A "nationally recognized locale for competitive high school sports"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They are paying someone for this?

How about using the money to improve the 2% math proficiency at Dunbar instead? Or have they given up on educating these kids?

Thats exactly what I was thinking. Once again, DME has no idea how to attract families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Audio of the first meeting is here:
https://dme.dc.gov/page/dc-sports-review-study

Their finding are idiotic. Lots of focus on baseball as a high school sport. The notion that DCPS kids — who don’t grow up playing baseball outside of upper NW and don’t play travel —- will be national standouts is laughable.

If anything, high school sports would be dramatically improved by more indoor basketball courts.
DCPS elementary kids play games in their lunchroom at some schools. For high school kids, the struggle for gym space is unbelievable.

The premise was idiotic so it's not surprising the findings were idiotic. They're really not doing the vast majority of kids any favors by leading them to believe that professional athletics is a viable career path. They may as well have classes in picking lottery numbers.

Sports are great for kids, but they should be focusing on creating more opportunities for participation.

I watched the video, and what struck me was that the emphasis was much more on adults than kids -- increasing salaries, creating more positions, making part-time positions full-time. There was never any evidence presented that there are vast numbers of DC kids who are on the cusp of turning pro, the only thing holding them back is that the AD at their school is part-time and their coach is underpaid. It seems that in fact the opposite is true, if kids have talent the opportunities find them.

THIS. There are so many adults hungry to have found the next phenom that even moderately talented kids get, if anything, too much attention by high school. My moderately talented kid had coaches telling him that he was going to go high D1 in basketball from 8th grade on, and in high school he had parents from Maryland publics and privates (not the top ones, but still) trying to convince him to transfer out of DCPS. One Maryland coach even offered to fake and address for him so he could pretend to be in boundary. And he was not a superstar. High school kids do not need more of that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Audio of the first meeting is here:
https://dme.dc.gov/page/dc-sports-review-study

Their finding are idiotic. Lots of focus on baseball as a high school sport. The notion that DCPS kids — who don’t grow up playing baseball outside of upper NW and don’t play travel —- will be national standouts is laughable.

If anything, high school sports would be dramatically improved by more indoor basketball courts.
DCPS elementary kids play games in their lunchroom at some schools. For high school kids, the struggle for gym space is unbelievable.

The premise was idiotic so it's not surprising the findings were idiotic. They're really not doing the vast majority of kids any favors by leading them to believe that professional athletics is a viable career path. They may as well have classes in picking lottery numbers.

Sports are great for kids, but they should be focusing on creating more opportunities for participation.

I watched the video, and what struck me was that the emphasis was much more on adults than kids -- increasing salaries, creating more positions, making part-time positions full-time. There was never any evidence presented that there are vast numbers of DC kids who are on the cusp of turning pro, the only thing holding them back is that the AD at their school is part-time and their coach is underpaid. It seems that in fact the opposite is true, if kids have talent the opportunities find them.

The key goal is off: They want to keep top athletes in the city. But are concerned about keeping top students?

We all know the answer is no. And no parent is going to turn down an offer from GDS to have their kid play a sport to stay at a DCPS school. Top athletes have been recruited away from public schools for a very long time. But these are few and far between. I’m all for more competitive sports for kids but not with the goal for them to go D1. That’s just a high bar and many kids make it to D1 because they families can afford to pay for travel teams and spend their weekends traveling all over the country so scouts can see their kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Audio of the first meeting is here:
https://dme.dc.gov/page/dc-sports-review-study

Their finding are idiotic. Lots of focus on baseball as a high school sport. The notion that DCPS kids — who don’t grow up playing baseball outside of upper NW and don’t play travel —- will be national standouts is laughable.

If anything, high school sports would be dramatically improved by more indoor basketball courts.
DCPS elementary kids play games in their lunchroom at some schools. For high school kids, the struggle for gym space is unbelievable.

The premise was idiotic so it's not surprising the findings were idiotic. They're really not doing the vast majority of kids any favors by leading them to believe that professional athletics is a viable career path. They may as well have classes in picking lottery numbers.

Sports are great for kids, but they should be focusing on creating more opportunities for participation.

I watched the video, and what struck me was that the emphasis was much more on adults than kids -- increasing salaries, creating more positions, making part-time positions full-time. There was never any evidence presented that there are vast numbers of DC kids who are on the cusp of turning pro, the only thing holding them back is that the AD at their school is part-time and their coach is underpaid. It seems that in fact the opposite is true, if kids have talent the opportunities find them.

The key goal is off: They want to keep top athletes in the city. But are concerned about keeping top students?

We all know the answer is no. And no parent is going to turn down an offer from GDS to have their kid play a sport to stay at a DCPS school. Top athletes have been recruited away from public schools for a very long time. But these are few and far between. I’m all for more competitive sports for kids but not with the goal for them to go D1. That’s just a high bar and many kids make it to D1 because they families can afford to pay for travel teams and spend their weekends traveling all over the country so scouts can see their kids.

And many more families spend all that time and money and don't get the D1 scholarship or even any interest. If you've ever been involved with youth sports, things get really crazy around 10-11th grade. That's the age where if the kids are good they start getting interest from college scouts. So it's the age when kids realize they aren't that good, and the parents realize their kids aren't that good. Parents get mad at the clubs and coaches who have been stringing them along and taking their money since the kid was twelve, kids want to quit the sport and teams fall apart because the players are quitting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's funny how the wokerati and the Klan often end up at the same place. The essence of this sports initiative is that blacks just aren't that smart, but they're good at sports. Let that sink in for a minute or two.

You’re the only person saying anything like the offensive sentiments that you are attributing to others. You seem not so bright.

I'm the only person saying it out loud. That's the difference.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's funny how the wokerati and the Klan often end up at the same place. The essence of this sports initiative is that blacks just aren't that smart, but they're good at sports. Let that sink in for a minute or two.

You’re the only person saying anything like the offensive sentiments that you are attributing to others. You seem not so bright.

I'm the only person saying it out loud. That's the difference.

It’s interesting — believing that most other people share one’s extremist views is very characteristic of all kinds of extremism.

[Anonymous]

The second meeting is tonight at 7pm.

Details at: https://dme.dc.gov/page/dc-sports-review-study

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How about building a decent competitive pool in wards 6/7/8?

It’s a widespread problem. Even with DPR’s excellent facility at Wilson up the street, the Hardy swim team practices and the much-harder-to-get-to pool at Roosevelt.

I thought Ballou had a pool. Pretty certain Dunbar does but I don't think they have a swim team. Just open it to the publci

[Anonymous]

The report is out:
https://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/DC%20Sports%20Review%20Dec%202022%20FINAL.pdf

It seems detached from reality.

[Anonymous]

They have given up pretending to care about education.

I guess thats refreshing honesty, at least.

[Anonymous]

The list of current participation and programming by sport in the Appendix is interesting.

The recommendations, however, are a laundry list with no strategy, priority, or cost estimates attached to make them useful.

I hope they didn’t pay big bucks for this. Yet I have no doubt they did.

[Anonymous]

The list of sports and participation is vaguely interesting to me, though the fact that it combines all school types really muddies the water and (IMO) makes it less clear what the state of play actually is in DC public schools.

Agree that the recommendations are garbage. More baseball fields?! Really?! The city has a LOT of baseball fields and they are historically underutilized relative to all other field types.

My kingdom for a report that leaned into actually preparing DC kids to build the skills for long-term health - lifting/training, cross country, swimming, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The list of sports and participation is vaguely interesting to me, though the fact that it combines all school types really muddies the water and (IMO) makes it less clear what the state of play actually is in DC public schools.

Agree that the recommendations are garbage. More baseball fields?! Really?! The city has a LOT of baseball fields and they are historically underutilized relative to all other field types.

My kingdom for a report that leaned into actually preparing DC kids to build the skills for long-term health - lifting/training, cross country, swimming, etc.

Something tells me you do not have a baseball player in your family. DC does not have many under utilized 90 foot baseball fields at all. And the few that exist are ALWAYS sold out every single year year round when permits open up. Many schools (public and private alike) bus to Nats youth facilities to play and often don’t have access for regulation size fields for practice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The list of sports and participation is vaguely interesting to me, though the fact that it combines all school types really muddies the water and (IMO) makes it less clear what the state of play actually is in DC public schools.

Agree that the recommendations are garbage. More baseball fields?! Really?! The city has a LOT of baseball fields and they are historically underutilized relative to all other field types.

My kingdom for a report that leaned into actually preparing DC kids to build the skills for long-term health - lifting/training, cross country, swimming, etc.

Something tells me you do not have a baseball player in your family. DC does not have many under utilized 90 foot baseball fields at all. And the few that exist are ALWAYS sold out every single year year round when permits open up. Many schools (public and private alike) bus to Nats youth facilities to play and often don’t have access for regulation size fields for practice.

But baseball has it better than any other sport.

DPR used to provide statistics about field usage, they stopped because it was embarrassing to them. In a typical year, about 20,000 players would participate in an activity that used DPR fields. About 3,000 of them would use a diamond, and 17,000 would use a rectangle.

DPR used to publish an inventory of their fields. They've taken it off their website, but it's available here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1uAjnGktN3AHfRfEzkFar4_NTqZaAeeFC/view?usp=share_link

Of the 110 or so DPR fields, roughly two thirds are diamonds. If you look at the categories on that inventory, you'll see there are six categories:

Grass Infield -- 60' Diamond
Grass Infield -- 70' Diamond
Grass Infield -- 90' Diamond
Skinned Infield -- 60' Diamond
Skinned Infield -- 70' Diamond
Rectangular Field -- (Multi-Use)

So 85% of the players are on 1/3 of the fields, and 15% are on the other 2/3. Note that many of the "rectangular" fields are multi-use, and can also be used for baseball. Logically, given the relative scarcity of rectangles you'd think that diamond sports would get lower priority on the multi-use fields, but that's not the way DPR sees it.

DPR sees itself as the Department of Baseball.