New Ward 3 Middle School ???

[Anonymous]

There is a legitimate debate about how best to address this mismatch. Do you build more of the schools that everyone wants -- charters and Ward 3 schools? This seems silly when there are so many empty ones. Or do you try to make people want the schools that exist? Sounds reasonable, but how exactly do you do that?



You bribe the best teachers from Ward 3 to teach at the worst schools. You double their salaries and give them curricular freedom for 5 years. You set up community trusts so that neighborhood efforts to improve facilities are matched by government money. You make everything transparent.

I don't think it is even this easy. Part of the reason you have so many kids coming from the Eastern part of the city to the Western part is that these schools are deeply segregated. Mostly reflecting the residential patterns of the city.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is a legitimate debate about how best to address this mismatch. Do you build more of the schools that everyone wants -- charters and Ward 3 schools? This seems silly when there are so many empty ones. Or do you try to make people want the schools that exist? Sounds reasonable, but how exactly do you do that?



You bribe the best teachers from Ward 3 to teach at the worst schools. You double their salaries and give them curricular freedom for 5 years. You set up community trusts so that neighborhood efforts to improve facilities are matched by government money. You make everything transparent.

I don't think it is even this easy. Part of the reason you have so many kids coming from the Eastern part of the city to the Western part is that these schools are deeply segregated. Mostly reflecting the residential patterns of the city.

Not even a bribe could make the best ward 3 teacher into the best ward 7 or 8 teacher. Parental involvement and the readiness and interest of the kids being taught have a lot to do with teachers' success, as any good teacher knows (but can't say aloud under DCs school reform movement).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New deal, new Wilson, new middle school...
Do we see a trend? Ward 3 is getting a lot of snazzy upgrades, wonder what ward 8 is getting? Minor fixes.

Shows where the money's going.

You could also say that it shows where the money (tax revenue, that is) is coming from. For years, particularly in the sorry Barry era, DC spent practically nothing west of the park, always saying that other areas were "more deserving." Certainly there are acure needs in Ward 8 and other wards. But at least Tony Williams and Adrian Fenty began investing in infrastructure in all wards of the city -- schools, playgrounds, parks, pathways -- so that areas that are the revenue engines of the city feel that they are getting some District services.

[Anonymous]

The true problem here is that alot of in boundary elementary schools have alot of out of boundary slots due to maybe kids going private or the neighborhood doesn't have alot of kids in it. That being said DEAL is at capacity with all there feeder schools. Why is Hardy such a big deal there are specialized schools all around the city and becasue Hardy was renovated the neighborhood feel its too good for OOB students?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a legitimate debate about how best to address this mismatch. Do you build more of the schools that everyone wants -- charters and Ward 3 schools? This seems silly when there are so many empty ones. Or do you try to make people want the schools that exist? Sounds reasonable, but how exactly do you do that?



You bribe the best teachers from Ward 3 to teach at the worst schools. You double their salaries and give them curricular freedom for 5 years. You set up community trusts so that neighborhood efforts to improve facilities are matched by government money. You make everything transparent.

I don't think it is even this easy. Part of the reason you have so many kids coming from the Eastern part of the city to the Western part is that these schools are deeply segregated. Mostly reflecting the residential patterns of the city.

Not even a bribe could make the best ward 3 teacher into the best ward 7 or 8 teacher. Parental involvement and the readiness and interest of the kids being taught have a lot to do with teachers' success, as any good teacher knows (but can't say aloud under DCs school reform movement).

A lot of the teachers Rhee fired had deep roots in these wards--grandma types who would call kids out on their behavior and stop their mammas in the street. When basic security in schools is an issue, that's no joke. I'm fine with bringing in young blood, great PD, and gradual systemic improvements-but I think Rhee made a horrible move in her mass firing of anyone who wasn't a blinking newborm TFA. Kind of like de-Baathification. She just didn't get the reality on the ground and how to partner up to improve, while simultaneously introducing improvement. My two cents.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The true problem here is that alot of in boundary elementary schools have alot of out of boundary slots due to maybe kids going private or the neighborhood doesn't have alot of kids in it. That being said DEAL is at capacity with all there feeder schools. Why is Hardy such a big deal there are specialized schools all around the city and becasue Hardy was renovated the neighborhood feel its too good for OOB students?

You got it wrong. The academics at Hardy are too weak for IB families. Hardy lags far behind Deal and suburban MS. And is light years behind private MS. So the IB kids go to private for MS, move, or pretend they live IB for Deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The true problem here is that alot of in boundary elementary schools have alot of out of boundary slots due to maybe kids going private or the neighborhood doesn't have alot of kids in it. That being said DEAL is at capacity with all there feeder schools. Why is Hardy such a big deal there are specialized schools all around the city and becasue Hardy was renovated the neighborhood feel its too good for OOB students?

You got it wrong. The academics at Hardy are too weak for IB families. Hardy lags far behind Deal and suburban MS. And is light years behind private MS. So the IB kids go to private for MS, move, or pretend they live IB for Deal.

No, you got it wrong -- before Pope was ousted and IB families were angling to get in to Hardy, the academics were comparable to Deal (check the DC-CaS #s at the osse site) minus the asian factor -- lots of asians bringing up the total scores at Deal vs no asians to speak of at Hardy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The true problem here is that alot of in boundary elementary schools have alot of out of boundary slots due to maybe kids going private or the neighborhood doesn't have alot of kids in it. That being said DEAL is at capacity with all there feeder schools. Why is Hardy such a big deal there are specialized schools all around the city and becasue Hardy was renovated the neighborhood feel its too good for OOB students?

You got it wrong. The academics at Hardy are too weak for IB families. Hardy lags far behind Deal and suburban MS. And is light years behind private MS. So the IB kids go to private for MS, move, or pretend they live IB for Deal.

No, you got it wrong -- before Pope was ousted and IB families were angling to get in to Hardy, the academics were comparable to Deal (check the DC-CaS #s at the osse site) minus the asian factor -- lots of asians bringing up the total scores at Deal vs no asians to speak of at Hardy.

Here are some facts:

According to the DC-CAS results on the OSSCE website:

Fewer white students at Hardy are advanced than at Deal
Fewer white students at Hardy are provicient or advanced than at Deal
Fewer black students at Hardy are provicient or advanced than at Deal
Fewer (any race) students at Hardy are provicient or advanced than at Deal
Fewer FARMS students at Hardy are provicient or advanced than at Deal

By no metric is the academic performance of students at Hardy on par with those at Deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The true problem here is that alot of in boundary elementary schools have alot of out of boundary slots due to maybe kids going private or the neighborhood doesn't have alot of kids in it. That being said DEAL is at capacity with all there feeder schools. Why is Hardy such a big deal there are specialized schools all around the city and becasue Hardy was renovated the neighborhood feel its too good for OOB students?

Ah, yes, it always livens up the Hardy debate to throw in a blanket statement that is contrary to the facts and then take a swipe at the neighborhood on the way by. All of the the feeder schools are jam-packed: Stoddert was 8% over capacity last year, Key was 15% and Mann a whopping 30%. None of those schools have accepted meaningful numbers of OOB kids in years -- last year over 500 kids applied to Key in the OOB lottery and zero were accepted.

As was pointed out in another thread:

1. Hardy is too big for the area that it serves. It has a capacity of 540 and a feeder school population of 911 (2010-11), or 1.7 kids in the feeder schools for every seat in the middle school. Compare to Deal which has a capacity of 980 and a feeder school population of 3,837 -- a ratio of 3.9:1. And Deal is still 39% out of boundary.

2. From 2005 to 2008 the school was moved to the Hamilton School in Northeast while the Burleith building was renovated.

3. Until very recently it was easy to get into Deal or Latin if you wanted to go public. Until recently Latin was located at Ward Circle, closer to most of the feeder schools than Hardy.

4. Until July 2010 the school had a principal who required all students -- in-boundary and out -- to go through an application process.

Schools develop communities, and it takes time for those patterns to change.

As for the academics, 14:37 has it right. Last year I went to open houses at both Deal and Hardy. The difference in quality and ambition of the academics is breathtaking.

[Anonymous]

"A lot of the teachers Rhee fired had deep roots in these wards--grandma types who would call kids out on their behavior and stop their mammas in the street. When basic security in schools is an issue, that's no joke. I'm fine with bringing in young blood, great PD, and gradual systemic improvements-but I think Rhee made a horrible move in her mass firing of anyone who wasn't a blinking newborm TFA. Kind of like de-Baathification. She just didn't get the reality on the ground and how to partner up to improve, while simultaneously introducing improvement. My two cents."

+100

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"A lot of the teachers Rhee fired had deep roots in these wards--grandma types who would call kids out on their behavior and stop their mammas in the street. When basic security in schools is an issue, that's no joke. I'm fine with bringing in young blood, great PD, and gradual systemic improvements-but I think Rhee made a horrible move in her mass firing of anyone who wasn't a blinking newborm TFA. Kind of like de-Baathification. She just didn't get the reality on the ground and how to partner up to improve, while simultaneously introducing improvement. My two cents."

+100

-101

[Anonymous]

If she is in fact proposing that Hardy become a district-wide MS for performing arts, does that mean that admission would be competitive, as it is for the several "magnet" DCPS high schools (SWOW, Banneker, Ellington)? Would the door then be open to the founding of not just a MS for the arts, but a district-wide "academic MS with tough admissions standards, such those that have existed in the burbs for decades? There's an active message board on the subject that worth checking out if you're interested. More and more parents seem to want such a school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I agree that there are enough 5th graders to fill two classes. That's not really the issue (although it speaks to the fact that many families bought into the idea that "Hardy would be improving" and stayed in DC longer than similarly situated families had in the past).

This is true.

Anonymous wrote:
The issue is that the 4th and 5th grades have (and continue to be) filled with kids who didn't apply to or get accepted to a 4-12 private. 4th and 5th graders are essentially "holding" grades as families figure out their 6-12 options. There has been no consistent pressure on the school to make 4th and 5th academically challenging b/c the Key-track has never been the academic path: the path has always really been the 4-12 or the 6-12 track.

This is hooey. First, it doesn't even make sense. If you opt for private, it is much harder to get in for 6th than for 5th or 4th. Sixth is not an admission year at the most selective schools, and it's the grade where schools start using the SSAT for admissions. Your kid has to be academically exceptional to get in to a top tier school for sixth, and if you are undecided there's no way you're going to coast through 4th and 5th. Second, the notion that "the Key track has never been the academic track" is just nonsense. Key parents are obsessed with academics. In the past few years they raised tens of thousands of dollars for teacher professional development, a structured reading program, a foreign language program and a chorus teacher.

Anonymous wrote:
The fact that Hardy continues to be horrible is not news either. The difference this year (and the reason for the unbelievable angst amongst the 5th graders at Key) was that no-one could finagle their way into Deal. That, and the fact that Latin is harder to get into, meant that there are no longer reasonable "fall back positions" for Key students. That is also not going to change anytime soon. Moving into the Deal boundaries or moving to an area with good schools are going to become more common choices for these families b/c the numbers aren't favorable.

Some truth here. I wouldn't call Hardy "horrible," just unappealing to Key parents. I've sat in a room where the principals of Deal, Latin and Hardy talked about their schools, and the difference in academic ambition between Hardy and the others was breathtaking. Parents who are considering privates might weigh them against Deal or Latin, but no one is doing that with Hardy. The arts curriculum at Hardy doesn't appeal to academically oriented families either. And the turmoil of the past 18 months -- with adults acting like children -- has scared a lot of people off.

Ward 3 is experiencing a baby boom, and the whole out-of-boundary system that DCPS relies on is headed for a train wreck. The kerfuffle at Hardy was just the beginning. Whether or not you like her proposal, you have to give Mary Cheh credit for recognizing that there is a problem and coming up with a constructive solution, which is more than anyone else is doing at this point.

I know of several Key boundary families that got into Deal. They were white families, FWIW.

[Anonymous]

Hardy is a specialized school so just don't go there!!!!! Go to Deal duh!

[Anonymous]

Since when does an arts curriculum not appeal to academically-oriented parents? You mean you're not giving your kids private music lessons? I thought educated people knew that arts education improves academics and makes well-rounded adults.