by Kelsey Hamlin
It’s been well documented that Seattle has a problem when it comes to racial gaps in learning, discipline, and opportunities for all of its school children. Some of these systemic issues can be traced all the way back to redlining, Seattle’s historic practice of effectively restricting designated residential areas to certain races.
via NAACP Advocates for Ethnic Studies in Seattle Public Schools — South Seattle Emerald
Created and run by Thomas Halverson, the director of the UW’s master’s in education policy (MEP) program, the Education and Society film screenings attempt to put academia into a real world context.
“It’s just something I’ve taken on as a way to help students better understand how these challenges impact members of the community,” Halverson said. “It’s one thing for our [students] to go out into the world and think about these issues from an academic perspective, but when they’re out in the trenches … that’s when it really comes home for them.”
Photo by Alex Garland
Wednesday night, Washington Hall was bursting with sound: a constant buzz of chatter, throb of laughter, and beat of music. A rally was happening, following the full work day of educators across Seattle who chose to redirect curriculum, hold discussions, and wear t-shirts for Black Lives Matter.
Organizers and educators hold a press conference to discuss the BLM plan (photo by Kelsey Hamlin).
Next Wednesday, Oct. 19, teachers, counselors, and other Seattle Public School District staff across the city plan on simultaneously wearing Black Lives Matter shirts to work, centering the day’s curriculum around race, civil rights history, and contextualizing current events. They will also hold a rally later that day.
Democratic lawmakers are proposing free community-college tuition for two years, following models like Oregon’s. No word on where the money will come from, however. Read more here
OLYMPIA —Tuition at the state’s community and technical colleges would be free for many state residents under an ambitious proposal that takes up President Obama’s call to expand educational opportunity, yet so far provides no way to pay for it.
A total of 23 pieces of free college legislation have been considered in 21 states so far, with three states taking action.
The first to pass a bill for free community-college tuition was Tennessee in 2014, then Minnesota and Oregon the following year.
Even if all of the Native American students who were admitted to the UW this year attend in the fall, they will still make up a smaller portion of the class of 2019 than Native Americans in the class of 2018.
While Washington state legislators recently decreased resident undergraduate tuition for the next two years, the UW Board of Regents determined June 9 that graduate, out-of-state, and international student tuition would increase.
Only tier III graduate students, or students seeking master’s and doctorate degrees in the College of Engineering, or master’s and doctoral candidates in the School of Public Health and the School of Nursing, will see a tuition hike. These students will be facing a 3 percent increase, a rise of $842 per year.
International students pay the same tuition as out-of-state students and will continue to do so. Their tuition is set to increase 2 percent for the next academic year. These students will be paying $33,072, about $700 more, and approximately three times more than in-state students will pay next year.
There is, however, one big difference between these two groups when it comes to footing the bill for education: International students don’t qualify for financial aid or most scholarships.
Jason Chen, an international undergraduate student at the UW, said neither of his parents finished high school in China, which is why they wanted him to have the best education possible. However, Chen said it’s becoming increasingly difficult for his parents to handle the expenses from his education.
