AnonymousBy Deb Finnegan
[On Monday] night, Washington Elementary School’s Principal Christina Giguiere and Assitant Superintendent Dr. Raul Ramirez announced the GATE magnet program for third graders will be canceled next year.
They stated only 11 students wanted to enter the program with 7 of them being transfers from other schools. Normally the class is around 25 students with a line for attendance as the parents push for their students to take part in advanced learning and classes. Both of them stated they didn’t know why there was a lack of interest this year.
Something doesn’t add up. In the past, just a few years ago, there were so many students wanting to get in they had to do a lottery system. My grandkids were part of that system and it was a big deal for them to get in and we all noticed the positive benefits in their education.
Ramirez has not been shy about his goal to get rid of the GATE magnet program in the past. Last year he proposed replacing this class with a different “cluster model,” meaning instead of a dedicated class those students would be placed with non-GATE students in a non-GATE program. Essentially, what’s the point of being GATE at all? Most parents rejected this idea and the Board moved on.
They said the advertising and marketing of the program to parents has been the same for this coming year but I’m hesitant to believe that.
I’d like to hear from other parents to see if it really was just 11 students wanting to enter to program or if they possibly miscounted to achieve their own end goal.
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It is not accelerated; it is enriched. Because the kids and parents want more challenges than regular classroom can offer. Why would an administrator want to get rid of a program that values extra challenges in K-12 eduction? You are right. Something is not adding up. Though after trying to shaft the entire program last year, I suspect parents saw the hand-writing on the wall. Get your kids out of SBUSD if you want them to thrive.
Let the watering down of Washington begin. People who value excellence in academics will move to Goleta. They have much better schools. Hindsight is 20/20. Real estate agents, rev your engines!
As a parent of a GATE kid, if I had to do it allover again, I totally would buy one of those crappy ugly Goleta houses. Goodbye, SBUSD! Downtown is over-rated.
Cry us a river, sad people. 11 students will never float a GATE classroom. It’s over there at Washington. “Deal with it!” as Mick Mulvaney said.
There was a test given to children in 2nd grade this year that was supposed to “qualify” them for the gate lottery. Parents who’s children scored high enough on the test were not automatically entered in the lottery, they had to go to the district office in person and submit a form to be entered in the lottery. At Washington, the way parents were notified was by a paper sent home with their child and then a single email telling of the requirement which was sent 1 day before the deadline to register for the lottery.
I imagine there were many parents who simply did not see the letter sent home with their child or were not able to re-arrange their work schedules on 1 day notice to go to the district office to submit a form.
This feels very similar to the District trying to cancel the Core Knowledge program at La Cumbre Junior High, one week after the open house touting the Core Knowledge program. (Indy, Jan 28 2020). The parents there managed to save the program, will the Washington parents be that lucky?
I subbed for gate and regular classes at San Marcos. Regular classes had lots of latinos. Gate classes almost none. It seemed like this is because the GATE students had educational and economic advantages that the rest didn’t. It looks unfair because of the segregation, but really the answer is to figure out how to provide all kids those advantages if the parents can’t provide them to start.
Why have the billons of dollars spent on First Five and Head Start for decades not changed this perceived disparity, PITMIX? Can we get that money back.
I’m not sure how I feel about this. I am on the fence about canceling GATE.
It’s not an either-or situation–you can have both if your kids are up to it and want to do go that route. If not, that’s OK, too. Lots of great kids in all the programs. It’s up to the parents to know their kids, provide healthy meals, see that they get the sleep they need, have a place to study and monitor their social interactions to keep them safe.
Time to elect a new school board. Imagine that. Voters do have control over some school policies and hiring decisions. SBUSD is shafting parents in this community. All it takes is a few more engaged parents to be willing to run and serve on our local school board and made a difference. Our local schools do not have to be total pawns of the teachers unions.
GATE programs are essentially a stop gap against the encroachments of private schools that cherry pick student talent to make bucks with their institutions. Public schools should be more democratic than they have become. Classes should be open to all with an interest in attempting their challenge. But pre-screening and testing at a very early age is not a good thing for a pluralistic and open institution. All this said, unless people stand up for local public schools and stop the marauding forces that are attacking the basic American institution, our country will continue its slide into a elitist class structure.
I can’t see what is inconsistent with being democratic and providing a good education. GATE stands for Gifted And Talented Education. Calling it Gate as though it was a passageway to better classes in intentionally misleading. Public schools should avoid deciding who is “Gifted and Talented” at such an early age. And it should offer the opportunity for those who have not been so identified to try harder or more creative work. This seems to me to be democratic.
Overuse of the word “democratic”. Be careful when you demand “democratic” means to seek only the lowest common denominator. “Diversity” is our strength, remember? Kids come in all sorts of native abilities and exposure to peer pressure – it is cool to be dumb sadly is a prevailing school ethic – which can be ruinously corrosive. Don’t let the least of us determine opportunities for the rest of us. It has been said, don’t pave the road tor the child; pave the child for the road. Some kids are tall. Some kids re short. And some are just plain brighter than others. Don’t punish anyone for what they can’t help. Respond to each group appropriately. With our current #45 ranked schools, we have already bottomed out the lowest common denominator for all student achievement. Don’t keep losing the kids on the top with continued misguided “social justice” policies, because they are anything but justice, and are not even social. You just want a generic soap factory turning out identical products of limited usefulness. First you have to admit the total failure of todays K-12 in this state. Otherwise you are arguing split hairs. NO one is getting good education in this state. Is that “democratic” – sharing the misery equally?
Being ‘gifted” is not a matter of hard work. It is a born native ability that processes information differently. Don’t punish it. And yes, this ability can be discerned at very early ages. It needs to be nurtured, not denigrated. Is there another descriptive term that does not trigger your distorted sense of “privilege envy”? The :gifted gene” can strike any child. They are just different.
Where is our investment in parent trainsing and why are we not putting our huge Prop 98 education dollar into educating parents to enrich their own kids, instead of brutally letting “the state” take over all parent contact with them from cradle to grave? Why after decades of investing billions of tax dollars in First Five are we still talking about lack of home enrichment and preparation for schools? Where are the results for First Five and if they actually were successful fostering parent education, why have they not been ramped up based upon their solid and proven success models?
Sounds so Trumpian to say that some people are just better than others and therefore entitled to their privileged road to success. Ugggh. (Didn’t monarchs claim the same thing–they were chosen to be leader from birth?) And, yes, I object to privilege that is dependent on getting a special push ahead when others are denied that assistance.