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Julia Silverman

@jrlsilverman.bsky.social
221 followers 17 following 144 posts

Education reporter at The @Oregonian, scientist’s wife, mother of twins. Opinions are my own. DMs are open.

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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2026
Impactful news out of Portland Public Schools this evening: oregonlive.com These 14 Portland schools could close under district's consolidation plan The school district is also proposing a host of attendance boundary changes and program shifts.
oregonlive.com
Oregon Local News, Breaking News, Sports & Weather
Get the latest Oregon local news, sports, weather, entertainment and breaking updates on oregonlive.com
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 22/06/2026
A beautiful tribute to a colleague gone far too soon. Zane Sparling's memory will be a blessing. www.oregonlive.com/portland/202...
oregonlive.com
Zane Sparling, reporter for The Oregonian/OregonLive, dies of cancer at 33
“He wanted his identity to be a reporter, and that’s what it was,” his father said.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 17/06/2026
*As ever, if you are able, please consider a subscription to support local journalism!
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 17/06/2026
Story 5 will tackle solutions — they are out there and they will require fortitude, focus+political courage. Are any of those in supply here in Oregon, in service of the state's public school students? We'll see. I'll keep posting gift links.* Please keep reading.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 17/06/2026
The next stories in the series will follow a teacher, a student+a classified staffer. The goal was to make a wonky policy debate more human, to show where Oregon's inequitable methods of funding schools are taking the biggest toll.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 17/06/2026
W/ great gratitude to everyone at the Reynolds SD who agreed to let photojournalist Beth Nakamura+me tell their stories, knowing that they were representing school districts statewide, from Woodburn to Salem to Klamath Falls to Ontario, where the same story plays out every day.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 17/06/2026
TFW the story you've been head down on for months finally publishes.. Please read the first installment of The Undercount, which at its core is a/b Oregon's bonkers+aging school funding formula and its impact on the state's poorest students. 🎁link ⤵️ www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Oregon’s school funding formula is broken. Its poorest students pay the price
Oregon is the only state in the country to rely solely on U.S. Census Bureau data to account for poverty in school districts, undercounting more than 100,000 students statewide.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 22/05/2026
A beautiful, thoughtful story from my colleague @gosiawoz.bsky.social. Enjoy this long read over the holiday weekend!
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 12/05/2026
A lovely obituary from Oregonian colleagues Jonathan Bach, Yesenia Amaro and Mark Graves for former Reynolds school board member Cayle Tern, who died unexpectedly last week after a heart attack at the age of 49. www.oregonlive.com/politics/202...
oregonlive.com
Portland organizer’s sudden death at 49 shakes immigrant community, Oregon politicians
Cayle Tern, a Reynolds School District board director and APANO civic engagement manager, died last week, leading to a flood of public condolences.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 14/01/2026
Say what you will a/b the Portland Public Schools board, but they pulled off a leadership election tonight with a remarkable amount of comity. Maybe the Portland City Council should take some notes? cc: @shanedkavanaugh.bsky.social. .
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
Should I live-recap it? Vote Y/N in comments pls.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 12/11/2025
I will bring the🍿to the Nov. 19 hearing at the OR legislature's joint committee on Public Education Appropriations on this bombshell new report: www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
In a first, Oregon lawmakers say they’ve met school funding targets. Education advocates beg to differ
The debate centers on whether the state has provided enough money to school districts to provide a "quality education," where 90% of students will graduate on time.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 27/10/2025
If you care a/b public education+OR's future, I am moderating the event for you! Come to the @pdxcityclub.bsky.social forum w/ a panel of heavy hitters, incl. PPS's Kimberlee Armstrong, Stand for Children's Sarah Pope+OR Teacher of the Year Bryan Butcher. Deets: crm.nonprofiteasy.com/6452/Pages/E...
crm.nonprofiteasy.com
Pages
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 19/10/2025
After you've read all the protest news from Portland today, take a minute to dive into the proposed major changes for attendance zones at PPS high schools in N/NE Portland: www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Families in N, NE Portland face shake-up in where children go to high school; see the 5 scenarios
The changes would affect attendance zones for four high schools: Grant, Jefferson, McDaniel and Roosevelt.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
Now is a great time to subscribe to The Oregonian and support local journalism work like this story and the other excellent coverage produced by my colleagues in these uncertain times. www.oregonlive.com/subscribe/?u...
oregonlive.com
OregonLive.com
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
🔎The state does not track how long it takes to resolve the cases in its system, though it has the right to grant itself multiple extensions. @hborrud.bsky.social had to build a database of all outstanding cases and how long they have been awaiting resolution.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
🔎Lawmakers approved money to let ODE hire 2 new investigators in 2024, to chip away at the backlog. But ODE did not even begin advertising those jobs until early this September. Tellingly, that was just a week after @hborrud.bsky.social asked why the jobs had not yet been filled.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
Some key takeaways in a brief thread: 🔎The median amount of time that the state education agency takes to investigate discrimination cases is a shocking 434 days. Experts say it should be 6 months or less.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
My colleague @hborrud.bsky.social is out today w/ a banger of a story on the Oregon families who are stuck waiting for years while the OR Department of Education drags out investigations into their claims of discrimination against their school districts: (🎁'd link) www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
She alleged discrimination. 5 years later, why isn’t Oregon done with its investigation?
One family's wait exposes systemic problems in state's response to school discrimination allegations.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 06/10/2025
My colleagues are doing phenomenal work for Portland this weekend.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 05/10/2025
And PS: If your kids are missing big chunks of school, then that's part of the problem. This isn't all on the school system: parents need to get their kids to school in the AM, ready to learn.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
🍎In summary: If you care about kids/schools/Oregon please read this story! Test scores are not the measure of any school system, but they are an important window. Parents, make sure to review your kids' scores. If they are Level 1 or 2, demand to know what the plan is to help.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
🍎Is OR alone in its post-pandemic lagging? No, not at all. But are there states where students have made much larger, faster gains in math or reading per their state tests? Yes: IA, TN, SC, CO, MS. It can be done. A good source: statetestscoreresults.substack.com/about
statetestscoreresults.substack.com
About - EDC State Assessment Data Substack
Hub for data from the Education Data Center on annual state assessments. Click to read EDC State Assessment Data Substack, by State Test Score Results, a Substack publication with thousands of subscri...
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
🍎There are limits to this data b/c of OR law that lets families opt kids out of testing. Upshot: things could be even worse – or better – but we have no idea+can't focus resources where needed. Has there been any serious discussion of getting rid of the opt-out? Nope.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
🍎There are 4 levels to the test. Level 1 is akin to getting D or F. Oregon has HUGE numbers of kids at Level 1 across all grades, including 49% of 8th graders in math. Half of all eighth graders are getting a D or an F in math? In what world is this NOT a massive emergency, OR?
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
🍎 Portland Public Schools gets a lot of grief, but the state's largest district is also 1 of the only ones to get 3-8th graders back to pre-pandemic levels in math+almost there in ELA. That's a bright spot+PPS still has a long ways to go esp for kids of color+those from poor families.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
🍎In a switch from years past, state ed staff suggested that students scoring at Level 2 — C grade, basically — are not in academic peril. I mean, Cs get degrees, I guess? But do they get you where you want to go w/o remedial help from colleges and/or employers? It's a dice roll w/ students' future.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
Key takeaways: 🍎At this pace, it could be a decade+ before OR kids return to pre-pandemic math/ELA skill levels...which weren't all that great to begin with. 🍎Leaders characterize the problem as urgent. Yet key provisions of Gov. Tina Kotek's accountability bill don't even kick in until 2029.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/10/2025
All eyes are on the ICE building in PDX. What is happening there is important. But the annual release of test score data from ODE matters too, for the future of Oregon's children, the health of its public school system+the state's economy. 🧵 Gifted link: www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Minuscule test score gains signal Oregon faces years of digging out from its post-pandemic academic hole
Overall, the state’s students are still performing far below pre-COVID levels, according to results released Thursday by the Oregon Department of Education.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 02/09/2025
Cue the "and the band won't play on" references: www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Bands won’t play at Portland high school football games this season as music directors protest pay
The move comes after years of negotiations between the school district and the Portland Association of Teachers over a pay schedule for outside-of-class duties.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 30/08/2025
Wondering whether PPS families are in for more early dismissals next week? Here's everything I know about it: www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Portland schools closed early at 72 degrees Friday as heat wave — and potentially more early dismissals — loom for next week.
The Portland teachers' union is seeking a commitment for early release on next week's "hottest days."
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
And don't sleep on the parallel convo, about school closures. There are 21 elementary schools in PDX w/ fewer than 300 kids and a lot of others that are between 300-350. A campaign to persuade people to re-enroll (+understand why they've left) could help, but will it land?
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
Also, there's Benson HS in close proximity to both Jefferson+Grant, brand-new and fancy, w/ room for a/b 700 more kids, who can lottery into the school. Just saying.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
The district is gambling that families won't leave, but data shows that already, about 31% of high schoolers who live in the district opt out of the public school system. Money follows students; the district can't afford to lose them en masse, esp. not w/declining birth rates.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
And also, a big influx of whiter, wealthier students into Jefferson would fundamentally change the tenor of Jefferson, once the state's only majority Black high school and still a rallying point of pride for many in Portland's Black community.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
Many families who were counting on sending their kids to Grant/Roosevelt/McDaniel, all large, modernized schools w/ robust programming, are going to be skeptical a/b being told they are being routed to Jefferson, which can't offer the same breadth of programming b/c of its size.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
From where I sit, Supt. Kimberlee Armstrong is wading right into the third rail of PPS by calling for the board to approve plans to sunset Jefferson HS's dual enrollment zone even before the building is modernized. She didn't create this mess. But she's going to own this attempt to fix it.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 11/06/2025
There's a LOT to unpack from last night's board discussion at PPS re: closing/consolidating schools+redrawing attendance boundaries (though the district would much prefer that I refer to this by their preferred euphemism "school optimization.' www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Portland Public Schools weighs big changes to school attendance maps
The school board is gearing up to consider merging some schools and sunsetting the dual attendance zone at Jefferson High School.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 30/05/2025
I feel certain that the social media comments on this column by colleague @billoram.bsky.social will be mostly of the cruel varietal. But those who take the time to read and sit with this McDaniel HS athlete's story will find a lot to think about here. I did.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 29/05/2025
And probably not an easy call. Balderas has deep ties to Beaverton, where his own children attended school, as he notes. The district’s most recent contract negotiations came down to the wire, but they avoided a strike. Difficult convos re: school consolidation lie ahead.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 29/05/2025
He has faced some complex dynamics in Beaverton, including some pointed questioning of his leadership by one of seven school board members.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 29/05/2025
Big news out of ⁦the Beaverton school district today, where Supt. Gustavo Balderas has announced that he will leave for a new job in WA in 13 months time. Balderas, previously Eugene’s supe, has been at BSD since 2022.
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Reposted by Julia Silverman
Hillary Borrud @hborrud.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
Important public service journalism from my colleague Julia Silverman: Oregon's school funding formula significantly undercounts student poverty and is likely the most regressive in the U.S. Lawmakers will most likely stick with it anyway. www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
A nat'l report says OR is the most regressive state re: funding for high-poverty students. The state has the data to fix it. But the money/political will? Nope. Meanwhile, lawmakers in a key ed budget comm. vote on the state school fund in a few hrs. Gifted link: www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Oregon’s school funding formula undercounts poverty, denying some districts millions. Lawmakers are poised to approve it anyway.
Oregon has more accurate datasets. But statute requires that the funding formula use on child poverty estimates the U.S. Census Bureau generates each year, which are less precise.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 24/05/2025
🔥🔥
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 24/05/2025
And at the end of the day, La Forte's lead has widened again, to 826 votes, with virtually no ballots left to count. She and Sanchez Bautista essentially split the remaining votes in MultCo and she was really boosted by the small number of PPS voters in Washington County.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 23/05/2025
Correction! WashCo vote totals have not been updated on the SOS website. La Forte's lead is actually 790 votes. It also appears that both Clack+Wash counties have more ballots left to count than MultCo, which works in La Forte's favor, given the split. Still a close race!
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 23/05/2025
Is there a possibility that this race could flip based on cured ballots? It is possible but miniscule. Was our call risky, maybe too risky? Also possible. Have I lost sleep over this all week? You betcha. But that's the math, and the numbers tell a story. www.oregonlive.com/education/20...
oregonlive.com
Portland voters pick longtime school safety advocate Virginia La Forte for Zone 5 school board seat
Virginia La Forte, a marketing and communications strategist, won election to the Portland School Board on Tuesday.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 23/05/2025
This AM, MultCo elections officials say they have under 300 ballots left to count today and La Forte's lead is 734 votes — super narrow but outside of recount territory (1/5th of 1%). There are still signature challenges out there, *maybe* and ballots can be received thru 5/27.
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Julia Silverman @jrlsilverman.bsky.social · 23/05/2025
But by drop 5, in order to overcome the initial lead (and the small # of votes that lean La Forte in Clack+WashCo), Sanchez Bautista would have needed to win ~65% or more of the remaining vote. (Remember, not all MultCo voters are PPS voters). By drop 5, he was back down to ~53%.
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