Principals fired recently - what do parents think?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
And who typically runs a school while search is on in past experience? Just looking for parental advice before we start DCPS.

Our school's principal "left" over the Winter Break. Since then, we've had two different interim principals. Not sure when/how they'll get around to selecting a new principal for our school (though there is a parent panel to provide input from the parent community.) We're hoping to have a permanent principal by the beginning of next school year (but I'm not holding my breath.)

[Anonymous]

OMG...just checking - charter school principals aren't subject to the same 1-yr chancellor can fire you, right? We're still on a couple of waitlists and it would be our first time in charter. Hadn't thought about this type of turnover potential before.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OMG...just checking - charter school principals aren't subject to the same 1-yr chancellor can fire you, right? We're still on a couple of waitlists and it would be our first time in charter. Hadn't thought about this type of turnover potential before.

No I don't believe so.

[Anonymous]

Charter schools are each run independently and make their own hiring and firing decisions, unless things get so bad that the "State" dept. of education steps in.

DCPS does its own recruiting for new principals from current principals and assistant principals, by recruitng from outside the District--locally and nationally, and by partnering with Principal training programs run by non-profits.

[Anonymous]

I don't have a child in the public schools of DC, but I am a veteran teacher of the NY Public Schools.

It is certainly true that the DC schools are failing many children. Without a doubt. There is certainly dead wood throughout the system. I don't want to discuss the need for change because it is obvious.

That said... If Ms. Rhee continues to speak as if all the DC teachers and administrators are awful and harmful and should be discarded, she will have no one willing to work with her to make these schools better. The teachers in the schools now - these are the ones she needs on her side. Principals, too.

I know from my own experience that I really wouldn't want to hear someone tell me I should "be accountable" when a) my books were out of date, b) I had no paper, c) my class roster didn't settle down until late October, d) the curriculum kept changing to reflect political whims, e) I had four different preps every day - that means I taught four different subjects, f) I had no job security from one semester to the next due to budget issues....

I have only great things to say about the "tough" kids I taught. (I taught in a very tough neighborhood.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:c) my class roster didn't settle down until late October

Honest question: so how does it work in NYC, elsewhere? I'm starting to think I've been brainwashed into accepting the DC musical chairs/hedge your bets system.

[Anonymous]

Former teacher PP here again. This is long. Sorry. I hope it is clear.

Basically, schools do their best to predict the number of students, and hire accordingly. Schools in affluent suburbs can generally do an accurate job. These schools also set standard class sizes below the legal maximum. So, when the kids show up in the fall, class size is darn close to expected, and even if there's a surprise enrollment of some extra kids, there's enough "slack" to accommodate.

Urban districts generally operate much closer to the margin (it was 34 for a high school class in NYC). Urban districts also have a much harder time predicting - turnover, immigration, less stable community.... They also are often not in a position to turn within-zone kids away. There are also a slew of kids who are "drop-outs in all but name" - kids who no one expects to actually show, but are technically enrolled and therefore entitled to a "spot." If local TANF benefits are dependent on school attendance, some of those kids will show up for a week. So, I'd start with a roster of maybe 38, then a few weeks in, we'd all compare notes and lists, and rearrange student schedules if needed to get all classes under the cap. Believe it or not - if we over-predicted by a large enough amount, we'd let a teacher go in week 3. We teachers would coordinate our lesson plans for the first month so that we could minimize the damage this "musical chairs" caused to our students, but it certainly wasn't optimal. (By the way, the "we teachers would coordinate to minimize the damage" is an example of why "accountability" can be seen as a threat. We were really trying hard.)

NYC is managed better than DC. It is also many, many times larger. There are boundary issues, and parents pulling strings. All the same crap as here.