Sp or Ch language?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:More misinformation.
The PA DID target marketing to those places listed, and did so in Mandarin (not Cantonese). However, that is the job of the school and not the parents.
District charter law DOES prevent preferential admissions criteria. Furthermore, it needs to be clearly stated in the charter formation documents that admission will be based on a lottery if more than enough applicants apply. The charter board will not approve anything else and it would be grounds to have a charter pulled if a school were to attempt something like that.
The students are assessed and placed in Mandarin ability groups regularly. The SOPA, CIRCLE and running records place the children by ability to their correct level. I'm curious what leads you to believe that your child is not placed appropriately? Do you mean to imply that you would wish for your child to be in a more native-speaker grouping? Or are you troubled that there are non-native speakers in the highest groups?

I get to the MoCo places most weekends. If YY targets marketing to them, where is it? Maybe they did once, but since nobody Chinese was making presentations in Cantonese, shaking hands or attending community functions, the impact would have been darn low.

Wasn't talking about preferential admissions critera- a no brainer. Was talking about evaluations of foundational skills for Mandarin acquisition. What you hope as a Cantonese speaker is that your child ends up working with one of the few teachers from the South, but there is no system in place for building on dialect skills (vs. at the San Fran school, where such skills are identified and harnessed). It's a big topic, but the students aren't really assessed and placed in ability groups regularly. Some are bumped to the second tier and others are not.

Troubled that there are non-native speakers in certain groups is not a question but a pejorative, forget it.

I only raise these issues because they underscore the fact that YY tends to treats bilingual Chinese as non-entities. Any wonder that around 2% of of the kids are bilingual, vs. 1/3-1/2 at most of the Spanish schools? At this rate it might be 1% - we're losing patience.

[Anonymous]

I have no idea what you mean by second tier. In every class from preK up there are at least 4 levels (5 in my son's class). Students are assessed every 2 weeks and are placed accordingly. It has been this way since the 2nd year when they introduced that type of assessment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I only raise these issues because they underscore the fact that YY tends to treats bilingual Chinese as non-entities. Any wonder that around 2% of of the kids are bilingual, vs. 1/3-1/2 at most of the Spanish schools? At this rate it might be 1% - we're losing patience.

So lose patience. Like you said, it's 2% - bilingual Chinese barely register... As non-Chinese YY parent, I would rather the school put it's attention to more pressing issues rather than spinning it's wheels on trying to recruit more bilingual kids: In the end, it's entry by lottery. Like many parents at YY, I don't care how many bilingual kids there are entering preK. My DC has learned a lot of Mandarin starting from nothing in less than a year and I highly doubt his learning would be any greater if there were more bilingual 4/5 yr olds in his class. There is no way YY can have 1/3, 1/2 or even 1/4, 1/8 bilingual Chinese kids unless they are given preference in admissions. Will NEVER happen in DC.

[Anonymous]

And it should never happen 20:20. People are complaining that they are nt enough Cantonese speaking children in a Mandarin speaking school, yet these same people don't take the time to apply for a lottery. Wow

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And it should never happen 20:20. People are complaining that they are nt enough Cantonese speaking children in a Mandarin speaking school, yet these same people don't take the time to apply for a lottery. Wow

I don't hear the Cantonese-speakers on the outside complaining - they say, forget it, not enough for the likes of us at YY (we're too Chinese for a Chinese school in DC, we'd never fit in). It's the quite assimilated Chinese who get in and enroll who sound disillusioned.

[Anonymous]

The PA DID target marketing to those places listed, and did so in Mandarin (not Cantonese). However, that is the job of the school and not the parents.

But then why does the PA have an "entire committee for outreach," as somebody mentioned? What do they do?

[Anonymous]

So lose patience. Like you said, it's 2% - bilingual Chinese barely register... As non-Chinese YY parent, I would rather the school put it's attention to more pressing issues rather than spinning it's wheels on trying to recruit more bilingual kids: In the end, it's entry by lottery. Like many parents at YY, I don't care how many bilingual kids there are entering preK. My DC has learned a lot of Mandarin starting from nothing in less than a year and I highly doubt his learning would be any greater if there were more bilingual 4/5 yr olds in his class. There is no way YY can have 1/3, 1/2 or even 1/4, 1/8 bilingual Chinese kids unless they are given preference in admissions. Will NEVER happen in DC.

I'm an AA parent who doesn't agree at all. It's embarassing that very few Chinese are interested in a public immersion school teaching Chinese. YY needs to reassess. When you only have one or two dozen native speakers and you're losing some because their parents feel unwelcome and pushed around, you should sit up, pay attention, and listen, not tell the Chinese to shut up and go away.

There must be some cost effective way for DC Charter, the YY Board and the PA "try to meet them halfway" as somebody put it.

I do care how many bilingual kids are entering preK because these kids must be learning a lot about Chinese culture at home via osmosis, and they can and do share their experiences at school. One Chinese boy told my 5 year old about what his Cantonese-speaking family does to celebrate the Moon Festival. My kid came home excited, asking if we could do some of the same things. I thought it was great. We staged a great little Moon Festival party, emphasizing vocab he'd learned.

[Anonymous]

YY parent here. I know several native speaker families/students and have not heard from any that they feel unwelcome - on the contrary, they are involved and happy from the school. I hear a lot of gripes from individuals who don't like the system (no preference for native speakers, no assessment tests for getting in at the early grades). Just like with everything, people gripe about the school if they don't like a particular policy. I am frankly appalled by some of the posts that were either racist or borderline. What I also don't understand is that since the lottery waitlist operates on a list based on time of application, any family that is on the ball and applies online or in person at the time applications are accepted basically will get in. This might not be the case this year or in the next few as more and more siblings will get preference as the school gets larger but it has been in the past. That is, any family who is really interested in the school and very focused on getting in can get in by being strategic about the application process.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have no idea what you mean by second tier. In every class from preK up there are at least 4 levels (5 in my son's class). Students are assessed every 2 weeks and are placed accordingly. It has been this way since the 2nd year when they introduced that type of assessment.

Can you please explain what you mean by this? Why are they assessing students every two weeks? What do you mean by 4 levels in your class? I am considering YY (have a spot there), but I did not hear anything about this from these levels or such frequent assessments? What is the point? Thank you.

[Anonymous]

The CIRCLE, designed by Yu Ying and paid for with a FLAP grant is a joke.

Signed, a Yu Ying parent who is glad FLAP funding got cut, because at Yu Ying, it was a huge waste of government dollars.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:YY parent here. I know several native speaker families/students and have not heard from any that they feel unwelcome - on the contrary, they are involved and happy from the school. I hear a lot of gripes from individuals who don't like the system (no preference for native speakers, no assessment tests for getting in at the early grades). Just like with everything, people gripe about the school if they don't like a particular policy. I am frankly appalled by some of the posts that were either racist or borderline. What I also don't understand is that since the lottery waitlist operates on a list based on time of application, any family that is on the ball and applies online or in person at the time applications are accepted basically will get in. This might not be the case this year or in the next few as more and more siblings will get preference as the school gets larger but it has been in the past. That is, any family who is really interested in the school and very focused on getting in can get in by being strategic about the application process.

Second time I've posted, my children are still too young for YY and I'm just collecting impressions.

You have to a highly assimilated native speaker to be on DCUMBD, or at least a sophisticated immigrant with an advanced degree. The more ordinary immigrants, e.g. the dry cleaner and take-out crowd, don't know how to be strategic about the application process, have never talked to anybody at the school, and don't put their kids names in the lottery because they've heard that YY doesn't welcome Chinese who don't speak both English and Mandarin well.

We have advanced degrees and have also been appalled by the many PPs telling the Chinese to go to hell, saying that they don't care if their kids are in class with children like ours, or perhaps don't want this. My wife, who has run down the whole thread, is now saying, we're not going anywhere near that school, what a bad environment for a bilingual family.

She's decided that all most of the parents care about is that THEIR kid gets a spot, to avoid bleak IB schools. The more Chinese who apply, the fewer places for other children. But it's hard to tell, maybe we should seek out more native speakers at YY to ask how they like it I've talked to a few bilingual parents who say they feel somewhat unwelcome and tired of being part of such a small minority, but keep this to themselves because they don't want to be accused of racism, wanting preferential treatment, or whatever. Sounds smart, given the apparent abundance of anti-Chinese feeling, ignorance of the culture, and lack of interest in it If YY had a Cantonese speaker in a position of authority you would see more DC Chinese taking an interest in the school and feeling at home there.

[Anonymous]

Really? YY parent here and my husband is chinese american. I don't think it is racist to say that YY can't change lottery rules, has tried outreach (unsuccessful for a variety of reasons). How is that racist? I hear a lot of the Chinese community offer reasons for not attending, including the race of the principal and the students (?racist). This discussion has gotten pretty nasty with everybody casting blame and making crazy allegations. My experience at YY has been positive and my DC has made wonderful progress in English and Chinese!

[Anonymous]

I'm not a YY parent--my kid is at LAMB--but when I read these miserable posts I can't help but wonder why in the heck the parents association and the board don't jointly approach DC Charter and the City Council talking some sense. We've done that on occasion at this school and got results. Just say, look, our student population is much less bilingual than any other immersion school in the city so we need a policy tool/mechanism to help us attract native speakers to achieve our goals. One lottery isn't working well for us so we'd like you to consider two, like LAMB has - if you won't play ball, we aren't worse off. So we'll ask now, we'll ask next year, we'll ask if five years, we'll ask every year until you see the value in working with us. We also need extra money for a Cantonese-speaking administrator/community liaison, or we have no hope of drawing in the DC Chinese community. We don't want bad press for having become a Chinese school the local community rejects, unlike in NYC, San Fran etc. We've done our best to work with the set-up you gave us, but it isn't going so well. Charters are a work in progress and we want much better for ours. So many of our parents are disconnected from the culture of the language we're teaching that our rep is suffering and our tiny group of heritage speakers is growing alienated and shrinking. Come on civic leaders, we're only asking to thrive. We can work with you to explain policy changes so that the public understands. Voters will grasp that 2% bilingual, despite our best efforts to date, isn't what any of us wants.

[Anonymous]

Because the charter board doesn't want a school that already attracts bright, well-off kids to have a preferential admission process that may be seen culling out the "unwanted" minorities. Do you REALLY think this hasn't been approached with them time and again? Don't you think that the school has been already looked at suspiciously for the past 3 years for dwindling numbers of low-income AA students? Honestly, the charter board doesn't look towards moving things in a positive direction and making influential change. They tend to only work on big problems that can't be ignored.

The over-simplification of the issues surrounding who does/doesn't choose to apply are too numerous to address here. It is a public school and the student population should reflect the population of the city. It does.

[Anonymous]

The population at Yu Ying does not reflect the population of the city. Around 70% of public school students are on a free/reduced price lunch.

At Yu Ying, due to the expensive cost of aftercare and mandatory school supplies, the number of students on a free/reduced lunch is well under 40%.