Kate Simkowiak

Advocacy

Budget information, legislative activities, WAETAG conferences, etc.

Important Message from the Washington Coalition For Gifted Education

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This message has been sent to you by The Washington Coalition For Gifted Education. Comments or questions can be sent to wagifted@earthlink.net or barbaragmaurer@yahoo.com. If you wish to have your name deleted from our mailing list, send a notice to wagifted@earthlink.net.


“Failure to help the gifted child is a societal tragedy, the extent of which is difficult to measure, but which is surely great. How can we measure the sonata unwritten, the curative drug undiscovered, the absence of political insight? They are the difference between what we are and what we could be as a society.” — Dr. James J. Gallagher, University of North Carolina

The Governor has just proposed to eliminate all state highly capable program funding for the next two years.  This is the third time she’s made such a proposal.  Her last attempt was rebuffed by the legislature during the just completed special session only five days ago.  The only way she can legally do this is if the Legislature suspends implementation of ESHB 2261.

Highly capable programming is not something extra to be funded only when times are good.  As the legislature declared in ESHB 2261 in 2009, “for highly capable students, access to accelerated learning and enhanced instruction is access to a basic education.” The Washington Coalition for Gifted Education will work together with families of highly capable students and advocates for highly capable programming across the state to oppose the Governor’s short sighted decision.  The first step in our campaign will be to write letters to the editors of our local newspapers protesting this action and sharing the important role highly capable programming has had in the education of our students

You can find contact information for your local paper in the print edition of the paper or at the paper’s website. The Secretary of State also maintains a listing of newspaper websites at http://www.sos.wa.gov/library/wa_newspapers.aspx.  Most papers will provide contact information on an “About Us” or “Contact Us” page.  Many will accept letters to the editor submitted via email, while others will provide a mailing address.

If you have never written to a paper before, the National Association for Gifted Children’s advocacy web site at http://www.nagc.org/index.aspx?id=3148 has some excellent suggestions and examples of where to begin.  Be sure to adapt your letter to reflect your personal experiences and the issues facing highly capable programming in Washington State.

Some key issues in Washington are:

– Full funding of Highly Capable Programs in the 2011 – 2013 biennial budget.

– Full implementation of the education reforms promised in ESHB 2261 beginning in September 2011.  Under ESHB 2261, highly capable program services will become a mandated part of basic education. This places them within the protections of basic education regarding funding, and it is vital that implementation proceed as scheduled. The Governor’s budget proposes to not fund a program which will be protected as part of basic education unless the Legislature follows her request to suspend implementation to some unspecified future date.

– Highly Capable Programs are an essential part of securing Washington’s economic future. This is a high-tech state and gifted programs are the place where STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) talents are best nurtured. Funding highly capable programming is an investment in our state’s future.

This is just the first step in our campaign for highly capable programming.  You can stay current with the latest activities of the Washington Coalition for Gifted Education at our website, http://wcge.wordpress.com or by becoming a fan on Facebook, http://www.facebook.com/wagifted.

Thank you for your continuing advocacy for our Highly Capable Learners!

Budget Update – Message from the Coalition for Gifted Education

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The state Legislature has passed the second supplemental budget bill and it restores highly capable funding to the level in ESSB 6444 – $18,377,000 for two years, including $170,000 per year for Centrum and $90,000 per year for FPS/DI. That is, the 6.287% across-the-board-cut ordered by the Governor this fall is rescinded.
This bill plugs only half of the budget hole so there will have to be either another supplemental when session starts on January 10, or another round of across the board cuts. For those interested in the details, you can get the bill and the explanation at http://leap.leg.wa.gov/leap/budget/detail/2010/co2010p.asp Click on  Summary.
The Governor’s budget proposal for the 2011-2013 biennium is due out no later than Wednesday. When we see what is in it for highly capable funding, we will have a better idea of what advocates need to do.
This was just an opening skirmish in what is likely to be a bruising contest for limited funds. Your outstanding efforts in contacting Legislators have brought us this far. We will need additional efforts in the coming weeks and months. If you have a newly elected Legislator(s), make every effort to contact him/her to begin their education about gifted. Newly elected Legislators will not have Olympia email addresses or phone numbers until they are sworn in on January 10. Many campaign web sites are still active and contain contact local information.
And do make plans to be in Olympia for Gifted Education Day on February 11, 2011. Your presence is vital to our efforts.

Budget Update – Message from the Coalition

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There is a face-off going on down in Olympia. The Governor v. the Legislature. The Governor v. her own democrats. The democrats v. the republicans. The house v. the senate. And caught right in the middle is funding for Highly Capable Programs in the supplemental budget.
It appears there will be a special session beginning Friday to consider the supplemental budget, provided the five parties to the discussions get their act together. We can’t wait to see if they do. We need you to take action immediately to make known your wishes regarding Highly Capable funding for 2009-2010.
The governor made across-the-board cuts in November. That resulted in 6.3% cuts to Highly Capable Programs:  $561,000 from categorical funding to districts, $11,000 from Centrum and $6,000 from FPS/DI, totaling $578,000 and leaving an appropriation of $8,628,000 for the year.

Now the governor proposes to totally eliminate all highly capable funding retroactive to September 2010.

Update – From the Washington Coalition for Gifted Education

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Threat of a Special Session is Back

There has been a significant amount of budget news over the last two days.  Both the Washington State House Democratic Caucusand the Washington State Senate Republican Caucus released responses to Governor Gregoire’s earlier suggestion of budget cuts.  The House Democratic Caucus proposal would leave in place the earlier across the board cuts to highly capable funding that the Governor imposed, but would go no further and would not eliminate all funding for FY2011.  The Senate Republican Caucus also would not result in any additional cuts to highly capable funding.  Representative Alexander also sent a letter to the Governor that argued that whatever cuts are made in a special session, they should not be retroactive.  As you might remember, the Governor’s original proposal would have made the elimination of highly capable funding for fiscal year 2011 retroactive to September 1, 2010.

It remains unclear whether there will be enough agreement to justify a special session, though there is mounting pressure for all sides in the discussion to resolve their differences and get something together very quickly.  The Seattle Times editorialized yesterdaythat the Governor’s cuts, including the elimination of highly capable funding, should be adopted immediately.  It is essential that you contact your representatives now, before a special session begins.  Once a special session begins, it is quite likely that there will already be an agreed upon solution in mind.  Your chance to influence your legislators is now.

Urgent! Governor Proposes Cutting Gifted Education

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90 seconds of your time NOW can make a lifetime of difference for your child.

The immediate future of gifted education in Washington state is in peril.

Governor Chris Gregoire, in an attempt to deal with the larger than projected revenue shortfalls and the reduction in tax revenues that resulted from the outcomes of the recent election, has put together a list of suggested cuts (and only cuts) that she has sent on to the legislature for their consideration. Included in the six program cuts are four that are education related, and one of them (the least expensive program on the list) is funding for gifted education in Washington.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Article: Gregoire: Eliminate health insurance for the poor, school programs. Rising deficit leaves policymakers with few choices

In order to implement these cuts, the legislature would presumably have to change the legislation currently scheduled to go into effect in September that includes gifted education as a mandated component of basic education in this state. It would also put the brakes on the work of the Highly Capable Program Technical Working Group, which just presented it’s initial recommendations to the Quality Education Council last week on how to bring Washington into the forefront in the provision of education for gifted students in the US.

This is critical, as without state funding, gifted programming in Edmonds School District will be decimated, if not eliminated all together.

Now is the time to let our legislators know how important gifted education is for our families. Historically, the legislators who represent the families in the Edmonds School District service area have been supportive of gifted programming and have voted to continue funding with each biennium. We urge you to contact them directly to let them know that “unfunding is unacceptable” for gifted students. Our students do what they can to convince our legislators of the value of our programs (why participation in Gifted Education Day is so important), but it is up to those of us who have the right to vote to lobby for them.

The expectation is that the legislature will be called back into special session before the scheduled January reconvening. Please utilize the links below to contact your legislators and let them know how you wish them to vote. You can email or phone them.

  • Find Your Legislator will launch a search page. Fill in your address information and it will provide links to the legislators who represent your district. Be sure to leave the default of “Legislative District” checked for this search. Select any of the representatives or senators listed for your district. Select the email link on that legislator’s personal page. On the email form, you will have the option to send the same message to all of your district’s legislators.
  • Contact the Governor will launch a pre-formatted contact page for you to complete.

This is urgent! The legislature could be called back into session any day now. The more they hear from their constituency, the better-informed their voting will be.

Please take 90 seconds now to contact your legislators.

Challenge Parent Association Board of Directors

Message from the Coalition – Highly Capable Program funding in Jeopardy.

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Highly Capable Program funding is in jeopardy.
• Highly Capable is a categorical program, and is not a part of basic education so is not protected from budget cuts.
• We survived the proposed cut in the First Supplemental Budget for 2009-2010.
• However, we don’t know what will be in the Second Supplemental Budget for our programs.

Getting Your Opinions to Your Legislators

Toll-Free Hotline
Do you want to send a message to your Senator or Representative? Call the HOTLINE at 1-800-562-6000 (TTY for Hearing Impaired 1-800-635-9993). Callers to the Hotline can leave a brief message for their district legislators or for the Governor or Lt. Governor on issues of concern or on questions they may have about bills or laws. These messages are forwarded electronically to the appropriate individuals. When leaving a message with the Hotline, please be prepared to give your name and street address. For non-English speaking callers we offer interpreter services for many languages.

During the Legislative session, the Hotline is open from 8AM to 8PM Monday through Friday and from 9AM to 1PM on Saturday.

When the Legislature is not in session the Hotline is open from 8AM to Noon and from 1PM to 4:30PM Monday through Friday.

E-mail Forms
If you prefer e-mail, you may use the website’s e-mail forms to send messages to your legislators at any time. From the Member E-mail List page, you may click a legislator’s name to go to the e-mail form for that legislator.

Newly elected Legislators will not be on the web site until sworn in January 11, 2011, and you will have to contact them through their campaign web sites or local offices before that date.

To contact the Governor, go to

http://www.governor.wa.gov/contact/default.asp

and complete the form you find there.

WAETAG’s “Parent Track” at 2010 conference

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WAETAG  will offer a “Parent Track” at it’s annual conference on October 16 in Bellevue.  “Proficiency Is Not Enough” will be explored in three parent workshops : “Bright Kids Dull Performances”, “Be a Powerful Advocate for Gifted”, and “Gifted Organization Skills – an Oxymoron?”.  Registration includes meals, materials, keynotes, Parent Track breakout sessions, and vendor marketplace admission.

Superintendent Parent Meetings & Roundtable Meetings

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Superintendent Parent Meetings
As he has done in previous years, Superintendent Nick Brossoit will host parent meetings around the district this fall.  One meeting will take place in each of the four quadrants of our district during October.  He will discuss the work we are doing with regard to student achievement, the district’s fiscal outlook, and any other topic of interest to those in attendance.  Please consider attending one of the meetings:
  • Oct. 6 at 7 p.m. in the Alderwood Middle Library (20000 28th Ave. W., Lynnwood, 98036)
  • Oct. 13 at 7 p.m. in the Meadowdale Middle Library (6500 168th St. SW., Lynnwood, 98037)
  • Oct. 20 at 7 p.m. in the Brier Terrace Middle Library (22200 Brier Road, Brier, 98036)
  • Oct. 27 at 7 p.m. in the College Place Middle Commons (7501 208th St. SW., Lynnwood, 98036)

Superintendent Roundtables

  • Oct. 6 at noon to 1 p.m.  (All meetings in the Educational Service Center Boardrooms, 20420 68th Ave. W., Lynnwood, 98036.)
  • Nov. 3rd at noon to 1 p.m.
  • Dec. 1st at noon to 1 p.m.
  • Jan. 12th at noon to 1 p.m.
  • Feb. 2nd at noon to 1 p.m.
  • March 2nd at noon to 1 p.m.
  • April 13th at noon to 1 p.m.
  • May 4th at noon to 1 p.m.
  • June 1st at noon to 1 p.m.

Message from the Coalition for Gifted

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Welcome back for another year. This one promises to be full of twists and turns as the state struggles with budget shortfalls and gears up for implementation of education reform beginning September 2011.
Education Reform
Several groups are working on various aspects of ed reform. The one of primary interest to gifted advocates is the Highly Capable Program Technical Work Group. You can read about it at their web site http://www.k12.wa.us/HighlyCapable/Workgroup/default.aspx.
A number of individuals who are active in the Coalition are serving on the TWG. Members are listed on http://www.k12.wa.us/HighlyCapable/Workgroup/Members.aspx.
In addition, the Coalition is keeping a close eye on the work of the group. Their next meeting is September 16 at the Renton SD headquarters and Coalition representatives will be there both as participants and observers.  We will keep you informed.