JLG vs McDuffie on public schools
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Anonymous
Got it. So no different than selective colleges. |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
So making up things is ok? I guess White people will say whatever in the Trump era. |
Anonymous
That claim doesn’t hold up, and here’s the receipts: DCPS actually commissioned American University’s School of Education to do an independent review of IMPACT -and the results were not flattering. The AU findings showed overwhelmingly negative feelings about IMPACT among teachers, who described it as creating an atmosphere of fear, distrust, and competition, especially in low-performing schools.  That’s not a few complainers. That’s a documented pattern across interviews and surveys that DCPS paid for. And then there’s the racial bias piece - Black teachers received two and a half times as many score deductions as white teachers, and more than twice as many as Hispanic/Latino teachers, regardless of the race of the evaluator.  So the system is producing biased outcomes even when you control for evaluator bias. That’s a structural problem, not a performance problem. Oh, and DCPS tried to sit on these findings. The WTU had to formally petition DCPS just to get them to release the AU data, even though DCPS had already received the early results.  If IMPACT were as great as they claim, why hide the independent research you commissioned yourself? DCPS absolutely cherry-picks which data they publicize. That’s the issue. So McDuffie agrees with scamming teachers and parents. As long as he can pretend to make it look good. You have PE teachers making 137k, doing nothing but letting your kids run wild in the gym but sure that’s ’fair.’ |
Anonymous
| GDS |
Anonymous
It's hard for me to understand why any parent could vote for JLG. You're voting to ensure you have no voice in school related decisions. |
Anonymous
Can't wait to see what kind of *insane* demands WTU makes next year if she's elected. It will be a great moment for them to have truly crazy demands. |
Anonymous
Unfortunately, this thread has gone off the rails. But I keep coming back to it. I don’t think the WTU will make insane demands. I think the biggest ask will be to improve IMPACT, and I think if she can do it, it will make DCPS better. Overhauling IMPACT will be an enormous task that requires a lot of care to ensure it’s being replaced with something better. IMPACT was initially useful for two specific reasons: One — it helped clear out the worst teachers in DCPS when it was first implemented. But for the most part, that had already happened through RIFs. Two — it helped change the culture to one of extremely high expectations for DCPS teachers. If you want to teach in DCPS you have to be a very hard worker. However, IMPACT has probably reached its limit for how much it will improve schools. We don’t need it to keep a culture of high expectations. It is a distraction from other things that are not working. And for every terrible teacher that it drives out (that could also be driven out with a better evaluation system), it is also drives out talented people who would rather find a new school system or even a new career than play the IMPACT game every year. I also think the most ardent pro-charter people on this thread should honestly be pleased that Lewis George is talking about improving IMPACT. That will take considerable time, effort and political capital, meaning it will leave very little time for meddling with charters. And here is what anyone who is honest and knows the landscape knows about charters: maybe one-third of charters are either very good or at least comparable to the average DCPS (most of those are the ones mentioned on this forum and then a few others); the other two-thirds range from barely mediocre to significant messes, with some bordering on total incompetency and wastes of taxpayer dollars. It’s a compromise that DC has made over the past thirty years — we get some truly excellent charter schools but it means we also fund and allow kids to go to some very, very questionable charter schools. This is why DCPS now routinely outperforms the charter sector on just about every standardized test. One day we will have to grapple with that fact, but many posts on this thread are good examples of what happens when a politician even says the word charter — people go crazy and accuse you of hating all charter schools. My shorter take is this: I think it’s good that Lewis George wants to improve IMPACT. I think it’s even better she talks about truancy and middle schools as needing attention. I really don’t think she will be a puppet of the WTU. And I think the charter panic happening in this thread is way over the top. I’m ranking Lewis George #1 and Rini #2 |
Anonymous
Just to speak from this perspective... so our child is currently at BASIS and loving it and learning a ton, and I have no doubt he will be well prepared to succeed in college. He getting a very rigorous STEM education and can compete on the debate team and is being supported by a system that gets kids all the way through 12th and into very, very good colleges. If we didn't have that charter school, he would be at Cardozo High School. Those are the options. Is there any doubt in my mind that his life path would be dramatically different if he had to go through Cardozo instead of BASIS? So that's why charter parents feel nervous about voting for a mayor who doesn't like charters. I personally will not be ranking here, and will hold my nose and vote for McDuffie. |
Anonymous
But where is this idea that she doesn’t like charters even coming from? I honestly hadn’t heard that except people on this thread saying it. Also, even if someone did hate charters, schools like BASIS would be the last place they’d be looking to make changes! The first place would be the plethora of charter schools that are terrible. I think we should normalize being pro-charter but also willing to question if all charters are the best use of taxpayer dollars. |
Anonymous
Um, her entire career? Janeese would be the most anti-charter mayor in DC history. The idea that charters are a poor use of money is kinda bizarre when the city thinks nothing of spending $100 million renovating a DCPS school with 300 students, none of whom are anywhere near grade level on anything. |
Anonymous
Ok, I gave you the benefit of the doubt and wondered if I had overlooked this, so I just did some googling …and this idea that she doesn’t like charters seems to simply be made up? In fact, everything I found was her saying positive things about charters. |
Anonymous
She's a strong supporter of the police too, right? This whitewashing of her record, and the way people want to sand all the edges off her, is really something... |
Anonymous
Yeah - the Basis’ and Latins won’t be touched. They are actually a politically useful release valve for otherwise demanding UMC parents. Plenty of other juicy targets with more vulnerable, less politically noisy family constituencies. |
Anonymous
Here is every instance that she mentions charters in her WTU questionaire. I don't see any love here: The vast majority of mid-year mobility flows into our high-need DCPS schools, often from charter schools after Count Day. The current system of funding DCPS based on its projected October enrollment and charter schools based on their actual October enrollment provides too much incentive for charter schools to push students out. I believe that if charter schools want to be funded like DCPS, they should adhere to the same transparency requirements as the traditional public schools system. Parents with children in charter schools often ask me for help as a Councilmember and it can be difficult to support them in our current system. Please address your thoughts and philosophy on what a “strong” school is, and decisions around opening and closing schools in both DCPS and DCPCS, including a moratorium on charter openings. ● Include a description of what the process would look like. Planning for strong DC public schools as a system does not seem to be a priority with current leadership. We cannot simply rely on market forces or parents’ willingness to move mountains to get their kids into better performing schools far from home. A strong neighborhood public school system requires thoughtful investment and support. Strong schools offer students a full education: not only reading and math, but also science, social studies, arts, music and vocational offerings. Strong schools have activities like sports and clubs that draw students in and keep them showing up every day. We need thoughtful, coordinated planning cross-sector but also within DCPS about what’s needed and a commitment that extra resources will be provided long-term. |