Proposal Implications: Loss of Proximity, Forced to go to Lowest Performing School, Concerns OOB

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you truly value diversity, you would live in any number of Montgomery County and Northern Virginia communities. In DC, the odds are pretty high that you are rich/white or lower-income/black. If you don't want to leave DC or move to Ward 7 or 8, try visiting DPR facilities like the Deanwood Pool or Anacostia Park, sending you child to DPR summer camps, joining the DC Youth Orchestra, etc. There is no shortage of options in DC.

I know you prefaced it with "odds are pretty high" but these statements irritate me. I think you would have been better served if you said "if you live in Wards 7 and 8..."

Many people in this city have prejudices and forget that there is a large amount of middle, upper middle and high income blacks in the city.

it sounds like you're implying something negative about wards 7 and 8, but I'm not sure. My race-dar is not working well today.

Actually I am high income black that lives in Ward 8. However, I know factually that a disproportionate amount of at risk students are located in Wards 7-8. PP generalized by saying in DC it is likely you are either high income white or low income black.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My guess is you are going from Murch to Hearst? If not, please clarify.

If this is the shift OP is describing, it's hard for me to feel much sympathy.

I think we have officially replaced "First World problems" with "Ward 3 problems."

Best post of the day. I have very little sympathy for OP, and this attitude is the reason we were so happy to move out of Ward 3.

Stereotyping! all ward three people are not alike

Just want to say that I'm the PP who coined the "Ward 3 problems" phrase and I live in Ward 3. Yes, we're not all like that, but honestly, lots of people here are ridiculous. We chose to live here so that our kids could walk to school and our commutes (to downtown and Bethesda) were manageable. We've met lots of great friends who are normal people, but I sure don't love everyone I meet here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My guess is you are going from Murch to Hearst? If not, please clarify.

If this is the shift OP is describing, it's hard for me to feel much sympathy.

I think we have officially replaced "First World problems" with "Ward 3 problems."

Best post of the day. I have very little sympathy for OP, and this attitude is the reason we were so happy to move out of Ward 3.

Stereotyping! all ward three people are not alike

Just want to say that I'm the PP who coined the "Ward 3 problems" phrase and I live in Ward 3. Yes, we're not all like that, but honestly, lots of people here are ridiculous. We chose to live here so that our kids could walk to school and our commutes (to downtown and Bethesda) were manageable. We've met lots of great friends who are normal people, but I sure don't love everyone I meet here.

Another ward 3 poster who agrees with you. I've lived in ward 3 since 1994. This is hard to believe but w3 is actually getting worse WRT those negative features commonly associated with w3 by residents of other wards.

[Anonymous]

Another ward 3 poster who agrees with you. I've lived in ward 3 since 1994. This is hard to believe but w3 is actually getting worse WRT those negative features commonly associated with w3 by residents of other wards. [b]

+1

I moved to W3 same year but left ten years ago. I don't hardly recognize the place anymore.

[Anonymous]

+2 I grew up in ward 3 but would never live there now. We'll inherit my parents' house someday, Lord
willing, but we certainly won't move back.

[Anonymous]

If OP really is talking about Murch and Hearst then that is absolutely the epitome of 3rd ward problems. Is a child's life going to be negatively impacted by going from Hearst to Deal to Wilson instead of Murch to Deal to Wilson? Please someone make that argument to me because I'd love to hear it.

I am an OOB Hearst parent and what the previous poster described about the community at Hearst is absolutely true. I've only been at Hearst a short time and have found it incredibly welcoming. And kids manage to have playdates and class parties despite coming from all over the city. Before coming to Hearst I had read the negative comments on DCUM and from the moment we've been there I've been scratching my head trying to figure out what is so objectionable about the school.

[Anonymous]

3rd ward parents. Phrase of the day, may it have the longevity of Larla.

[Anonymous]

Sorry 3rd ward problems. I screwed up a great phrase in my first usage dammit.

[Anonymous]

I love the convenience of living in Ward 3, and there are wonderful families in the part of the neighborhood where I live. I walk everywhere and we are thinking of selling our car because we use it less than one day per week. We could never have a walkable quality of life like this in MD or VA.

We are an African-American family and our immediate neighbors are Latino, Asian, and international.

Do these proposals help anyone? If families are hurt by the proposals why go through with them?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:+2 I grew up in ward 3 but would never live there now. We'll inherit my parents' house someday, Lord
willing, but we certainly won't move back.

So, no one wants to live there, but everyone wants to send their kids to school there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If OP really is talking about Murch and Hearst then that is absolutely the epitome of 3rd ward problems. Is a child's life going to be negatively impacted by going from Hearst to Deal to Wilson instead of Murch to Deal to Wilson? Please someone make that argument to me because I'd love to hear it.

I am an OOB Hearst parent and what the previous poster described about the community at Hearst is absolutely true. I've only been at Hearst a short time and have found it incredibly welcoming. And kids manage to have playdates and class parties despite coming from all over the city. Before coming to Hearst I had read the negative comments on DCUM and from the moment we've been there I've been scratching my head trying to figure out what is so objectionable about the school.

+1 The idea that kids have different long range outcomes from, for example, Murch compared to Hearst when all those kids go on to Deal and Wilson does not make a lot of sense. I agree with you completely PP.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everyone can agreed that everyone deserves good/great schools.
But some people feel more entitled to them than others, like the OP. It it because she pays more in taxes? (but what about people who don't have kids and who pay taxes?). I can understand feeling dismayed if one bought in a neighborhood for a particular school, but the hysterical outcry about "OOB concerns" and a sudden influx of "the most challenging students" in DCPS seems a bit paranoid.


Whatever one's motivation for calling for diversity or not, the reality is that there are truly terrible, awful schools and there are tons of kids who have NO other alternatives--we're not talking murch vs hearst. DCPS may be finding the worst way to fix it, there may not be a way either through redistrcting, social engineering or what, but the ways things are right now the system is terribly unequal. Rich kids get a much better PUBLIC education than poor kids, in DC as in most places. Seems like lots of posters in DCUM hope the terribly unequal situation can be fixed, in some abstract way, but are hysterical that attemps at fixing might incur losing their access to the few high performing schools or allowing more "OOB" to enter the high performing district. So why doesn't everyone be 'honest' about things--the poster who is losing access feels entitled to the best school because she bought there--but is she more entitled than someone who lives far east of the park and would never have a shot at a decent school at all? (Please dont trot out the "I lived off cat food for 3 years in a 45 sq ft closet to send my kids to Janney' argument either. Let's be real).

I agree with this in bold. HOWEVER, for different reasons in DC than in most places.

In most places the rich areas have better schools primarily because they collect more tax revenues.

In DC, it is different. There is truly no shortage of money at any of the disadvantaged schools.

Rather, the main reason for your statement in bold has to do with the rich/poor divide in DC being the largest of any American city. In other words, students and parents, not government, are the root cause of education inequality in DC.

I do believe that government can be part of the solution.

You're really quite wrong about this. DC government has always played to its tax base with every public service and especially with schools.

Twenty years ago, I was a third grade teacher at Walker Jones ES, which at that time looked and felt very much like a prison. Half the teachers there were like me - no teaching credentials, just a college degree and a willingness to take a long-term job as a substitute. They were that desperate for staff and on the first professional development day, I recall teachers from other schools asking what I'd done to get sent there and when would I be getting out. I thought that all DC schools were in the same sorry state but when they sent me to Hearst one day to observe a "model" classroom for the new curriculum that had been adopted, I left feeling physically ill because the difference between the schools was so stark and outrageous. The kids in my own classroom hadn't seen much outside of their neighborhood, but they were fully cognizant of the fact that their government didn't give a shit about them. Many of them at 8 years old couldn't read or write much beyond their own names, but all of them could recite their Miranda rights.

That was a long time ago and much has changed, but many of the kids from that classroom are parents now. And every time I read someone on DCUM saying that poor parents don't value education, I remember that most of the parents I knew back then DID value education, but their kids grew up learning that it wouldn't make one whit of difference for them.

And yes, the DC government had everything to do with creating that value judgement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I love the convenience of living in Ward 3, and there are wonderful families in the part of the neighborhood where I live. I walk everywhere and we are thinking of selling our car because we use it less than one day per week. We could never have a walkable quality of life like this in MD or VA.

We are an African-American family and our immediate neighbors are Latino, Asian, and international.

Do these proposals help anyone? If families are hurt by the proposals why go through with them?

This entire thread is about Ward 3 privilege and entitlement. Yet you thought it was a good idea to post this?

[Anonymous]

11:14, that you for sharing that story. It certainly challenges and corrects many of my own biases.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If OP really is talking about Murch and Hearst then that is absolutely the epitome of 3rd ward problems. Is a child's life going to be negatively impacted by going from Hearst to Deal to Wilson instead of Murch to Deal to Wilson? Please someone make that argument to me because I'd love to hear it.

I am an OOB Hearst parent and what the previous poster described about the community at Hearst is absolutely true. I've only been at Hearst a short time and have found it incredibly welcoming. And kids manage to have playdates and class parties despite coming from all over the city. Before coming to Hearst I had read the negative comments on DCUM and from the moment we've been there I've been scratching my head trying to figure out what is so objectionable about the school.

+1 The idea that kids have different long range outcomes from, for example, Murch compared to Hearst when all those kids go on to Deal and Wilson does not make a lot of sense. I agree with you completely PP.

I would be interested in hearing about private school acceptance rates from Hearst. We are an international family and will likely have to go private for the upper grades because our child may need to move. How do Hearst families fare with private school acceptances?