Thanks for incorporating the updates. Sorry I am so late in commenting here. I had hoped to come up with more, but I have only two questions to add (which is, perhaps, a testimony to your thoroughness!):

1) Are the contractors who will be hired to do the actual construction tied to Magellan in any way?

2) If there are closures/consolidations, does the District plan to provide transportation for children whose new schools will be farther away from their homes?

My recommendations for great background:
Read Rethinking Schools’ Barbara Miner’s essay on corporate control of public education. (it’s on the Neighborhood Schools Alliance site).

To understand how corporate think takes over school boards and districts read former Houston School Board member Don McAdams “Fighting to Save Urban Schools ….and Winning”. I disagree with him totally, but it is a fascinating look at that mindset. He has consulted for PPS since 2003. He works for Broad Foundation.

Read anything you can on the Broad Foundation (lots on the NSA site about that).

Susan Ohanian’s site is a huge resource.

Sorry I must go read to my daughter. Otherwise I would have put the links in.

We need to literally start over on all of this before the facilities bond.

K-8 was sold as a way to get more “enrichment” to the K-5 grades, when in reality it has resulted in less “enrichment” for 6-8.

The notion of 7-12 was resoundingly rejected for Jefferson, but they snuck in 6-12 academies anyway. Now they’re sneaking in 8-12 at Madison and Franklin.

This is reactive design. We need to be proactive in the design of our entire system.

We need to take a step back, admit that we’ve made a massive mess of things (this is beyond debate), and start over with a comprehensive design of the configuration of our entire district. And this time, we need to focus on equity first.

Some new information just posted on Oregon live on the 6th tells how “Next year’s eighth graders at Portland’s Rigler and Scott elementaries will move to Madison High School to relieve overcrowding in the lower grades, Portland public schools officials have decided.”

More of the same regarding PPS’s poor planning and inequity!

Here’s the link:

http://blog.oregonlive.com/bre.....portl.html

Will the district be up front with their intentions in this regard before the bond, or will this be sprung on us after it passes?

I don’t think anybody in North Portland wants to support a bond that will raise their taxes but further limit academic opportunities for their children.

I think the district is going to have a harder time with this bond than expected if they can’t get the equity community on board. And they’re not going to get us on board until we know their intentions about high school closures or mergers.

Excellent research and compelling questions!