Who (in particulr) is to blame for the idea of 2.0?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes MCPS wrote their own curriculum (2.0) when the state adopted the Common Core State Standards. There weren't packaged curriculums for the system to purchase. So they threw together this nonsense.

And they promoted regular classroom teachers without any real qualifications to do it. And it was a mess.

Our Guinea pig kids did not receive a good education. Mcps is bracing themselves for how those kids care in HS (they are starting 9th grade this year).

I'm just glad most people finally realized 2.0 was a failure. Many of us pointed that out early on, but so many of you defended it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s Common Core. MCPS tried to get out ahead of Common Core by issuing 2.0. So I guess that means you should be mad at the whole national educational community.

I’m not mad at all. My kids have gotten a great education over the past 7 years.

You do realize plenty of systems turned down common core and among those who didn’t, they could have bought a peer-reviewed evidence based curriculum? I think if your kids have been in MCPS consistently then you can’t know. I’ve done MCPS and another system for my kids, so I’ve seen the difference. 2.0 is awful.

This was a state by state decision, not a school system by school system decision. Maryland adopted the Common Core State Standards, as did most other states.

Yep. And here’s a crazy thing: Common Core makes enough sense that even states that didn’t officially adopt it still might use a form of it. I live in Missouri, which does not have Common Core, but if you go to our state education website to look at standards, they’re mostly copy-pasted from Common Core. There’s even a link on the site to the Common Core site. They just don’t use the branded name because of the political implications.

[Anonymous]

The private school where I work even tries to align its curriculum to common core on a broad scale. The hysteria against common core on here is ignorant and irrational.

[Anonymous]

Many of my teachers friends would get the next unit just a day or two before they were supposed to start teaching it. The errors that parents complain about were not the teachers' errors. It was the crappy curriculum that was shoved on them a day or two ahead of time. Then the next unit was written in a quick, crappy way. Lather, rinse, repeat. They got rid of ability grouping in favor of heterogeneous groups. My kid met with his reading teacher once a week because he was in the high group. He spent at least an hour a day doing independent work while the teacher worked with the middle and low groups. No more gifted and talented classes. We were told the teacher would be able to meet their needs in a mixed classroom. Um nope. Just giving them a more advanced book doesn't mean they will get enough instructional time with their teacher. I moved my kid to private school. The math instruction was worse than the reading.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes MCPS wrote their own curriculum (2.0) when the state adopted the Common Core State Standards. There weren't packaged curriculums for the system to purchase. So they threw together this nonsense.

And they promoted regular classroom teachers without any real qualifications to do it. And it was a mess.

Our Guinea pig kids did not receive a good education. Mcps is bracing themselves for how those kids care in HS (they are starting 9th grade this year).

I'm just glad most people finally realized 2.0 was a failure. Many of us pointed that out early on, but so many of you defended it.

Yup. The art teacher in my school went to central office to help write the literacy curriculum.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes MCPS wrote their own curriculum (2.0) when the state adopted the Common Core State Standards. There weren't packaged curriculums for the system to purchase. So they threw together this nonsense.

And they promoted regular classroom teachers without any real qualifications to do it. And it was a mess.

Our Guinea pig kids did not receive a good education. Mcps is bracing themselves for how those kids care in HS (they are starting 9th grade this year).

I'm just glad most people finally realized 2.0 was a failure. Many of us pointed that out early on, but so many of you defended it.

Yup. The art teacher in my school went to central office to help write the literacy curriculum.

Same for one of the math writers, who actually got promoted and is now an admin at Pyle.

[Anonymous]

Jerry Weast, Pat O'Neil and Barclay (the BOE guy that got caught stealing money to buy stuff at Target and PopEye chicken) were responsible for hatching the bad idea. The plan was to ignore university peer reviewed curriculums and partner with Pearson to make up their own and resell it. Terrible mistake for Pearson and MCPS believing that unqualified MCPS employees could just come up with a curriculum.

The most blame lands on Starr though who took this mistake to a whole new level demonstrating what true incompetence can do to a system. He was so unqualified himself for the job that he didn't recognize how unqualified Marty and Eric Lang were as well. Lang got to staff up his office and filled it with more unqualified people. Rather than providing a shred of quality control or review, they all kept barreling forward. There was a HUGE outpouring of complaints from parents and teachers. Did Starr look into any of the complaints? Nope he hired more PR people and just behaved arrogantly.

It really escalated the creation of a toxic environment where the only ideas allowed in the central office were yes men who fanned over each other. The central office became increasingly insular never learning or addressing its own mistakes-just demonizing anyone that disagreed with them. Starr had a history in Connecticut in always focusing on you scratch my back and I'll scratch your back and punishing staff that rock the boat. He took this to another level in MCPS both with hiding the sex offenders and ignoring all the obvious signs of problems within the curriculum.

I honestly think that Weast would have done something or at least stopped the 30% errors in the materials that were coming out of the central office.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Jerry Weast, Pat O'Neil and Barclay (the BOE guy that got caught stealing money to buy stuff at Target and PopEye chicken) were responsible for hatching the bad idea. The plan was to ignore university peer reviewed curriculums and partner with Pearson to make up their own and resell it. Terrible mistake for Pearson and MCPS believing that unqualified MCPS employees could just come up with a curriculum.

The most blame lands on Starr though who took this mistake to a whole new level demonstrating what true incompetence can do to a system. He was so unqualified himself for the job that he didn't recognize how unqualified Marty and Eric Lang were as well. Lang got to staff up his office and filled it with more unqualified people. Rather than providing a shred of quality control or review, they all kept barreling forward. There was a HUGE outpouring of complaints from parents and teachers. Did Starr look into any of the complaints? Nope he hired more PR people and just behaved arrogantly.

It really escalated the creation of a toxic environment where the only ideas allowed in the central office were yes men who fanned over each other. The central office became increasingly insular never learning or addressing its own mistakes-just demonizing anyone that disagreed with them. Starr had a history in Connecticut in always focusing on you scratch my back and I'll scratch your back and punishing staff that rock the boat. He took this to another level in MCPS both with hiding the sex offenders and ignoring all the obvious signs of problems within the curriculum.

I honestly think that Weast would have done something or at least stopped the 30% errors in the materials that were coming out of the central office.

You basically say that it’s Weast’s initiative but somehow Starr should get more blame. That doesn’t make any sense. I’m always amazed at the venom toward Starr. I work for MCPS and worked with him directly on two projects, which was unusual because I’m not in management. I always felt that what people saw as arrogance was actually a bit of social awkwardness. He was a supportive employer, and many other colleagues feel the same way. I don’t have any power or influence and could do nothing for him, and he made a point of recognizing my efforts and encouraging me. I know a lot of people who feel the same way, and who also felt that he genuinely cared about kids and his heart was in the right place. I agree that he could hold a grudge—he was into loyalty. I am sure he knows exactly who wrote the BOE to ask them to keep him on! He also was rough around the edges. But I do think he was misunderstood and I bet that if you polled mcps teachers and principals, a lot of them would rather he be in charge right now, myself included. This monster you paint who wanted to hide cases of child abuse is not the superintendent I dealt with on a personal level. He also was superintendent so long ago at this point that I’m surprised at the level of interest in him all these years later.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Jerry Weast, Pat O'Neil and Barclay (the BOE guy that got caught stealing money to buy stuff at Target and PopEye chicken) were responsible for hatching the bad idea. The plan was to ignore university peer reviewed curriculums and partner with Pearson to make up their own and resell it. Terrible mistake for Pearson and MCPS believing that unqualified MCPS employees could just come up with a curriculum.

The most blame lands on Starr though who took this mistake to a whole new level demonstrating what true incompetence can do to a system. He was so unqualified himself for the job that he didn't recognize how unqualified Marty and Eric Lang were as well. Lang got to staff up his office and filled it with more unqualified people. Rather than providing a shred of quality control or review, they all kept barreling forward. There was a HUGE outpouring of complaints from parents and teachers. Did Starr look into any of the complaints? Nope he hired more PR people and just behaved arrogantly.

It really escalated the creation of a toxic environment where the only ideas allowed in the central office were yes men who fanned over each other. The central office became increasingly insular never learning or addressing its own mistakes-just demonizing anyone that disagreed with them. Starr had a history in Connecticut in always focusing on you scratch my back and I'll scratch your back and punishing staff that rock the boat. He took this to another level in MCPS both with hiding the sex offenders and ignoring all the obvious signs of problems within the curriculum.

I honestly think that Weast would have done something or at least stopped the 30% errors in the materials that were coming out of the central office.

You basically say that it’s Weast’s initiative but somehow Starr should get more blame. That doesn’t make any sense. I’m always amazed at the venom toward Starr. I work for MCPS and worked with him directly on two projects, which was unusual because I’m not in management. I always felt that what people saw as arrogance was actually a bit of social awkwardness. He was a supportive employer, and many other colleagues feel the same way. I don’t have any power or influence and could do nothing for him, and he made a point of recognizing my efforts and encouraging me. I know a lot of people who feel the same way, and who also felt that he genuinely cared about kids and his heart was in the right place. I agree that he could hold a grudge—he was into loyalty. I am sure he knows exactly who wrote the BOE to ask them to keep him on! He also was rough around the edges. But I do think he was misunderstood and I bet that if you polled mcps teachers and principals, a lot of them would rather he be in charge right now, myself included. This monster you paint who wanted to hide cases of child abuse is not the superintendent I dealt with on a personal level. He also was superintendent so long ago at this point that I’m surprised at the level of interest in him all these years later.

Starr left a known sexual predator in a classroom. Fact. Source: The Washington Post.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Erick Lang

Erick Lang is now happily working for Discovery Education.

[Anonymous]

Starr left a known sexual predator in a classroom. Fact. Source: The Washington Post.

+1 Starr was also in charge while 2.0 was being created, rolled out and implemented. He was at helm when the decisions were made about the ridiculous P grading system, ending math acceleration, removing final exams because too many kids were failing, and the creation of all the flawed material.

Anyone who has ever walked into organization and taken over from a predecessor knows that they have a short window to assess and then they own it. Who hasn't inherited a project with problems? Starr hadn't and he didn't know what to do. He didn't even know enough to pay attention to anything other than tweeting and trying to get national attention for himself.

Starr could have recognized the problem and course corrected. Starr could have delayed the implementation - remember how this was rolled out and there were almost no materials. It really screwed the teachers. What did Star tell the principals? Starr told them I've got your back if you've got mine. I know several principals and they ALL spoke about how Starr was easy to work for because you just had to keep things quiet and always focus on positive PR. Starr could have demanded quality control and fired staff in the curriculum office who were creating shoddy materials. Starr could have listened to the complaints. Starr could have paid attention to the early data coming in with dropping scores. He didn't. He did nothing and just clung to his talking point that everything was great, teachers just weren't trained in 2.0 and parents just weren't educated enough to see the depth of 2.0

So how did this all work out? Seven years of kids received a crappy education with a failed curriculum. MCPS dropped from being 1st in the state to being 9th in the state. Howard, Frederick, DC, and VA all made strides forward while Starr knocked our school system down to the point that it may never recover. Starr's legacy is failure and hurting over 100K students. After failing in Conn and failing so miserable in MCPS I doubt another school system will ever hire him and he certainly will never get a national appointment that was always his goal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Starr left a known sexual predator in a classroom. Fact. Source: The Washington Post.

+1 Starr was also in charge while 2.0 was being created, rolled out and implemented. He was at helm when the decisions were made about the ridiculous P grading system, ending math acceleration, removing final exams because too many kids were failing, and the creation of all the flawed material.

Anyone who has ever walked into organization and taken over from a predecessor knows that they have a short window to assess and then they own it. Who hasn't inherited a project with problems? Starr hadn't and he didn't know what to do. He didn't even know enough to pay attention to anything other than tweeting and trying to get national attention for himself.

Starr could have recognized the problem and course corrected. Starr could have delayed the implementation - remember how this was rolled out and there were almost no materials. It really screwed the teachers. What did Star tell the principals? Starr told them I've got your back if you've got mine. I know several principals and they ALL spoke about how Starr was easy to work for because you just had to keep things quiet and always focus on positive PR. Starr could have demanded quality control and fired staff in the curriculum office who were creating shoddy materials. Starr could have listened to the complaints. Starr could have paid attention to the early data coming in with dropping scores. He didn't. He did nothing and just clung to his talking point that everything was great, teachers just weren't trained in 2.0 and parents just weren't educated enough to see the depth of 2.0

So how did this all work out? Seven years of kids received a crappy education with a failed curriculum. MCPS dropped from being 1st in the state to being 9th in the state. Howard, Frederick, DC, and VA all made strides forward while Starr knocked our school system down to the point that it may never recover. Starr's legacy is failure and hurting over 100K students. After failing in Conn and failing so miserable in MCPS I doubt another school system will ever hire him and he certainly will never get a national appointment that was always his goal.

You sound like a defensive school board member. If you are, y’all are equally to blame. He at least had skin in the game. Odds are he didn’t set out to purposely do harm considering he still has three kids in the system.

[Anonymous]

Former Superintendent Starr and his central office cronies like Marty Creel and Erik Lang. Their mantr was pay themselves more and more and be the first ever school district in the world to reverse the achievement gap.

So far so good. Kicking it off with a krap curriculum for 8 years brought anyone down a few notches, unless their parents noticed and supplemented.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Starr left a known sexual predator in a classroom. Fact. Source: The Washington Post.

+1 Starr was also in charge while 2.0 was being created, rolled out and implemented. He was at helm when the decisions were made about the ridiculous P grading system, ending math acceleration, removing final exams because too many kids were failing, and the creation of all the flawed material.

Anyone who has ever walked into organization and taken over from a predecessor knows that they have a short window to assess and then they own it. Who hasn't inherited a project with problems? Starr hadn't and he didn't know what to do. He didn't even know enough to pay attention to anything other than tweeting and trying to get national attention for himself.

Starr could have recognized the problem and course corrected. Starr could have delayed the implementation - remember how this was rolled out and there were almost no materials. It really screwed the teachers. What did Star tell the principals? Starr told them I've got your back if you've got mine. I know several principals and they ALL spoke about how Starr was easy to work for because you just had to keep things quiet and always focus on positive PR. Starr could have demanded quality control and fired staff in the curriculum office who were creating shoddy materials. Starr could have listened to the complaints. Starr could have paid attention to the early data coming in with dropping scores. He didn't. He did nothing and just clung to his talking point that everything was great, teachers just weren't trained in 2.0 and parents just weren't educated enough to see the depth of 2.0

So how did this all work out? Seven years of kids received a crappy education with a failed curriculum. MCPS dropped from being 1st in the state to being 9th in the state. Howard, Frederick, DC, and VA all made strides forward while Starr knocked our school system down to the point that it may never recover. Starr's legacy is failure and hurting over 100K students. After failing in Conn and failing so miserable in MCPS I doubt another school system will ever hire him and he certainly will never get a national appointment that was always his goal.

Agree. Welll said.

I’m waiting for the JHu school of Ed case study on how MCPS cannibalizes itself.

[Anonymous]

I blame Erick Lang and that other guy who went over to Discovery Education this year because if it weren't for them, we wouldn't be talking about 2.0, we'd be talking about the curriculum that had already been selected over the summer, and how it was being piloted.