Maury Capitol Hill

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think there is a subset of current families at Maury who very specifically and intentionally moved into the boundary in order to attend one of the “best” public elementary schools in DC. It's maybe contributing to the NIMBYism.

Yes, that's what parents do all over the country. Move to a specific neighborhood for the schools.

Yes but there's a difference between moving somewhere for a specific school district, or even a specific school triangle, and moving somewhere for a specific elementary. Especially in DC where elementary schools are small and boundaries often cut through neighborhoods, as is the case with Maury and Miner.

The NIMBYism in this situation is extra strange to me because these two elementaries feed to the same MS, which families at Maury are currently actively trying to improve. Moving into the Maury boundary while KNOWING that there is an elementary school a half mile away with essentially the opposite demographics and outcomes, and then being surprised when the suggested solutions for this problem impact the school you bought in-boundary for, reflects some ignorance about how school districts work. Districts are always seeking to balance populations, whether it's moving kids around to address overcrowding, balancing demographics, or trying to create feeder patterns that make sense.

In any case, there is a version of this cluster idea that could actually be an opportunity for Maury and Miner IB families to join forces and create two great schools that then feed to the same middle school. But it sounds like the vision for greatness at Maury is as much about who they keep out (poor kids, SpEd kids, at risk kids) as what they actually do at the school, so they do not feel up to that taks with a much more racially and socioeconomically diverse population.

Can you in any way demonstrate or provide anything other than vibes a feels that the Maury and Miner could "join forces and create two great schools"?

Maury parents would be for it! Spoiler: There's nothing but vibes and feels.

Premise #1: If Miner could get it's at risk percentage under 40%, it could more easily gear programming and resources towards a socioeconomically diverse student body.

Premise #2: If Miner could get its at risk percentage under 40%, it could more easily attract IB families who currently avoid the school because of the belief that most resources and programming at the school will be geared towards its large at risk population.

Premise #3: If Miner and Maury combined and Maury retained its current family composition, even before increasing IB buy-in for Miner, the at risk percentage for the combined school would be 33%.

Premise #4: The willingness of Maury families to stay at the combined school would attract IB Miner families the school, further dropping the at risk percentage and increasing programming and resources that could be aimed at non-at-risk students at both schools.

Permise #5: As the largest feeder to EH, families from the Miner-Maury cluster would have more influence over the culture and programming at EH, and be able to more effectively advocate for tracking that would further better serve students by meeting them where they were at.

Conclusion: A Miner-Maury cluster with buy in from both school's boundaries could not only produce two elementary schools with a favorable demographic balance, but could also help produce a MS with the same. While the cluster would initially change demographics at Maury in a way that would present challenges, the majority of students would still be high SES, and if the schools could retain existing families and build IB buy-n a the Miner zone, the benefits to both school communities in the form of a larger community of committed, IB, high SES families supporting multiple strong elementary schools and a strong neighborhood, by-right middle school would ultimately benefit Maury families more than the present situation, in which they have a very strong elementary that feeds to a struggling MS and HS, forcing many Maury families to turn to charters and other non-neighborhood options for MS and HS.

But the whole thing would hinge on Maury families being on board and Miner IB families being willing to buy in. I think the latter is likely if you get the former, but the former is unlikely based on what we've heard from the Maury community thus far.

the problem with your analysis is that #1 and #2 are completely theoretical and yes “vibes” based, with the exception of a handful of shaky studies with a million confounders. There’s no good evidence that merely reducing the concentration of low-SES students improves their education, and that a single classroom with such big gaps can be taught to the needs of all students. Meanwhile DCPS discourages or forbids methods that would allow for tracking and fails to examine what the lower SES kids actually need in terms of instruction. The theory is literally ALL VIBES.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

I love these Miner parents who are trying to sell this half-cocked plan by any means necessary.

Not a Miner parent -- a Ward 6 parent who sees the benefit to having an entire Ward full of strong schools instead of a Ward with a few strong elementaries and that's it. The current situation doesn't really serve us very well, does it? We've got three middling, weak middle schools with limited buy-in, and a high school almost no one in the Ward will send their kids to. We love our elementary school but... then what? I'm not enthusiastic about sending my kid up to Latin or BASIS -- I'd prefer a neighborhood school. We'll probably do SH but don't view Eastern as a viable option. But it's hard to ever make the MSs and HS great if we still have so many weak elementaries in the Ward. So yes, I'm very invested in the idea that Miner and other schools can improve, and I'm absolutely open to out-of-the-box ideas for how that might happen. Even though we aren't IB for Miner and won't go there, having a good school there could be a net benefit.

Great then you lottery for Miner. No? Why not?

If the measure of “good school” is IB buy-in then making a cluster gets us nowhere close to that goal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

The borders of Ward 6 are every bit as arbitrary as the borders of the Maury and Miner zones.

While we're at it, by my reckoning the at-risk percentage across CH schools is about 25%, so the proposed cluster overcorrects Maury by quite a bit. If we correct SWS, Peabody, LT, CHMS, and most of all Brent up to 25%, that would be much more fair.

Agree. A Miner-SWS cluster actually makes the most sense. Give Miner IB rights to SWS and fill the rest of the seats in the lottery.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To me it's clear something needs to be done to lower the at risk percentage at Miner. I understand the objections to the cluster, but you can make similar objections to any proposal.

It feels like a lot of people are basically arguing for the status quo, which means Miner remains a school with a lot of at risk kids who it ultimately fails.

It feels like no matter what is proposed, it will be rejected as infeasible, and nothing will change.

How about DC actually figure out how to teach at-risk kids? Moving them from one school to another is NOT an instructional strategy!!! The status quo id terrible but moving kids around does ZERO to fix it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Logically, after dust settles down, Payne or Watkins would benefit.

Payne maybe. It seems like it’s on an upward trajectory. Watkins has a long history of pretty toxic dynamics between people who live on the Hill and leadership/OOB parents who do not live on the Hill, and it’s extremely inconvenient to the Maury boundary. I don’t see it being a landing spot for Maury families.

+1

+2. Both Miner and Maury families should speak to Cluster families to see what the difficulties are present when you have an fundamental differences between IB and OOB families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

Got it. So we’re just getting rid of the Ward 8 poors.

If you're a Maury parent, this is such a weird thing to say. So you want elementaries filled with at-risk kids from across the river in the neighborhood, but just not at your school? Why?

Do people want more IB buy-in or not? I want more IB buy-in, on a ward-wide basis. I want what they have in Ward 3, which is a whole triangle of strong schools. They didn't get that by investing in Janney but saying "screw it, let Murch burn." Because they both feed to Deal so ideally they'll both be strong.

Then INVEST IN MINER!

Again, IB families TRIED to get momentum going at Miner and DCPS made it impossible through a series of bone-headed moves. There are plenty of “non-poor” children in the Miner catchment but they all flee Miner because Miner has been an administrative mess. Fix that problem.

This. One of the primary problems with a Maury/Miner cluster is that you will also inherit the administrative problems of Miner. That has nothing to do with any Miner families and everything to do with DME and DCPS. I'd fix that issue first.

What administrator wants to take on a role where the community the school is located in wants the school to change, to attract more IB families and improve test scores, but the majority of attending families (a large percentage of whom do not live in the community) want the school to stay the same and actively dislike changes that might make the school more attractive to IB families?

I would definitely want to spend time to find out whether Maury and Miner have matching priorities before combining them. It's virtually impossible to raise IB buy-in if they don't.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To me it's clear something needs to be done to lower the at risk percentage at Miner. I understand the objections to the cluster, but you can make similar objections to any proposal.

It feels like a lot of people are basically arguing for the status quo, which means Miner remains a school with a lot of at risk kids who it ultimately fails.

It feels like no matter what is proposed, it will be rejected as infeasible, and nothing will change.

How about DC actually figure out how to teach at-risk kids? Moving them from one school to another is NOT an instructional strategy!!! The status quo id terrible but moving kids around does ZERO to fix it.

Plus, most of the schools that have high at-risk numbers in DC don't have successful neighbor schools you can pull from. If we're hearing that this is the only solution for Miner, what does that say about the strategy for those schools?

[Anonymous]

I hope all these inspired Ward 6 parents have already filled out their lottery applications and have Miner ranked #1.

Using Maury kids as pawns in an experiment that has already failed on the Hill instead of your own is high level hypocrisy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

The borders of Ward 6 are every bit as arbitrary as the borders of the Maury and Miner zones.

While we're at it, by my reckoning the at-risk percentage across CH schools is about 25%, so the proposed cluster overcorrects Maury by quite a bit. If we correct SWS, Peabody, LT, CHMS, and most of all Brent up to 25%, that would be much more fair.

Agree. A Miner-SWS cluster actually makes the most sense. Give Miner IB rights to SWS and fill the rest of the seats in the lottery.

LT families tried to get IB rights to SWS 10 years ago and DCPS refused.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

The borders of Ward 6 are every bit as arbitrary as the borders of the Maury and Miner zones.

While we're at it, by my reckoning the at-risk percentage across CH schools is about 25%, so the proposed cluster overcorrects Maury by quite a bit. If we correct SWS, Peabody, LT, CHMS, and most of all Brent up to 25%, that would be much more fair.

Agree. A Miner-SWS cluster actually makes the most sense. Give Miner IB rights to SWS and fill the rest of the seats in the lottery.

This makes no sense at all. SWS is tiny, and there is no evidence that any significant numbers of families now at Miner are interested in the Region approach SWS uses-- their experience as an all city school indicates that the approach has a much bigger appeal to UMC white families.

The only people who this benefits are the UMC folks in the Miner boundary who already lottery out. It doesn't actually solve anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I hope all these inspired Ward 6 parents have already filled out their lottery applications and have Miner ranked #1.

Using Maury kids as pawns in an experiment that has already failed on the Hill instead of your own is high level hypocrisy.

It's not hypocritical-- many of us send our kids to schools like Payne, Watkins, JO, Van Ness, and Tyler (my kids' school is on this list). I don't have to prove my bona fides to you. I am already doing my part to create truly integrated Ward 6 schools and support the education of at risk students in my school. I don't need to lottery for Miner because I'm already doing it somewhere else.

Your turn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think there is a subset of current families at Maury who very specifically and intentionally moved into the boundary in order to attend one of the “best” public elementary schools in DC. It's maybe contributing to the NIMBYism.

Yes, that's what parents do all over the country. Move to a specific neighborhood for the schools.

Yes but there's a difference between moving somewhere for a specific school district, or even a specific school triangle, and moving somewhere for a specific elementary. Especially in DC where elementary schools are small and boundaries often cut through neighborhoods, as is the case with Maury and Miner.

The NIMBYism in this situation is extra strange to me because these two elementaries feed to the same MS, which families at Maury are currently actively trying to improve. Moving into the Maury boundary while KNOWING that there is an elementary school a half mile away with essentially the opposite demographics and outcomes, and then being surprised when the suggested solutions for this problem impact the school you bought in-boundary for, reflects some ignorance about how school districts work. Districts are always seeking to balance populations, whether it's moving kids around to address overcrowding, balancing demographics, or trying to create feeder patterns that make sense.

In any case, there is a version of this cluster idea that could actually be an opportunity for Maury and Miner IB families to join forces and create two great schools that then feed to the same middle school. But it sounds like the vision for greatness at Maury is as much about who they keep out (poor kids, SpEd kids, at risk kids) as what they actually do at the school, so they do not feel up to that taks with a much more racially and socioeconomically diverse population.

Can you in any way demonstrate or provide anything other than vibes a feels that the Maury and Miner could "join forces and create two great schools"?

Maury parents would be for it! Spoiler: There's nothing but vibes and feels.

Premise #1: If Miner could get it's at risk percentage under 40%, it could more easily gear programming and resources towards a socioeconomically diverse student body.

Premise #2: If Miner could get its at risk percentage under 40%, it could more easily attract IB families who currently avoid the school because of the belief that most resources and programming at the school will be geared towards its large at risk population.

Premise #3: If Miner and Maury combined and Maury retained its current family composition, even before increasing IB buy-in for Miner, the at risk percentage for the combined school would be 33%.

Premise #4: The willingness of Maury families to stay at the combined school would attract IB Miner families the school, further dropping the at risk percentage and increasing programming and resources that could be aimed at non-at-risk students at both schools.

Permise #5: As the largest feeder to EH, families from the Miner-Maury cluster would have more influence over the culture and programming at EH, and be able to more effectively advocate for tracking that would further better serve students by meeting them where they were at.

Conclusion: A Miner-Maury cluster with buy in from both school's boundaries could not only produce two elementary schools with a favorable demographic balance, but could also help produce a MS with the same. While the cluster would initially change demographics at Maury in a way that would present challenges, the majority of students would still be high SES, and if the schools could retain existing families and build IB buy-n a the Miner zone, the benefits to both school communities in the form of a larger community of committed, IB, high SES families supporting multiple strong elementary schools and a strong neighborhood, by-right middle school would ultimately benefit Maury families more than the present situation, in which they have a very strong elementary that feeds to a struggling MS and HS, forcing many Maury families to turn to charters and other non-neighborhood options for MS and HS.

But the whole thing would hinge on Maury families being on board and Miner IB families being willing to buy in. I think the latter is likely if you get the former, but the former is unlikely based on what we've heard from the Maury community thus far.

the problem with your analysis is that #1 and #2 are completely theoretical and yes “vibes” based, with the exception of a handful of shaky studies with a million confounders. There’s no good evidence that merely reducing the concentration of low-SES students improves their education, and that a single classroom with such big gaps can be taught to the needs of all students. Meanwhile DCPS discourages or forbids methods that would allow for tracking and fails to examine what the lower SES kids actually need in terms of instruction. The theory is literally ALL VIBES.

#1 and #2 are not theoretical.

Look at test scores in DCPS schools based on percent of at risk students. It's a direct correlation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

The borders of Ward 6 are every bit as arbitrary as the borders of the Maury and Miner zones.

While we're at it, by my reckoning the at-risk percentage across CH schools is about 25%, so the proposed cluster overcorrects Maury by quite a bit. If we correct SWS, Peabody, LT, CHMS, and most of all Brent up to 25%, that would be much more fair.

Agree. A Miner-SWS cluster actually makes the most sense. Give Miner IB rights to SWS and fill the rest of the seats in the lottery.

This makes no sense at all. SWS is tiny, and there is no evidence that any significant numbers of families now at Miner are interested in the Region approach SWS uses-- their experience as an all city school indicates that the approach has a much bigger appeal to UMC white families.

The only people who this benefits are the UMC folks in the Miner boundary who already lottery out. It doesn't actually solve anything.

I think the point is it makes at least as much sense as a Maury-Miner cluster.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I hope all these inspired Ward 6 parents have already filled out their lottery applications and have Miner ranked #1.

Using Maury kids as pawns in an experiment that has already failed on the Hill instead of your own is high level hypocrisy.

It's not hypocritical-- many of us send our kids to schools like Payne, Watkins, JO, Van Ness, and Tyler (my kids' school is on this list). I don't have to prove my bona fides to you. I am already doing my part to create truly integrated Ward 6 schools and support the education of at risk students in my school. I don't need to lottery for Miner because I'm already doing it somewhere else.

Your turn.

DP. My went from Maury to EH - are you going to send your kid to the IB MS? The fact is, zero parents (including black and lower SES) make school choices based on some abstract sense of “creating a truly integrated Ward 6.” That’s nonsense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Data point: Payne is doing overall really well recently. It is 34% at-risk.

Imagine if Payne continued this trajectory and a Miner-Maury cluster got it's at risk percentage to 30% or less. Then imagine EH gets its at risk percentage down to 30% or less. Now look at the trajectory of LT, and the potential for JOW to capitalize on the decline of Two Rivers and its new building to follow suit, and the impact this could have on SH. Now consider that Amidon-Bowen has also received increased neighborhood buy-in recently and is ALSO slated for an upcoming renovation, and it feeds to Jefferson along with Brent.

Now remember all of this happens and what the impact could be on Eastern High School.

But it requires families in Ward 6 to work together, instead of being pitted against each other. It means acting in collective interest instead of individual self-interest. Which is the entire premise behind public education.

I love the idyllic picture you have painted of a world in which we have managed to get rid of most of the poors.

Alternatively -- a world in which poor people who live in Ward 6 are better served by Ward 6 schools because they are good across the board instead of becoming landing places for poor children from the entire East side.

We're not talking about getting the at risk percentage to zero, we're talking about getting it down to a manageable percentage that actually allows schools to serve both at risk and non-at-risk at the same time.

The borders of Ward 6 are every bit as arbitrary as the borders of the Maury and Miner zones.

While we're at it, by my reckoning the at-risk percentage across CH schools is about 25%, so the proposed cluster overcorrects Maury by quite a bit. If we correct SWS, Peabody, LT, CHMS, and most of all Brent up to 25%, that would be much more fair.

Agree. A Miner-SWS cluster actually makes the most sense. Give Miner IB rights to SWS and fill the rest of the seats in the lottery.

This makes no sense at all. SWS is tiny, and there is no evidence that any significant numbers of families now at Miner are interested in the Region approach SWS uses-- their experience as an all city school indicates that the approach has a much bigger appeal to UMC white families.

The only people who this benefits are the UMC folks in the Miner boundary who already lottery out. It doesn't actually solve anything.

I think the point is it makes at least as much sense as a Maury-Miner cluster.

That's not how it was presented, but in any case I'd argue it makes significantly less sense than a Miner-Maury cluster, which actually does potentially resolve problems at Miner, albeit while creating problems at Maury.

A Miner-SWS cluster makes no sense whatsoever. SWS is too small and the schools have different curriculums and approaches, plus SWS is all-city already so it is already possible for any at risk family, including those IB for Miner, to lottery to them. But in practice, even though this option exists, few do.

It's just a silly proposal that distracts from actually addressing the problems at hand.