the DC International Public Charter School (DCI)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

All the feeders have their main entry yr at preK-3, preK-4 and only accept new students to replace students who leave until 2nd grade. If you look at the proposal, DCI estimates they will take around 20 new students total for grades 6-9 a year. This is based on the estimate that less than 2/3s of students from the feeders come to DCI. Probably an underestimate and either way, DCI will remain primarily a middle and high school for kids who entered the feeder schools as 3-4 yr olds.

Time will tell whether the estimates are correct. Until then, it will be a "wait and see", with great expectations of Washington DC - both the Capital & Capitol - being a lightening-rod for progress in "urban education." (We all know that "urban" is code for "economically disadvantaged, and 'of color'".)

Everyone who believes that public education should educate ALL of our students to the highest degree to which the student aspires, must support this school. Where else may a student of a "disadvantaged" background graduate high school, possibly fluent in Mandarin & Spanish (in addition to English)? Better educated students = better educated workforce = better lifestyle in the competitive global market-place.

[Anonymous]

2nd try:


Time will tell whether the estimates are correct. Until then, it will be a "wait and see", with great expectations of Washington DC - both the Capital & Capitol - being a lightening-rod for progress in "urban education." (We all know that "urban" is code for "economically disadvantaged, and 'of color'".)

Everyone who believes that public education should educate ALL of our students to the highest degree to which the student aspires, must support this school. Where else may a student of a "disadvantaged" background graduate high school, possibly fluent in Mandarin & Spanish (in addition to English)? Better educated students = better educated workforce = better lifestyle in the competitive global market-place.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCI as a school will offer MULTIPLE languages. Students can and will enter its grades. Most DCI students will graduate having studied at least 3 languages and will be fluent in at least 2

For example, a Yu Ying student might have excellent Chinese by grade 7 but no exposure to Spanish. He'll start Spanish as a third language.

Meanwhile, a student from LAMB might be bilingual English/Spanish but have no exposure to Chinese. She can get that as soon as she starts at DCI.

Having multiple languages makes it unnecessary to test students or worry about new students starting at a disadvantage. All students will start a "new" language at some point in DCI.

DCI will, of course, be a language-focused charter. A student with no interest or aptitude for foreign languages would probably want to look elsewhere.

Oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man... I SO WANT Sela to beg, borrow, or steal a way into this school.

I don't see many kids opting to study Hebrew when they have Mandarin, Spanish and French to choose from...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DCI as a school will offer MULTIPLE languages. Students can and will enter its grades. Most DCI students will graduate having studied at least 3 languages and will be fluent in at least 2

For example, a Yu Ying student might have excellent Chinese by grade 7 but no exposure to Spanish. He'll start Spanish as a third language.

Meanwhile, a student from LAMB might be bilingual English/Spanish but have no exposure to Chinese. She can get that as soon as she starts at DCI.

Having multiple languages makes it unnecessary to test students or worry about new students starting at a disadvantage. All students will start a "new" language at some point in DCI.

DCI will, of course, be a language-focused charter. A student with no interest or aptitude for foreign languages would probably want to look elsewhere.

Oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man... I SO WANT Sela to beg, borrow, or steal a way into this school.

I don't see many kids opting to study Hebrew when they have Mandarin, Spanish and French to choose from...

Well, my child is studying Spanish at one of the DCI feeders but I would love for my child to have an opportunity to learn Hebrew too at DCI. Our family has no connection to the Hebrew language but I think it would be a great opportunity for any child. There is strength in numbers.

[Anonymous]

So they would be providing, say math instruction in Hebrew? Don't get me wrong, there is nothing inherently wrong with learning Hebrew, but with limited resources, shouldn't the focus be on World Languages? The two functional languages of the UN are English and French, and the other 4 official languages are Spanish, Mandarin, Arabic, and Russian. Perhaps these should be the focus of the school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So they would be providing, say math instruction in Hebrew? Don't get me wrong, there is nothing inherently wrong with learning Hebrew, but with limited resources, shouldn't the focus be on World Languages? The two functional languages of the UN are English and French, and the other 4 official languages are Spanish, Mandarin, Arabic, and Russian. Perhaps these should be the focus of the school?

This sounds logical, but in the real world, DC's charters are set up by people with the passion and skills to do the job. So while the organizers of DCI may wlagree that Arabic is more useful than Hebrew, as long as there's no Arabic elementary charter, and as long as DCI feels the need for more feeders/partners, Hebrew could be what's offered.

[Anonymous]

All this talk of SELA, Hebrew or Arabic is getting ahead of the DCI discussion. SELA right now does not exist as a school. It is slated to start next fall. It's first students won't be finishing elementary and thus ready for a middle school for another 6 or 7 years. Sure, it would be great if DCI is successful and adds still more languages to its curriculum, but that would be quite a ways into the future, IF that is even direction it goes is to add more languages rather than focus on Chinese and Spanish.

Keep in mind...the DCI effort was spearheaded by Yu Ying and is slated to involve a couple of other language focused charters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
So they would be providing, say math instruction in Hebrew? Don't get me wrong, there is nothing inherently wrong with learning Hebrew, but with limited resources, shouldn't the focus be on World Languages? The two functional languages of the UN are English and French, and the other 4 official languages are Spanish, Mandarin, Arabic, and Russian. Perhaps these should be the focus of the school?

This sounds logical, but in the real world, DC's charters are set up by people with the passion and skills to do the job. So while the organizers of DCI may wlagree that Arabic is more useful than Hebrew, as long as there's no Arabic elementary charter, and as long as DCI feels the need for more feeders/partners, Hebrew could be what's offered.

This is very true, sadly.

I'm Jewish and a fluent Modern Hebrew speaker and, frankly, I'm ashamed that the sole reason Sela was granted a charter is because they had a dedicated group of people with the passion to craft an application that can get approved because DC charter school board doesn't bother to ask whether an eligible charter actually serves the children of DC. Fact is, there is no reason under the sun why anyone needs Hebrew immersion. Hell, there are only 7m people, tops, you speak the language and they are very clearly serviced by enrichment programs that do not command public money.

This is the single greatest failure of the DC Charter Board. They don't care, at all, for the needs of the present population, the ones they are supposed to serve and for whose needs they exist. They care about a narrow list of things. Greater real estate. More money. Create a private school at public school.

Truly disgusting.

[Anonymous]

Pp ignores the many benefits of language immersion that go far beyond practical usage of the language.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Pp ignores the many benefits of language immersion that go far beyond practical usage of the language.

Very true, but in that case we want classic Greek and Latin way before Hebrew. Btw, if this is a thread about DCI, why don't sela boosters open their own thread?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pp ignores the many benefits of language immersion that go far beyond practical usage of the language.

Very true, but in that case we want classic Greek and Latin way before Hebrew. Btw, if this is a thread about DCI, why don't sela boosters open their own thread?

And why do we want classical Greek before Hebrew and who is WE and who gets to decide "what serves DC"? I am not a Sela booster, just a woman of color who wants language options for my children. But I have to say there is more than a smack of racism and/or paternalism on DCUM. Upper middle class white folks spewing under the cloak of anonymity about what they feel the poor black children of DC want or need. And in my book, that's "disgusting." I want my children to go to a solid school where they have exposure to another language. I don't believe in the concept of inferior and superior languages. The need to constantly pick on Sela is most curious (more racism?). Modern Greek is spoken by about 12 million people, Hebrew by about 13+ million plus. Something tells me no one would be going after a Greek language charter. Charter schools are a function of the market. It's not the Charter School Board's to do market testing, it's their job to find well organized schools with a solid working model. If no parents are interested, nobody shows up, and the school doesn't happen. I had to wait a long time to get through the crowd at Sela's table where there were more parents with skin tones similar to mine holding up the line filling up applications. Some of you all need to do some soul-searching about why you think YOU get to decide what MY children, and children with less resources than my children, learn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Pp ignores the many benefits of language immersion that go far beyond practical usage of the language.

Very true, but in that case we want classic Greek and Latin way before Hebrew. Btw, if this is a thread about DCI, why don't sela boosters open their own thread?

And why do we want classical Greek before Hebrew and who is WE and who gets to decide "what serves DC"? I am not a Sela booster, just a woman of color who wants language options for my children. But I have to say there is more than a smack of racism and/or paternalism on DCUM. Upper middle class white folks spewing under the cloak of anonymity about what they feel the poor black children of DC want or need. And in my book, that's "disgusting." I want my children to go to a solid school where they have exposure to another language. I don't believe in the concept of inferior and superior languages. The need to constantly pick on Sela is most curious (more racism?). Modern Greek is spoken by about 12 million people, Hebrew by about 13+ million plus. Something tells me no one would be going after a Greek language charter. Charter schools are a function of the market. It's not the Charter School Board's to do market testing, it's their job to find well organized schools with a solid working model. If no parents are interested, nobody shows up, and the school doesn't happen. I had to wait a long time to get through the crowd at Sela's table where there were more parents with skin tones similar to mine holding up the line filling up applications. Some of you all need to do some soul-searching about why you think YOU get to decide what MY children, and children with less resources than my children, learn.

Greek and Latin are key foundational components of Western and Near Eastern scholarship, science, law and literature. Most terminology in virtually every area of science, engineering and technology contains Greek or Latin roots. Greek scholars gave rise to modern study of such fields as ethics and logic, Greek playwrights gave us the foundations of modern drama and theater, Romans gave us great works on rhetoric and many other areas - those ancient writings are still very much relevant and powerful today. Latin was the universal language of academia throughout the western world up to the 20th century. Many languages rose from Latin, to include Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, French and Romanian - and a good understanding of one makes it much easier to learn any of the others. Hebrew - not so much influence on our society, not by a great stretch. If anything, Yiddish (a Germanic language) has had far more influence and provided more loan words than Hebrew has.

[Anonymous]

^ To add to my post- the point I was trying to make is that Greek and Latin are indeed a big deal, as opposed to Hebrew which isn't as fundamental to our everyday society.

However, I wouldn't suggest that Greek and Latin be taught immersion-style - immersion-style teaching should focus on everyday, modern languages.

[Anonymous]

As an oncologist, I can tell you that your arguments about the importance of Greek and Latin on modern medical practice is laughable. Moreover, as a PK, I can tell you first-hand of the contribution of ancient Hebrew to Western Civilization - for example the very concept of law derives from Hebrew. Hebrew, of course, has many more cognates that Yiddish, sounds like you need to brush up on your alphabet (a Hebrew cognate). In any case, I echo the concern for this strange preoccupation with picking on Sela. I am not pulling my daughter from Yu Ying for Sela, but I hope Sela goes forth and prospers. YY parents are familiar with such negative fixations by DCUM, but you all seem to have fallen of the mental cliff of late!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As an oncologist, I can tell you that your arguments about the importance of Greek and Latin on modern medical practice is laughable. Moreover, as a PK, I can tell you first-hand of the contribution of ancient Hebrew to Western Civilization - for example the very concept of law derives from Hebrew. Hebrew, of course, has many more cognates that Yiddish, sounds like you need to brush up on your alphabet (a Hebrew cognate). In any case, I echo the concern for this strange preoccupation with picking on Sela. I am not pulling my daughter from Yu Ying for Sela, but I hope Sela goes forth and prospers. YY parents are familiar with such negative fixations by DCUM, but you all seem to have fallen of the mental cliff of late!

So true! DCI welcomes you Sela....in like 7 years! Y'all need to chill with this anti-Sela rhetoric (and YY, and Basis, and Washington Latin, and DCUM's next victim charters, wherever they may be found).