SBE held its annual planning retreat and Board meeting September 14-16, with a special session on September 9 with the Office of Equity. During the meeting, the Board reflected on their self-evaluation and norms, and discussed mastery-based learning and graduation, legislative priorities, and more. The Executive Committee elections were held as well. You can find documents from the meeting on SBE’s Simbli page.

New Board Officers – Bill Kallappa II (Tumwater) was elected as the new Board chair beginning his term immediately following the meeting. Harium Martin-Morris will serve as Vice Chair. Chair and Vice Chair serve a two-year term. In addition, Mary Fertakis (Tukwila), Kevin Wang (Bellevue), and Patty Wood (Kelso) were elected to serve one-year terms on the executive committee as At-Large members. A special thank you to Peter Maier and MJ Bolt for their service on the Executive Committee.

Legislative Requests and Priorities – The Board submitted three requests to the Governor’s Office for the upcoming legislative session:

• Agency request legislation to extend voting authority to student members on the State Board of Education
• Budget request for resources to develop recommendations for a statewide approach to assessing school climate
• Budget request for resources to strength the Board’s capacity for community engagement

In addition, the Board discussed advocacy priorities for its 2022 legislative platform, which will be finalized and adopted at the November Board meeting.

Graduation Pathway Options Research Update - On behalf of the Board, Strobel Consulting surveyed districts about graduation pathway options (as required by legislation), conducted focus groups, and prepared a report (two volumes). Both volumes are available on SBE’s Legislative Reports page.

Graduation Requirements (Mastery-based Learning, Profile of a Graduate) -

Current graduation requirements were reviewed, and Board members were updated on the Profile of a Graduate and the work of the Mastery-based Learning Work Group and Collaborative. Members reviewed a timeline of Board work on system alignment in 2022 and discussed and identified topics and policies that might need focused attention as part of the alignment work. 

Ethnic Studies - SBE has engaged Jasmin Patrón-Vargas to help SBE develop a concept paper regarding what an ethnic studies graduation requirement in Washington could look like. Jasmin is currently a doctoral candidate whose dissertation research explores the implementation of ethnic studies in other states. She presented to the Board her work around how ethnic studies implementation is occurring in three states and how those lessons could inform Washington's efforts.

Strategic Planning - The Board is in the third year of the four-year strategic plan adopted in November 2018. This segment will provide an update on the status of the strategic plan indicators, the accountability system redesign, and the new SBE Data Book. 

Elementary Science – Member Jeff Estes presented on the issue of equitable access to quality elementary science learning opportunities, and members discussed what the Board could do in the areas of policy, advocacy, and oversight to help advance equity in this area.

Basic Education - For the 2021-2022 school year, the survey application and format for Basic Education Compliance Reporting were changed to accommodate new reporting requirements for an emergency waiver program in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and to address the evolving need to collect information from districts to help improve the state’s K-12 educational system.

Private Schools - The Board considered approval of private schools and adopted emergency rules for private schools. 

The next meeting is scheduled for November 3-4, 2021. The agenda and materials will be posted one week in advance of the meeting on SBE’s meetings page.