Why aren’t KIPP schools popularity on this board

[Anonymous]

I know people who do, but they all seem to get into more desired charters eventually. I think the lack of a conveniently located middle school would be an issue even for people who were otherwise fine with the KIPP approach.

[Anonymous]

They think they know all they need to based a 60 Minutes piece a few years back or an article they read.

KIPP has a track record and a national reputation, which can cut both ways.

I also think most DC charter parents still consider themselves left of center politically and feel better about choosing a homegrown DC charter school over one that’s part of a national network.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I moved my child from one well-regarded DCPS to another one because DC needed LESS structure. DC is highly self-motivated, wants time and space to explore, and is a lot happier without too much rigidity.

So whatever. Kids are different. Count me as an UMC who *knows* that KIPP would not work well for my child. Kids are different. Some (me!) thrive in structure; some don't. To each his own.

I don't disagree (I am the PP whose child needs structure for now). Kids are all different.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I know people who do, but they all seem to get into more desired charters eventually. I think the lack of a conveniently located middle school would be an issue even for people who were otherwise fine with the KIPP approach.

High school, I mean.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I moved my child from one well-regarded DCPS to another one because DC needed LESS structure. DC is highly self-motivated, wants time and space to explore, and is a lot happier without too much rigidity.

So whatever. Kids are different. Count me as an UMC who *knows* that KIPP would not work well for my child. Kids are different. Some (me!) thrive in structure; some don't. To each his own.

But the point is it's not BECAUSE you are UMC. It's because it's what your child needs. He just happens to be in an UMC family

Yeah, but I don't understand this need to denigrate UMCs for (allegedly all) not being wild about KIPP. If it works for you, super.

[Anonymous]

For the KIPPs in Shaw, the middle school is not super large, and doesn't offer a lot of the sports and activities you could get at Stuart-Hobson. So it may not be as appealing. Also the extended day makes it tough to do things like instrument lessons or a separate sport. I don't have a problem with it philosophically, but I can see why someone might not choose it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know people who do, but they all seem to get into more desired charters eventually. I think the lack of a conveniently located middle school would be an issue even for people who were otherwise fine with the KIPP approach.

High school, I mean.

Exactly. People want to get into a DCI feeder so they leave. Because if it's either KiPP on Benning Rd or Dunbar, I'm out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I moved my child from one well-regarded DCPS to another one because DC needed LESS structure. DC is highly self-motivated, wants time and space to explore, and is a lot happier without too much rigidity.

So whatever. Kids are different. Count me as an UMC who *knows* that KIPP would not work well for my child. Kids are different. Some (me!) thrive in structure; some don't. To each his own.

But the point is it's not BECAUSE you are UMC. It's because it's what your child needs. He just happens to be in an UMC family

Yeah, but I don't understand this need to denigrate UMCs for (allegedly all) not being wild about KIPP. If it works for you, super.

You were the one that inserted UMC in your post. We didn't need to know that to learn that your child does better with less structure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I moved my child from one well-regarded DCPS to another one because DC needed LESS structure. DC is highly self-motivated, wants time and space to explore, and is a lot happier without too much rigidity.

So whatever. Kids are different. Count me as an UMC who *knows* that KIPP would not work well for my child. Kids are different. Some (me!) thrive in structure; some don't. To each his own.

But the point is it's not BECAUSE you are UMC. It's because it's what your child needs. He just happens to be in an UMC family

Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

This is unbelievably racist. You think that the white UMC kids of DC have the soft skills that make them "conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher"? No, they have parents who will argue that it's not developmentally appropriate for them to sit still and that they need a yoga ball or fidget or ability to move during lessons or... any number of things. It is the white parents I know who don't ask about homework and argue for less of it. Sheesh.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

This is unbelievably racist. You think that the white UMC kids of DC have the soft skills that make them "conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher"? No, they have parents who will argue that it's not developmentally appropriate for them to sit still and that they need a yoga ball or fidget or ability to move during lessons or... any number of things. It is the white parents I know who don't ask about homework and argue for less of it. Sheesh.

PP said UMC, not "white."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

This is unbelievably racist. You think that the white UMC kids of DC have the soft skills that make them "conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher"? No, they have parents who will argue that it's not developmentally appropriate for them to sit still and that they need a yoga ball or fidget or ability to move during lessons or... any number of things. It is the white parents I know who don't ask about homework and argue for less of it. Sheesh.

Sorry you can't call racists posts racists here. Your post will be deleted. It's happened numerous times to me.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

This is unbelievably racist. You think that the white UMC kids of DC have the soft skills that make them "conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher"? No, they have parents who will argue that it's not developmentally appropriate for them to sit still and that they need a yoga ball or fidget or ability to move during lessons or... any number of things. It is the white parents I know who don't ask about homework and argue for less of it. Sheesh.

PP said UMC, not "white."

So we are going to do the whole, in dc SES status correlates to race again? Round and round we go here at dcum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

This is unbelievably racist. You think that the white UMC kids of DC have the soft skills that make them "conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher"? No, they have parents who will argue that it's not developmentally appropriate for them to sit still and that they need a yoga ball or fidget or ability to move during lessons or... any number of things. It is the white parents I know who don't ask about homework and argue for less of it. Sheesh.

OFFS. All this stuff is well documented.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/26/magazine/26tough.html

In public life, the qualities that middle-class children develop are
consistently valued over the ones that poor and working-class children develop.
Middle-class children become used to adults taking their concerns seriously, and so
they grow up with a sense of entitlement, which gives them a confidence, in the
classroom and elsewhere, that less-wealthy children lack. The cultural differences
translate into a distinct advantage for middle-class children in school, on
standardized achievement tests and, later in life, in the workplace.
Taken together, the conclusions of these researchers can be a little unsettling.
Their work seems to reduce a child’s upbringing, which to a parent can feel
something like magic, to a simple algorithm: give a child X, and you get Y. Their
work also suggests that the disadvantages that poverty imposes on children aren’t
primarily about material goods. True, every poor child would benefit from having
more books in his home and more nutritious food to eat (and money certainly makes
it easier to carry out a program of concerted cultivation). But the real advantages
that middle-class children gain come from more elusive processes: the language that
their parents use, the attitudes toward life that they convey. However you measure
child-rearing, middle-class parents tend to do it differently than poor parents — and
the path they follow in turn tends to give their children an array of advantages.

...

When students enroll in one of these schools (usually in fifth or sixth grade), they are
often two or more grade levels behind. Usually they have missed out on many of the
millions of everyday intellectual and emotional stimuli that their better-off peers
have been exposed to since birth. They are, educationally speaking, in deep trouble.
The schools reject the notion that all that these struggling students need are high
expectations; they do need those, of course, but they also need specific types and
amounts of instruction, both in academics and attitude, to compensate for
everything they did not receive in their first decade of life.

...

Students at both KIPP and Achievement First schools follow a system for
classroom behavior invented by Levin and Feinberg called Slant, which instructs
them to sit up, listen, ask questions, nod and track the speaker with their eyes. When
I visited KIPP Academy last month, I was standing with Levin at the front of a music
class of about 60 students, listening to him talk, when he suddenly interrupted
himself and pointed at me. “Do you notice what he’s doing right now?” he asked the
class.
They all called out at once, “Nodding!”
Levin’s contention is that Americans of a certain background learn these
methods for taking in information early on and employ them instinctively. KIPP
students, he says, need to be taught the methods explicitly. Middle-class
Americans know intuitively that “good behavior” is mostly a game with established
rules; the KIPP students seemed to be experiencing the pleasure of being let in on a
joke.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Yes, there are poor families who have the internal structure of UMC families, but they are in the minority in DC. KIPP is targeting those kids whose parents don't ask about homework, aren't conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher, who don't know the "soft skills" that UMC kids learn. They are in the business of filling gaps.

This is unbelievably racist. You think that the white UMC kids of DC have the soft skills that make them "conditioned to sit and pay attention to a teacher"? No, they have parents who will argue that it's not developmentally appropriate for them to sit still and that they need a yoga ball or fidget or ability to move during lessons or... any number of things. It is the white parents I know who don't ask about homework and argue for less of it. Sheesh.

Those parents at whom you scoff have the academic research on their side. In any event, what bothers you so much about a fidget toy? What's wrong with not wanting an overload of homework?