Individual School Plans?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did any of you Hearst complainers actually attend the grade-level meetings that solicited feedback from parents about reopening? Most parents said they did not want class size to dramatically increase or to change teachers or to get rid of departmentalization at the upper grades -- all of which would be necessary to open in-person classes in all grades. K is different because there are 3 teachers, so the other two classes can absorb the extra kids without making class sizes huge. Until all teachers and all kids are required to go back, I think this is where we're stuck because we have only 2 teachers per grade in most grade levels. The only other option is hybrid, where teachers teach live and online at the same time, and most parents said they thought that would not work well for anyone. Hearst has no good options, and this plan seems like it was the least disruptive to most people, while still allowing the neediest kids to get some in-person instruction in ELL and SPED. Most people I know are fairly happy with the virtual learning at Hearst because the cohorts are small and our teachers have been awesome. Obviously some kids are not doing well, but the school has to do what works for the majority of kids, and making virtual classes huge does not work for the majority of kids.

This. I recognized that something has to give -- either my kid loses her teacher, or her virtual class is huge, or she loses specialized ELA/math instruction, or they continue all-virtual. You can't have everything, because space and staffing are limited. And a lot of parents want everything. You have to decide what the priority is. For us, it was keeping our kid's homeroom teacher, which we acknowledge might mean that she doesn't get an in-person slot. Someone else might decide on a different tradeoff. But demanding no tradeoffs is unreasonable. And if that's the feedback that Hearst got from parents, then their decision is actually pretty reasonable.

I agree with you. I recognized that too and voted for my child to go back and indicated that keeping their teacher wasn't important. However, a lot of parents I know seem to have think they were voting to open schools AND keep their child's teacher, like they were outsmarting DCPS by telling them they wanted it all and calling their bluff by saying they wouldn't come in person if they had to switch teachers. In the end, they're taking the in-person seats with different teachers and/or CARE classroom seats regardless of whether they indicated that they wouldn't take them if their child had to switch teachers. I knew it would end up like this, and I feel bad for the people who honestly indicated that they would take the seat no matter what and now might not be offered one. In-person demand has been undercounted because some parents (in some cases willfully) misinterpreted the survey.

Hearst parent here. We voted to go back and switch teachers. We lost. And yes, we stated this on the grade-level call. We have zero confidence that our kid will return to school this year. But great that his friends at other schools are.