Root cause of issues at MOCO schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Former director Greg Edmundson is now on special assignment to work in the Compliance Unit. That’s a new position. I’d imagine he’s a good person to talk to about ethical and legal violations.

How are people other than those reading this thread supposed to know Greg Edmundson is working in the Compliance Unit and the purpose of his new position?

This is what is posted on the new, pretty MCPS website: http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/compliance/

Can you please enlighten DCUM readers as to what Greg Edmundson's responsibilities are in the Compliance Unit? Thanks.

[Anonymous]

I don’t know—you’re right that it’s not on the website. I was told by someone who saw the news on his Twitter account.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the IEP process is extremely stressful. As previous post mentioned, the "team" has made decisions in advance, accomodations are inconsistently implemented and sometimes not at all. It is emotionally draining to email teachers and administrators every year, only to see your child falling further behind because there is not consistent compliance in implementing the IEP and the team will preyend that all the goals are being met, despite data that indicates otherwise. You feel as if you have no recourse. The child's best interest is irrelevant for the team, truly sad for all children with learning differences in MCPS.

I’m the counselor pp. I don’t blame you for giving up, but please report these people to help others and put them on notice that they are not flying under the radar. They just changed the leadership. It may be worth complaining again now—to help the next child if it’s too late for yours. One of the worst offenders is no longer working in central. Please do it also to lend credibility to the staff who are also working to hold people responsible for acting ethically. I’d get outside services too if the school wasn’t meeting my needs. Two separate issues. One is incompetence.

They already retaliate in terms of grades, punishing him severely for minor things that other kids don't even get reprimanded for and help/meeting child's needs so if we report, then what? They will make it worse on the child. Yes, its nice to hold people accountable but we live in a world where very few are actually held accountable and as parents the focus needs to be on our children, not fighting an unnecessary battle.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Too many times Central Office hides behind "mistakes". It's difficult to proove intentions easy to proove noncompliance when you get to the point of bringing your own attorney to the process.

It sickens me that MCPS is so broken that it takes an attorney to protect my child's rights.

They have an attorney too. More than one. And use them. Like it or not it’s in your interest to have representation too.

So who benefits from this type of system? Lawyers that charge MCPS (ultimately taxpayers) and parents $500 per hour. So much is wasted on both sides that could be used to help educate children.

It works well for MCPS. The kids who have very mild SN like ours are often private pay for privates that are willing so instead of us paying $500 an house we decided to spend the money on private. Switched to public and now we are looking at private again. Why pay an attorney to fight for years when we can get our child in a better environment in a private (luckily ours does not need a SN school).

[Anonymous]

Meanwhile, kids who can't afford private services fall through the cracks. It is terrible how MCPS treats students with disabilities.

[Anonymous]

To an earlier post who suggested homeschooling. For a high school student, are there co-ops or programs that are recommended?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The "team" concept requires respect, dialog, opened mindedness, listening, careful thought and consi pRederation on both sides. Realize paents and students have also been burned by the system. Realize that many times a student can be falsely accused or misunderstood. Often the lack of training and understanding when it comes to working with children with with disabilities can be relevant. Parents feel like when they walk into meetings, decisions have been premade before they come into a room in the premeeting the MCPS staff had prior to the official meetings.

There are problems on both sides of the table. It's a BIG problem that ultimately hurts the child.

All our IEP meetings the IEP is pre-written, we don't get a copy in advanced and get a final afterward that they refuse to modify. There is no team work. One specialist cannot even get my child's name right despite her providing services for several years. We get no input what so ever.

That’s both outrageous and against the law. I’d contest that IEP asap. I say that as a school counselor who knows the right procedure.

We gave up, do everything on our own and dropped the IEP. The services were a joke and they refused to do the supports my child needed. I cannot even figure out what my child learned last year or what the grades were based on as very little work came home. The school counselor, vp and principal and teachers don't return emails and refuse to speak in person.

Same here. We got really sick of the BS procedures, central office, admin-centered rules (not student centered) and moved back to NW DC. Super happy and the best PTAs and curriculum in the area for publics. MCPS has really moved in the wrong direction the last 8 years.

[Anonymous]

And when I say the NWDC ES PTAs are awesome it's compared to our also highly active former Bethesda ES. However in DC the PTA funds and usages are not throttled down by MCPS Central Office. If we don't like the class size, we hire an aide. This is in addition to the better curriculum and more dedicated subjects than MCPS had (mainly reading, math), full time music (2x/week), art (2x/week) and PE (3x a week) classes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And when I say the NWDC ES PTAs are awesome it's compared to our also highly active former Bethesda ES. However in DC the PTA funds and usages are not throttled down by MCPS Central Office. If we don't like the class size, we hire an aide. This is in addition to the better curriculum and more dedicated subjects than MCPS had (mainly reading, math), full time music (2x/week), art (2x/week) and PE (3x a week) classes.

Sure, but you realize that allowing PTAs to hire aides not only perpetuates inequality, but also isn’t a sustainable source of funding for that aide. Let’s say your kid’s class could use an aide, so you pay for one. What happens when your kid graduates from the school? Do you keep paying for the aide, or does the aide lose his/her job because you don’t want to pay the salary anymore and the current PTA parents don’t see the need for one?

I totally agree MCPS has problems, but the solution isn’t having PTAs pay for things like that. The public school system needs to be the one to provide those things.

Also, if you look at the national rankings, DCPS schools still lag far behind MCPS, with the exception of 2-3 charter schools. Some DCUM posters love to act like DCPS is this wonderful place, but it’s just not.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And when I say the NWDC ES PTAs are awesome it's compared to our also highly active former Bethesda ES. However in DC the PTA funds and usages are not throttled down by MCPS Central Office. If we don't like the class size, we hire an aide. This is in addition to the better curriculum and more dedicated subjects than MCPS had (mainly reading, math), full time music (2x/week), art (2x/week) and PE (3x a week) classes.

Sure, but you realize that allowing PTAs to hire aides not only perpetuates inequality, but also isn’t a sustainable source of funding for that aide. Let’s say your kid’s class could use an aide, so you pay for one. What happens when your kid graduates from the school? Do you keep paying for the aide, or does the aide lose his/her job because you don’t want to pay the salary anymore and the current PTA parents don’t see the need for one?

I totally agree MCPS has problems, but the solution isn’t having PTAs pay for things like that. The public school system needs to be the one to provide those things.

Also, if you look at the national rankings, DCPS schools still lag far behind MCPS, with the exception of 2-3 charter schools. Some DCUM posters love to act like DCPS is this wonderful place, but it’s just not.

Why does MCPS not allow its PTAs to fund teacher aides? Many of its non title 1 schools have 24-28 K or 1st graders per class. I would think having two teachers at such a young age of fully learning reading, writing, math would make a big impact. That's too bad if that is true that MCPS forbids it and other publics allow it. DC has better charter and KIPP schools as well. So many good options in this area!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And when I say the NWDC ES PTAs are awesome it's compared to our also highly active former Bethesda ES. However in DC the PTA funds and usages are not throttled down by MCPS Central Office. If we don't like the class size, we hire an aide. This is in addition to the better curriculum and more dedicated subjects than MCPS had (mainly reading, math), full time music (2x/week), art (2x/week) and PE (3x a week) classes.

Sure, but you realize that allowing PTAs to hire aides not only perpetuates inequality, but also isn’t a sustainable source of funding for that aide. Let’s say your kid’s class could use an aide, so you pay for one. What happens when your kid graduates from the school? Do you keep paying for the aide, or does the aide lose his/her job because you don’t want to pay the salary anymore and the current PTA parents don’t see the need for one?

I totally agree MCPS has problems, but the solution isn’t having PTAs pay for things like that. The public school system needs to be the one to provide those things.

Also, if you look at the national rankings, DCPS schools still lag far behind MCPS, with the exception of 2-3 charter schools. Some DCUM posters love to act like DCPS is this wonderful place, but it’s just not.

Stop with the meaningless averages, standardized test rankings, and pretend teacher aides in high school BS. MCPS has big problems and not just for ESOL and FARM kids. It is failing its middle and top kids daily with a crap curriculum that mainly teaches math and english badly and skips out on teaching science, social studies, any arts, and gym. A huge bifurcated COUNTY-RUN school district like MCPS does not provide well. At all. You will be supplementing and supplementing for holes and missing subjects until high school. Then the robotic federal AP curriculum kicks in.

Go tour 3 Bethesda ESs and 3 NW DC ES (Janney, LaFayette, Mann) and report back on class size, hourly/weekly curriculum, extracurriculars, community involvement. If you have a choice, and are informed firsthand, you would not chose MCPS.

Central office MCPS policies, procedures, curriculum have annihilated the MoCo reputation. Just peel back the onion one layer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And when I say the NWDC ES PTAs are awesome it's compared to our also highly active former Bethesda ES. However in DC the PTA funds and usages are not throttled down by MCPS Central Office. If we don't like the class size, we hire an aide. This is in addition to the better curriculum and more dedicated subjects than MCPS had (mainly reading, math), full time music (2x/week), art (2x/week) and PE (3x a week) classes.

Sure, but you realize that allowing PTAs to hire aides not only perpetuates inequality, but also isn’t a sustainable source of funding for that aide. Let’s say your kid’s class could use an aide, so you pay for one. What happens when your kid graduates from the school? Do you keep paying for the aide, or does the aide lose his/her job because you don’t want to pay the salary anymore and the current PTA parents don’t see the need for one?

I totally agree MCPS has problems, but the solution isn’t having PTAs pay for things like that. The public school system needs to be the one to provide those things.

Also, if you look at the national rankings, DCPS schools still lag far behind MCPS, with the exception of 2-3 charter schools. Some DCUM posters love to act like DCPS is this wonderful place, but it’s just not.

DCPS parents with 1-3 kids in good public ESs will gladly pay $1k, $5k, 10K per family for an aide and avoid $40k at the nearby private school. Duh. DCPS, like MCPS, puts a good $4k extra per pupil in title 1 and high FARM schools, plus the aides go to the bottom performers. So it's up to parents and PTA to provide an aide in the NW DC schools, their pupils only get $12k from DC not the $16k per kid like in SE DC ESs.

[Anonymous]

Trust me, I have huge problems with MCPS, but DCPS is just not this glorious heaven you’re making it out to be. Sure, there are some good elementary schools, but what about middle and high school?

Public education in the US is a crap show all over. Stop acting like DCPS is heavenly.

Also, if you don’t understand why it’s a problem for PTAs to fund aides, you’re an idiot. It’s simply not a sustainable source of funding, unless the PTA is committed to paying for that person for as long as he/she wants to work there and is performing well, even if that’s 25 years. How is that a good solution?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Why isn't this posted on the MCPS website for OSSI??? Thank you DCUM.

Should I let them know that is how I found out who is for what school as of July 1st?

http://nebula.wsimg.com/d4573365c8dd4ed04eb1fb64adc7a3ff?AccessKeyId=AB71C8A62DC88BF7171E&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

http://nebula.wsimg.com/74e0a86a005e2fcbeff6d3d90835efb9?AccessKeyId=AB71C8A62DC88BF7171E&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

I was just at our area MCCPTA/MCPS meeting last night and the "new" directors were talking all about getting to know the community and being open to communication, etc. And yet the official website still lists the old director assignments http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/clusteradmin/school-assignments.aspx/ and the only reason any of us has access to the correct org chart is that someone on DCUM posted the link to where it lives on the internet on "nebula.wsing.com" whatever that is. And of course I wouldn't even know who to complain too...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Why isn't this posted on the MCPS website for OSSI??? Thank you DCUM.

Should I let them know that is how I found out who is for what school as of July 1st?

http://nebula.wsimg.com/d4573365c8dd4ed04eb1fb64adc7a3ff?AccessKeyId=AB71C8A62DC88BF7171E&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

http://nebula.wsimg.com/74e0a86a005e2fcbeff6d3d90835efb9?AccessKeyId=AB71C8A62DC88BF7171E&disposition=0&alloworigin=1

I was just at our area MCCPTA/MCPS meeting last night and the "new" directors were talking all about getting to know the community and being open to communication, etc. And yet the official website still lists the old director assignments http://www.montgomeryschoolsmd.org/departments/clusteradmin/school-assignments.aspx/ and the only reason any of us has access to the correct org chart is that someone on DCUM posted the link to where it lives on the internet on "nebula.wsing.com" whatever that is. And of course I wouldn't even know who to complain too...

Since the website isn’t updated yet also note that former director Greg Edmundson is now on special assignment to the Office of the Superintendent to do Compliance. So complain to him about stuff involving laws and ethics, I suppose. As for the website, not sure who you’d complain to. I actually don’t mind the website and think it’s an improvement (once updated). I find the colors jarring though. Teal and an ugly dark color and a horrible shade of pink. Would have liked a different palette better !