Re: “Make Seattle family-friendly again with effective school governance” (Could 23, Opinion):
Kudos to Donald P. Nielsen’s name for restructuring Seattle Public Colleges’ ineffectual governance system.
Because the Sixties, main coverage quagmires corresponding to desegregation and faculty closure ushered in a brand new breed of activist board members, lots of whom knew little about overseeing advanced programs. Seattle Faculty Board alternatives of superintendents since Forbes Bottomly have been equally uninspired, excluding John Stanford.
We should be lifelike about the way forward for management for Seattle colleges. The SPS board is incapable of righting its personal ship. Asking a brand new superintendent to result in wanted change whereas concurrently coping with a inexperienced and politicized board is folly — as historical past has proven.
Nielsen factors us in the precise route of entertaining progressive choices for college governance. Such a radical change would require contemporary considering and a coalition of neighborhood leaders outdoors SPS to re-vision governance and education for SPS. Our neighborhood is rife with organizations and specialists able to main such a course of. We’re lengthy overdue shedding early-Twentieth-century governance constructions for the calls for of Twenty first-century education.
Stephen Rowley, Ph.D., Bainbridge Island (former SPS instructor)
