Summary of Partnership Action Team for International School 
11/1/99 meeting at Lincoln High School 3:45-5:00 PM

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John Stanford International School at Latona Elementary
Mission:  To Educate and prepare all students to achieve today 
and tomorrow in a global community and economy.
(206) 298-7744  Principal Karen Kodama
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recorder: Michele Anciaux

PRESENT:  
Michele Anciaux, Paul Aoki, Gordon Luke, Rik Katz, 
Katie Frevert (Latona parent),
Eduardo Tobar (Spanish language consultant at State
Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction), 
Sharon Cronin (bilingual instructor & Pacific Oakes College)

NEXT MEETINGS:  
    November 8  3:45-5:15 PM Lincoln High
    December 6  3:45-5:15 PM Lincoln High

also coming up:
    November 7-9 Port Ludlow Retreat
    November 13-14 Primary Years Program Training
        in Melville NY (for Concie, Nani, Margreet)
    December 18 AM - Kick-off Winter Walk (see below) 
    January 28, 31 - possible workshop with Regla Armengol
      from Center for Applied Linguistics in Wash., DC, set
      up immersion program in  Fairfax County

DISCUSSION ITEMS FROM 11/1/99 MEETING

1.  How to tie curriculum to Social Studies (Dolly)

The school has adopted a new social studies curriculum,
"World Communities."  The question had to to do with how to 
cover different geographical areas:  
* cover specific geographical areas by whole school  or
* cover specific geographical areas by grade level

From the discussion, it seemed pretty clear that it is more
"doable" to focus on certain geographical areas by grade.
This also matches the new curriculum better:
K-1	Mexico
2-3	South America (and Central?)
4-5	Spain (Europe)

It is still possible to do some school-wide activities to make
it coherent, but each grade-level teacher won't have to develop
curriculum for Mexico, for example.

2.  Fund Development

Karen has received a letter from the General Counsel suggesting
what are and what are not appropriate ways to "recognize" or
mutually benefit businesses and other groups that contribute to
the JSIS.  (For example, nameplates in books are OK.)

Karen is interested in trying to write a grant to fund a staff person
to be community liaison.

3.  Web Site

Our UW student web site developer is getting started.

4.  Brochure 

Karen is still looking for a donation of printing for the brochure.
SAFEO can't do it.  Karen will approach Boeing.

(Note: suggestion from Michele - is there any chance of getting
Landor to provide a modified black-and-white version that can
be printed as needed for general consumption?  Even if we get
an initial print run donated, we are likely to run out.  We can't
be left sitting with nothing to give people just because the color
printing is prohibitive.)

UPDATES FROM PARTNERSHIP ACTION TEAM

We talked mostly about working on the connections with Latona 
School community.  Karen informed us that the Latona Site
Council is not currently meeting and will reexamine its role in
May.  Karen would like to include parents on the School 
Leadership Team in the future.  Students (who used to be
represented on the Site Council) are now encouraged to be
active in the Latona PTSA.

[Historical Note for those of you who don't know about site
councils and such.  Speaking in general terms (since I
don't know the specifics of Latona), the Seattle School
District was encouraging schools (and at one point
mandating schools) to establish "Site Councils" - typically
bodies representing parents, teachers, staff, students,
principal, and often community members.  These Site
Councils were intended to provide a forum for shared 
decision making in the school (which was viewed as a
necessary component of education reform).  Some schools
developed very strong, effective site councils; many did not.

After John Stanford (and Joseph Olchefske) came to the
district, there was a move toward more local decision making
in schools through a new funding formula.  In connection with
this (if my understanding is correct), principals were to 
establish "Leadership Teams" to include staff and teachers
in the decision making process for allocating funds.  Sometimes
parents could also be included on the Leadership Team (though
to my knowledge, there was no mechanism for "electing"
parents to represent the broad parent constituency).

In any case, things seem to be a little confusing right now
because there may be multiple shared decision making bodies
(e.g., Site Council with elected members; Leadership Team
with selected members; PTA/PTSA with elected members -
but you have to join the PTA to serve).    Michele]

In terms of the role of the "Partnership Action Team," our
job is to interface with whatever is the leadership body at the
school in order to directly relate our efforts in builing school-
family-community partnerships based on strategic goals
that the leadership body has set for the school.

Not sure yet how we'll sort this all out, but it seems like
the next step is for members of our Partnership Action Team
(i.e. the "Outreach Committee" for the John Stanford
International School) to meet with leaders in Latona school
(whether Site Council, Leadership Team, or PTSA) and 
see what everyone's priorities are.

A final topic of conversation was the future of BOC (Bilingual
Orientation Center) kids at the school, i.e. how to encourage
them to stay on at JSIS after they complete their bilingual
orientation.  Karen says it will really be up to the parents, 
recognizing that the kids will be getting 1/2 day immersion
in Spanish and no special ESL instruction (once they enter
the regular program).

Also, how do we attract, in particular, Hispanic families
to apply to Latona next year?  Eduardo and Karen said they will
work on creating a piece to give to the Latino Childcare Task
Force of King County and other Hispanic community groups.