High-school assignments don’t tune into students’ needs
“Garfield makes great music, history at Ellington competition” [NWTuesday, May 11] provides another piece of evidence that Seattle’s music programs offer outstanding opportunities for young musicians.
While most of the attention is placed on high schools, it is also true that Garfield High’s success depends on its feeder school, Washington Middle School (WMS). Garfield High has received abundant streams of incoming musicians each year — until now.
The new neighborhood-based high-school assignment plan would prevent some talented WMS musicians from attending Garfield High due to assignment boundaries. Seattle Public Schools needs to make accommodations to serve the educational needs of these musicians.
As an eighth-grader at WMS, where a large percentage of the population participates in music ensembles, I know from experience that my bandmates are extremely dedicated and hardworking where music is concerned. They have looked forward to playing at Garfield High for years, and are about to be sent down dead ends. Garfield is the only south-end high school that offers music programs at such a high level.
Seattle Public Schools is continually touting its incredible music programs, and have clearly created this plan without realizing the damage it would inflict on said programs. I hope it can create a system that tracks WMS students to Garfield High before the performing-arts programs take a definitive turn for the worse.
— Alice Mar-Abe, Seattle