myself to the work ahead. To responsible and effective budgeting, to academic excellence, honest community engagement, to operational clarity, and to a vision of public education that reflects the hopes of every family who entrusts us with their children, particularly those that have endured tremendous sacrifice and risk and pursuit of better opportunities for them. Seattle, I thank you for your trust in me. And to echo my new colleague, let's get to work. [Applause] Thank you, Director Song. So, now we are I'm going to call all board directors up. We have to do the illegally required part here. Um, so all board directors, please come up. Um, yes. Yes. All board directors. Superintendent Podesta, will you please present the board?

026>> Yes. Face the community. >> All right. Thank you all for joining us here tonight. It is my distinct privilege and pleasure to present to you the board of directors of Seattle Public Schools. [Applause] Thank you. >> No, we're not. >> Okay. All right. You may be seated. Um, we are That was the first portion of our meeting. Now, we're going to get to some actual business here. Um, so, thank you everyone for joining us for this celebratory moment. Uh we're going to take a few minutes to enjoy each other's company as we reset for progress monitoring. So if we could please be seated at the use in roughly 15 minutes. So at 510 if we could be seated around the tables but we will uh so we will see everyone back around 510. Thank

027you. [Laughter] [Music] You my day. I'm my [Music] [Laughter] [Music] Oh my. Down. [Music] You want hey? [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] 3. [Music] Hey. Hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Hey, hey, hey. [Music] Heat. Heat. N. [Music] down. Hey [Music] All right. I hate to start breaking up conversations, but board directors, if we could start assembling at the U. >> All the student board directors listened for the timing. We seen director Misrai or direct vice president. All right, we'll give Vice President Briggs and Director Miseri one more minute. >> All right, we're gonna We lost our superintendent. All right, we're going to move into the progress monitoring portion of tonight's meeting. Uh we'll have a presentation um on goal one. we'll have an opportunity to do a little discussion and then we will move on

028to a presentation on goal two and have a little discussion. So that I will pass it over to Superintendent Podesta. >> Thank you, President Top. Uh I'm joined by my colleagues, Associate Superintendent, uh Dr. Torres Morales and Mr. Ted Howard, who is our chief accountability officer. And I really want to uh make clear that we're kind of the spokespeople for a large interd disciplinary team that has been working on our internal processes to kind of prepare for progress monitoring discussions with the board but also try to elevate our own practice. Um we have others in the room if the conversation goes a particular way and we decide we need to phone a friend. But um we'll do our best to get through this. And I just want to acknowledge the work of folks in academics,

029schools and school senior management um uh in uh services, our technology folks in in um business intelligence. This has really been a fullcourt press and we're really trying and we'll talk a little bit specifically about this that we're really trying to integrate this process to be um sort of the tail end of internal practice improvements that we can um discuss with the board as a highlight of what is going on, not be the front end that we're backing into. We still have a lot of work to do. Uh progress is the word of the day because this is a work in progress. But um I uh really want to thank the team. People work very hard. Um our original intent was that we wanted to make sure we could be responsive to the board's interest

030in a deeper dive. So only touch one of these subjects in a session. We're doing two because uh November turned out to be a pretty busy month at Seattle public school. So we um there's some information that'll be repeated. We are going to spend more time as a result on the early literacing uh literacy goal than the math goal to avoid some of that redundancy and also we've done more staff work on it so I think we have a bit more um to say um but I just appreciate this opportunity. Want to thank our newly constituted board for your interest in this matter and and getting to work right away. This is and I think um you know I love the optics of this that this is where you start because this seems like you

031know board there's so many demands on the board but when it boils down to what the most important oversight goal uh it's not my place to say but I would certainly um argue that this is near the top of the responsibilities of the board and so it's a it's a great place to part. Um so what we're trying to accomplish today is um to talk about process again a little bit um set some context which I'll do and I'll turn to my colleagues to go in a little deeper. I am not um going to pretend to be an expert in assessment as part of this process. Um but I um have worked closely with the team and and watched um multiple teams uh work on how they're going to deal with data, how they will

032interrogate data um to see what um initiatives we can undertake so we can complete our strategic plan. the life cycle for this in a kind of constant uh um improvement plan, continuous improvement. As you know, the board has uh articulated the vision and values of the community and we're using that as a starting point. Um we're using very specific topline goals as part of that to um think through our strategic planning and the initiatives we want to start. We are still um so we're in a little bit of an awkward moment in as much as that those are being finalized um but this is a good place to start because the way we've structured this discussion is really about setting baselines and looking forward and so can inform how we um how this process moves

033forward and how we do our work and our planning work going forward. The subsequent touches with the board will be u more true progress monitoring. Again, we're we're establishing a context and a baseline here. So, the um schedule that we all agreed to or that the board adopted again um is built around a framework of three uh conversations a year per goal. Um we are doubling up the baseline discussion for both um math and early literacy tonight because we um uh didn't um manage we weren't able to find the appropriate spot on the calendar to do early literacy in November. So um we will uh do that one as well and then again get into math later. um that's something we'd like feedback on along the way while we all um discussed a calendar that

034was structured this way and particularly um since we have new and and I think we all need to be honest we have um new member uh new directors have joined the board we have incoming leadership so uh our team is trying to be as flexible as possible that we kind of have a plan now but we're um certainly interested in taking feedback along the way is is this the right path um I'm sure superintendent and Scheler will have his own ideas and experiences and that will that's the point of elections that's the point of bringing in new leadership is to get some new ideas on the table so um nobody is religious on this you know this exact methodology but we're trying to build something out so um we do have running start for everybody

035that um is involved in this so in terms of process again what we've been struggling with and trying to make sure is that this is part of a meaningful process this isn't um while communicating with the board and the community is is really important, we want it to be integrated with the work overall. And so we're trying to get to the point where this progress monitoring discussions represent the tip of the iceberg in as much as this is the highlights of work that we're doing internally um to hold ourselves accountable to look at what's working and what's not working and we see you know various aspects of that. most importantly or at least what we're working on first is the internal prog progress monitoring processes. We um worked hard to use these measures. Again, this

036is a subset of measures that staff are looking at um in detail with a um team representing multiple departments. really focused again on schools, uh, academics and services, um, with data folks to help us synthesize the data and do research and analysis along the way to, um, make sure that we come away from those sessions with action plans or at least further interrogation of the data that need to be done really at the school level, sometimes at the classroom level to understand because many of the discussions we've had in past years of this have been really at the system level. And we're not um going to address all these. There are things that need to be done at the system level. There's adoption of curriculum and and um systemwide professional development programs, but there's also

037actions that need to be taken um with individuals and in classrooms. And so we really need to dig deep and it takes many hands, many eyes on data to do that. Ultimately, um, we want to also make sure that all these efforts are aligned with how we look at, uh, school improvement plans. And, uh, I'd like to ask Mr. Howard to speak a little bit to his vision for that and how we'll try to align that work going forward. >> Love to get started. Director Ranken on the way back. But um >> as we come together to talk about progress monitoring, it's important to look at section one and section two of the books I just passed out to you because you're getting just a quick snapshot of what we do in progress monitoring. So,

038I'm going to take you guys on a little road trip of what it's like to do a continuous school improvement plan uh at the start of the year and then what does it look like all the way down into the classroom and who participates and what does that look like? And so, the continuous school improvement plan is a road map. It's a road map starting with the strategic plan from the board filters into the continuous school improvement plan at the building level. Then it filters into building that. What does that look like when you build that? what does it look like at the beginning of the year getting baseline data and then September we do some dipsticks taking a look at what the correlated data looks like and that may mean attendance data that may

039mean discipline data that may mean um sitting down talking to students who are struggling mental health issues things of that nature and then we personalize what that looks like we build our smart goals around that and then we try to lift those smart goals up uh throughout the year so if I took you on a road trip in in August and September, you'd be looking at baseline data. They would kick that off with the CIP. Uh October, November would be the first look. We'd look at early warning uh indicators, attendance, dibbles, map, and then as we look at the rosters, we would look at the master schedule and develop what that looks like for our students to personalize that to actually make sure we're meeting our students needs. As we build this, as you're taking

040a look at this quick look at this iceberg, you're seeing just a tip. And so when we're saying the tip, imagine the whole year, but you only get a chance to look at this for a month. And so there's a lot of other things that are happening below the water, but also throughout the school year because this is continuous growth. As we go, we learn. We learn in September, we learn in October, we learn in November. And we want students to continue to learn. And we want that continuous school improvement plan to be adjusted, to be flexible. And then we want to leave space for what we don't know. We have to leave space for what we don't know and what we didn't expect to happen. And it's almost like you having a house or

041apartment and a pipe breaking. Didn't didn't see that coming. So, as teachers, we want to make sure our teachers have the tools that they need. And as we are building that, it'll be successful. Our principles are actually doing walkthroughs. They're looking in the classroom. They're looking at attendance. They're doing observations. And then they're checking in. parents. We ask parents to come and be a part of that conversation by sharing with us what works for their children, what hasn't worked for their children, what our children need, what they've seen in the first month of school, and what they hope for their children. And so, as they build that with us, we're able to personalize that and actually make that happen. That should be an ongoing conversation throughout the year, throughout uh K12 experience to all the

042way through until you get ready to launch to go to college or career. >> Thank you, Mr. Howard. So just as we want and we have a a formalized structure around uh continuing school improvement pro uh plans the same with department goals we have a accountability structure and a performance structure that is really based around individuals. This is a a area where we need to do continuous uh continual work and make uh incremental improvements in terms of uh making sure these plans cascade at the department level in the central office and across our lines of business. not just about the way we typically have these conversations about individual performance of leaders or um individual contributors less so about team performance unlike what we do at schools where there's a plan for the whole school as

043opposed to a plan for a particular department. So this is work that still needs to be thought through and done. And then uh all this is about um improving our practice which means um we really need to support our practitioners. We need to support teachers. We need to support educators directly to make sure that all of this is aligned to a plan and that when we're perform when we have these conversations with the board and the community um this is a result of an integrated um uh set of work that leads up to um the the results the the so what and how we're how this is um creating outcomes for students. So the top line goal uh we're going to discuss first is the early literacy goal. Um the board adopted uh a goal

044uh for a second grade foundational skills that um we're going to start with the baseline tonight. We want to start talking also about differentiated targets or at least differentiated reporting because while the topline goal did not um use the same uh uh distinct language around equity. Thank you. That um that we used in the previous strategic plan. We've heard loud and clear from the board about their expectations to understand um how this work is um playing out for multiple groups. We know that the community and the district has not backed away from any of its equity uh commitments. So while that is not reflected in the number in the topline goal per se, we're proposing um to to keep monitoring differentiated targets. we're proposing tonight um to carry forward some of the constructs we had

045in the past with African-American males and students of color furthest from educational justice and to also keep tracking um poverty as represented by um students who qualify for free and reduced lunch as um and there are many more and we know there's curiosity among directors and we're um interested in you know what are these again this isn't meant to be the be all end all and staff are disagregating this data a million different ways certainly by the uh profiles of students and again by schools and by programs and by strategies. So um that's part of the feedback we want. We thought this is a reasonable place to start and also gives us a bit of a historical context since at the high level these goals are similar to goals that we've had in the past.

046Um so that's why we're starting there. That's one of the things any feedback we uh whether in this meeting or offline we'd really like to have. So that is establishing kind of the context and the process and what we're trying to accomplish here. Um I'm going to um uh turn it back over to Mr. Howard to just talk about kind of the scorecard that we're thinking of using in these discussions because it's a little bit simplified compared to things we've shown you in the past. Um and then we'll get into the actual data. All righty. So, as we take a look at that scorecard, what we're trying to do is normalize what that looks like and and get consistent language. You see uh up there declining, you see maintaining, you see improving, and you see

047met target. That could be something where we go up two points in a building, go down one point, but it's to get everyone on the same page where we're looking at what's working, what's not working, what needs to change, and we're developing a cycle of continuous improvement. So, as we're working through this process and taking a look at the performance status that you see up there, it's just normalizing the language, but it's also getting everyone in the in the classroom and in the buildings to actually uh get used to knowing that you're always going to start a new subject, a new uh chapter, and you may be versed in it early on, but then you may start over again. And that's saying that in life that's what happens. So we're starting off with using that

048language um the declining the maintaining just to foster a vocabulary that everybody's uh clear with. Um I will read this quick um quote. We want all families to understand how we're doing and where we're working harder. So these categories give a clear simple picture of the progress toward every child reading at what grade level. So this helps schools focus on what students need right now. Leaders use the system to provide the proper support for each school. It creates transparency that families can understand. It protects students by ensuring we take action early. It connects schools level work to district big goals and it helps classrooms by keeping adults focused on improvement. Now as I say all those things and we look at this, the hard part is now building it. So you know to put a

049theory out now turn it into action is what we ask every principal to do every community to do every uh student to participate in that conversation. So this continuous improvement with the CIP built into uh this common language around performance and then at the same time our teachers our principles our students were continuously looking at data to help um respond to that and get a real clear baseline to get a direction where we need to go. You know, I'll admit when I first saw this scale, I was um had a reaction that well, wait a minute, why do we have one way of succeeding and then three different um ways that we're categorizing categorizing places where not we're not as successful? And um the team really persuaded me that that's where we need to learn

050that having specific responses to where we're seeing improvement and how can we copy that, you know, how do we react in places where progress is flat is going to be different than where we're seeing a a reduction in in progress. And so that's why this is got as many colors as as it does. I was first thinking, oh, this could be simpler, but but I um really appreciate the thought that went into this. Um I'll turn it over to Dr. Torres Morales, who's going to go into the actual results, um the actual baseline that we're trying to establish tonight. Good evening, board directors. I'm going to start us off with the baseline data in our first goal, which is in the K through2 literacy. So, what you'll see here is a brief description of the

051assessments that are going to be used for the purpose of progress monitoring. As you see, we're going to be using the dibbles, which stands for the dynamic indicators of basic early literacy skills, and the MAP, which is the measures of academic progress. You'll see that the topline measure is actually going to be the map for second grade. This was in response to uh direction from the board around the desire to start seeing data at second grade versus third grade because third grade felt too late and we needed to to know in second grade so that we can make adjustments. And so based on that, we also would start looking back at first grade and kindergarten. so that we know in the younger cohorts or as kids are coming through where we need to start intervening

052in certain areas. And so you'll see that in the blue those are the interim goal measures. Those are what we'll be reporting out on. And then the the pinkish color there that's the map that's the topline goal measure. So the difference between the dibbles and the MAP assessment. The dibbles assessment is a one-on-one assessment. It is conducted by teachers. It does look at the foundational literacy skills which was the intent of the goal. And so built in there is phmic awareness, letter naming, decoding accuracy which is those are critical to successful reading development. It's also useful for diagnosing foundational reading challenges and when it's mixed with uh what's called the RAN, it is a screener for some weaknesses associated with dyslexia etc. The map is computer adaptive and takes the students do take the test

053independently in the K2 version of the MAP. Um the foundational skills in addition to early reading comprehension and second grade are assessed as well as vocabulary use and growth aligned to reading standards. This is useful for providing a broader view of reading progress, foundational and early comprehension and ability to transfer and apply skills. When you think about using these two types of assessments for progress monitoring, this gives you a bit more of a holistic sense versus being purely computer adaptive or purely teacher administered. This will give you both. So teachers have worked with kids and heard them read and giving their version of what they're seeing based on valid and reliable assessments and there's a computer computer adaptive version. So this is giving us a more holistic view for um where students are performing in

054terms of foundational literacy. On the next slide, this is where you're going to see our topline measures with baseline. So we went back to 2223 just to provide a little bit of the trend data and 2425 this is what you will see as where we ended and 2526 these are where the goals are going moving out as you note um it is 2% per year is for all students but then there are differentiated targets for groups as superintendent Podesta noted we did not want to get rid of some of our equity stance on some issues to look at how are our kids performing at the end of the A when we have some of our most marginalized performing and outperforming that's letting us know that the system changes we're doing are actually changing the system

055where we need to change it. So let's start with interim measure grade one map. So interim measure 1A this is the percent of grade 1 students who achieved the grade level benchmark or higher on the spring MAP reading assessment. What you'll see is that 63% of our students in Seattle public schools did meet those scores on the MAP assessment. It it is a RIT score which is stands for a Rous unit. It was actually a score of 171 for those that are curious and interested and want to know more. But that means that 63% of our students met the score. 36.5 did not. You can also see the data disagregated by some of the subgroups that we had indicated. If we go to our next set of measures, what you're going to see is this

056is the growth. So what what's the difference? The map growth is looking at did a student make one academic year's worth of worth of growth essentially for their grade. So from the beginning of school to the end of school, did they make what would be considered one year versus of academic growth. When we look at the MAP growth measure, this is specifically for the students who did not meet the standard or meet the score. That's why we're looking at the growth. The important reason to look at the growth is that lets us know are we on track with what we're doing. Are our instructional strategies working? Is the coaching working? Is what we're doing with principles working? And it in in a perfect world, what we would see is that all kids are meeting their

057growth measure and or exceeding it. And that tells us that we're getting kids up to at least a year's worth of growth or more. So when you put the two measures together, they become important to provide a more holistic picture as to what's going on in schools because there's one thing to say are the kids proficient or not and the other thing is okay for those kids who aren't proficient are we growing them by a year or more. So when you look here you'll see that 66.2% of our students did not meet our growth measure. So what is that telling us? This is telling us that we do need to do something differently because not only are there a group of kids that aren't meeting the measure, there's a group of kids who aren't even

058meeting the year's worth of growth. So that's why this measure is an important measure to look at. >> Yeah. What are the dates of the two measurements? So when are when did they not meet the standard and then when are we measuring it again to see if they >> we we usually do them at the same time. So I believe if I look back this was from >> this was spring. These were the spring uh first graders which are current second graders. Yeah. You good? >> Okay. Okay. So, next we're going to look at the grade one dibbles. As a reminder, the dibbles is slightly different. This is a teacher administered exam. This covers foundational literacy skills. And so, when we look at the dibbles, what we see for the first graders is that 74.2%

059of the students are meeting those foundational skills as scored by our teachers, not by computers. So this is an a teacher standing sitting with a student one-on-one actually going through reading and skills and those sort of things and and marking the assessment and even then we had 25.8% of our students who did not meet the ben benchmark on that. So we do have some more work to do as a system. Finally we did uh kindergarten dibbles. So, this is actually important to look at as well because in terms of thinking about a long-term second grade goal, you do need to start thinking back and thinking earlier and intervening where it's needed. And so, for kindergarten, what you'll see is 66.6% of our students met uh what would be considered a kindergarten levels of foundational literacy

060as administered by by one-on-one with teachers. So, we're going to talk a little bit now on pathways to success. So, we showed the data, we talked about it, we see that we're doing well, but we still have gaps and we still have gaps in the same areas. And so, it does beg the question about so what are we going to do about this? We can't just sit with this data and and be happy that we have some promising data. We have to think about we need to do some things differently. So, I'm going to give it over to Superintendent Podesta to kick us off on some of the draft strategic plan conversation. And again, I did say we have a timing issue here in that and this and maybe it's not as much I'm making

061a bigger deal of it than it is since this is really about a baseline discussion and as we finalize and continue to adapt our strategic plan that will be um lead to a set of um a high level set of priorities in terms of where um where we need to focus on we need to focus on academics. we need to focus on workforce the in the draft strategic plan we're working now we've identified kind of five priority areas um our academic and academic approaches workforce development a unified system of leadership and accountability and uh uh support for educators and schools that they have the resources that they need and then um engagement with the community and trust building are kind of the five areas and then there'll be specific strategies ies and priorities come um

062from the priorities those and those are areas of focus. The strategies will kind of be general strategies and then we really need to hone in on a specific set of initiatives which will be projects. You know the point of an initiative is to make systemwide change. What is it? Um since we want growth, since we want change, what are we actually going to do to affect that change? We also want this same nested structure for accountability. And I was going to ask Mr. Howard to talk a little bit about um kind of the analog to this in terms of as we set goals and this discussion that we're having here is the accountability process at the goal level. Um I think if you could describe kind of a cascading set of uh accountability that we

063would envision, Mr. Howard, that'd be great. >> Yes, I'd be happy to. Um, I'm gonna go in reverse and say our students sitting here, do you guys still have a library card? Yeah, >> you do. Here's the second question. How many minutes do you read every day? >> Outside of school books, the history books, the literacy books on your own, not including cell phones. >> Probably like an hour a week. >> An hour a week. Email reading. >> Yeah. Email reading. Okay. >> Hour. >> It depends on the on the day. >> On the day. >> Okay. >> Great. Great. I'm gonna pick on some of the directors here. How often do you read? [Laughter] >> Um, not as often as I should. >> Okay. Actually, that's a goal I have for myself next year.

064I don't have to spend all of my free time. >> Okay. Okay. >> Read a book. >> Okay. Okay. >> I read for fun. Probably about an hour a day. >> Hour a day. Okay. President >> Top include the newspaper in the morning and then kids books and then my book in the evening. Probably about an hour. >> About an hour. >> Yeah, you'll turn right here. You turn it on and off that same way. >> Okay. Um I think I read too many hours. It's my escape from life and stress release and I'm ashamed to say how many I probably fit in. >> Okay. Okay. Okay. Is this Are we talking? >> Um, thank you. >> Uh, Ted, are we talking about uh, yeah, pleasure reading? >> Yeah, it counts. >> I know, but

065but is that the only thing we're talking about or just all reading? >> Just trying to get an estimate how much you read a day? I mean a lot I would say. So like two hours. >> Okay. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> Of books for pleasure almost none. I'm dyslexic and it's not enjoyable. So I listen to audio books when I'm >> and that counts >> in commute. Yeah. And that counts. >> So the reason why I wanted to just do a dipstick is we want to personalize what we're doing when we start talking about draft strategic plans. These are plans to be made, but they are made to be adjusted based off of just this quick survey I did with you here to find out how often do you read are you reading? And

066so as we talk to our parents and find out this information, we have to make adjustments. And so we do come up with our goals and guardrails and they cascade down into our priorities into our strategies and our initiatives, but they're going to shift based off of the information I just got here, a audio book or someone likes reading or what they don't like reading. But we want our parents to participate. Our parents, we asked our parents, first thing we asked them to do, get a library card. We want you to visit the library. Go on a field trip to go visit the library. We're going to increase literacy skills. I need you to go to the library. I need you to check out books. I need you to read at least 30 minutes a

067day. For high school students, I need you to read at least an hour a day. And you should be reading anywhere from 25 to 30 books a year. Picture books starts with picture books. But the reason why I started that way and worked backwards, I wanted you to see how we apply our goals and what it looks like and how we change our goals based on the information we got here. And that's what we ask our teachers to do. We ask our principles to do that. We encourage them to get more information. The more information they get, they can personalize it. So as they get to know their students, create a sense of belonging, create a sense of, hey, this is your school, this what do you need? We can shift that and make that

068happen. So as we look at our priorities and initiatives, they are a theory and then we will shift and change that. Um so we'll set our goals using our CIPS. We will set our priorities. Guess what? When it comes to report card conferences, they may change because after report card conferences, we may shift that practice based off of what we learn from those parents. Um then we ask our departments to come together to align. They come together to work together to look at the strengths and weaknesses that they have together in their PLC or in their teams to see what they need to shift that practice based off of information just found out. Hey, we have a student who who doesn't like reading and wants to do audiobooks. What are we going to do in

069the classroom? What does that look like when we break into small groups? How are we going to do that? How are we going to do that in math? How are we going to do that in science? What are we going to do to address that? That's new information that some people may have background in and some people may not have a background in. So, we're going to shift that. Then, we have to monitor, progress, monitor, have conversations. Why are we having conversations? Because some of our teachers have skills in that and some of our teachers do not have skills in that. All right? If I was to put some pressure on our students here and say, "Do you have a favorite teacher?" Wouldn't ask you to name that teacher, they would probably tell me who

070their favorite teacher is. If I put a little bit more pressure on our students, I'd say, "Do you know the strongest teachers in your building and the ones to stay away from?" They probably would tell me. uh if I put a little bit more pressure on them. And so in saying that, we want our students to know that every teacher that sits in front of them has the skills that they need to be successful. And that's what this does with the goals and guard rails and the priorities and strategies um to get to initiatives. And that's what we're working on as we build this together. Our board has given us the goals and guard rails and the pleather to be able to come up with a plan that is going to adjust and change throughout

071the school year. I was just going to ask Dr. Torres Morales um to uh go a little bit down um memory lane u with our uh strategies. We've had an early literacy goal for a long time in the previous um strategic plan since 2019. It's evolved a little bit in terms of structure, but the the uh the aspiration I think is the same. And so we learned things along the way and um uh Rocky maybe if you could kind of walk us through what's presented. >> Thank you superintendent Podesta. I'm going to go through what some of the strategies were from the previous strategic plan and also what we learned from those strategies which is going to help inform some of our pivots and initiatives going forward. So one was the implementation of a common

072K through5 curriculum with with focus on systematic phonics to ensure consistent reading instruction across schools. That was the initiative. What did we learn from that? That the curriculum that we did end up adopting lack some critical elements and especially in knowledge building. So for those that are curious, you can pull reports on this. Um Ed reports is one of them. you can go there and you can look at ELA curriculum and different math curriculums and they'll give you what they call gateways and and those sort of things and it'll just show you where they feel like curriculum are lacking. And so one of the things that we found is that what we ended up adopting as it started getting more researched was that it did act lack some of those critical elements in the science

073of reading training. It's for all K through3 teachers and principles to align teaching with uh research on reading. What we learned from that that it did improve our teacher understanding of the science of reading but that the training must be comprehensive and required for everybody if we want to see some of those results instructional coaching and monthly PLC's uh ability to provide job embedded support for improving the teacher practice specifically in priority schools and what we learned was that the coaching developed capacity if integrated with the PLC's and with principal leadership but in the absence of that it doesn't always land um principal learning network was to strengthen the instructional leadership in the priority schools and what we heard from that was that the priority school principles felt that supports were clear, coherent, and impactful.

074So what does that lead us to know is that when we're thinking about leadership networks for instructional improvement that this is a lever that we should potentially pull on, but how do we do that in a more robust way across the system? uh dibbles and map were adapted districtwide in K2 to monitor skills development and growth. Uh dibbles along with the rand component was used to help uh for us to screen for dyslexia and differentiate early based on needs. What we found was that uh inconsistencies remain in how schools use the data for differentiated instruction. So for us that's a indication that these are strong tools. We can use them. How are we using them? How are we working with schools and teachers and principles to build up their skill set to use that data

075and not just have the assessment sit on the shelf? And then curricular embedded assessments, which sound pretty fancy, but basically it's almost like when you would have your unit test or your quiz or your what. So curricular embedded assessments link teaching to real-time student progress. Um, they're promising tools for MTSS implementation and improving the use of real-time data, but more work to be done there around what does it mean when a student misses a question on a CA. In reality, those are aligned to a standard and that gives um from a teaching and learning perspective an indication, hey, the kid doesn't know that standard yet. And it's quicker because it's usually done in short cycles, which means at the end of a week or at the end of a month versus waiting for a map

076result to tell you those sort of things. Next, we're going to look ahead and Superintendent Podesta is going to join me on this one because we're talking about now the strategic plan going forward. And so, we are looking at uh here specifically, we're going to be talking about three priority areas. And I want to be clear, this is draft. Once again, this is draft. This is nothing that's fully baked and ready to go. But the first priority is rigorous and inclusive academic experiences. Second priority area is recruit, develop and retain a diverse and effective work for force. And the third one is unified leadership and systems of accountability. So within our priority area for rigorous and inclusive academic experiences, you'll see one of the strategies is around highquality tier one instruction and aligned assessment. So

077to adopt a new K5 curriculum, as you you'll note, I said previously that we did an adoption before. It was lacking some key elements. So we we are in a space where we recognize we do need to do an adoption of a new K5 curricular material for language arts. Expand the use of curricular embedded assessments to align the instruction in a timely way for with student needs. And then reinforce universal design for learning to ensure inclusive accessible instruction for all. For those not familiar with universal design for learning, it's a way to set up lesson structures and in your instruction that make it more universally accessible to students. Additionally, putting more emphasis on a multi-tered systems of support. I think y'all have heard me say this a couple times, but we're we we are pushing

078this now. Even this week, we had principles here in professional development working on multi-tered systems of support up to and including through our high schools. We had coaches here that were high school principles for years working with them on how do you do MTSS in your high school. So, every single one of our high school principles received that as well. here when we're talking about the emerging initiative somewhere in the in the vein of improve the data systems and the collaborative structures for monitoring progress and coordinating supports that students need and also provide clear clear guidance for consistent school-based implementation of tier 2 and tier three support. So what does that mean in MTSS? A student we could see from CAS and map and dibbles this student might need some more support. What does that

079mean? Okay, let's get him a tier three support. In an effective MTSS system, schools and teachers would know how does a student get into a tier 2 support, how do they get out of a tier 2 support, and what is a tier 2 support? And it should be a research and evidence-based support or structure. So that's what we're talking about when we say the guidance being consistent for schools in terms of prior and our second prior priority area around recruit, develop, and retain a diverse and effective workforce. The strategy is to develop and recruit highquality professionals. So the emerging initiative is around aligning the systems districtwide for consistent job embedded professional development. So what does professional development look like specifically for our educators system as a whole? But really a big emphasis on our educators.

080Thinking back if we talk about um in the previous iteration of the strap plan with science of reading training, what does that mean? How are we doing that? K3 all elementary principles, those sort of things. And then connecting observation, feedback and educator support to instructional vision for achieving goals. And finally, unified leadership and systems of accountability. It's more so related to performance management. So establishing the routines and structures for monitoring and accountability at all levels to connect school and classroom practice to goals and guardrails. And when we talk about this, it's not just about schools. It's actually coming all the way up to even at the central office. Like what are our department's goals? What are we doing? And how are we making sure that our strategies are aligned with what schools need to support

081them so that they can achieve their goals? Thank you Dr. Torres Morales. I um had mentioned this before. This represents three priority priority areas out of five. And this construct was really helpful for us um in our work with our partners at uh education resource strategies in terms of organize. How do we organize our work? um was the point of the priority areas that obviously um the academic experience uh all our uh teaching and learning staff can lead that effort. The uh workforce involves line management as well as human resources and um uh several areas where we're responsible um for professional development. the unified leadership and accountability. Um we that is a challenge and an observation we really got in the diagnostic work is that we have spread many functions across multiple departments and we

082re need to reconcile that. Um in addition to these three um there's a priority area again about resource and resource allocation to make schools have um what they need to be successful and according to student need. And then a fifth one about uh community engagement and trust building. Uh we're working on those as well. In the end, this list of initiatives needs to be manageable and prioritized in each year. Um we um probably can't move all of them in parallel in any given year, but we can prioritize and we hope to have a draft set of initiatives to discuss with the board in early 2026. And again, our goal is to have as finished product as possible in draft mode. So, um, again, with the reconstituted board and the incoming superintendent, um, to be teed

083up, um, so, Superintendent Sheliner can kind of tie a bow around it and you all can, um, uh, come to terms on how we move forward. But I think we're making good progress. I think um, establishing this baseline for progress monitoring is a good start. I'm sure it's going to evolve. This is not exactly how we'll do it, but it um but it's made a difference in how we're approaching our work already, particularly as we're being mindful of the future and what we want to do next. So, I know that was a lot of information. I think we wanted to just get it all out there and then open it up for questions before we um uh go to math. And we don't have to cover all the ground in math because we covered a

084lot of it in this uh presentation. Thank you, Superintendent Podesta. So, um, just looking at the time and how we're going to manage this conversation. Essentially, what we're going to do is we're just going to go around the U. We're going to start this way. We'll go around the U. I'm going to ask that uh we have about an hour for this discussion for questions. Um, so on on the reading topic and then we'll we'll move to the math. I'm going to ask directors keep their questions or comments for this first round to roughly two minutes. So, if you kind of get over those two minutes, I'm going to ask you to kind of wrap it up and that way everyone has an opportunity and we can uh hopefully or possibly go around again after

085we have questions and comments. So, with that, we'll just kind of continue uh along the U. Director Smith. Um, thank you. This was a I think a very comprehensive presentation, so I appreciate that. Um I think my only comment is for science of reading. Um it has training for K through three teachers and principles. Um I have seen um some analysis um recommending that the science of reading doesn't stop at third grade but to kind of continue it continue it on up. Um but that's a very small issue. Um overall I um think this looks good. So give staff hang on an opportunity to respond. >> No, I just want to say thank you and we'll take that into consideration. Um the initiatives are very much draft so feedback like this is very important and

086I could also see the benefit because there are times where for some reason there's a student that maybe is not at grade level by the end of third grade and so if they're going into fourth grade, how is that teacher ready to support them if they haven't had some of the foundational science of reading training? So, thank you for that. >> Yeah. Okay. Vice President Briggs. >> Oh, yeah. Mine doesn't work. Can I >> Thank you. >> Um I Oh, it was still on. Um I just have a quick question. Um possibly too. Uh are as far as the data, the disagregated data, who all included in students of color for this from educational justice, are native students part of that group? Um, and is it possible to disagregate them as a separate group? Um,

087and also students with IEPs wondering about that. >> Yeah. Yes, >> that group as well. >> We can disagregate the data any way that you all would like and share it for the purposes of progress monitoring. That's a conversation that we need to have and happy to do it any way y'all would like. If it's that we would want to see those numbers in in these sort of sessions, fine. We can do it that way. If it's that y'all would want to see them in some sort of like board memo, we can do it that way as well. And then to your first question around students of color, further from educational justice, it includes black, African-American, Native American, Pacific Islander, Hispanic, Latino, Southeast Asian, Middle Eastern, North African students, and multi-racial students from any of

088these groups. >> Ah, I see it's in the end notes. Yes. Okay. >> See, he thought I knew that off top of my head. >> Yeah. Very impressed. Um, okay. Great. Thank you. That's all for me. >> I think one comment I would add about that is we had as a recommendation not so much because I think the whole team thinks it's um particularly useful. It's just that um I wasn't ready to abandon it because it's something we've talked we wanted to have this conversation and look critically. That's a concept we've had for many years. So before we just said, "Hey, let's stop." I I have a feeling at the staff level people would might prefer to disagregate the data another way. Um mainly because it's very difficult to benchmark. this is a Seattle public

089schools thing and so it in terms of looking at other strategies uh looking at benchmarks um uh with our peers it it doesn't necessarily always offer a lot of value but that's not we wanted to have to u think about it and get feedback she was saying to keep it under two minutes because of me uh Um, I emailed a bunch of questions already, so you guys already received those. Um, I won't go into all of those to save everyone from them. Um, I'd like to, you know, mention kind of what Director Briggs just mentioned as well. We don't, we're not seeing any IEPs, 504s, or specific learning disabilities charted out on this graph. And although we do need to see you know the students furthest from educational justice that absolutely should maintain um we

090need to see you know the kids that are struggling to learn reading also broken out on this as well as you know highcap and multilingual learners would be beneficial as well to see how all of this data kind of goes together um going forward into this. We have a bunch of different competing curriculum at this point in time um along with you know apps and systems. What are we looking at discontinuing or you know how are we looking at the whole ecosystem of how these interact together as we're trying to meet these goals. The next one you mentioned sci um science of reading align trainings. Oh, okay. I just didn't know if you wanted me to rocket fire for two minutes and I'm happy to do that. >> Up to you. But you can you

091want to give him a chance to respond? It's up to you how you want to do it. >> I will stop. >> I I can go either way. I got notes. I have notes here. >> Um I'll I'll I'll be real quick. for the science of reading online training. When I've talked to teachers about that, there's been two call outs in that it was a two-hour training that happened one time. When, you know, they've done stuff in the state of Mississippi to improve reading rates, it was, you know, 60 hours over the course of the year. So, those are very different things when we're talking about that. We've done trainings. >> Um, also, science of reading, what specific trainings because that's a very much an umbrella term. >> I will finish up with the last

092one, which is hopefully a short one. There was a mention of the Dibbles assessments being given K through two. I just want to ensure that we are in accordance with the law and offering Dibbles testing to screen for dyslexia at all points in a child's education with Seattle public schools. >> Okay. >> So, you can go for it in just a sec. So, we we we may have more time for questions. The only reason I did the two minutes is because if we each do two minutes and they just respond, that's 40 minutes total. So that gives it like then we have a 20-minute fudge room. So we may have time to go around again. >> Absolutely. If we go around again, I have so many questions. But again, they already got them emailed and

093so I I did compress into my topline questions. >> I feel bad pushing people. I just want to uh we may have time for more questions as well. >> And be uh before I let um Dr. towards Morales give you real answers. I I do want to um highlight that we really appreciate his written questions. Staff are um working on responses and we'll transmit those to the whole board um that and as you know we normalize our practices. That's a practice we have and and it's great. It is really helpful to get those questions and again we're trying to um do this as much as possible as an interdisciplinary team. So we'd like to get a lot of eyes on it and that's um as we go forward I think it also touches on the

094subject of disagregated data. Do we want to you know 100 data points in a presentation? Do we want to we used to have a presentation and a memo? We're trying to figure out how that goes. But there is there is room to for us to present um uh more detailed information in other formats. So but we appreciate the questions going forward. So I'll shut up now. I'll also probably ask less questions as we've figured it out, but no guarantees. >> Yeah. No, thank you. Um, and I think, you know, one of the things I want to do a call out on is when you talk about the high cap results, that's where when you look at some of these MAP growth measures, those become very important because oftentimes that group of students is proficient or

095above on assessments and people just say, "Oh, they're fine." That's where you need to look at growth measures because it'll say even if they're proficient or above, have they grown a year or more in school? because that tells us how are we doing with our instructional practice. So just wanted a side note on that. But in terms of dibbles, yes, it is administered, but we will get some more confirmation on that. We'll submit it with your written response in terms of how how it's used for the dyslexia screener for the science of reading training. Julie noted and thank you. We have been doing a little bit of work looking at Mississippi and where their data has gone because they are they're very much an outlier, but they're being celebrated for the reading results. So we've

096actually been looking at some of the results thinking when we're thinking about our goals and also just thinking about like what have they been doing and so noted on the science of reading training and the amount and extent um so thank you for that and then in terms of competing curricular we are currently in the process of working through uh K through five elementary or English language arts adoption and then related to that as part of the strategic plan in our work with ERS they we recently pulled a team together of our elementary schools where we were seeing the be basically are the best results we're getting for language arts to talk to those principles have them get feedback from their teachers about what is it that that's working for them whether it was um

097the core curriculum whether it was something that they purchased on their own what were they doing and how were they getting those results for context for this for this group as well what we found was when we started to look at where the schools that were having the most success we saw the range in there and when I mean the range it was from all over different parts of the It was all different demographic groups. And so with what we felt really good about was okay, so we do have pockets that are doing this well for different groups of kids, different parts of the city, um different socioeconomic groups, pulled them together so they can give us some feedback too as we're thinking of drafting our initiatives going forward. How are we using some of

098their successes to think to start replicating that um across the city? >> M director Miss Rahi. Yeah, thank you. I'll have uh fewer questions, so I'll be able to seed my time to director Lavali. Um first of all, uh I think this is really uh very helpful work, especially in all the work that's gone into setting the baseline is super important and I think uh will be really helpful as we measure progress over time. So I want to appreciate all the work that went into that. Uh I think most of my feedback is on the um the strategies piece of it. not negative feedback because I know I understand where we are in the process. So I just want to give you my initial thoughts on it. Um you know I think that um it

099would be great to see I think all the things seem like the right direction. It would be great to see more just tangible like you know how are we doing these things? Uh how are we aligning systems districtwide? Um uh what professional development are we using? And I think the thing that we have an opportunity to do is to really develop these strategies in ways that are we can do a temperature check as they roll out to see which ones are working and which ones weren't. I think one of the challenges that I had in um our last round of progress monitoring with the strategies was some of them were like lumped together in ways that some things were working but it was hard to tell which ones were working and which ones weren't working.

100So I think being able to really identify which strategies are successful, which ones aren't, and we need to just move on from. Um, so as we build out these strategies from like the idea formed like what specifically are we doing, I think building in ways to measure the efficacy of each strategy. And then the other thing on what strategies we're using as we developed the goal, one way that we talked about this that I think was super important for those of us who were on the board was around resources and how we're moving around and allocating resources in a way that really focuses on this goal. So, I would love to see in these strategies what that means in terms of resource allocation, how we really are moving resources from wherever we're moving them from.

101And that's probably an important thing to know too to that uh K through 2 grade literacy. Um and and I think that um if we understand the resources that we're putting into it, of course, then we can as we measure what's effective, we can maybe pump more resources into those things. Um and the last thing I would say is that really thinking about and maybe it's in priority area too how um particularly in that K first and second grade how we really orbit the students school day around early literacy and thinking about how that becomes ingrained in their science and math curriculum and um what they're doing in library and music and just you know if if that's the goal is to really focus on that second grade literacy how do we make every piece

102of the child's school day about literacy uh and I think that's the type of resource allocation that I would be looking for at least that's my feedback. Thank you. >> Thank you for the baseline. Um looking at the um kind of draft that we have for now. Um, one point of feedback that I have is a lot of these strategies are kind of broadstroke systematic strategies and what seems to be missing for me is what are your strategies around jumpstarting the kids that really need to be jumpstarting? Um, is it high dosage tutoring? I I'm I don't know what I don't I'm not the educator. I don't know what the strategies are, but these right now feel very kind of high level applies to everybody, but I want to know what are the strategies for

103the kids that really need the extra support. Um, another um point of feedback for, you know, as we're going forward, um, I would be interested to see learn more about how um, this team plans to track fidelity of adoption for these strategies. So kind of looking at one of the things that you had learned with your previous strategies, there's inconsistencies that remain. So going forward with a new set of strategies, how will this team be tracking fidelity um for each of the strategies? Um and kind of echoing what uh director Mazari is saying um with future sessions of progress monitoring I think it would be really helpful to know you know what analysis was done and help us understand why we think the strategy didn't quite work the way we were working kind of more

104of that analysis and and also kind of um echoing what he said around um more specifics I'd like to get us to the level where um a parent would be able to kind of identify the strategy and their own students learning. Um so kind of getting to that's what can a parent expect um and I think it will be really helpful to bringing the community along around the work that we're trying to do for our kids. Thank you. >> Just want to uh re reply to that real quickly. You're speaking my language uh around accountability. So I would tell you in year one uh in this collection of our strategic plan we have not collected uh that data yet. Uh we have learned some things but systemwide we're we have not identify universal strategies we're

105going to put across K through 12. I would also tell you when you taking a look at the four disciplines that you have in front of you um I gave those out to you so you can see where we're headed. The lead, the lag measures, the correlation of data, all that's in the best practices. So you're going you're going to see us start to use that language. We wanted you guys to be proficient in the language we're going to be using. So when we start to look at the smart goals and start to collect these uh patterns, you'll be able to see it. I I would tell you um performance trends is where we're looking at immediately. And performance trends uh refer to patterns of change with students over time. And so we're looking at

106improving uh what's improving, what's declining, what has worked, what hasn't worked. We're also looking at the pace students are progressing. We're also going to be looking at the who's accelerating faster, slower, and then we want to identify what strategies that have worked, which ones we're going to lift up, and the ones we're going to stop using. Um, and so as we start to collect that in our strategic plan, you're going to see all this roll out in year one of our strategic plan. And we'll be very succinct with you about what's worked, what hasn't worked, what we're going to use for PD and support around that, and how we're going to continue to build that and learn from that throughout the year. So, we're just at the early stages. That iceberg, think about that iceberg.

107That's all the stuff that's happening underneath. Uh, like the ducks paddling underneath. We're doing all those things underneath to get to the point where you see us start to move forward and show growth. But we're just at the early stages. I think I think related to that when we talk about the multi-tered systems of support that is a model that OSPI does push that we need to do all school districts need to do because embedded in there are the research and ev evidence-based practices for what a student needs. So, it may be worth in a future time us just talking through what is that with the board so that people know because ultimately a parent should be able to know if their kid ends up getting a tier 2 support that should have been a

108conversation in some way like hey this is what we're doing and know but it shouldn't also be that it's exactly this thing for Joe this thing for Vivian this thing for Josephine it should be what does Joe need and this is what it is and the family should know but they it should be identifiable that yeah my student is getting a tier 2 support for reading or for even for science or what for whatever it is. So I think a little bit more conversation on that but Julie noted on the fleshing out on like yeah we we we're there too. We we've talked a lot about this like for example what would be almost the work plan for each initiative like what is it and within there if I hear you and um director Ms.

109Rahi it's also analysis of the outputs and the outcomes like what are the what are the steps that are going through in the work plan are we hitting them yes or no are we checking fidelity and also then what are the results coming so um duly noted >> director Manglesen more response just um to both uh your comments I think there'll be companion conversations as we discuss the budget about resources and how that aligns with this and And then we do want to do a longer session just on the strategic plan and drill down into the proposed initiatives early in 2026. So this is this is a really it is by definition a really high level delineation. >> Director Manglesson. >> Um all right. I just have one question. Um I heard you all kind

110of discuss how like when going beyond just data um you're engaging with parents like there's a lot of parent involvement and I especially heard uh discussions about like principles coming and and talking and being engaged in these things but um I'm really I'm curious because I didn't hear it mentioned um if teachers are directly being brought into these discussions and um because I feel like I mean obviously um as you move into higher grades like student engagement is a really good resource for understanding um directly like at the source of what's going on but I think especially you know K through 2 grade um I think teachers should definitely have some sort of a a voice in um kind of monitoring um what's going on in their classrooms as they're the ones um who are

111who are seeing it daily. Um so I'm just I just didn't hear anything. I don't know. I'm just curious if there are plans for it or if that's currently going on. >> So thank you for that and I'll clarify a bit. So for example, on Tuesday we had what's called school leader engagement session. That's where every principal across the city comes in and we do professional learning with them. And a lot of what that professional learning involves is working with them and what's called like their professional learning network. So small groups of principles around what their problems of practice are. But embedded in there is how are they working directly with their teachers and small groups and professional learning committee. So the way the model works is currently working is yes there's work being done

112with teachers uh through their principal or through their school leaders or assistant principles. So teachers are also sitting with curricular embedded assessments or those unit tests and looking at those and an um analyzing those. And so some of the work we did with them this week was talking through all right if you have a curricular embedded assessment what are you doing with that and how are you working with your teachers to look at that and do reteing. So yes, and additionally as we're talking through this multi-tered systems of support, the intent would be with the more unpacked initiative that there is going to be more direct also just coaching PD for the teachers. But currently that they are involved. It's not that they're absent. It's just that from our level, what we're doing is starting

113with the principles and they're going down and working with their teachers on data analysis and the assessments. Director Rinken, this to me represents a some something has changed. something has changed because this is a huge leap in understanding of what in my interpretation of what progress monitoring is intended to be and um I don't know if veteran veteran directors you know all of our six and two years or whatever um can see the huge difference in what was just presented as to what we've had before. um this is the level we need to understand when we're leading a system of what is the district actually do what are you actually doing to make these things happen and is it working um so I just want to acknowledge that there whatever you all have there's been

114a shift that is really important >> thank you I I think we can all agree old and new that what we were doing before in terms of these discussions wasn't really satisfying to anybody. So, people um really stepped back and dug into we need to do something different. People really pulled together. I'm very proud of this team >> and kudos to you, Superintendent Podesta, cuz as much as you will try to have us believe you're not an instructional leader. This is a this is showing a level of systems understanding and reflection to us as the governing body that we can actually see what do you plan to do and why you think it's going to make a difference for students and we'll be able to we'll be able to see that as as this goes

115on and it's really really really an important shift has taken place and I just wanted to highlight that um I definitely am missing seeing IEP P students and multilingual students. I think those are students that are um in need of the most support from our system. Um they're consistently at the bottom of growth and achievement. And it's not because they inherently can't do it. It's because they're not getting the support and access to education that they need. And so we're not monitoring that. We we we don't know if all students are actually making gains because we're leaving out some pretty significant groups. Um, and then to kind of tag along to what Director Song was saying, um, once we have that also, we'll be able to hear from you. Okay, here's what is working overall

116and to to better address the needs of students with disabilities, MLL students. Here are some additional strategies that we're doing to support those students. So, that'll give us um an idea of um what's working. Um, and um, yeah, I mean I I that's pretty much it. I just want to I want to thank you all for providing this baseline in a way that I think is what why we need to do this. What are we trying to do? Are we getting there? And what is the system doing to support what's happening out in buildings? This is showing us that. This is a huge leap forward and showing us that. And I'm excited to see how you all continue to work to align systems and structures so that what's happening here is actually connected to and

117supports what happens in our buildings and it's not just a conversation around the U that doesn't go anywhere. So I'm I'm very um excited to keep working on this together. >> Thank you. Director Yun, >> before you speak, uh just want to tell you the three areas that we're really focused on is targets, systems, and implementation. Those are the three areas that we were really focused on. Um what we haven't collected enough data on is what we're going to do to change adult practices. That's the next step in this process. And that's uh Dr. Torres talked about the principles getting trained up to be able to go in the classroom and do those types of things with walkthroughs and other things, but we're we're crescendoing down and cascading down to those pieces. So, that's the

118next step in those three areas. Just so >> I actually have one question related to that and related to what um director song was asking also about fidelity um is what types of or if they don't exist now um I would like to see strategies to you know fidelity is important but we also need feedback loops for if everybody is adhering to something that it turns out isn't working what are what are the ways that um you all are going to get feedback from the the boots on the ground so to say about um you know I I know we're in a we're in a position of of moving some things. But I know curriculum embedded assessments because we don't necessarily have everybody using the same curriculum. For some teachers, those are not embedded in

119their curriculum. They're a whole separate thing that they're now having to pause to to do. And so that's not as as particularly um integrated as as it may seem like it is. So, how are we how are we kind of balancing fidelity with also the feedback and then the support so that we're not just well everybody has to do this so we're doing it >> um but making sure that it's effective and and supporting students and staff. >> No, thank you. And uh as we continue to look at adult practices, I would tell you we're looking at PLC quality, we're looking at MTSS fidelity and then coaching implementation as an example of shifting adult practices. That's just one sliver of what we're continuing to collect right now, but we're working towards that. >> Now, Director

120Yun, >> thank you. Um, I only had one question. So, how are teachers being supported in helping these different student groups meet the target goal? Because from the data, every student group is at a different benchmark. And I can only imagine um how complex it could be for a singular educator in a classroom to make sure different student groups are um they have the correct resources to meet these goals. And it is a very big goal. So I just want to make sure the educators who are kind of doing the execution of this have those support systems in place. And it's fine if you like don't have a specific answer yet. I just wondering if that is something um that is will be implemented or at least an idea of >> please. >> So I

121think there's there's a couple things. One I would go to um if you go back you know I I was talking a lot about the principles and the work with the teachers. We actually had teacher leaders with us as well. If you go back to August, the first week of August was school leaders institute and each school had teacher leaders with them when we were starting our conversations around both uh multi-tered systems of support and um the Charlotte Danielson framework which is their teaching framework. So I forgot to mention that that they have been brought along in in this conversation. But additionally, when we talk about multi-tered systems of support, this is it's it's a big umbrella that has a lot packed into it, but when done well addresses a lot of the things we're

122talking about. So, for example, when you have a very functional MTSS system and you do a curricular embedded assessment, it'll tell us Eliza got this question wrong. Eliza needs support with this specific standard and here are the instructional materials and how a teacher can do that versus a teacher having to go onto a teacher's pay teachers or go dig through all these all these materials. And so the long-term goal is to get us there fully recognizing we're not there yet, but I wanted to just call it in the space. So that that yes, we are aware and that is the goal is to provide that to teachers. That does not mean we're talking about robotic teaching and we're talking about teachers using their craft. What it does mean is providing them the support of a

123research and evidence-based material and intervention when it's needed and then do your magic as a teacher in terms of the art and science of teaching. And then at the planning level, um thank you for your question, Director Yun and Director Manglesen. While the words don't, you know, sing off the page, that priority area um related to recruit, develop, and retain a diverse and effective workforce is the bulk of that is about teachers and supporting teachers and the um the connect, the observation, feedback, support. So they're they're very much again this is all about improving our practice and teachers are practitioners. So that is where the rubber meets the road. >> And I would just add one one of the things that we're doing and we're going to continue to do is abandon certain things that

124are working or uh that haven't worked in the past and get very clear about what we do very well. So you'll see that in our strategic plan. We have to abandon some of the initiatives, some of the things we're doing. We can't do all these things to mastery. Um it was mentioned that if you're doing science and reading, it takes 66 hours to get there. Well, we can't do that. Well, you get an hour here and then five years later you get another hour. We're going to see the growth sporadic. So, we are recognizing those pieces and we're getting very clear about what we can and can't do. Director Msudi. Um >> um so for when I was one comment I have was when I was looking at it I think that another category which

125other directors have mentioned is having a section for students that are non-native or don't speak English at home or English is a language that um they're still learning um and having that as a category for tracking their progress over um for literacy as well as what has been mentioned for students with IEPs and learning disabilities. I think that's also another category that's really important to be tracking and that's my only comment. >> Thank you. >> Well, I appreciate I appreciate the presentation. Um, and I appreciate the fact that we as a collective, as a board have started the conversation and started this journey together with uh four newly sworn in sort of count Joe and that director M and that uh with sort of this baseline conversation. So, we're kind of all starting in the

126in the same place. So, I appreciate the conversation that we we've had. I appreciate all the work that has been put into just sort of bringing this baseline and I know it's a lot of information tonight doing doing both goals. So, I appreciate you also um being prepared to do to do both of those things. I think that um also hearing from us as a board sort of the information we need to see in the presentations um to kind of feel comfortable with where things are at. Um it was really enlightening and helpful and also I think um something we're all kind of waiting is the wrong wrong word for but like where's that strategic plan then then fit in and excited for this sort of early uh 2026 conversation where we'll hopefully see some

127of the more details I think that I'm interested in similar to director song and director Misrai mentioned but I appreciate the work and thank you for the presentation. We do have a little bit of extra time. So if directors have extra question additional questions um I I want to uh give opportunity. So um director of Ali >> picking on me but I I went ahead and rocketed through as much as possible right then. So I think everything else is just in their inbox and you know >> perfect. >> But they've got a whole list from me. Don't worry. Um other other directors so it's >> all right. Director >> Ms. Rahi >> can you explain the grade one map growth slide to me? So this is >> Yes. >> I'm going to try and summarize

128my understanding which is probably wrong. So these are students who did not achieve grade level benchmarks. So we're breaking that group out. Correct. >> Yep. So those are the students who did not hit the benchmark and among those students >> okay among those students yes finish that thought >> 33.8% 8% of them made an academic year's worth of growth. 66. >> Is that on that same test or then the next year when we tested them, they made an academic year's worth? >> I'll have to double check. Um I believe it was from the same administration, but I I'll need to confirm that. I don't want to say that. >> So they're not meeting standard and they also didn't make a year's worth of growth growth from the previous year when they took the MAP test.

129>> Yeah, it goes through basically from that same what the way the statistics generally work is just it would be from that same assessment. it'll it'll look at it from their previous scores, do a determination based on where they hit. Each student um when they're done with the assessment will get a growth score or a growth rate that they should hit that would demonstrate a year's worth of growth. And so that's where that comes from. >> So someone's in so someone who's in that all student 33.8%. They are still not meeting standard, but they made a year's worth of growth. They're like on the same trajectory. They're on an upward trajectory, but it's not quite meeting standard. >> Yep. they made a year a year's worth of growth or more. I think one of the

130things when when you do this like when we get in teams and we start looking at these data some of the things to look at there are all right so who are they are they above a year because if you're trying to do opportunity gap closing you need to see that with among that group of kids that they've done like a year and a half to two years of growth sometimes not just that they hit a year because if they hit a year they're always going to still be a year >> well and the flip side of that if I'm understanding this then is that the students in the 66.2% 2% are not hitting benchmark and they're falling further behind than they were the previous year. >> Yes. >> Right. Okay. Okay, >> which is

131which is why we're when we start talking about a second grade goal, it's important to start looking at first grade because what this is telling us is that um for this this you know when you start looking back at the previous grades, that's the time where you need to jump in and almost like triage like >> well and it seems like not not an educator, but like it seems like that would highlight maybe some issues with the tier 2 and tier three interventions that need to be like >> Yep. Yep. >> boosted. Okay, got it. Yeah, >> I I would add to it is um we have to disagregate that data because sometimes we have students who are with us for one year, sometimes they're with us for two years, sometimes they come in year

132year two and they don't get a chance to get to the tier 2, tier three intervention. So as we unpack that data with teachers and principles, uh we have to look at the the interventions and how quickly we can actually establish that intervention. Sometimes that intervention takes six weeks or eight weeks with that person. um and you know the teacher is the biggest change artist inside of that classroom. And so if we can't get that teacher to have access to that student, we won't see that growth. So I just wanted to kind of give a a birdwalk into what does that look like and as we disagregate this data. So it's a lot in that data that when we look at growth data we're unpacking. I I would also say if you're talking about Ted

133and Ted came in and he was predicted to grow from the first uh MAP assessment uh I was supposed to get to say 75 percentile and then Ted doesn't get there. What happened along the way? Was it access to the teacher? Was it Ted stopped coming to school? What happened along the way? So Ted didn't get that growth that is so important even more so than looking at this data here. So that's the unpacking. I think that as we unpack this information that we're getting to, that way we can get to strategies and then Dr. Torres, what he's talking about with the MTSS assessments, we can actually learn from those pieces and then personalize that for why Ted's not coming to school, unpack that and maybe create a sense of belonging. So Ted will come

134to school and we can address why he's not getting to school, whether it's bus problems or he's being bullied, all these different things. So the more times we do this, looking at our four disciplines of execution that lead data, we can we can actually look into those problems that happen at school and predict that and actually address it before it happens. >> Other questions? Director Lavali. >> Yeah, I I did lie and I do have a a follow-up question. Um, I'd love to know a little bit more about how you identify the priority schools that you had listed on the document and is there literacy rates being track are there literacy rates being tracked separately and are you doing any different programming in those priority schools if they've been flagged? So, the priority schools are

135an artifact of the previous strategic plan >> that had um African-American boys in the topline goal. And that was really um a staff construct in terms of are is there a subset of schools that would have a significant number of African-American boy students? And so 13 schools accounted for 50% of that population in the district. And so then there were um uh particular practices and resources assigned. Since we're still in the throws of developing the next strategic plan, those most of those resources been maintained, but that's not necessarily a strategy that we're recommending going forward. It's still um it but it's still built into how we're doing things now. >> Wonderful. Yeah. >> And yes, those were tracked separately and as part of the act. saw those on the previous literacy monitoring reports and I

136just was like, "Huh, I hadn't seen other notes to that." So, thank you for the clarification. >> You will also see that uh looking at the the city uh schools uh total of 30 of them and probably you would ask the same questions. We have the same strategic focus on those students and uh and uh access to budget. Some schools got an additional even from 200,000 to almost 800,000 each year to actually move forward with these personalized strategies and then we monitored check to see what was working, what wasn't working. So it wasn't s planning, but it was extending what we were already doing. So we learned a lot from that as well as we're going into this next levy roll out, what we're going to do differently and how we're going to support the

137initiative, not just the school. And that was a big question people were asking. Are you going to adopt another 30 schools or are you adopting an initiative like literacy and then all the schools get supported for that literacy rather than just that school. So >> thank you. >> Others all right then we will take a quick five minute break. We'll be back here at 6:40. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. N. [Music] Hey. [Music] Hey. Heat. Heat. [Music] I missed my target by three minutes. I'm sorry about that, folks. We want to come back to the U. We're missing We're missing some staff. >> All right. Okay. We're going to move on to our uh goal two, our math baseline performance report. And again, we'll send it to Superintendent Podesta to start

138us off. >> All right. So, while it's unfortunate um that we weren't be able to hold to our calendar where we were doing early literacy in November and um math in December, the good news is that we get to skip over my intro part. So, the part that I was yapping um is exactly the same. And you guys already heard it. So, uh I won't do that. Um other than I should talk about the goal itself. Uh again, um we're looking for the same level of growth. Um and that the there's a topline goal that's been established um by the board that again didn't specifically um have call outs the way we had in the uh previous strategic plan. And so that's why we're talking as we've talked about with the literacy goal about how

139we will definitely as a practice with staff uh look at differentiated um uh outcome data and um whether and sometimes you'll see the word scenario in here and sometimes a target. Not sure we're exactly going to set targets for every um subgroup, but we will certainly monitor and have thresholds in terms of um if we are not closing the opportunity gaps that we are not um that we are still committed to. And this implies that we need to see not only can folks not fall behind, we are going to need to have um more ambitious goals for all the groups that we haven't been serving well. So while um and I know we need to have discussion about the topline goal and it's how ambitious it is but whatever it is there will be some

140um correlation between that and a more ambitious goal for groups that we've not served well before. So, um, it it it won't be if we're looking at 2% growth for any measure per year, it isn't going to align with our values that that same 2% is applied um to students who we haven't served well in the past. We're going to have to do something different there. So, we definitely are going to need to have differentiated practices. Um um and that's why we're um looking at one of the many reasons to look at a multi-ter system of support so we can address need um however it presents itself. Um and again it may not lead to a specific target. That's a discussion we need to have but it will certainly lead to different practices and will

141certainly lead to specific monitoring of disagregated data. With that sorry Dr. Torres Morales I'm going to turn it back to you. Thank you, Superintendent Podesta. Um, we're going to go straight into the baseline outcomes because the first part of the presentation is similar around um, performance status, those sort of things. And so, in terms of math, measuring the progression, we're going to once again talking about sixth grade math. So, we're going to start looking back all the way into fourth grade so that we know where and when to start intervening as needed. The two assessments that we're going to be looking at are the Smarter Balance Assessment or the SBA and the MAP. I spoke on the MAP earlier, so I'll go quickly through the Smarter Balance assessment. This is what some people would call

142the state test. This is the end of the year assessment that basically looks at is a student proficient at their grade level. It is a computer adaptive test and a performance test requiring multi multi-step reasoning. It measures mastery of grade level standards. And this is important because that includes conceptual understanding and procedural fluency, problem solving and application. What does that mean? If we were to go back probably about 15 years or 20 years ago, a lot of the assessments were just looking at computational fluency. So if you did an, for example, if you took those assessments back then and you were dividing fractions, it was flip the number, multiply, get your answer good. That's not what these assessments do anymore. It looks at do you know how to do that and do you understand what

143the concept means? So there's a that's the difference between math fluency and conceptual understanding. So when you think about the smarter balance assessment, it's assessing both of those things within a standard. And then it provides uh the purpose of it is to provide summitive endofear information and whether students have met grade level expectations. As you'll see below for the interim measure, we're going to look at the fourth grade SBA. Uh fifth grade, we'll look at MAP and SBA. sixth grade will look as uh at MAP as an indicator for where we believe our students are going to land in the SBA with the ultimate topline measure being the smarter balance assessment for our sixth graders. Here you'll see our topline measure with the baseline goal for the sixth grade SBA. So what you'll see you'll

144see the trend data for 22 23 23 24 and 2425. 2425. This was the end of the school year essentially. And now when you go to 2526 forward, those are the goal areas for the smarter balance assessment and proficiency. Okay, so our first interim measure is grade 5 SBA. So what does that mean? This is the current sixth graders. So what does that mean? This was when they finished their Smarter Balance assessment for fifth grade last year. So, this is our current cohort of sixth graders, grade 5 SBA. And in order to be deemed proficient on the assessment, a student needs to score at a level three or a level four. So, when you look at the number met for all students, it says 56.2%. What that tells us is our current sixth graders when

145they finished their fifth grade year last year, 56.2% of them scored a level three or level four on the smarter balance assessment. 43.8% of our students did not. Then you can further see that level uh that data aggregated by the subgroups that we presented knowing that there is a desire to see more data for for other subgroups. But here is just currently these are our current sixth graders how they finished the end of last school year. Next, similar to what we were doing in language arts where director Misrai was asking me around growth. This is for the grade five map growth for our students. So of the students in grade five who did not achieve level three or four in the smarter balance mathematics assessment, the percentage who met or exceeded their growth target. So

146these are the students who are current sixth graders who did not get a level three or four on the SBA last year. So when they finished their fifth grade year, they did not score proficient. Of the group of kids, 48% of them are demonstrating a year of growth or more in their academics. 51.9% are not. And then finally, we're going to go, actually, I think we're going to go through a couple more data charts, but this one is the grade four SBA. So, this was our current fifth graders. And as we were saying earlier, it's important to start looking back a couple grades so we know when to jump in instead of waiting till just sixth grade and only looking at sixth grade data. It's sometimes it's almost too late, especially when you think about

147some of those growth charts we're looking at. If we know we can't always get kids to grow by um more than a year within one academic year, we need to go back and just start planning earlier. So in terms of grade 4 SBA, these are the percentage of grade four students who achieve level three or four on the smarter balance mathematics assessment. So this was grade four end of last school year. These are the current fifth graders. So, our current group of fifth graders in Seattle public schools, 62% of our students uh scored proficient on the assessment and 37.9% did not. I think one of the things I want to call attention to that we've been pointing out pretty much all evening, but this data really shows us a stark difference when you start this

148aggregating that data, you can see how there is more support. there's more conversation needed for our subgroups about what's happening because we have several students, several groups of students who are performing so well, they're taking that number in the aggregate high. So, in general, people would say, "Wow, look at Seattle public schools. 62% of your kids are proficient in math." But when you look at our subgroups, you're like, "No, we have a lot of work to do here. This is not as as great as we think." And next, this is the grade six map. So this is fresh the freshest data we have. We are going to go into deeper a deeper look on this in a future progress monitoring on math. But this is just for some context. So this is our current sixth

149graders in the fall. How did they do? So the percentage of sixth grade students who achieved the grade level benchmark or higher on the fall MAP mathematics assessment. 51.4% of our students met would be what would be determined to be basically like a proficient score. MAP does give you what's called a predicted proficiency where it can it it helps predict where our students are going to score at the end of the year on a MAP assessment. And so currently the prediction would be 51.4% of our sixth graders by the end of this year will score proficient on the SBA. Next, uh we'll start talking through some pathways to success. similar to our literacy goals. I think I don't know if there anything further you want to say on this draft strap plan. >> I think

150the concepts are the same. It's still a nested set of um actions uh built around the goals and guardrails and our top level goals and that the accountability strategies would mirror these as well. So I I think um the remarks I made and Mr. Howard made would will apply to all the measures, this one and the life ready goal as well. So we're going to do a little bit of where we've been, what we've learned. So on the left once again, these were initiatives that were in our previous strategic plan and on the right it's things that we've learned. So one of the things was an adopted K through 5 instructional material with a focus on problem based learning and visual strategies to develop conceptual understanding. What we learned is that having a coherent curriculum

151across grades K through 8 supports students in transition to middle school. What does that mean? A lot of times when you have an instructional material within that material there's called the it's almost like the instructional routine or how the lessons laid out. the more that kids are taught in that same manner, not because it's supposed to be wrote, but more so that they're not wasting brain space on thinking what am I doing next? Like the lesson comes in order of like for example, what's a goal? What's the new knowledge? Those sort of things. And so the more that you can get into curricular materials that do a similar cadence for kids. Kids are then focused on what the standards or what the skills and knowledge are and not thinking what am I supposed to be

152doing next in class. I know we do problems now. We do group work now. we do, you know, end of so that that's kind of what that's leading towards. Uh required three years of training of newly adopted instructional materials for all K5 teachers. That's what we did. What we learned was that teachers need multiple opportunities to understand and internalize the structure and pedigogy. Online training must be followed up with classroom embedded professional development to ensure materials are taught as needed essentially or as intended. Apologies. Essentially, what this is saying is that yes, you can train the teachers, but until you're going actually into the classroom and having some of that work additionally with it, it's not sufficient to just say, "Oh, yeah, we trained them on how to find the lesson or how to find

153the material." Actually, what does that mean in the classroom and practice? So, how are you marrying those two things? Develop a consistent pathway to accelerated math in middle schools. Teachers need professional development and ways to support students to be successful in an accelerated pathway through different things such as differentiation and UDL. I think many of you know the highly cable department and myself we've been on a big listening tour through the whole fall and I think I may have heard this topic come up I don't know how many different times. So this is a big thing that we've recognized and we realize and within there is the idea of what does that mean and how do you do it? And so it's not just um that we're going to do it. We need to have

154it consistent. It needs to be a professional development. People need to understand uh if you ever want to Google it, look up the spiral of the standards and it'll really talk about mass standards and how that works. Um but it's very possible and basically what we're saying here is that we know we need to do better on this part in future strat plans in future work related to math. provide instructional coaching, professional development, and PLC support to increase the quality and rigor of tier one instruction. So, what we learned were coaching cycles allow teachers to develop their teaching practice by planning, trying, and debriefing instruction moves in the classroom. This is very much related to some of the question I was getting from director Manglesson earlier around like what are we doing with the teachers?

155And this is part of this is what we're saying we need to keep continue to do work on so that teachers know when when students finish a CA or they have MAP data what to do with that and how to help support kids in in the classroom. What we did required MAP administration districtwide in grades 3 through 8 to monitor skill development and growth and differentiate early based on need. So what we learned was the number of students who completed the MAP assessment increased each year. So we our students are taking the MAP assessment now but that our teachers need support and guidance to understand MAP results and use them effectively in their classrooms. So some of we've started some work on this already. We have a team called the students academics and services cabinet.

156That means that every director executive director that works in the schools division works in our student services division which is where special ed multilingual our schools are our regional executive directors of schools and our curriculum academics instruction directors. We all come into a meeting and we look at data and we specifically look at map data. And so one of the trainings we did recently as a team was just around how do you use the MAP results and the scores aligned to standards and what does that mean? So for every student, let's say it's me and I get a 171 on assessment. The maps the MAP assessment will tell you these are all the standards and things that I've mastered. Here's where I need more work. And so some of the things that we're looking at

157now is how are we also getting that down to the classroom level for teachers so they don't feel like I'm giving the map because it's required and it's just a thing. It is a thing but it actually has a lot of stuff in there that will help you uh and working with your students especially in moving them towards proficiency. So we've also had some trainings done with um some of our teachers on this already but this is an area that we say we need some growth in so that people are really clear as to the what how and why. The map is not just to predict proficiency on an SBA. It actually has instructional pieces within there that can be very beneficial. And then finally, required curriculum embedded assessments in grades six through eight three

158times a year to increase consistency and access to grade level standards across our system. Um these are promising tools for teachers to get feedback on their instruction and to provide targeted support to students. Similarly to the map, there is some work that we need to continue to do here around what in in the industry we would call question analysis. Essentially, when you do a CA or any sort of assessment, each question is pegged to a standard. And so when a student does not answer that question or only gets part of that question correct, that in turn gives you the knowledge you need to know that, hey, I need to work more with the student on this specific thing. Oh, there we go. Okay, you want to go? Again, this slide is uh very similar to

159the one in the literacy um uh presentation. And again, we're uh develop five priority areas as part of strategic planning and are um will come uh in several weeks to the board to talk about these initiatives in a bit more detail. Um and we want to make sure that um ongoing progress monitoring discussions, whatever form they take, um stay there's a throughine uh to our strategies in the strategic plan and our initiatives. And then of course we'll be talking a lot about finances and resources as well. And we're going to try very hard to keep those conversations connected so you know what our priorities are and where we're allocating our um time, people, and money. Thank you. You'll you'll note that these look very similar to the language arts, but it's the idea that this

160is an overlay for a different content area, different grade levels. So, even when you're thinking about MTSS, yes, but there is a difference between what this would be for middle school math versus or late elementary, middle school math and what it would be for early literacy. But the undergirling, the the concept is still the same at the root. top. We'll turn it back over to you for questions. >> Sorry about that. Just taking some final notes. So, we're going to do similar structure roughly two minutes. We'll go around the U this way this time. So, we'll mix it up, but I won't go to you right away. I'll start I'm going to start with Director Ms. Rahi because he's going to go um online. Um and so, just to make sure since I'm a little

161worried about technology, he's we'll let him go first. >> Thank you, President Top. Yeah, we had a >> try again. >> I don't know. Okay, is that better? Um, very helpful. Uh, I think similar feedback on the looking ahead strategies that I had last time. So, nothing nothing new there, but I think this is all helpful. The one question I maybe this is a goal setting question so I don't know if we're like past this point but why um so maybe you have to remind me because maybe this was a choice that we made as a board but why we're using SBA um smarter balance as the as the benchmark tool for the sixth grade math and not MAP testing like we did for the reading. >> When you think about second grade uh SPA

162does not start until third grade. So when the goal for literacy is now at second grade that that's that's why we would use the map. In the past we would have used when we when it was third grade we were using third grade SBA. SBA is available for sixth grade. >> Yeah. I guess maybe it's a maybe it's a it's an academic point because we're going to be looking at both. But but I think the benefits in my mind to map testing is that you're doing it multiple times per year. So you have more touch points to measure, more touch points to like adjust and see how things are going. Um and and I think you know uh that that I think gives gives a a teacher a school our system time to kind of

163course correct throughout the school year. It might not matter because we're going to be obviously we're not going to not look at one, you know, we'll be looking at both and I think they're both helpful data points. But um but I think we should also just be benchmarking the map, you know, along the way because I think it's it's still a helpful tool. >> Yeah. And I think that that's going to be the intent. And when you when you administer the map, it does give you a predicted proficiency that has a very high correlation. Basically, that'll say this percentage of students or this student is predicted to be proficient. And in general, what you'll see is that student does end up proficient on the SBA. But um duly noted and thank you. >> Yeah. And

164then I guess my last point is, you know, because now we have two metrics here. So I'm looking we have fifth grade SBA, fourth grade SBA, sixth grade MAP. I assume because they haven't taken the SBA, right? Right. That's like there's still But it'd be helpful to see the um fifth and fourth grade MAP testing because what I'd be curious about is like and you all probably have have an assessment of this already, but like where is the big drop off happening, right? Where are we where's that where's that inflection point where where where we're >> going in the wrong direction and having like is it is it the is it the gap between fourth and fifth grade, fifth and sixth grade, and like where is that really happening? So we can obviously target when

165we're doing the most intervention. >> Yeah. And so in our future progress monitoring that is that is exactly what we're going to um dig in really deep on. Currently this was the benchmarking but I believe we're coming back to this in February. And part of the reason that the sixth grade was included was superintendent Podesta wanted to be clear that we do have some fresh data. So let's show it so people know and are able to see it. and in our February um session on progress monitoring. That's where we want to definitely get deeper into those pieces that that you're talking about. >> Okay. Well, that's my feedback, but you know, otherwise this is also a similarly um great presentation and very understandable. So, appreciate all the work. >> Thank you, Director Massudi. >> Maybe

166can you come back to me? >> I Yes, I can. Director Yun, >> I don't have a question, but just a comment that I just really like how you all like focused and emphasized the difference between math fluency and conceptual understanding. These um standardized SBA map are designed very differently from tests you would take at schools. And so having those trainings and it's also very hard for teachers to grasp um learning a new skill to teach for um students on a specific test because test taking is also a skill but and in this specific standardized testing they test you on the conceptual understanding that may not always show up in a school setting. So I really appreciate how you emphasize those two different categories and how you are attacking those two categories to ensure students

167have an understanding and are prepared for both and the teachers are also prepared to teach the students. >> Where do you go to school? I know >> Seattle public schools >> what you just hit out of the park is so true and that's one of the big pieces our teachers are actually as they unpack that data and then um our our big big conversation is about how we actually take the curriculum based assessments and MAP and SBA and unpack those to see where we're having fall-offs where we need to actually ramp up tutoring if we're doing certain things to come back to helping our students get where they need to go. But you hit it right out of the park. That is the conceptual piece, that theory based, and then the actual things that we

168do in practice with our students. And so we call that the strategy is the approach and the initiative is the practice. And so we are really good at the practice, we're not so good at the strategy piece. And so as we merge both those pieces together, we're learning from these pieces. And so these are great conversations because we haven't got to a place yet to say hey what have we learned and what are we going to say as a we build our strategic plan for the next 5 years what are we committed to and what are we going to see in every building that's what we're collecting right now with the curriculum based assessment with the SBA and map and you will see that correlated to elementary middle and high school and then what you

169guys have said to us you want to see is when you go to any elementary school it should be the same assessments. It should be the same learning going on and that's what we are building now as we do the fidelity implementation. It should be the same when you go into different schools. Now we can exceed that but this should be a baseline but that's what we're working on. Director Ranken. >> Uh again, iterate my uh excitement over that the conversation we're having is about whether or not students are learning. And that is the conversation that the board should be having and we haven't been able to have that when the information provided to us doesn't tell us if that's happening or not. So the the leap in growth that has taken place is what

170we've been you know pushing for really for well the last two years but but before that too trying to get to a place where we're talking about what's going on um and in a way that you know a board could be comprised of I mean we're literally representative of the community. We could be anybody. we are anybody. Um, and we need to be able to understand at a high level what's happening in schools if it's working or not and be able to tell our community. Um, and I I feel like we're getting to a place where we're actually that's what we're doing now. and I feel really tired but um that it's been really long journey to get to here but it's it's an exciting place to be um uh uh after a lot of

171a lot of strife. Um, so the question I have is is related to what Joe asked and um, so because it's the ESBACK measure and the MAP measure. So they're not the same measures, but what I'm noticing is all students, all four columns that we have, every group, including the all student group declined from grade five to grade six. So I was wondering if you >> attribute that. Huh? >> No, nothing. If you attribute that to it's a different measure or is there something going on that we should be looking at? That's what's happening when kids are going from elementary to middle school that the proficiency rate or the benchmark or higher rate has gone down across all of the across the all student group and and the broken out student groups too. I mean

172>> oh they declined four to five also. >> We can go all over the place on that question. I mean to be honest with you, uh the predictive values of what's happening right now, it's personalized in each building. Um we haven't identified those strategies that go across all middle schools, all elementary schools. Some personalized it and they're doing wonderful things, but we're gathering that data right now to look at and disagregate that to see what's actually happening. We know there's a gap. >> Yeah. Um >> well and it looks like you did identify that um you believe a through line from K through 8 >> is something that's going to help that. >> Yeah. The two measures we're always looking at is algebra ready. >> Yeah. >> Uh was uh for kids coming into high

173school. Um but at the same time we got to disagregate what's what's been happening to get kids algebra ready. It doesn't just happen going from 8th to 9th. It starts way earlier than that. So what are we going to be doing differently? Uh two things that we're doing to actually address that immediately is how are we going to address ownership? Right now it's been put on the math department has to do it but Dr. Torres has said across the board with MTSS we got to go across the whole system to give kids more time on task. You can't just say the math department's doing that. You got to teach it in science. You got to teach it in reading. You got to teach >> and there's also a ton of literacy in math. >> Yeah.

174And so we got to unpack those things. And as we unpack that ownership across the board, we can get to th those pieces. But um some takeaways that I I want to mention was uh you know where we're investing in leveraging that which is our talent time our PD our tools and then taking a a large look at our programs and then we're looking at what our leading indicators will be uh for fall midyear and spring so we can pivot and make changes across the system and then what does that look like in closing that gaps every 45 to 60 days. So we're at the early stages of doing that with the strategic plan, but we're just at the early stages. So when Dr. Torres comes back, he'll be able to say the MTSS strategies

175for our elementary schools are this. And then you'll see that across the system. And then you'll see principles, you'll see district leaders going in to measure the quality of the implementation of that. And so then we get to fidelity, then we get a chance to see if this school's not doing it, then we can go in and coach them to get them to where they need to be. But we're just at the early stages of building this. >> I mean, early stages, but again, huge, huge leap forward. So, thank you so much to everybody for the work. >> Director Manglesen, >> um, I don't really have much to say. Um just that um kind of restating what Sabi or director Yun um said um I just appreciate how you're kind of looking at a bunch

176of different points and you're looking at um kind of how things move together and how we're considering um yeah I guess if that makes sense. But that's all. Thank you >> Director Song. Um, I didn't get to thank you with the last one, but thank you for including in your endnotes what are the actual skills. That was very helpful. So, thank you for including that information. Um some of the feedback I have would be very similar to um the literacy part but um it is actually helpful to have the baseline for both uh literacy and math back to back because I think I had this reflection around um there's a lot of assessment that's happening with our kids and it may be helpful I don't want to create extra work but it may be helpful

177for us to have a work session or like a mini work session to talk about what is the entire universe of assessment um by grade level and like what are kind of the what is driving the assessment what are you know what are we trying to do with assessment kind of more on a collective basis because now I would just share as a point of anecdotal feedback at my children's parent teacher conference they offered that there was new assessment around writing there's new assessment around science it's a lot of assessment um But it would be helpful for us to just kind of look at it collectively and I'm curious if some of the assessment decisions are being made on a siloed basis or they are kind of made at a top level. Um the other

178point of feedback I qu I guess more of a question is um so I think it's this year's cohort of eighth graders where the very first cohort of students in sixth grade all students are going to be taking math six. Um, and I think my understanding of that is part of the reason we wanted to go in that direction is because that's when you're pulling students from different elementary schools into kind of the same school. So, I'm curious if this team has done any reflection or analysis on how that approach has worked or not worked um, and how it will influence your strategic plan going forward. I don't want to ask a question on the question, but expand a little bit more because I I think I know what you're talking Actually, I do know

179what you're talking about. I just want to get a little bit deeper on the question. So, are you saying um for when all of the elementary fifth graders get into their neighborhood middle school and taking the math six? Yeah, we're working on those analyses now. Specifically, one of the things that we we had started to work through was for our highly capable students that were going between neighborhood schools and then into pathway schools and then what the offerings were going to be. So, we we are working on some of that analysis now. Bigger picture when you think through I believe it's noted in here, but some of the initiative work we're talking about is what's the math pathway in general for all of Seattle public schools. So, what we're going to be what we're trying

180to figure out now is what is the end point going forward, we know what it is right now, like every kid can get to AP calc. I'm pretty sure everyone can get the AP stats if they wanted to to sit for the the exam and then backwards map it all the way down to kindergarten. So, that some of the work that we're doing now. So, to your question, yes, we're in that analysis. We're super early. I'm not even to the point where I'm like, hey, we can get you something this week. We're very early, but yes, working on it and thinking about it more bigger picture for the system. >> Director Miss Rahi, >> sorry, but I I made it back out of >> order, but that's okay. >> Uh, maybe that's debatable. Um, I

181know the SBA has a alternative test, which MAP doesn't. Is that included in these SBA numbers? The W AIM, right? I think it's called. >> No, the W kids is the kindergarten. The Yeah, the kindergarten. No, the numbers in here are for the students that took the SBA and for the MAP. No, not that I want to know. >> We can confirm that though. >> Director Lavali. >> So, the first question that I had was about the computer adaptive testing. For the early literacy screenings, we were using one computer adaptive test and for this one, we're using two. Um, does that have any impact on our on the results that we're getting? I'm asking this also because I know in my own child's elementary school there, you know, he's doing a test on paper and

182then filling it into the computer because without doing that work and sitting there with the pen, sometimes he's just sitting there entering data and being like, I think it's five. um and not really engaging his brain in the same way that he does on a written test with space to think through things. So is is there do we expect that there might be any difference between written examination and computer adaptive testing? >> It's actually been a larger conversation across the country for a bit especially when most states move to the computer adaptive test. And so what we find um we can get more information for you on it specifically for what's going on in Seattle public schools, but oftentimes kids will need scratch paper to work through some of the things. And this goes a

183little bit into what we were talking about earlier. I think one of the student board directors mentioned it around like I think it was Sabi around or director Yun around um yeah there's there's all the actual learning parts of it and then there's like how do you take a test and so it is an unfortunate reality of what we live with but it is a thing where we do have to work with kids on tools. I'll go back to when I was a principal. We actually had to spend some time. I was very clear. I wanted it to be minimal, but you needed to teach kids how to use a protractor on the state test. You there's like calculator, different tools and different state, different assessment, but it is a thing. So, yes, we can

184get more information for you on it. But students in general do have access to be able to work things out. >> Perfect. Um, and then within kind of the combination of math and language literacy, director Rankin kind of mentioned it as well, but a lot of math problems rely heavily on word problems that you're solving and that was also mentioned by director Yun in the different types of problems that we're solving. Are we looking at any different are you looking at any differentiation of test results to see if there's a divergence in data especially for our multi- language students who are you know are English learners excuse me um who are maybe not at the same literacy point at this point in time but do understand these mathematical concepts and so is there differentiation that

185we're able to parse in the data to learn kind of who is um who needs improvement and on what. >> Yeah, we can pull some of that and unpack it and get you a more robust response around that. But there is allowable accommodations um and we'll get you get you all further information on that. But for example, there are the assessment for students whose primary language is Spanish. There is a way to do that for them in Spanish. it, but it's not currently for all of our top languages. Um, and there's also allowable for certain students who have diagnosed reading disabilities to have readaloud accommodations, those sort of things. So, some of those things are built into the assessment. I don't know if it'd be as robust as what we would like to see per

186se, but there are some of that does exist. Yes. >> Yeah. Then there's questions of are the students themselves and the teachers aware of those options and able to ask for them, which is a whole different not for this meeting. >> Yeah. We're still pulling uh data right now from the WEDA which was formerly GLAD strategies but now they went into the WEDA strategies and looking at that correlated to the the students and how they're doing on math. But we're also pulling data to take a look at the curriculum based assessments like you said when they're writing to see how the well they do on the curriculum based assessments versus when they have to do the computer generated assessments to see if there's a a difference. Right now it's just qualitative. We haven't been able

187to to pull quantitative data regularly, but we're looking at that individually with schools, the teachers who volunteer that information to us. >> I'm not even sure that's necessary for like ongoing reporting and and monitoring, but at the same time, when we're baselining, kind of knowing where the holes might be and how we might need to adapt them going forward for consistent monitoring might be beneficial. Yeah, it's it's to get us to get a baseline to see where uh teachers are at so we can help our teachers shift their behavior. So, if we can't get a clear baseline, then we're all over the place when we go in and say this is what we're going to guarantee, uh we're going to focus on a strategy at elementary or at middle or at high school. So, we're

188trying to get that baseline with our teachers so we can provide that professional development for them. >> Okay. Thank you, Vice President Briggs. >> Thank you. Um, I no no no questions for me. I I just wanted to echo Liza's appreciation. Um, thank you for this and for the previous one as well, of course, obviously. Um, it does it it feels like we might actually get somewhere, which is exciting. Um, and then I'm just gonna um I know the board passed these targets and I at the time felt that they were too low and I still feel that way and I would love to see us blow right past these like in a year. >> Uh, Director Smith, >> thank you. Um I first do kind of want to chime in on some of the

189comments on literacy um at disagregating around IEPs and multi- language learner learning. I know that will come up in the strategic plan, but just want to chip in. It's to be discussed eventually. Um I also want to say that having taught math at a college level, I absolutely agree with focusing on the earlier grades. Um, I I feel like even teaching college math, there there would be times where I'd say, you know, I'm too late. There's foundational stuff that needs to be mastered in order to engage with the material. So, um, and of course, I haven't taught in, you know, uh, elementary or middle school, so I I can't say like, yes, this is definitely the right place, but just wanted to give that agreement and support. Um, let's see. for the strategies that have

190been tried um for the adopted K through 5 curriculum. And I guess this was a little bit covered with the grade 6 math. Um but I was just wondering about um how it helps support the transition to middle school because we've adopted a consistent K through 5 um curriculum, but then I I think it would be good to see that consistency through six in in six through eight. And I think that has kind of been addressed. Um, oh, also just commenting on the numbers where um, this year's sixth graders um, their fifth grade score to fifth to sixth grade scores on the map to the or the SBA to the map. I think we have um, you know, it is concerning to see that go down. We also see the fourth grade compared to fifth

191grade. There's another drop. Although it's not the same students, it's you know different students. Um but the growth is is actually significantly better the the map growth um than on literacy. So that's you know a a reason to hope a positive. Um the trajectory over um like the starting in 22 23 um that's actually it looks like it's on track. So that's also good. um wondering how much um COVID may have impacted you know the current fifth or sixth graders. I know that that's a big a big big impact um for the curriculum embedded assessments. Um compared to literacy, it looks like that's giving really frequent feedback. Um so I think that's something having it just three times a year. We're not getting that advantage yet. So that's something else to and it might just

192be like okay it takes time to really start getting this started. Um, and then the last thing comparing to literacy, um, the science of reading, we have really strong examples of, you know, Mississippi and other places where that's been effective. Um, and I'm just wondering if there are any examples of really successful math learning that we're able to follow and draw on. >> We'll get you a response to that. A lot of it I I think were were comments and agreed. Yeah. Yes. Yes. Thank you. I agree. And then in terms of the um the math PD duly noted because I think when we look at the previous presentation is really clear like yep we're going to really hit hard on the science of reading and in adoption whereas in the math yes we do

193have some current strategy work around a subset of our schools that are getting intense PD etc. I think this conversation here is begging the question of how do we do that more and how do we validate the research base for that um versus just at a certain subset of schools do we expand it everywhere and validate the research base on it. >> Yeah. >> No follow please. >> Oh >> okay takes a minute to turn on just I just need to talk more. Um but yeah, I think having seen the the literacy um monitor progress report first um you know seeing the science of learning that was such a strong presentation and seeing what we've done with science of learning or science of reading and where we are going forward and so I think that

194having seen such a good example made it more apparent that like oh something feels like it's missing here. So >> so thank you for the the first presentation. Yeah, I think we'll we'll go around I'll say my comments and then we'll go to Director Song and we have a little bit of time for for directors if they have followup questions. She she wants she's good. Um so um again I think just more appreciative to the board for having this conversation. I think this is a great way for us to sort of baseline and and sort of all start in this in the same place as we we monitor progress throughout the year. So, I appreciate everyone kind of coming in and and and sort of grounding ourselves for for where we're going to go. Um,

195as we have a new uh new set of faces at the youth, so that's that's super exciting. But, uh, Director Song, >> I have a follow-up question. So, um, similar to my comment about the assessment, um, the professional development seems to be a important strategy for both literacy and for math. And I'm wondering how your team is thinking from like a more of a systems level. How are we approaching professional development? Not just the specific content that we're pushing towards teacher, but you know, what is the entire universe of professional development? When is it offered? When is it scheduled? Um I'm also wondering if teachers have is there a feedback loop? Do teachers have an opportunity to provide feedback on the professional development and also the assessment and how will you work in their feedback

196as you adjust your strategies going forward? >> I'm not trying to punt it over to Superintendent Podesta, but so I'll start. If you if you look um to one of our looking aheads around the second priority area, there's a this is uh a big thing that we've noted if you go to the work that was done by ERS and their analysis of Seattle public schools, they they identified that as an opportunity area for us that we need to work on our alignment of the systemwide district-wide PD um because it does end up getting siloed as as Ted as Chief Howard loves to use. we're we're sil and it does end up happening and so it is something that they've identified for us and also set that we we should set up some sort of initiative

197or priority to really parse that out and really develop it further so it's clearer >> exactly that both um with regard to that priority area around workforce and also um uh unified system of leadership there's been several areas where we've identified we've um spread responsibility and accountability across um our organization in novel ways that we um need to think about and and that would be kind of a one of the system level responses. >> Other directors. >> All right, that concludes our math uh progress or baseline progress monitoring presentation. Thank you so much, Dr. Forest Morales and uh accountability officer Howard and uh Superintendent Podesta. >> I I just want to say really thank you for your time. I really thank you acknowledging that this feels a little bit different. That was intentional there. There

198were a variety of just tactics that had nothing to do with knowing anything about education that um that uh we typically did these in regular meetings and I think this environment and a study session is a little bit more conducive to a different kind of conversation. I really want to thank my colleagues here at the table. We decided, well, maybe just different faces would be good. That does not I want to make sure that everybody understands this was a team effort and a people that um carried too much of the weight in past conversations had enormous um effect and and input into this process. Um all the usual suspects, Dr. Stroski, Dr. Toner, um Dr. Perkins, Dr. Anderson every and um ERA Dr. Era Jackson did a great job of facilitating our um uh students

199academics and services cabinet in a PLC type environment. And I just I just want to underscore everybody contributed. Um we intentionally just wanted to do it a little bit differently just to be different because we thought it was a good way to reset the conversation and I think the content is different. there's substance behind it, but I just don't want anybody to think that different people are contributing because we everybody came and pulled their weight and I really appreciate it. >> And yeah, our business intelligence team, I'm I'm going to leave people out. Phil Romano, but many many many hands. No, the well our uh executive directors of schools are the ones who are really tasked with leaning in at the school level and and that's really I think um some of us who could

200have picked up weight before are picking up weight and I think that's helpful for all of us. So I just want I I don't want this isn't us. We're just we just we just had the privilege of being the spokespeople for this. >> Appreciate that. Thank thank you, Superintendent Podesta, and acknowledging the amount of work that it takes to get to this this place and really refining it. And I I know I've heard from you personally the the amount of work that your team has been putting in um to to present tonight. So, thank you. Thank you all. Um so, with that, uh concluding our progress monitoring, I just want to do uh one quick reminder that we have our next board meeting on December 10th. That will be our regular board meeting. But as

201there is no further business on the agenda, the meeting >> President To Can I ask one question? >> Yes. >> We need a third uh uh director Briggs is not able to attend our audit committee next week. So it'll be director Morrai and I. We need a third third person if anybody is in I mean everyone is welcome to join the meeting but if there is uh a director who would like to join as the third um let let President Top know please. >> Let's have Carrie send out an email to board directors because I don't even know when it is off the top of my head. So I can't can't I I don't know when it is on the calendar. So since we do need a third in the audit committee, we'll have Carrie

202send an email around to see who can who can fill in. All right, with that there being no further business on the agenda, the meeting stands adjourned at 7:34. Thank you everyone. Have a wonderful evening.