If you reside in the Edmonds School District and are interested in public school choices for your child, you may be interested in joining a group of families that are exploring the possibility of starting a new cooperative school that would be similar, but not identical, to the Maplewood Parent Cooperative K-8 School that is part of the Edmonds School District.

Maplewood Parent Cooperative was started by a group of concerned parents about 20 years ago, and has grown and been housed in several different schools over its lifetime. Just last year, the school moved back into a brand new school at its old site in Edmonds. At their grand re-opening celebration, some of the “Founding Mothers” were in attendance and able to see the fulfilling results of their hard work from many years ago.

The success of Maplewood can be attested to by the long waiting list (over 250 children) for entrance, low student-turnover rate, and consistently high (relative to the district) scores on the ITBS, WASL, and Level Tests. Parent involvement is what started the school, and it is the foundation upon which the school thrives. Families that choose to join Maplewood make several commitments to participate in their child’s education throughout the school year.

Given the success and high demand for this type of school, why not start another cooperative school? So far, our fact-finding stage has included numerous phone calls to people involved with the Maplewood Coop, a meeting with Pam Hopkins (an Assistant Superintendent with the Edmonds School District), and conversations with the principals of a couple of the local elementary schools. We have found that there is a sparcity of building space in the district (i.e. there is no empty school building waiting to be populated) and current funding levels are low, especially because of the failure of the last levies. However, there is an overall gradual decrease projected in enrollment for the district, which may open some space locally and make the presence of another popular “choice” school more attractive. It appears that the best way to proceed may be to align ourselves with an existing school and start small, growing gradually as enrollment increases with progressing classes. Nothing we have found out so far has been surprising nor discouraging, although there is a lot more work to do before a new coop school comes close to becoming a reality.

The primary purpose of this letter is to get responses from interested families so that we can start a list of those families to show the school district that there is substantial demand for another Parent Cooperative School within the Edmonds School District. Also, if you are inclined, your help and input would be appreciated in the idea stage of the project. In the upcoming months, we would like to formulate plans for how the school will work, what type of parent involvement should be required that will encourage families to participate, what are our options for location and how to coexist with an existing school, how best to gain approval from the school board, and numerous other details. This is a wonderful chance to share your ideas, help formulate the ground rules for a new school, and be involved in a far-reaching and worthwhile project that will benefit not only our own children, but those for years to come.

You can express your interest in either being on the list of potentially interested families or by helping with your input and ideas by calling and/or e-mailing one of us below. Please let us know the ages/grades of your children. Thank you for your interest, and we hope to hear from you with comments and questions!

Chris Archer (425) 742-8168

Amy Collins (425)640-8784 collinsak@earthlink.net