Deal Behavior

[Anonymous]

Don’t forget the Deal students who pretend to live in DC but in fact reside in Maryland. It could be 5 to 10 percent of Deal’s enrollment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just a friendly reminder that neighborhood schools are a choice as well. There is no fundamental right to go to your neighborhood school. School districts adopt systems to identify how they will distribute seats to schools. DCPS has long been a neighborhood school system with a lottery system for available seats. The feeder rights for OOB students has now been in place almost a decade.

Cities like NY give a preference but no guarantee of a spot in a neighborhood school. SF has a complete lottery system. Seattle long had a choice system with a neighborhood preference to a cluster of schools.

DCPS could adopt a number of ways to solve the overcrowding problem. Doing away with the right for OOB students to follow a feeder pattern is one option but not the only and not necessarily the most politically palatable.

My youngest starts Deal in the fall. How they solve this will not have an impact on my kids so I really do not have a dog in this fight other than property values.

All of you parents that recently bought into upper NW and think this can be easily solved by cutting off feeder rights to OOB students likely did not participate in this discussion last time it was actually on the table in a boundary review.

I think it is wise to think about a solution that betters the system for all DCPS students, not just your child's path.

I really don't know what you are trying to say in this post.

There is no such thing as a fundamental right when it comes to what school you can attend.

Right now in DC you have the right to attend the school whose boundaries you live within. In the case of Deal and Wilson those boundaries are illogical and enormous.

Now perhaps what you meant to say is that the right is not set in stone and can be taken away and that is true.

But practically speaking the alternatives to such a system at the MS and HS level would be to go to either an all merit based application system or a pure lottery system where everyone is equal and scattered around the city randomly. The former would do almost nothing to address inequality or access to the select schools while the latter would almost certainly fail and cause lots of middle class families to flee.

I don't think new boundaries and sticking with neighborhood based schools will necessarily cause so many middle class families to flee - knowing where their kids would be attending middle and high school would give those families the chance to be engaged with DCPS and the DC Council years before their kids actually get to those schools and to make sure those schools were up to their expectations but sending the kids to random schools would make that impossible. Unfortunately DCPS has been screwing around for years when it comes to getting a high quality middle school up and running in Ward 4 which is the needed bridge to get these kids to some other high school besides Wilson.

And the swipe from the PP at Upper NW parents shows how misinformed this poster is - the demographic that is going to most vociferously fight any changes is the same demographic most causing the problems in EOTP schools and that is the new UMC families who do whatever they can to avoid sending their kids to their neighborhood EOTP schools whether by going the charter route or finding ways to squeze into Deal/Wilson. If you want to know what it looks like when white people riot then zone Crestwood out of Deal.

The people on here screaming about closing OOB feeder rights are overestimating its role but mostly I think conflating OOB and neighborhood schools - Deal still has enormous boundaries and draws kids from much of NW DC. I think there are some UMC families from both sides of the park that are a bit surprised at how diverse Deal is but the fact that we've got a lot of UMC white families crossing the park to attend a diverse school suggests it should not be impossible to get them to attend a diverse school EOTP and that hopefully points the way to solving the overcrowding here.

[Anonymous]

I observed a 7th and 8th grade classroom at Deal a couple of years ago and the behavior of a few students was disgraceful. More parents should see what these teachers have to deal with and how their own children conduct themselves in school. What I found most disturbing was while the teacher was addressing disruptive students, the majority that were there to learn had to sit and wait until there was some modicum of control. DCPS clearly needs to revisit its discipline policies because what is currently in place is not working.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I observed a 7th and 8th grade classroom at Deal a couple of years ago and the behavior of a few students was disgraceful. More parents should see what these teachers have to deal with and how their own children conduct themselves in school. What I found most disturbing was while the teacher was addressing disruptive students, the majority that were there to learn had to sit and wait until there was some modicum of control. DCPS clearly needs to revisit its discipline policies because what is currently in place is not working.

...and, since this is only getting worse, that's why private schools are thriving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Building Capacity is: 1200
They currently have over 1500 students enrolled

I do not care how many demountables there are -
you have 300 extra kids in the lunch room / in the halls / in the stairwells.

It is a problem and DCPS does not care. They will keep pressuring for OOB (They accepted last year)

Parents who have the means will put their children in private - when their child complains that they can't eat lunch b/c there is no place to sit and eat. The stress is real for these kids.

Have you seen the projections in the DME's Master Facilities Plan? 2108 students by SY 2017-18. That's eight years away.

I think you mean 2027-2028?

Do not forget there is a boundary review scheduled for 2022-23.

Yes, 27-28.

Let's think about that boundary review. According to the projections, Deal will be 538 over capacity. The three next closest middle schools to Deal -- Hardy, MacFarlane, and Adams -- will all be over capacity, by a combined 273. So those four schools will have 800 kids who have to go somewhere else. The two next closest are Brookland and McKinley, which both will have space, combined about 400 seats. Then there's Stuart-Hobson, which will be 112 seats short. The next two schools are Jefferson and Eliot-Hine, which both have capacity, about 220 seats.

West of the Anacostia there are nine middle schools. Five of them will be over capacity, by a combined 923 seats. Four will have space, a combined 673 seats. Every middle school in that part of the city would have to change its boundaries, and you still wouldn't have enough seats.

West of North Capitol Street the middle schools will be short a combined 800 seats.

It's not going to be like 2012 where they could move Eaton from Deal to Hardy and call it good. Every boundary is going to have to change, and some by a lot. It may not be possible to keep boundaries that physically include the school.

I'm really not sure that DC's political culture can handle it. It may be easier to go all-lottery.

[Anonymous]

Keep in mind the DCPS projections don’t take either charter growth or a slowing economy (which we have now) into account.

I would not use those numbers as gospel.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Keep in mind the DCPS projections don’t take either charter growth or a slowing economy (which we have now) into account.

I would not use those numbers as gospel.

They do take into account charter growth.

They are based on Office of Planning estimates, which have consistently been low.

They assume the number of kids in private school doubling in the next eight years, which is nearly impossible.

There are a lot of reasons to believe the estimates are actually low.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I observed a 7th and 8th grade classroom at Deal a couple of years ago and the behavior of a few students was disgraceful. More parents should see what these teachers have to deal with and how their own children conduct themselves in school. What I found most disturbing was while the teacher was addressing disruptive students, the majority that were there to learn had to sit and wait until there was some modicum of control. DCPS clearly needs to revisit its discipline policies because what is currently in place is not working.

Truth, the idea on here that it is just some random OOB kids is wrong. School culture in DCPS sucks across the board, not as bad at Deal as at some schools but teachers have little power to do much about it and some teachers have clusters of students like this in their class whereas others don't. Yet, all teachers held to same standard, some raking in bonuses and some being hit. And yes that includes teachers at Deal, who have been hit by students.

[Anonymous]

The most important issue is not the overcrowding, but that the DC Council has set impossibly strict limits on suspensions. Kids do egregious acts and are in school the next day because downtown won’t suspend them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just a friendly reminder that neighborhood schools are a choice as well. There is no fundamental right to go to your neighborhood school. School districts adopt systems to identify how they will distribute seats to schools. DCPS has long been a neighborhood school system with a lottery system for available seats. The feeder rights for OOB students has now been in place almost a decade.

Cities like NY give a preference but no guarantee of a spot in a neighborhood school. SF has a complete lottery system. Seattle long had a choice system with a neighborhood preference to a cluster of schools.

DCPS could adopt a number of ways to solve the overcrowding problem. Doing away with the right for OOB students to follow a feeder pattern is one option but not the only and not necessarily the most politically palatable.

My youngest starts Deal in the fall. How they solve this will not have an impact on my kids so I really do not have a dog in this fight other than property values.

All of you parents that recently bought into upper NW and think this can be easily solved by cutting off feeder rights to OOB students likely did not participate in this discussion last time it was actually on the table in a boundary review.

I think it is wise to think about a solution that betters the system for all DCPS students, not just your child's path.

I really don't know what you are trying to say in this post.

There is no such thing as a fundamental right when it comes to what school you can attend.

Right now in DC you have the right to attend the school whose boundaries you live within. In the case of Deal and Wilson those boundaries are illogical and enormous.

Now perhaps what you meant to say is that the right is not set in stone and can be taken away and that is true.

But practically speaking the alternatives to such a system at the MS and HS level would be to go to either an all merit based application system or a pure lottery system where everyone is equal and scattered around the city randomly. The former would do almost nothing to address inequality or access to the select schools while the latter would almost certainly fail and cause lots of middle class families to flee.

I don't think new boundaries and sticking with neighborhood based schools will necessarily cause so many middle class families to flee - knowing where their kids would be attending middle and high school would give those families the chance to be engaged with DCPS and the DC Council years before their kids actually get to those schools and to make sure those schools were up to their expectations but sending the kids to random schools would make that impossible. Unfortunately DCPS has been screwing around for years when it comes to getting a high quality middle school up and running in Ward 4 which is the needed bridge to get these kids to some other high school besides Wilson.

And the swipe from the PP at Upper NW parents shows how misinformed this poster is - the demographic that is going to most vociferously fight any changes is the same demographic most causing the problems in EOTP schools and that is the new UMC families who do whatever they can to avoid sending their kids to their neighborhood EOTP schools whether by going the charter route or finding ways to squeze into Deal/Wilson. If you want to know what it looks like when white people riot then zone Crestwood out of Deal.

The people on here screaming about closing OOB feeder rights are overestimating its role but mostly I think conflating OOB and neighborhood schools - Deal still has enormous boundaries and draws kids from much of NW DC. I think there are some UMC families from both sides of the park that are a bit surprised at how diverse Deal is but the fact that we've got a lot of UMC white families crossing the park to attend a diverse school suggests it should not be impossible to get them to attend a diverse school EOTP and that hopefully points the way to solving the overcrowding here.

Crestwood was zoned out of Deal.

[Anonymous]

to 22/37 -- Deal is only diverse if you think diverse means that there are some students from every racial and ethnic group.

But Deal is not at all reflective of the DC school population. At all.

Not going to post the stats here (again) but you can see for yourself https://dcschoolreportcard.org/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Just a friendly reminder that neighborhood schools are a choice as well. There is no fundamental right to go to your neighborhood school. School districts adopt systems to identify how they will distribute seats to schools. DCPS has long been a neighborhood school system with a lottery system for available seats. The feeder rights for OOB students has now been in place almost a decade.

Cities like NY give a preference but no guarantee of a spot in a neighborhood school. SF has a complete lottery system. Seattle long had a choice system with a neighborhood preference to a cluster of schools.

DCPS could adopt a number of ways to solve the overcrowding problem. Doing away with the right for OOB students to follow a feeder pattern is one option but not the only and not necessarily the most politically palatable.

My youngest starts Deal in the fall. How they solve this will not have an impact on my kids so I really do not have a dog in this fight other than property values.

All of you parents that recently bought into upper NW and think this can be easily solved by cutting off feeder rights to OOB students likely did not participate in this discussion last time it was actually on the table in a boundary review.

I think it is wise to think about a solution that betters the system for all DCPS students, not just your child's path.

I really don't know what you are trying to say in this post.

There is no such thing as a fundamental right when it comes to what school you can attend.

Right now in DC you have the right to attend the school whose boundaries you live within. In the case of Deal and Wilson those boundaries are illogical and enormous.

Now perhaps what you meant to say is that the right is not set in stone and can be taken away and that is true.

But practically speaking the alternatives to such a system at the MS and HS level would be to go to either an all merit based application system or a pure lottery system where everyone is equal and scattered around the city randomly. The former would do almost nothing to address inequality or access to the select schools while the latter would almost certainly fail and cause lots of middle class families to flee.

I don't think new boundaries and sticking with neighborhood based schools will necessarily cause so many middle class families to flee - knowing where their kids would be attending middle and high school would give those families the chance to be engaged with DCPS and the DC Council years before their kids actually get to those schools and to make sure those schools were up to their expectations but sending the kids to random schools would make that impossible. Unfortunately DCPS has been screwing around for years when it comes to getting a high quality middle school up and running in Ward 4 which is the needed bridge to get these kids to some other high school besides Wilson.

And the swipe from the PP at Upper NW parents shows how misinformed this poster is - the demographic that is going to most vociferously fight any changes is the same demographic most causing the problems in EOTP schools and that is the new UMC families who do whatever they can to avoid sending their kids to their neighborhood EOTP schools whether by going the charter route or finding ways to squeze into Deal/Wilson. If you want to know what it looks like when white people riot then zone Crestwood out of Deal.

The people on here screaming about closing OOB feeder rights are overestimating its role but mostly I think conflating OOB and neighborhood schools - Deal still has enormous boundaries and draws kids from much of NW DC. I think there are some UMC families from both sides of the park that are a bit surprised at how diverse Deal is but the fact that we've got a lot of UMC white families crossing the park to attend a diverse school suggests it should not be impossible to get them to attend a diverse school EOTP and that hopefully points the way to solving the overcrowding here.

I am the PP you are responding to. I am an upper NW parent that was very engaged in the last boundary review. Things like a city-wide lottery to the middle and high schools were on the table. My swipe was to the parents that are blaming OOB feeder pattern is just a response to the entitlement expressed in their posts that their children have a right to their in boundary schools that is stronger than those that get in through the OOB process. The rules of the OOB process are just as embedded in the law as the boundaries and changing that iis not so simple as just deciding to stop it. The mayor did not win her job in upper NW, there are other parts of the city that DCPS is responsive to and upper NW is lucky that no one in the city wanted to do away with the boundary system, even those with what you would consider sucky IB schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:to 22/37 -- Deal is only diverse if you think diverse means that there are some students from every racial and ethnic group.

But Deal is not at all reflective of the DC school population. At all.

Not going to post the stats here (again) but you can see for yourself https://dcschoolreportcard.org/

Do you know what diverse means, hint, it does not mean reflective of the city’s population.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:to 22/37 -- Deal is only diverse if you think diverse means that there are some students from every racial and ethnic group.

But Deal is not at all reflective of the DC school population. At all.

Not going to post the stats here (again) but you can see for yourself https://dcschoolreportcard.org/

Do you know what diverse means, hint, it does not mean reflective of the city’s population.

Diverse means economically diverse too, which Deal is not. And it is losing what racial and ethnic diversity it does have every year -- not as fast as Wilson but it's significant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:to 22/37 -- Deal is only diverse if you think diverse means that there are some students from every racial and ethnic group.

But Deal is not at all reflective of the DC school population. At all.

Not going to post the stats here (again) but you can see for yourself https://dcschoolreportcard.org/

Do you know what diverse means, hint, it does not mean reflective of the city’s population.

Diverse means economically diverse too, which Deal is not. And it is losing what racial and ethnic diversity it does have every year -- not as fast as Wilson but it's significant.

Maybe someone could post the world rankings on this vitally important academic number, 'diversity'. All I can find is our horrible stats for math, reading and science...along with US kids' #1 ranking in, "self esteem"!!!!!!! Not a typo. Not STEM auto-corrected to 'esteem'. Bad at academics, yet still feel superior to those crushing their scores. (Kind of explains the atrocious Sidwell parents' behavior in this week's Post article.)

If folks truly wanted their kids to have a rich cultural academic experience, they know their kids could enroll OOB at any other MS in the city. But, come on, they just want to post online and talk at parties about how frustrated they are with diversity at the school that's a half mile from Chevy Chase Md.