Wednesday, September 18, 2019

Minutes from 9/17/19 Meeting


HiCap Parent Council Meeting
with Amity Butler
September 17, 2019
10:00 am – 12:45 pm


  1. Amity - 2018-2019 Highly Capable Eligibility Process Report, which will be submitted to NSD School Board on Monday
    1. NNAT3 screening results
    2. Low Income based on Free & Reduced Priced Lunch
    3. Final Qualification Decisions probably includes kids who qualified via portfolio review
    4. Question: How many kids qualified but had a score of 94 or less on Naglieri?
  2. Amity - Working thru website feedback to fix the problems
    1. Explaining unclear data, including timelines, processes and FAQs
    2. Trying to clarify October 25 date
      1. Want permission as soon as possible because if a child passed thru screening process, not a lot of time between screening and assessment.
      2. Need permission prior to assessment.
      3. Will robocall parents for permission as necessary.
      4. Do not need permission from K parents since all K kids are tested anyway
      5. 1st and 5th grade – permission not needed until after screening.
      6. Oct 25 mostly for students new to NSD or whose parents referred children
    3. 7th grade is still missing on the drop-down list in the referral form
  3. Amity - Testing
    1. Proctor training: October 11
      1. Request to inform proctors no music, yoga poses or other distractions.
      2. Clarity on whether kids should guess on the tests.
      3. Amity asked principals for name of para-educator from each school to train as proctor
    2. Screening deadline: October 16. Kids who enroll after October 16 will need portfolio review
    3. Permission form will add first and last name. Entering Student ID is super helpful and saves a lot of time.
    4. Request to send robo-call to parents of single-qualified HiCap kids to complete permission form
    5. Confusion about whether SBA test matters to middle-school kids, and that the results may be used to determine algebra or other placement.
    6. Only test that every child will get this year is I-Ready, 3 times per year: October, January and May/June. Star is teacher and school dependent. SBA will occur in the spring.
    7. Naglieri – Problems with color-blind children. Should add a color-blind checkbox to the permission form
  4. Planning to pilot for single-qualifiers math (467) pick a few schools to do online capabilities where students login to work on accelerated math if not already have a program set up in building. Some buildings have something set up, others do not. Will pick schools willing to work with them and teachers. Could be during I-Ready time. Software is Edgenuity. Teacher would become facilitator. Not necessarily giving the lessons. Considering Beast Academy for AAP classrooms. Concerned about instructional component needed for Beast for younger grades. Trying to make this as self-contained as possible for non-EAP teachers. The struggle is every school does things differently. Driven by Katie Byornstad. Designed for credit recovery more than acceleration.
  5. MineCraft pilot last year – Does not work on ChromeBooks. Very intensive on teachers to create the worlds to create a good math lesson. But some kids was fun enough that non-HiCap kids would be jealous.
  6. Why is walk-to math not a priority at elementary schools? It’s a contractual issue. Scheduling is another issue, especially when there are lots of classrooms for a single grade. Clustering is officially recommended by the district, but not actually implemented by individual schools. Can you hold schools accountable for not implementing the district policies? Is it official policy or just a recommendation? Sometimes it’s a teacher accommodation since a class with some HiCap kids is easier for teachers than no HiCap kids. This is a particular issue at Moorlands, but not unique to Moorlands.
  7. EAP sites for next year:
    1. Question about Fernwood EAP classrooms for next year? No idea right now.
    2. Boundary changes are not finalized. October 7 is first meeting of EDTF.
    3. Questions about whether kids at some EAP sites want to stay at current site or move to home schools that now that EAP. Parents are split.
    4. Bear Creek – Anxiety among families. Would like to know where kids will end up. EDTF decision on EAP due by October and GenEd assignments by November.
    5. Parents would love to see consistency of testing and placement. But there are real costs to moving kids around and no way to please everyone who have different priorities: commutes, going to neighborhood school, staying at current school, keeping siblings together, keeping friend groups together, etc.
  8. NorthShore Family Partnership
    1. HiCap qualified students are not getting services
    2. Similar to in-school services, but different because NFP has electives.
    3. District provides curriculum to do the work at home
    4. Is there an acceleration option for NFP?
    5. Big question – What is the policy for HiCap kids in NFP?
    6. Should we be adding an NFP rep to the HiCap Parent Council?
  9. Middle School AAP
    1. Canyon Park -- Challenge kids and HiCap kids in same classroom. They are teaching a HiCap curriculum but with some selected Challenge kids who “qualified”. Teachers were originally confused about which curriculum to present.
    2. SkyView – HiCap kids are spread around.
    3. Would like to see consistency across middle schools
    4. Leota – Interest in piloting HiCap science curriculum.
    5. All AAP curriculum changes happen by piloting, for all subjects.
    6. Part of the problem is there is no AAP curriculum
    7. Amity will reach out to teachers to see if there is interest in piloting
  10. High School
    1. Families have not been informed there is a HiCap class. Not entirely clear there even is a HiCap class.
    2. Woodinville and Bothell have GenEd and Pre-IP English
    3. All 9th grade students are automatically enrolled in Pre-AP English 9, with the exception of 2 HiCap only sections of Pre-AP English, and a small group of Learning Center English students. Inglemoor is doing the same approach, except their course is titled, "Pre-IB English 9.
    4. No idea if curriculum is different
    5. Concern is no communication to families about any of this
    6. No descriptions or syllabus for courses, let alone consistent titles, for parents and students to make informed decisions about which classes to register for
  11. Integrating 6th grade classrooms
    1. Math clustering is not happening
    2. Problem with 6th graders being in class with 8th graders


Post Amity Discussion
  1. Missing By-Law signatures and pictures on website
  2. High school
    1. We should try to communicate early about registration issues
    2. Website has tips for Bothell and Woodinville HiCap registration
    3. Nothing for Inglemoor or North Creek
    4. Suggestion for parent education night
  3. Discussion about Naviance as a schedule planning tool, particularly for college
  4. Suggestion for high school guidance counselors to have all HiCap students instead of assigning them by last name
    1. Not a priority
    2. Could cause issues within schools
    3. Not enough support
  5. Priority for Dr. Reid and HiCap Board is developing curriculums for single-subject HiCap, EAP and AAP. That will help with consistency among teachers and schools.
  6. Discussion about non-academic criteria for identifying HiCap kids, such as creativity. But creativity is not always an indicator of HiCap.
  7. Concerns about English class novels all being about death and conflict.