Interesting review on the fall of Dunbar High

[Anonymous]

Colbert King (Dunbar graduate, 1957) recalls Commencement Day 2007 (at which he gave the address):

The class of 2007 had earned at least $1.5 million in scholarships. The valedictorian had received scholarship offers worth more than $100,000. That didn't sound like failure.

June 11, 2007, stands out in my mind for another reason. Dunbar's graduation day began at Howard University's Cramton Auditorium. I watched as Mayor Adrian Fenty, six months in office, warmly greeted School Superintendent Clifford Janey on the stage.

The day ended with Janey receiving a late-night call from Fenty telling him he was fired.

That may have been a key accelerant in Dunbar's burning. The next day, Fenty placed the school system under the leadership of Michelle Rhee. A year later, Rhee got rid of the school's principal, Dr. Harriet Kargbo.

Nothing but turmoil has followed.


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/17/AR2010121706498.html

[Anonymous]

I hope more disclosures come out about all of the schools with Rhee appointees, especially where principas were fired her first year. While many do not represent the extreme difficulties and drama of Dunbar's experience there are plenty of good schools that became mediocre under Rhee or worse.

[Anonymous]

I tutored a girl who went to Dunbar -- the stories she told about her school were beyond depressing.

[Anonymous]

I think King's column was poor. It sought to blame everything on Fenty/Rhee which, while they do deserve quite a lot of blame for their management of Dunbar since they came on the scene, left the impression that Dunbar was not that bad until Fenty/Rhee.

King's column on it's face was contradictory. On the one hand he sought to cast Dunbar as not that bad by citing the scholarship money offered to the 2007 class, but at the same time acknowledging only that the "lower" grades were not doing so well (a phenomena that must have started pre-Fenty/Rhee).

A more thoughtful column would have explored why this was so.

I do agree w/ King that a long-term steady principalship (if it's the right person) can do wonders for any school, and that it's crazy that Dunbar has had 4 principals in 3 years, but that is not the root cause of Dunbar's slide.

As much as I think Fenty/Rhee screwed up Dunbar even more with this sub-contracting arrangement, the reality is that Dunbar and pretty much all the DCPS high schools have been crazy bad for years. At least Fenty/Rhee have had the courage to say that and to try anything and everything to fix it.

You know what they say in 12-step -- you can't fix a problem until you acknowledge you have one.

[Anonymous]

I don't know about the blame all being on Fenty/Rhee merely because Rhee tried to put a management team inside of Eastern. It was the Kevin Johnson group that camed to Eastern with Rhee in tow and we as the African-American parent group said no in uncertain terms "hit the road Kevin." Well, they took the dog and pony show over to Ballou and it fizzled out too. I think that Dunbar were grasping at straws and was ready to sip anyone's kool-aid. So, there you had it the Bedford management team presented a case and they began to improve.

Remember they [DCPS] rehired the same principal who quit while working under the management team, so there's some type of compliance or acceptance about the Rhee program that the Dunbar parent base was accepting.

Dunbar High School is not Dumbar and should not be underestimated and hopefully this can be the beginning of great things at that school. I remember the times that Dunbar would have rivaled Wilson, SWW, Banneker and probably Gonazaga in various academic and athletic activities.