Claudia Rowe

2 months ago | tri-cityherald.com | Claudia Rowe

Jemiere Robinson's murder is one of the most horrific child deaths King County prosecutors have ever seen. But being an outlier doesn't mean the case of a 14-year-old apparently tortured to death by his own mother has no lessons to offer about holes in our child welfare system that threaten many more kids. Last year's fatal stabbing of 4-year-old Ariel Garcia at the hands of his mom also points to a serious, correctable, deficiency.

Nov 15, 2024 | seattletimes.com | Claudia Rowe

It would be easy for most of Seattle to forget them. Each of the sixboys killed by gunfire in the city this year was too young to have made much of a mark on the world beyond their friends and family. The eldest was just 17; the next two, 16; two were high school freshmen. And the youngest had just graduated middle school. Ten months since the first of these killings, and not one person has been arrested. It’s not for lack of witnesses.

Aug 30, 2024 | seattletimes.com | Claudia Rowe

For just a moment, if possible, let’s set aside the arguments that hold charter schools as an existential threat to traditional public education and focus on one of the primary reasons they were allowed to take root in Washington a decade ago: to serve as education labs. Freed from the regulations binding traditional public schools, charters might be able to demonstrate other ways of reaching kids, the thinking went.

Jul 31, 2024 | seattletimes.com | Claudia Rowe

When 43 young men living at the Green Hill juvenile lockup were abruptly handcuffed and sent to state prison last month, lots of people surely assumed they were the worst of the worst — unrepentant and irredeemable. After all, the state Department of Children, Youth and Families argued that conditions at Green Hill were so dangerous they had no choice. The atmosphere was a tinderbox about to explode, officials said. To get control they needed fewer inmates.

Apr 5, 2024 | seattletimes.com | Claudia Rowe

Sixteen years ago, while driving south on Route 167, Terrell Dorsey had a moment. He was a middle-aged father of four, crying in his car on the way to work. The job selling electronics wasn’t terrible. But earning minimum wage at 52 years old was not the life Dorsey had imagined. He’d attended good schools in Portland and, as a youngster, excelled. Dorsey, however, was not a big kid, and in high school he got bullied.