Hello, my name is Molly Gras-Usry and I am a Cooper Elementary Parent. I want to bring to your attention a very fiscally, socially and educationally irresponsible recommendation the School Board has made. The Seattle School Board recommends that the Cooper Elementary students be kicked out of their building so that the West Seattle Pathfinder K-8 Program can occupy the building come fall 2009.

This recommendation doesn't add up. First of all we have been told all along that Pathfinder needs at least 391 seats. Cooper won't give that many seats. The Autism Programs that have been invited to stay occupy 4 classrooms for 24 kids therefore taking away 75 of the planning capacity seats. Also, they have invited 8 of the Cooper students to stay at Cooper in the Pathfinder Program, which brings the number of seats available to the Pathfinder program 378. Thirteen fewer seats than what Pathfinder needs. Also, bringing a K-8 program into a K-5 building requires the District to retrofit the school with lockers and labs costing the District more money rather than saving money. Why not move Pathfinder into a vacant middle school building fall 2010 that will already have the lockers and labs it will need like Denny or Boren?!

Furthermore, Cooper doesn't meet the criteria established by Dr. Maria Goodloe-Johnson for closing a program. A program must be tanking on the WASL and enrollment needs to be declining. Cooper Elementary has the strongest WASL scores compared to other schools with similar demographics and enrollment has steadily grown the past several years.

Cooper staff and students also don't appreciate being told by a Seattle School Board member that Cooper students are "making a waste of a nice, new building". I'm not sure what he means by that but I see the Cooper family making great use of their space. Due to Cooper's 80 percent free and reduced lunch population, we don't have extra funding for off site field trips. Cooper students enjoy on site field trips through the green belt land they occupy and incorporate their environmental exploration with art.

This isn't excellence for all, this is excellence for SOME.

Thank you for your time.

Molly Gras-Usry

Cooper PTA