Coffee in Lincoln Park with David Catania

[Anonymous]

Somebody with the numbers. Quick, how any 6th graders is that if

Watkins
Tyler
Brent
Payne
Ludlow Taylor
Maury
JO Wilson
Miner

All fed to the same middle school?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry, no neighborhood school no neighborhood buy in - Good Bye. Leave the feeder patterns the way they are, because it doesn't matter. No one from the neighborhood will attend. Net result = no change.

1) please define "neighborhood school"

2) is Deal a neighborhood school? For how long has it been one?

3) how come there is major buy-in by these very same people to charter schools and private schools when they are pretty much the antithesis of neighborhood schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Somebody with the numbers. Quick, how any 6th graders is that if

Watkins
Tyler
Brent
Payne
Ludlow Taylor
Maury
JO Wilson
Miner

All fed to the same middle school?

Oh, and SWS

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

Just to add if it's just about "well prepared" students, then why add SWS? What measure is she using to be so sure they are "well prepared"? Are the kids there even old enough to have been taking the DC CAS yet?

So please, give me a break.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

No actually. The idea would be to create a large middle school that served all the elementary schools. It seem that in DC larger means more funding which means a middle school could have more bells and whistles including robust remedial as well as advanced course work and a wide variety of extra-curricular activities and support services that are key to middle schoolers enjoying their experience and testing out their interests and talents.

I

In the current set-up that this pp seems to favor, the well-prepared, academically ambitious students ( of all races and SES backgrounds ) decide that if they are in the distinct minority at a certain school, then they had better find a school where they won't be. Believe me, this sentiment is even stronger with African American parents than it is with white parents. And so, children are left to languish in their "crappy schools" as you say. Trying to sprinkle academically strong students around to different middle schools has never worked and it never will.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

Just to add if it's just about "well prepared" students, then why add SWS? What measure is she using to be so sure they are "well prepared"? Are the kids there even old enough to have been taking the DC CAS yet?

So please, give me a break.

That would be DIBELS results at grade K-2 as compared to other schools. It can actually tell you a lot including where students started and how quickly they moved in their basic literacy levels.

[Anonymous]

This is an interesting map. The area encompassed by the boundaries of those elementary schools mentioned above is smaller than the feeder area of many other middle schools.

It just doesn't seem rationale to divide these school that are geographically contiguous among three different middle schools


http://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/Final%20SY2015-16%20Feeder%20School%20Maps_ES%20to%20MS%20and%20MS%20to%20HS.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

No actually. The idea would be to create a large middle school that served all the elementary schools. It seem that in DC larger means more funding which means a middle school could have more bells and whistles including robust remedial as well as advanced course work and a wide variety of extra-curricular activities and support services that are key to middle schoolers enjoying their experience and testing out their interests and talents.

I

In the current set-up that this pp seems to favor, the well-prepared, academically ambitious students ( of all races and SES backgrounds ) decide that if they are in the distinct minority at a certain school, then they had better find a school where they won't be. Believe me, this sentiment is even stronger with African American parents than it is with white parents. And so, children are left to languish in their "crappy schools" as you say. Trying to sprinkle academically strong students around to different middle schools has never worked and it never will.

If that's the case, why only single out Brent, Maury, Peabody (sic), and SWS?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

Just to add if it's just about "well prepared" students, then why add SWS? What measure is she using to be so sure they are "well prepared"? Are the kids there even old enough to have been taking the DC CAS yet?

So please, give me a break.

That would be DIBELS results at grade K-2 as compared to other schools. It can actually tell you a lot including where students started and how quickly they moved in their basic literacy levels.

Where can we look at the published DIBELS assessment results?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh for goodness sake. Who mentioned SES? Trying to find a way to concentrate well -prepared students in one middle school is not offensive. It is smart. Hopefully Ludlow Taylor, Payne, JO Wilson and Tyler would also be feeding there. Think outside your box please

So by "concentrat(ing) well prepared students in one middle school" you are doing what then? Leaving all the rest of the kids to languish in their crappy schools? Is that the point?

And you don't need to mention SES. I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here.

No actually. The idea would be to create a large middle school that served all the elementary schools. It seem that in DC larger means more funding which means a middle school could have more bells and whistles including robust remedial as well as advanced course work and a wide variety of extra-curricular activities and support services that are key to middle schoolers enjoying their experience and testing out their interests and talents.

I

In the current set-up that this pp seems to favor, the well-prepared, academically ambitious students ( of all races and SES backgrounds ) decide that if they are in the distinct minority at a certain school, then they had better find a school where they won't be. Believe me, this sentiment is even stronger with African American parents than it is with white parents. And so, children are left to languish in their "crappy schools" as you say. Trying to sprinkle academically strong students around to different middle schools has never worked and it never will.

If that's the case, why only single out Brent, Maury, Peabody (sic), and SWS?

My guess is because those are the schools where parents are whining the loudest about middle school options. But that's conjecture and you ask a good question.

[Anonymous]

And one minor point: where would that single large school be located? All three (if we just take DCPS middle schools) are central to some corner of Ward 6, none is really central. I guess Hine was (not so much for the Navy Yard though) but that ship has sailed. Better yet, we could ask the Capitol to be moved a little up street, that would be central and also spacious enough.
To say that these discussions about "one middle school" in Ward 6 are just plain stupid and I trust even Catania is rolling his eyes at that. Ward 6 is not Ward 3, just isn't, not even if we could disregard the demographics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And one minor point: where would that single large school be located? All three (if we just take DCPS middle schools) are central to some corner of Ward 6, none is really central. I guess Hine was (not so much for the Navy Yard though) but that ship has sailed. Better yet, we could ask the Capitol to be moved a little up street, that would be central and also spacious enough.
To say that these discussions about "one middle school" in Ward 6 are just plain stupid and I trust even Catania is rolling his eyes at that. Ward 6 is not Ward 3, just isn't, not even if we could disregard the demographics.

How about leave two schools and closing SH? Jefferson and EH are geographically close enough for the the rest of Ward 6.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And one minor point: where would that single large school be located? All three (if we just take DCPS middle schools) are central to some corner of Ward 6, none is really central. I guess Hine was (not so much for the Navy Yard though) but that ship has sailed. Better yet, we could ask the Capitol to be moved a little up street, that would be central and also spacious enough.
To say that these discussions about "one middle school" in Ward 6 are just plain stupid and I trust even Catania is rolling his eyes at that. Ward 6 is not Ward 3, just isn't, not even if we could disregard the demographics.

Other ideas, then? Or you like the status quo?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
How about leave two schools and closing SH? Jefferson and EH are geographically close enough for the the rest of Ward 6.

That could work. S-H could become early childhood, create another PK-8 cluster with an elementary school, consolidate a bunch of self-contained special ed classrooms (thus freeing up space in other schools), etc.