Can we get MCPS to allow fundraising for staff positions?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"Here's another alternative, that people are ready and willing to do: give the parents at a school some autonomy to help their school. Shocking! Unconstitutional! But DCPS does it, so, I guess it isn't so shocking or unconstitutional."

They have the autonomy to volunteer currently and it seems like many schools have ample volunteers in wealthy areas. Now if you happen to be at a school where the principal does not allow that in a classroom, that's an issue to take up with the principal since it's not a county-wide rule.

Also i find it pretty funny that people are pointing to DC schools as an example of "things working just fine".

You can find it funny if you want, but at least in the DCPS classrooms in the JKLMM's, they don't have 27 kindergarteners and one teacher in a classroom. You're kidding yourself if you think we have it better. Now, is there a vast imbalance in the schools from NW to NE in DC? Yes. Of course there is. But there's a vast imbalance in the schools in Potomac versus Eastern Moco too. This rule isn't preventing that. All it's doing is making sure the classrooms in the "popular" schools are overcrowded. Way to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Sure, they have choices. Everyone has choices. We can all choose to homeschool. But now let's get back to reality and admit that the choices presented SUCK. And you're refusing to allow an alternative that would not suck.

Why would sending your child to a Title 1 or focus school SUCK?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
+1 Like OP, I live in Bethesda. I don't have quite the same level of concern about class size, and I am sympathetic to the principle of not allowing wealthier school clusters to buy more staff. But it does annoy me that, at least on DCUM, people love to rally around knocking the Bethesda schools down a peg. The kids are generally high-performing, so apparently they don't deserve any relief from some of the largest classrooms in the county. Bethesda is comparatively rich, so everyone seems to think it is OK that its schools are horribly overcrowded ("If you don't like it, move."). Or, Bethesda schools shouldn't be limited to people who live there, so let's bus more kids in or allow unmanaged development of high-density residences so more kids can benefit. I actually support more workforce housing in Bethesda, but it makes me bonkers that there's no money coming in to address the fact that Bethesda has some of the most overcrowded schools anywhere. Nobody thinks Bethesda needs any public resources, and yet the main things that are needed (expanded facilities, more staff) are the things that people in Bethesda are prohibited from contributing directly themselves.

The schools in Bethesda have the same class size caps as every other school in MCPS.

But in practice MCPS explicitly maintains significantly smaller class sizes in Title I / Focus schools. That's the whole point of this post. I don't agree with the OP's suggestion of "buying" additional teachers via parent donations ala the Upper NW DCPS model. But I do think it's reasonable to question why it's considered OK to stuff 26 K students into a classroom in Bethesda but not elsewhere in the county. I'm all for closing the achievement gap. But there should be some baseline equity in the educational experiences provided to kids. That's precisely why parents shouldn't be allowed to fundraise for extra teachers; but equity shouldn't mean sabotaging the earliest years of elementary school for kids who live in wealthier zip codes with ridiculously large classes that have zero support.

I'm a PP who says we SHOULD be able to fundraise for aides or teachers, BUT I wholeheartedly agree that the best option would be to lower the cap for student/teacher ratio across the board. Of course. Let's keep it to 20 in K, 22 in first, etc. But after years of trying to get that to happen, I am utterly hopeless that it will any time soon. So I want to be able to make it better any way I can for as many kids as I can now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

You can find it funny if you want, but at least in the DCPS classrooms in the JKLMM's, they don't have 27 kindergarteners and one teacher in a classroom. You're kidding yourself if you think we have it better. Now, is there a vast imbalance in the schools from NW to NE in DC? Yes. Of course there is. But there's a vast imbalance in the schools in Potomac versus Eastern Moco too. This rule isn't preventing that. All it's doing is making sure the classrooms in the "popular" schools are overcrowded. Way to go.

"Popular" schools? Most students in MCPS do not go to schools in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, or Potomac. They are not the popular schools; they are the schools in places where you can't live unless you're affluent.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Sure, they have choices. Everyone has choices. We can all choose to homeschool. But now let's get back to reality and admit that the choices presented SUCK. And you're refusing to allow an alternative that would not suck.

Why would sending your child to a Title 1 or focus school SUCK?

Because I would have to remove my kids from their friends, move and hope that the unknown new school isn't going to come with new problems that we don't even know about yet. Not to mention all the issues involved with moving, selling a house, buying a house, moving away from family, etc. Do you move every year? Do you think it's great for kids to switch schools? And I have one kid with some social issues, so moving is even worse for her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You can find it funny if you want, but at least in the DCPS classrooms in the JKLMM's, they don't have 27 kindergarteners and one teacher in a classroom. You're kidding yourself if you think we have it better. Now, is there a vast imbalance in the schools from NW to NE in DC? Yes. Of course there is. But there's a vast imbalance in the schools in Potomac versus Eastern Moco too. This rule isn't preventing that. All it's doing is making sure the classrooms in the "popular" schools are overcrowded. Way to go.

"Popular" schools? Most students in MCPS do not go to schools in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, or Potomac. They are not the popular schools; they are the schools in places where you can't live unless you're affluent.

Use whatever term you want. You know what I mean -- the schools where they fill the classes right up to the cap limit. Some schools that doesn't happen because they don't have the same population.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree with others that holding up DCPS as a model is crazy.

Yes, Janney, Deal and Wilson have become good schools in the last 20 years but at what cost to the rest of the system. The disparity between the haves and have nots is growing. Look at the scores sometime. And that is BEFORE Parc Testing. And the difference between the resources at any given Ward 7 or 8 school compared to Ward 1 schools is shocking. Not long ago we took a few students from a Ward 8 school to a Ward 1 school for an event - on the way back they were discussing how nice the school was and one young man said, "I want live with the white people." I wanted to cry.

"At what cost to the rest of the system"? Answer that question, please. You're pointing out the inequality, but it's not like JKLMM have made the other schools worse. They've just gotten better. If anything, those schools getting better has attracted more high-income people to DC and increased the tax base -- benefiting all schools.
Seriously, crabs in a bucket.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
The schools in Bethesda have the same class size caps as every other school in MCPS.

But in practice MCPS explicitly maintains significantly smaller class sizes in Title I / Focus schools. That's the whole point of this post. I don't agree with the OP's suggestion of "buying" additional teachers via parent donations ala the Upper NW DCPS model. But I do think it's reasonable to question why it's considered OK to stuff 26 K students into a classroom in Bethesda but not elsewhere in the county. I'm all for closing the achievement gap. But there should be some baseline equity in the educational experiences provided to kids. That's precisely why parents shouldn't be allowed to fundraise for extra teachers; but equity shouldn't mean sabotaging the earliest years of elementary school for kids who live in wealthier zip codes with ridiculously large classes that have zero support.

Fine. The schools in Bethesda have the same class size caps as every other school in MCPS, except for K-3 class size caps in Title 1 and Focus schools.

Bethesda does not have a monopoly on large kindergarten classes in MCPS.

http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/02159.pdf
https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/02227.pdf
https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/02703.pdf
https://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/02511.pdf
http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/regulatoryaccountability/glance/currentyear/schools/02207.pdf

No one said Bethesda had a monopoly on large K classes. I don't want ANYONE to have large K classes. I'm all for fixing that through public funding and regulations. And if we can't do that, then letting whoever can fix it themselves.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone thing people in Bethesda/Potomac might start to de-camp to Fairfax County? FCPS seems to have less drama in the overall funding.

I don't know about Fairfax county, but I am very seriously leaving Bethesda for somewhere else -- anywhere I can get a job that will let me afford schools for my kids that aren't this poorly run.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree with others that holding up DCPS as a model is crazy.

Yes, Janney, Deal and Wilson have become good schools in the last 20 years but at what cost to the rest of the system. The disparity between the haves and have nots is growing. Look at the scores sometime. And that is BEFORE Parc Testing. And the difference between the resources at any given Ward 7 or 8 school compared to Ward 1 schools is shocking. Not long ago we took a few students from a Ward 8 school to a Ward 1 school for an event - on the way back they were discussing how nice the school was and one young man said, "I want live with the white people." I wanted to cry.

"At what cost to the rest of the system"? Answer that question, please. You're pointing out the inequality, but it's not like JKLMM have made the other schools worse. They've just gotten better. If anything, those schools getting better has attracted more high-income people to DC and increased the tax base -- benefiting all schools.
Seriously, crabs in a bucket.

+1. Let's do what we can to attract high-income people to MCPS. It's a win-win for all. Let's allow parents to donate to aides in the classroom.

[Anonymous]

I find it depressing that people would rather have things be "equal" and poor quality than allow some schools to improve their quality of education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You can find it funny if you want, but at least in the DCPS classrooms in the JKLMM's, they don't have 27 kindergarteners and one teacher in a classroom. You're kidding yourself if you think we have it better. Now, is there a vast imbalance in the schools from NW to NE in DC? Yes. Of course there is. But there's a vast imbalance in the schools in Potomac versus Eastern Moco too. This rule isn't preventing that. All it's doing is making sure the classrooms in the "popular" schools are overcrowded. Way to go.

"Popular" schools? Most students in MCPS do not go to schools in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, or Potomac. They are not the popular schools; they are the schools in places where you can't live unless you're affluent.

Use whatever term you want. You know what I mean -- the schools where they fill the classes right up to the cap limit. Some schools that doesn't happen because they don't have the same population.

This does not happen only in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, and Potomac.

[Anonymous]

Should we prohibit the Bethesda school from having a reading group in K for kids who are reading at fourth grade level? Because there might not be a group like that at every school, so it's unfair? So those kids should just not be allowed to be in a group like that?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

You can find it funny if you want, but at least in the DCPS classrooms in the JKLMM's, they don't have 27 kindergarteners and one teacher in a classroom. You're kidding yourself if you think we have it better. Now, is there a vast imbalance in the schools from NW to NE in DC? Yes. Of course there is. But there's a vast imbalance in the schools in Potomac versus Eastern Moco too. This rule isn't preventing that. All it's doing is making sure the classrooms in the "popular" schools are overcrowded. Way to go.

"Popular" schools? Most students in MCPS do not go to schools in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, or Potomac. They are not the popular schools; they are the schools in places where you can't live unless you're affluent.

Use whatever term you want. You know what I mean -- the schools where they fill the classes right up to the cap limit. Some schools that doesn't happen because they don't have the same population.

This does not happen only in Bethesda, Chevy Chase, and Potomac.

NO ONE SAID IT DOES. No one's arguing that only B, CC ,and Potomac should be allowed to do this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The problem with MCPS is the absolute lack of local control. It is way too big and all decisions are made by a school board made up of politicians who have no idea what goes on in the individual schools. I moved to MCPS from an area with local control of the schools and left MCPS to go to another area with local control. Nothing is perfect but the school board members in my district live in my town and their kids are either in or have gone through our schools. One downside is higher taxes. I sold my house in Montgomery County for $850 and bought a house here for $400 yet my property taxes went up by 40% (basically the same size house). I don't know what the answer is. Chicago Public Schools implemented local school councils. Maybe MCPS needs that for each cluster as well.

I completely agree. I grew up in, and used to live in a town with a town-based school system. It was vastly better than this county-based train wreck.

For the record, there are no employment taxes charged by towns. So yes, property taxes are higher, but the net tax impact is about the same as what it is here.