Technology at Oakridge Elementary?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here. Still trying to find out. Our neighbor said they had mandatory iPad work throughout but there were also games on the iPad and her kid was always on it at home. No idea how Oakridge teaches reading or the cell phone policy...
What I really want to know is what makes it "..a horrible, horrible school, the absolute worst" ???

So, at Oakridge a while back, a kid was using technology for an inappropriate use. After that, kids were no longer allowed to take iPads home. And then, because the county started paying attention to how bad Oakridge's test scores were, the principal needed to raise test scores and said kids would go home with their iPads and use them for educational apps. But I don't remember ever hearing exactly what the kids were supposed to be doing on the iPads at home. Maybe they did, I don't know. My kid just hauled his iPad back and forth in his backpack and never took it out. I think that it's honestly pretty easy for a kid to trick a parent into saying some game is educational when it isn't actually what they are supposed to be doing.

The way they teach reading is a county-wide thing. I forget the name of it, but it's phonics based. The only issue with reading at Oakridge is going to be the same at all APS schools-most veteran teachers have been trained in balanced literacy which (if we are being honest) de-emphasizes phonics. But reading isn't something I'd worry about now that Lucy Calkins is over. Reading is also taught using Lexia (on the iPad) and the county is very intense about being sure students get a certain number of hours a week doing Lexia. So again, any issue you might have with that is a county-wide thing.

The kids also use iPads for memorizing math facts. I don't like this because the way they do seating arrangements and the demands that they put on teachers to constantly assess kids means that teachers can't always look to be sure the kids are actually working on their times tables. They just see kids staring at their iPads unless they walk right up behind them. There are so many other things kids do - YouTube, messing around with the timer app, taking selfies, websites with games, etc. I think my kids did other things during math iPad time and one of them didn't have her times tables down until maybe sixth grade. This is also APS-wide (and I imagine all over the country).

But really this is not what I'd worry about when it comes to Oakridge. The principal is terrible to most of the teachers so you have a lot of stressed-out, inexperienced teachers with no admin support. This leads to awful classroom environments and low test scores. She is also really into equity and has a massive white savior complex, which means that basically if a kid is not white or if he has an IEP, he won't be disciplined and the teacher is stuck trying to deal with him in class (I know this is an issue all over the county but I think it's especially bad at Oakridge). The principal's main way of taking care of conflict is yelling at teachers, parents, and kids. And she just does lots of awful thingsShe did this thing last year where she bought the teachers breakfast and said that there was a contingent of parents who were opposed to the teachers (and we weren't, we were opposed to HER) in an effort to get teachers on her side. The Arlington Ridge Civic association and other groups are trying to get her fired, and APS knows that all this stuff is going down and has known for a long time, but the principal has some powerful allies on her side because she is a master at making herself look good.

[Anonymous]

She has also ridiculed parents after IEP and other meetings. Yes, I’ve witnessed this firsthand. It makes me ill looking back on it now.

Speaking of trying to get teachers on her side, that sounds very similar to the time when one of her lackeys/acolytes was sent around to round up teachers to attend meetings “so it wouldn’t just be Dr. Wright” facing angry parents.