The Observation Deck

The following is a message from Lakewood City Schools:

Come learn about our Gifted Program

The gifted program information meeting scheduled for Wednesday, February 25, has been canceled. A new date will be announced as soon as possible. The meeting scheduled for Thursday, February 26, will take place at 7 p.m. Please note that the meeting location has been changed to the Horace Mann Elementary School cafetorium. Horace Mann is located at 1215 West Clifton Boulevard. The parking lot is accessible from Webb Avenue. All are welcome.



If you have kids in Lakewood Schools, or you're going to, or you have had, and you've had a great experience (or a not so great one) with Lakewood's Gifted program, please attend one or both of these meetings.

There are big changes afoot; so far--some seem good, some seem not so good, and some of the reasons for the changes could use more examination from the community. Those of us who have had a great experience owe it to our school system and fellow parents and families to share what we know, and to safeguard what has been so good. The parents, kids and teachers who have participated in the past are the ones with the greatest amount of experience, so please come and share. If this program has changed your kids' lives, take the time to support its wonderful teachers, and the rest of the families who haven't yet had a chance to participate in this program.

Betsy Voinovich


A teacher and a graduate of Grant Elementary school's 4/5 Gifted program congratulate each other on a job well done at a recent performance of one-act plays at LHS. (The plays were acted, written and directed by students.)

The gifted program information meeting scheduled for Wednesday, February 25, has been canceled. A new date will be announced as soon as possible. The meeting scheduled for Thursday, February 26, will take place at 7 p.m. Please note that the meeting location has been changed to the Horace Mann Elementary School cafetorium. Horace Mann is located at 1215 West Clifton Boulevard. The parking lot is accessible from Webb Avenue. All are welcome.

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I did not get much out of this meeting. The presentation was disjointed. The message was unclear. The group activity was confusing. I think that everything could have been covered more clearly and completely via an email or a flyer sent home or a presentation posted online.parents would then have been able to give it more thought and provide feedback at their leisure.

It doesn't feel like Lakewood City School District is giving the professionally trained and experienced gifted educators much agency in the process. When teachers have to show up to public meetings to plead for what they think is best for their own classrooms, it means they're not being listened to at the top where the "decision makers" meet and discuss. Lakewood has excellent teachers, the district lauds this fact, but my experience tonight and in the past shows that we are not appreciating our educators for their input, problem solving ability, and leadership potential. If education choices, such as eliminating the "split" or two-year cohort classes, are being made at the top without serious listening to the excellent educators at the bottom, we'll continue to see programs and choices done for the good of the numbers and state report card and not for the benefit of our children. Tonight's meeting, with all of the reminders that this is an inclusive process, was a top down answer to needs being felt at ground level by our teachers and it's a shame that the teachers aren't being allowed the agency to effect change.

Right or wrong, I also felt like this was merely a formality. A CYA meeting to be able to say that you asked for public input. That was just the vibe I got.

Part of the reason for that feeling was the presentation. Many slides were skipped and many others were not shown long enough to read. This tells me that the presentation was not designed for this audience or this purpose. If you plan on a quick summary then you (re)design your ppt to be shorter and more concise. That kind of thought/time/effort was not put into the prep for this meeting.

As I said in the meeting, I have been mostly very happy with the GT program offered by Lakewood. I do lament the loss of the 4/5 split class that I believe helped my daughter to thrive during those grades.

I also hope we aren't wasting valuable time, money and effort chasing some phantom state report card grade - especially for value added. If those grades had any meaning then just doing what was right for the kids would be enough to raise them. If we're chasing anything else in order to rank better then the state evaluations are meaningless.

Sean Wheeler wrote:It doesn't feel like Lakewood City School District is giving the professionally trained and experienced gifted educators much agency in the process. When teachers have to show up to public meetings to plead for what they think is best for their own classrooms, it means they're not being listened to at the top where the "decision makers" meet and discuss. Lakewood has excellent teachers, the district lauds this fact, but my experience tonight and in the past shows that we are not appreciating our educators for their input, problem solving ability, and leadership potential. If education choices, such as eliminating the "split" or two-year cohort classes, are being made at the top without serious listening to the excellent educators at the bottom, we'll continue to see programs and choices done for the good of the numbers and state report card and not for the benefit of our children. Tonight's meeting, with all of the reminders that this is an inclusive process, was a top down answer to needs being felt at ground level by our teachers and it's a shame that the teachers aren't being allowed the agency to effect change.

Sean,

Very, very interesting post!

Great customer experience doesn't start at the bottom of the pyramid:



But for those who fear empowerment:


????

Scott Meeson

I attended the Gifted & Talented presentation on February 26. Given that G & T program received a D on the state report card last year, I had high hopes that I would hear from the administration about how they were going to address this situation and improve the program. Unfortunately, that was not the situation. The presentation was hastily put together and came across as the administration simply wanting to say that they met with parents rather work with them to improve the program.

The focus of the presentation should have been on what we are doing to fix the program and provide our students with the best education possible. Instead the presentation was an example of our administration not looking to solve problems but wanting to apply window dressing to a legitimate area of concern. As one parent stated to me “they are not concerned with the quality of the program and improving it, they just want to find a way to improve the report card grade.”

The problems with the presentation included:
• No presentation material was handed out
• Many slides labelled “Westlake High School” – we can’t create our own slides?
• Many slides not covered – the presenter skipped over numerous slides. If they were not of value that should not have been included.
• The presenter read several slides verbatim to us. It felt like a way of running out the clock so that they did not have to answer questions.
• A discussion of several items not relevant to the Gifted / Talented program
• There was no central theme / message nor was there an action plan to address the situation

In addition, the presenter made it clear at the start of the presentation that there would be no opportunity for stakeholders to address their concerns directly to administration (“we should park our questions on sticky notes, post them on the wall and the administration would post answers to they on the website in the weeks to come”).

While it may not have been the goal of the administration, the impression given was that they did not want our input; instead they just wanted to say that they met with the parents / stakeholders. The whole thing felt like they were just patting us on the head and telling us to run along while they took care of this issue because we would not understand how things worked.

There is another presentation on March 3. I remain hopeful that the following questions will be addressed.


• Who is on the 3 committees? How were they selected? Are they from all schools and stakeholders?

• Why wasn’t a survey sent out / sent home to the current participants asking them for their feedback / insight on the current program? Why were parents only addressed now with less than a month to go for their opinions and ideas?

• What problem(s) are the changes addressing? – Tough to decide if the changes are needed / helpful if we do not know the problem they are meant to address. The concern from the stakeholders is that the changes and discussions are nothing more than window dressing (putting lipstick on a pig) rather than actual solution to the problems we face. For example, last year we had our 7th grade math students take the 8th grade exam. This exam covered Geometry which they had not been taught yet. The only reason for the change was so that we could get “bonus points” on the state report card. It had nothing to do with improving on student’s knowledge and skill with math. Are the changes being discussed more of the same?

• Many have complained that the G&T program just teaches 1 year ahead (5th grade material in 4th grade) without adding any depth and rigor to the instruction. What are we doing to address this concern?

• Are we going to keep the current self-contained program and add ‘clusters / pull outs’ to it? Or are we looking to reduce the size of the self-contained program by focusing on adding “clusters / pull outs instead?

• Are we looking to start the program earlier or will it still start in 3rd grade?

• Feedback the administration received from our G&T alumni indicates a need for more instruction / work on critical thinking and writing. What is being done to address this concern?

• The presenter made the comment that we need to provide our teachers with training so that they could better serve our students. If this is true, what are we doing to improve our hiring practices so that the teachers have those skills when they come to us?

• What parts of the G & T program does the administration feel need to be improved? Strengthened? Revamped?

• As a district how are you addressing the curriculum for teachers? What training are they receiving?

• The split classes (2/3 and 4/5) were highly rated by both teachers and parents, why were they ended?