Portland Public Schools

There were actually two heroes that prevented further bloodshed during yesterday's school shooting in Bend.

Meantime, Portland Public Schools wanting to hear from families before deciding which schools could close down.

President Trump apparently made a deal with China's President Xi to allow Visa, MasterCard, and Citigroup in China.

Details during business news at 4:26.

Dr. DeNyck says it's okay for parents to talk to kids about this shooting, but stick with open-ended questions and try to keep adult emotions and opinions out of the conversation.

Because physical touch is soothing for most kids, her prescription right now, lots of hugs.

Portland Public Schools wants to hear from families before deciding which schools could close.

KXSL's John Eric Smith reports district leaders will take more feedback tomorrow.

Um, [laughs] but yeah, I mean, you know, and, and that's a, a test.

I, I kind of compare it to Congress, right? Like, you know, everybody's like, "Oh my God, Congress is the worst," just the same as people are often like, "Oh, Portland Public Schools is dysfunctional," or whatever.

But they love their individual school the same way that they keep voting for their individual congressperson.

Mm.

Yeah.

Um, you know, you asked me do I think that there's a chance that this won't go forward.

And I think if that happens, it will be because there is this increasing drumbeat from folks who maybe recognize intrinsically why Portland Public Schools needs to do this, but are f- very frustrated with the how-

Mm-hmm

You end up reading it and feeling like, "I don't even know what just happened there," but I know that that's all they could get out of the school district because somebody at the school district is afraid of actually telling the parents and the taxpayers and the teachers and the students what's actually going on.

But any case, let me get back to Portland and Portland Public Schools.

This time, both candidates for Oregon governor want the state's largest school district to keep empty buildings open at the expense of students and teachers.

Let me explain what I mean by that.

Portland Public Schools have known for decades that they have severely underutilized buildings.

Let me tell you why.

In the '50s and '60s, Portland Public Schools had 80,000 students.

They have just over 40,000 students today.

Um, however, I think this is a, this is an Oregon problem.

It's not unique to PPS.

Uh, we're, w- uh, w- the question is, [chuckles] you know, where are these kids? Where are they going? Um, and yeah, there's, there's always a, there's been a constant effort, uh, you know, for at least, uh, I've- far as I know, of trying to recruit more kids, programs to recruit more, kind of, uh, PPS has been doing a lot of outreach to, to capture as many as possible.

You know, we've seen maybe a one, 2% increase- And yeah, but I'm gonna be honest, that's, that's where we are.

There's a lot more to talk about in terms of, of that population and, and your thoughts about how to capture them, and the effects that, that these plans might have on that.

Hi.

Um, so my question is about the school closure policy.

So the policy states that there needs to be an adequate analysis of the community impact and of barriers, and I'm wondering what kind of factors were considered, um, when, uh, making the scenarios and whether there were factors outside of PPS jurisdiction, such as number of after-school care seats that were lost, proximity to preschools, quality of ADA sidewalks outside of the school, um, access to bus routes, access to city resources, and, um, access to county libraries.

And she has no, yeah [laughs] and she has no relevant non-financial relationships to disclose.

I'm an employee of Portland Public Schools, and I was an adjunct professor for the University of Houston.

I loved that.

I'm also compensated from Speech Therapy PD for hosting School of Speech, dream job, and I am a member of ASHA and I volunteer for Feeding Matters.

And I am on LinkedIn too.

You just have to find the one that's, uh, in Portland Public Schools and spells her name with two O's, not one O, one E. [laughs]

I-

There-

So please, let me know what I got wrong.

Um, and, and I will say, we're gonna be digging into what's going on with Portland Public Schools a lot more in the coming weeks, uh, with some of the reporters who are really covering it and who know that issue best.

So if you want more on that, stay tuned.

Let's take a quick break, and when we come back, Sophie, you're gonna help us untangle what's going on with the ballot initiative that is gonna be on the city ballot this fall.