#Education
Target:
Seattle School Board Members Sherry Carr & Michael DeBell
Region:
United States of America

We appreciate that the recommended maps published by Seattle Public Schools on 11/3/09 changed Whittier Elementary’s southern boundary from NW 70th St. to NW 67th St. based on the feedback from our community.

This acknowledges the importance of our neighborhood integrity, school proximity, and safety when walking to school. However, this boundary still does not encompass all of Whittier Heights. This new boundary still sends a small number of neighborhood children to schools farther away, endangers their safety, and fragments this tight-knit community.

With the line moved to NW 67th St., just a tiny sliver of Whittier Heights—six one-block residential streets from NW 67th St. to NW 65th St. between 15th Ave NW & 8th Ave NW—is isolated from the rest of the neighborhood. This revised boundary excludes these families from Whittier Elementary and Whitman Middle School, and assigns them to West Woodland Elementary and Hamilton Middle School.

The line at NW 67th St. impacts JUST these six residential blocks of Whittier Heights. Ballard High School, the Ballard Pool, a church, and a business occupy 40% of the area in question.

To Directors Carr & DeBell

We, the undersigned Whittier Elementary families and Whittier Heights neighbors, urge you to introduce an amendment on November 18th to move Whittier Elementary’s southern boundary from NW 67th St. to NW 65th St. between 15th Ave NW and 8th Ave NW.

Families living on these blocks are much closer to Whittier than to West Woodland.

Families living on these blocks can easily walk to Whittier. This short walk is a safe one across a few quiet residential streets. The walk to West Woodland is a dangerous walk of nearly a mile crossing up to 16 streets including the busy arterials of NW 65th St. and 8th Ave NW.

Please keep Whittier Elementary as the neighborhood school for all of Whittier Heights and introduce an amendment on November 18th to move its southern boundary to NW 65th St. between 15th Ave NW and 8th Ave NW.

The Whittier Elementary for All of Whittier Heights petition to Seattle School Board Members Sherry Carr & Michael DeBell was written by Judith Robb Eggerman and is in the category Education at GoPetition.