Hello. My name is Calvin J. Watts and I am honored to serve as superintendent of our Kent School District. I would like to thank the Kent Reporter for the opportunity to share monthly updates on our district, as well as issues and trends in education that may impact our schools.
When I say our district and our schools, I mean it. The 42 school facilities in our organization were built for and by the residents of this community with local tax dollars.
Our schools (Yes, it is true. My wife and I have 27,000 KSD children, and one son – a proud Mattson Middle School Mustang – who lives with us) are in need of some repair. We also need new modern schools to respond to overcrowding, to ensure students are future-ready learners and to meet the new mandates on class size earlier passed by the voters.
We are running a bond measure this November. This is the same measure we ran this past April, and while we had almost 60 percent of voters support the measure, school bonds require a 60-percent-plus-1 “supermajority” to pass. In an area with more than 80,000 registered voters, we came up 218 votes short.
Our elected school board believes the measure is important to our district’s future. As a public employee, I cannot advocate for or against any election measure, candidate or political party. However, I can say please vote and please visit ksdbond.org so you can make the most informed decision that matches your own values and perspective.
The first public school in our area opened 147 years ago. Instead of a handful of children in a mostly rural setting halfway between the lumber ports of Seattle and Tacoma, the Kent/Covington/Renton area of 2016 is a modern metropolis in its own right. The organizational anchor of South King County, our school district’s service area is home to 70,000 households, is one of the most important industrial and manufacturing hubs in the nation and is recognized internationally for its thriving and wonderfully diverse communities.
By 1890, the original Kent School was no longer adequate and a new Kent school was built. Since then, we have experienced steady growth through the end of the 19th century, the entirety of the 20th century, and now well into the 21st. What will the rest of the 21st and the 22nd centuries bring us? Will education change as much as it has since those pioneers turned the first shovel of dirt and set this district on a course toward industry, innovation and the information age? What will be needed to prepare the children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren of our current students?
As area residents, we will have the opportunity, privilege and responsibility to exercise our democratic right in support of or in opposition to a resolution calling for $252 million in school construction and renovation.
You and I have some choices to make.
If passed, issuing new bonds will not increase our current tax rates as they will simply take the place of expiring bonds. In fact, the funds generated will build two new elementary schools, one in Covington and one in the Kent Valley (likely very near the site of the original one-room school house). Twenty new classrooms will be built throughout the district to alleviate overcrowding in our schools as well as a host of other safety, maintenance, infrastructure and facilities improvements. Every school in our district will see some benefit.
You, me, we, yours, ours .… We have a great deal of ownership in our school district and ownership has its responsibilities. At 147 years old, we are still growing and still moving forward.
So, the next time you drive by a KSD facility with family or friends from out of town, remember to point to that building and say, “That’s our school!”
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