Advocacy
District Reconfiguation Survey
Deadline: Tuesday at 5pm!
To view the slides presented in the meetings, CLICK HERE
To watch a brief voiceover presentation of the slides, CLICK HERE
To watch a video of one of the full public presentations, CLICK HERE
Alpine School District Split
Alpine School District is studying the feasibility of a district split. The company that was contracted for the study, MGT Consulting, will be presenting the various options at these upcoming public meetings. This is an important discussion on which we need to share our voice. Attend one of these public meetings if you can, and there will be more on surveys and emails to come. These could be the only public meetings held on the topic.
If the school board approves a split decision, that configuration will be on the November ballot. There are currently 6 options proposed, but only one will be on the ballot for voters. Now is the time to make your opinion known.
More Information:
Preserve and Expand
Update: Sarah Beeson (Board Member) will be holding a Parent Feedback Meeting on Tuesday, December 19th @4pm at Westfield
The district feedback will remain open until at least January 9th.
Alpine School District has decided to close down Westfield’s Advanced Learning Lab (A.L.L.) program. The Alpine School Board heard a presentation from the Executive Director of Equity, Inclusion & Student Support regarding a recommendation to REMOVE A.L.L. programs from Westfield Elementary. They proposed removing 2 A.L.L. programs in the area (Westfield and Cedar Ridge in Cedar Hills) and leaving only the program at Highland Elementary. Reducing the total spots in the area from 90 to 30! These programs were the ONLY they recommended to close.
Why?
The district's claimed goal is equity across the district by reducing access in our area rather than increasing access throughout the district. An additional justification is that Westfield does not attract as many out of area students as other A.L.L. sites. This is likely due to the specialty programs in this area, however, our scores are still very competitive. Your students would likely be accepted if you lived elsewhere in the district. There is NO additional cost associated with A.L.L. programs and no justification for our school to lose this vital program.
The PTA and SCC at Timberline evaluated this issue extensively over the past couple of years and determined that the scores were so high in the area to justify 2 A.L.L. programs at Timberline. Now, the district wants to take away the ONLY feeder program into Timberline.
What can be done?
There will be no vote and if you listen to the board meeting, there was very little deliberation. There will be no town hall meetings to discuss this issue. The decision will be made by the district but community response is vitally important. We need to advocate for Westfield NOW. The comment period ENDS on December 21st. We need a very large response from our community in order to influence this decision. A few emails won't make the difference, we need everyone to help!
By district standards, Westfield is a smaller elementary school. If this change goes into effect, we will likely loose nearly 20% of our school population. There is no justification to move these kids out, who are loving Westfield, and reducing the size of our school and taking resources, unnecessarily. This will further exacerbate the challenge we are already having with HUGE classes in some grades.
Rationale for continuing ALL at Westfield Elementary
Closing the Westfield ALL program conflicts with the Study Committee’s Guiding Principles #2 and #5: by eliminating a program pathway through secondary, and by removing a program where it is possible to strengthen and expand it.
1. Essential feeder program for middle school ALL: If ALL were removed from Westfield Elementary, Timberline Middle would be the only middle school in ASD without an ALL feeder school. Timberline has two successful ALL sections.
2. Better behavior and social experience: Including some students in the program who have ALL test scores below 95% provides a better balance in the classroom with improved behavior, greater social skills, and higher emotional intelligence. This provides high-scoring students with important social experiences and benefits. Teachers and parents agree on this point, and that these slightly lower-scoring students (e.g. > 85%) are still able to perform well in ALL.
This is already the situation in every ALL class.
In addition, by allowing more students with relatively high test scores to be in an advanced class, teachers of other classes are more enabled to teach to the level of their students instead of being required to support faster-learning students as well.
3. Avoiding participation loss: Based on multiple reach-outs and discussions, no ALL parent at Westfield wants the program to cease at Westfield, even if that meant having a higher scoring ALL class at Highland Elementary. Moving the ALL school means that many students would no longer participate in ALL because their siblings would still attend Westfield, or their parents are unable to drive them each day.
4. Increased participation: More students will test for and participate in ALL if it is available in more locations, due to transportation challenges and a desire to attend school locally.
a. District data demonstrate that qualified ALL students are more likely to participate at their local school.
b. If only half of the Cedar Ridge students shifted to Highland, then with the current counts of the 3 present ALL elementaries, Highland would have nearly twice as many students as at the largest site at Saratoga Shores. The result would be allowing well fewer willing and able students to participate in ALL.
5. Prepared and capable: Westfield’s Tiers 1 & 2 and Tier 3 enrolled student composite scores are the second highest of the 7 fourth-grade ALL schools, and close to the highest. An inference that Westfield students are less prepared or able to succeed in ALL because of a lower out-of-boundary student ratio is not supported by actual results.
Full Day Kindergarten NOT in the plan for Westfield
While you are at it...Westfield is currently NOT on the list for Full Day Kindergarten for the 2024-25 school year. ALL of our kindergarten teachers want to be full time teachers and are excellent at what they do. We have the space and there is NO additional expense for the school to offer full day kindergarten. In fact, you are already paying for full day kinder at other schools through your income taxes. In addition, we are at risk of losing a Kindergarten teacher if our numbers do not go up, we need to make our program more compelling. Please support our incoming students and our amazing teachers by advocating for Full Day Kindergarten as well.
EMAIL and fill out the comment survey using the QR Code TODAY!
Our Board Member Sarah Beeson (sbeeson1@alpinedistrict.org)
Superintendent Shane Farnsworth: (sfarnsworth@alpinedistrict.org)
DEI Dr. Analis Ruiz: (aruiz@alpinedistrict.org)
Jamie James, Director of Gifted Services: (jamiejames@alpinedistrict.org)
Administrator K-6 North Brady Rowley (browley@alpinedistrict.org)
Additional Board Members
School Board President Sara Hacken (sarahacken@alpinedistrict.org)
Julie King (julieking@alpinedistrict.org)
Joylin Lincoln (joylinlincoln@alpinedistrict.org)
Stacey Bateman (stacybateman@alpinedistrict.org)
Mark Clement (markclement@alpinedistrict.org)
Ada Wilson (adawilson@alpinedistrict.org)
For your convenience...
To: sbeeson1@alpinedistrict.org
cc: sfarnsworth@alpinedistrict.org; aruiz@alpinedistrict.org; jamiejames@alpinedistrict.org; browley@alpinedistrict.org; sarahacken@alpinedistrict.org; julieking@alpinedistrict.org; joylinlincoln@alpinedistrict.org; stacybateman@alpinedistrict.org; markclement@alpinedistrict.org; adawilson@alpinedistrict.org