Overcrowding and lack of space in Ward 3 Schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This list serve is just a place where people can make suggestions that they "frankly" feel are needed or reasonable or fair or, or, or. But the truth is, people don't typically make recommendations for change that will affect themselves negatively. So if your suggested recommendation doesn't hurt you, you can offer it up (even though you know if it impacted your family negatively you wouldn't suggest it). I see these sorts of ideas thrown out all the darn time but the reason decision-makers won't ever embrace them is because they impact real families who will scream their bloody heads off. It is a ridiculous pipe dream, PP, to think you would EVER tell an inboundary family who has just bought into a $1.2 million mortgage that they suddenly no longer have access to their by-right middle school. You are ridiculous. How about adding a dose of reality to some of these ideas, people? Packing schools beyond capacity has been the practice for decades, if you want to dial it back it going to have to be incremental or it won't happen.

Maybe you're describing how you don't make suggestions that might hurt you, but that's not me. I live near the edge of a boundary for an overcrowded school. If the overcrowding gets solved by reducing the OOB population (which I suggested), I guess that benefits me. If the overcrowding gets solved by changing boundaries (which I also suggested), there's a good chance that hurts me. If IB students have to go through a lottery (which I suggested), there's a chance that hurts me too, depending on the lottery odds.

If you assume that no one will propose or support anything that might harm them, then we shouldn't bother having any discussion at all, because none of us will change our mind.

What are you at risk from going from Janney to Murch? Not really "hurt" you right? You'd still keep Deal/Wilson. Like PP said, we are all selfish. That is all politics these days. How does this proposal help or hurt me?

Yeah, I know some people like to discount everyone else's opinions by hunting for bias. But you're wrong here. If the boundary near me moves, I probably go from Deal/Wilson to an entirely different feeder community.

I guess we know that you're biased though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Next you'll be telling us that your suggestion of ending or curbing OOB potentially hurts your child by losing out on racial and economic diversity, buy gosh darn it, you're willing to make the sacrifice...

Screw you. Your brand of bullshit is why no problems ever get solved around here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Next you'll be telling us that your suggestion of ending or curbing OOB potentially hurts your child by losing out on racial and economic diversity, buy gosh darn it, you're willing to make the sacrifice...

Screw you. Your brand of bullshit is why no problems ever get solved around here.

This is the DCUM I know and love.

-- signed, 11:51 on page 10 (The guy who was wondering what happened to all the "vocal and persistent advocacy").

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Next you'll be telling us that your suggestion of ending or curbing OOB potentially hurts your child by losing out on racial and economic diversity, buy gosh darn it, you're willing to make the sacrifice...

Screw you. Your brand of bullshit is why no problems ever get solved around here.

Are you talking about local Dem politics?

If so, I couldn't agree more.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's also important to acknowledge that a big part of the overcrowding problem in upper NW schools is that families bail on their inboundary schools and usually do it without reasonable notice. So upper middle class families will leave after 2nd, 3rd or 4th grade in order to claim a private school spot. That's fine. Do what's best for your child, right? But it leaves the DCPS holding the bag and a target enrollment number that the principal is obliged to try and reach. So he/she goes to the waitlist to fill up those classrooms that are now unexpectedly small in order to meet enrollment targets and justify the teacher salary. Making some sort of blanket statement that OOB practices should be halted is naive and doesn't take reality in to account. Rather than trying to eliminate OOB or middle and high school feeder rights (which I genuinely think are nonstarters), I think a better step would be to implement a "no new OOB students" policy for grades 3rd through 5th at upper NW "desirable" schools and have downtown give those schools a little break in not forcing them to fill those grades to capacity (because doing so grows the Deal and Wilson overcrowding problems as they inherit those kids). You can't blame OOB families for wanting to get their children into a feeder pattern that is attractive.

Not sure I understand your OOB views.

I think understand your point about principals wanting to meet enrollment targets, and then admitting OOB students from a waitlist when existing students (IB or OOB) leave unexpectedly. I suppose I don't have a problem with your suggestion in that situation of DCPS just cutting them some slack and allowing them to miss enrollment targets. But I also don't see much problem in letting them pull other students (presumably mostly OOB) from the waitlist in that situation. So for example (totally made-up numbers), if Deal is expecting 400 students in its 7th grade class, but 50 students leave for private or MoCo over the summer, what's the problem with adding 50 replacement students from the waitlist? The resulting class will still be only 400, so it won't change the total number of students in the feeder pipeline for that grade.

My suggestion would be to order access priority like this: IB, OOB feeder, OOB non-feeder. So when Deal is arranging its 6th grade class, the IB students get first priority for spots. If there are any open spots after the IB students are slotted, then they go by lottery to OOB students at Deal's elementary feeders. Then if there are any spots left after that, they go to OOB students who are not at Deal's elementary feeders. If students drop out of the Deal pool over the summer, then DCPS fills those spots in the same priority order: IB waitlist, OOB feeder waitlist, OOB non-feeder waitlist. It's not really "eliminating" OOB feeder rights entirely, but rather just saying their OOB feeder rights are subject to capacity limitations.

FWIW, I agree with you that we can't fault any parents for trying to get the best situation for their kids.

Yes, yes, yes. That's the way it worked before Rhee. The new Chancellor should return the order access priority arrangement to its logical, pre 2010 state. Will he? Doubt it unless political heads roll over the issue first.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's also important to acknowledge that a big part of the overcrowding problem in upper NW schools is that families bail on their inboundary schools and usually do it without reasonable notice. So upper middle class families will leave after 2nd, 3rd or 4th grade in order to claim a private school spot. That's fine. Do what's best for your child, right? But it leaves the DCPS holding the bag and a target enrollment number that the principal is obliged to try and reach. So he/she goes to the waitlist to fill up those classrooms that are now unexpectedly small in order to meet enrollment targets and justify the teacher salary. Making some sort of blanket statement that OOB practices should be halted is naive and doesn't take reality in to account. Rather than trying to eliminate OOB or middle and high school feeder rights (which I genuinely think are nonstarters), I think a better step would be to implement a "no new OOB students" policy for grades 3rd through 5th at upper NW "desirable" schools and have downtown give those schools a little break in not forcing them to fill those grades to capacity (because doing so grows the Deal and Wilson overcrowding problems as they inherit those kids). You can't blame OOB families for wanting to get their children into a feeder pattern that is attractive.

Not sure I understand your OOB views.

I think understand your point about principals wanting to meet enrollment targets, and then admitting OOB students from a waitlist when existing students (IB or OOB) leave unexpectedly. I suppose I don't have a problem with your suggestion in that situation of DCPS just cutting them some slack and allowing them to miss enrollment targets. But I also don't see much problem in letting them pull other students (presumably mostly OOB) from the waitlist in that situation. So for example (totally made-up numbers), if Deal is expecting 400 students in its 7th grade class, but 50 students leave for private or MoCo over the summer, what's the problem with adding 50 replacement students from the waitlist? The resulting class will still be only 400, so it won't change the total number of students in the feeder pipeline for that grade.

My suggestion would be to order access priority like this: IB, OOB feeder, OOB non-feeder. So when Deal is arranging its 6th grade class, the IB students get first priority for spots. If there are any open spots after the IB students are slotted, then they go by lottery to OOB students at Deal's elementary feeders. Then if there are any spots left after that, they go to OOB students who are not at Deal's elementary feeders. If students drop out of the Deal pool over the summer, then DCPS fills those spots in the same priority order: IB waitlist, OOB feeder waitlist, OOB non-feeder waitlist. It's not really "eliminating" OOB feeder rights entirely, but rather just saying their OOB feeder rights are subject to capacity limitations.

FWIW, I agree with you that we can't fault any parents for trying to get the best situation for their kids.

Yes, yes, yes. That's the way it worked before Rhee. The new Chancellor should return the order access priority arrangement to its logical, pre 2010 state. Will he? Doubt it unless political heads roll over the issue first.

Not quite. Until about 2010 OOB wasn't a big deal anyway, there were essentially enough seats. Each principal set the policy for his school. Some schools had lottery, some had first-come first-served. I remember 15-20 years ago there were stories about parents sleeping on the sidewalk to get their kid into the elementary school of their choice. It happened very, very quickly that the WOTP schools started filling up, and DCPS was unprepared and reactive. First they went to every school had to have lotteries, then they went to a single DCPS lottery, and then they went to unified DCPS/DCPCS lottery.

What you have to keep in mind is that the old days were full of shenanigans. Principals knew their lives would be easier if they could get kids who weren't troublemakers and were good students. They tended to have an idea of what kinds of kids were likely to fit that description. Siblings of existing, trouble-free students were always a good bet. Kids who had gone to a good elementary school -- and weren't known troublemakers -- were as well. In those days Deal pretty much let in anyone who had gone to elementary WOTP. So feeder rights weren't a complete invention, they were kind of a codification of existing practice.

Now, the way that feeder rights were implemented was typically Rhee: she panicked, and pandered. Enrolment in Deal grew very quickly from 2008 to 2010, as school went from being under-enrolled to crowded. All of a sudden families in the feeders who had counted on going to Deal began to worry, and put pressure on. At that point, if feeder status had been implemented as a preference rather than a right, it would have been politically acceptable. Instead it was implemented as a right, which is one of the things that got us into the current unsustainable situation. Once it was established as a right there was no going back.

[Anonymous]

Unsustainable to...whom? What's to stop Deal from serving, say, 2,000 students? And to stop Wilson from absorbing more than 2,000? Fire code violations? Health and safety violations? Lack of space for classroom trailers and an addition? Furious in-boundary parents voting their CM out? What? I'd like to know.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's also important to acknowledge that a big part of the overcrowding problem in upper NW schools is that families bail on their inboundary schools and usually do it without reasonable notice. So upper middle class families will leave after 2nd, 3rd or 4th grade in order to claim a private school spot. That's fine. Do what's best for your child, right? But it leaves the DCPS holding the bag and a target enrollment number that the principal is obliged to try and reach. So he/she goes to the waitlist to fill up those classrooms that are now unexpectedly small in order to meet enrollment targets and justify the teacher salary. Making some sort of blanket statement that OOB practices should be halted is naive and doesn't take reality in to account. Rather than trying to eliminate OOB or middle and high school feeder rights (which I genuinely think are nonstarters), I think a better step would be to implement a "no new OOB students" policy for grades 3rd through 5th at upper NW "desirable" schools and have downtown give those schools a little break in not forcing them to fill those grades to capacity (because doing so grows the Deal and Wilson overcrowding problems as they inherit those kids). You can't blame OOB families for wanting to get their children into a feeder pattern that is attractive.

Not sure I understand your OOB views.

I think understand your point about principals wanting to meet enrollment targets, and then admitting OOB students from a waitlist when existing students (IB or OOB) leave unexpectedly. I suppose I don't have a problem with your suggestion in that situation of DCPS just cutting them some slack and allowing them to miss enrollment targets. But I also don't see much problem in letting them pull other students (presumably mostly OOB) from the waitlist in that situation. So for example (totally made-up numbers), if Deal is expecting 400 students in its 7th grade class, but 50 students leave for private or MoCo over the summer, what's the problem with adding 50 replacement students from the waitlist? The resulting class will still be only 400, so it won't change the total number of students in the feeder pipeline for that grade.

My suggestion would be to order access priority like this: IB, OOB feeder, OOB non-feeder. So when Deal is arranging its 6th grade class, the IB students get first priority for spots. If there are any open spots after the IB students are slotted, then they go by lottery to OOB students at Deal's elementary feeders. Then if there are any spots left after that, they go to OOB students who are not at Deal's elementary feeders. If students drop out of the Deal pool over the summer, then DCPS fills those spots in the same priority order: IB waitlist, OOB feeder waitlist, OOB non-feeder waitlist. It's not really "eliminating" OOB feeder rights entirely, but rather just saying their OOB feeder rights are subject to capacity limitations.

FWIW, I agree with you that we can't fault any parents for trying to get the best situation for their kids.

Yes, yes, yes. That's the way it worked before Rhee. The new Chancellor should return the order access priority arrangement to its logical, pre 2010 state. Will he? Doubt it unless political heads roll over the issue first.

Not quite. Until about 2010 OOB wasn't a big deal anyway, there were essentially enough seats. Each principal set the policy for his school. Some schools had lottery, some had first-come first-served. I remember 15-20 years ago there were stories about parents sleeping on the sidewalk to get their kid into the elementary school of their choice. It happened very, very quickly that the WOTP schools started filling up, and DCPS was unprepared and reactive. First they went to every school had to have lotteries, then they went to a single DCPS lottery, and then they went to unified DCPS/DCPCS lottery.

What you have to keep in mind is that the old days were full of shenanigans. Principals knew their lives would be easier if they could get kids who weren't troublemakers and were good students. They tended to have an idea of what kinds of kids were likely to fit that description. Siblings of existing, trouble-free students were always a good bet. Kids who had gone to a good elementary school -- and weren't known troublemakers -- were as well. In those days Deal pretty much let in anyone who had gone to elementary WOTP. So feeder rights weren't a complete invention, they were kind of a codification of existing practice.

Now, the way that feeder rights were implemented was typically Rhee: she panicked, and pandered. Enrolment in Deal grew very quickly from 2008 to 2010, as school went from being under-enrolled to crowded. All of a sudden families in the feeders who had counted on going to Deal began to worry, and put pressure on. At that point, if feeder status had been implemented as a preference rather than a right, it would have been politically acceptable. Instead it was implemented as a right, which is one of the things that got us into the current unsustainable situation. Once it was established as a right there was no going back.

OK, but NW wasn't in it's own universe on feeder rights. Capitol Cluster parents, who are mostly from Wards 5, 7 and 8, not Ward 6, where Stuart-Hobson is located, lobbied Rhee to allow feeder status to be implemented as a preference rather than a right for a middle school where more than 80% of students were and are OOB. The designation stuck during the 2013 boundary and feeder review. As a result, the strongest middle schools on Cap Hill--Brent, Maury and SWS--weren't allowed to feed into Hobson. I'd take terrible crowding at Deal and Wilson over my dead-ended middle school and high school feeders, where proficiency pass rates are in the teens, any day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Unsustainable to...whom? What's to stop Deal from serving, say, 2,000 students? And to stop Wilson from absorbing more than 2,000? Fire code violations? Health and safety violations? Lack of space for classroom trailers and an addition? Furious in-boundary parents voting their CM out? What? I'd like to know.

+1 yes. I agree. Please explain rationally why the schools can't continue to grow if the demand is there. I have inklings of the reasons (at what point it grows too big to manage, dealing with school arrival and dismissal , etc), but would like to see the "literature" that tells us why Deal shouldn't grow. I attended the Deal open house yesterday and it is an enormous school with additional property space if needed for further expansion.

[Anonymous]

Didn't Mayor Bowser promise "Alice Deal for all"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Didn't Mayor Bowser promise "Alice Deal for all"?

Yes, and if all middle schoolers in DC were to attend Deal, its scores would be abysmal. When will people understand that it's not the school itself that makes it successful, but the student body?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unsustainable to...whom? What's to stop Deal from serving, say, 2,000 students? And to stop Wilson from absorbing more than 2,000? Fire code violations? Health and safety violations? Lack of space for classroom trailers and an addition? Furious in-boundary parents voting their CM out? What? I'd like to know.

+1 yes. I agree. Please explain rationally why the schools can't continue to grow if the demand is there. I have inklings of the reasons (at what point it grows too big to manage, dealing with school arrival and dismissal , etc), but would like to see the "literature" that tells us why Deal shouldn't grow. I attended the Deal open house yesterday and it is an enormous school with additional property space if needed for further expansion.

How big was your junior high? How many people in your 8th grade?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unsustainable to...whom? What's to stop Deal from serving, say, 2,000 students? And to stop Wilson from absorbing more than 2,000? Fire code violations? Health and safety violations? Lack of space for classroom trailers and an addition? Furious in-boundary parents voting their CM out? What? I'd like to know.

+1 yes. I agree. Please explain rationally why the schools can't continue to grow if the demand is there. I have inklings of the reasons (at what point it grows too big to manage, dealing with school arrival and dismissal , etc), but would like to see the "literature" that tells us why Deal shouldn't grow. I attended the Deal open house yesterday and it is an enormous school with additional property space if needed for further expansion.

It's an enormous school that is full and overcrowded and not great test scores for the masses!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Didn't Mayor Bowser promise "Alice Deal for all"?

Yes, and if all middle schoolers in DC were to attend Deal, its scores would be abysmal. When will people understand that it's not the school itself that makes it successful, but the student body?

+1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unsustainable to...whom? What's to stop Deal from serving, say, 2,000 students? And to stop Wilson from absorbing more than 2,000? Fire code violations? Health and safety violations? Lack of space for classroom trailers and an addition? Furious in-boundary parents voting their CM out? What? I'd like to know.

+1 yes. I agree. Please explain rationally why the schools can't continue to grow if the demand is there. I have inklings of the reasons (at what point it grows too big to manage, dealing with school arrival and dismissal , etc), but would like to see the "literature" that tells us why Deal shouldn't grow. I attended the Deal open house yesterday and it is an enormous school with additional property space if needed for further expansion.

In 2014 the State of Maryland (you know, the state with one of the best public ed systems in the country) did a study that concluded 900 students is the optimal size for a middle school. They looked at operating efficiencies, academic achievement, disciple, student-teacher satisfaction, etc.

http://www.marylandpublicschools.org/Documents/adequacystudy/SchoolSizeReportr091114.pdf