WaPo takes deep dive into DCPS residency fraud

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

If you multiple those kids (say, 30 kids at a school) by the amount they should be paying in tuition for all of the years they attend, it quickly looks massive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

If you multiple those kids (say, 30 kids at a school) by the amount they should be paying in tuition for all of the years they attend, it quickly looks massive.

Sure, but the schools are still overcrowded just a little less so. But I 100% agree they should not be in the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

I've heard this estimate as well, particularly at Deal and Wilson. It's particularly galling when you think that schools like Eaton have been forcibly removed from the Deal feeder pattern, basically so fraudsters from Landover or Upper Marlboro can burrow their kids into Deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You'd think it would be easy for the D.C. government to police its own employees, when it comes to cheating the residency requirement for schools, because it already has their tax information.

The cheaters are playing a risky game. New leadership can easily connect the dots and has all the data points that will give them cause to clean house and start assessing big fines.

I think it's only a matter of time before the DC Attorney General gets a hold of the tax data. Frankly, I think maybe OSSE will lose enforcement powers and it may be moved into a neutral entity (i.e. , the AG's office).

Did you read Racine's reaction?

OSSE sent 100+ cases to him and fewer than 10% have been pursued. Racine said that they weigh whether it's truly worth expending resources on these, including whether it's likely any money would be recouped. He doesn't see an upside to going after these folks either.

There's value in deterrence. Even if there is only one public hanging every so often, potential criminals will get the idea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

If you multiple those kids (say, 30 kids at a school) by the amount they should be paying in tuition for all of the years they attend, it quickly looks massive.

I mean, just consider the tax fraud alone. DC is spending close to $20K/student per year. If that's 30 kids per school that are cheating, that's $600K per school. There's 111 schools in DCPS, so that's over $66m per year in DC funding on students who don't live in DC.

That's f#cking insane. This is not a "small" problem.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is the deal - all you need is a few well publicized stories on Families having to pay - and implication to students and people will start to think twice about it.

It's well publicized that some people who commit crimes go to jail for a long time, but there's still plenty of crime - that's because criminals don't expect to get caught. Research consistently finds that "The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment." (https://nij.gov/five-things/pages/deterrence.aspx)

An out-of-district parent who knows of dozens of people who don't pay anything and a few who pay a lot, they are unlikely to be deterred. So while people who are caught shouldn't be let off the hook, the focus should be on removing out-of-district families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

If you multiple those kids (say, 30 kids at a school) by the amount they should be paying in tuition for all of the years they attend, it quickly looks massive.

I mean, just consider the tax fraud alone. DC is spending close to $20K/student per year. If that's 30 kids per school that are cheating, that's $600K per school. There's 111 schools in DCPS, so that's over $66m per year in DC funding on students who don't live in DC.

That's f#cking insane. This is not a "small" problem.

Some of the funding is federal though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

If you multiple those kids (say, 30 kids at a school) by the amount they should be paying in tuition for all of the years they attend, it quickly looks massive.

I mean, just consider the tax fraud alone. DC is spending close to $20K/student per year. If that's 30 kids per school that are cheating, that's $600K per school. There's 111 schools in DCPS, so that's over $66m per year in DC funding on students who don't live in DC.

That's f#cking insane. This is not a "small" problem.

Some of the funding is federal though.

So that makes it ok?! How's the weather today out in Bowie?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is the deal - all you need is a few well publicized stories on Families having to pay - and implication to students and people will start to think twice about it.

It's well publicized that some people who commit crimes go to jail for a long time, but there's still plenty of crime - that's because criminals don't expect to get caught. Research consistently finds that "The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment." (https://nij.gov/five-things/pages/deterrence.aspx)

An out-of-district parent who knows of dozens of people who don't pay anything and a few who pay a lot, they are unlikely to be deterred. So while people who are caught shouldn't be let off the hook, the focus should be on removing out-of-district families.

Here's the other way to catch the scammers. Right now, many schools have a financial incentive not to worry about residency fraud. DC should make clear that if schools report fraud and expel scammers, that they will get to keep their funding and even get a bonus for each fraud case they uncover. On the other hand, if the fraud is uncovered by OSSE, then the school should lose 150% of the scammer's per pupil funding allotment. That will focus the principals on the problem damn quick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:have to wonder who much the waitlists for these schools would shrink if the dc government made any effort to prevent its own employees from cheating the system.

Doubt it. The best neighborhood schools are overenrolled, and if an IB student drops out, there isn't an empty seat. It just becomes less overcrowded.

earlier in the discussion there was a specific example of a student at School Without Walls. I know of a student at McKinley Tech. Both of these schools have waitlists.

Let's pretend that at every Tier 1 school there is 1 child per grade that is residency fraud. This adds up and makes a difference at the macro level.

With the feeder path guarantee, this does add up. Because no one in power actually wants to fix this, for all we know the overcrowding in the Wilson feeder schools - and Brent and Maury - could be eliminated if we eliminated the fraud.

Can we please do that before we talk any more about either ending OOB rights for children who live in the city legitimately or building some new school in ward 3?

I'm against this as much as anyone. However are you really suggesting like 10%+ of the students in the Wilson feeders, Brent, and Maury are from MD? The overcrowding at a handfull of schools and the out of city people cheating the system are largely two separate issues.

Yes, I think it's 5-10%.

That is one or two kids per class. That does not change much if anything.

If you multiple those kids (say, 30 kids at a school) by the amount they should be paying in tuition for all of the years they attend, it quickly looks massive.

I mean, just consider the tax fraud alone. DC is spending close to $20K/student per year. If that's 30 kids per school that are cheating, that's $600K per school. There's 111 schools in DCPS, so that's over $66m per year in DC funding on students who don't live in DC.

That's f#cking insane. This is not a "small" problem.

Some of the funding is federal though.

So that makes it ok?! How's the weather today out in Bowie?

Not at all, i'm just saying DC would not save the full amount.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is the deal - all you need is a few well publicized stories on Families having to pay - and implication to students and people will start to think twice about it.

It's well publicized that some people who commit crimes go to jail for a long time, but there's still plenty of crime - that's because criminals don't expect to get caught. Research consistently finds that "The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment." (https://nij.gov/five-things/pages/deterrence.aspx)

An out-of-district parent who knows of dozens of people who don't pay anything and a few who pay a lot, they are unlikely to be deterred. So while people who are caught shouldn't be let off the hook, the focus should be on removing out-of-district families.

Here's the other way to catch the scammers. Right now, many schools have a financial incentive not to worry about residency fraud. DC should make clear that if schools report fraud and expel scammers, that they will get to keep their funding and even get a bonus for each fraud case they uncover. On the other hand, if the fraud is uncovered by OSSE, then the school should lose 150% of the scammer's per pupil funding allotment. That will focus the principals on the problem damn quick.

You have this backwards. OSSE should do ALL of the residency verification and the schools should do none. Take it out of individual schools' hands just like they did with the lottery. It's either all above board or OSSE owns the failures.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is the deal - all you need is a few well publicized stories on Families having to pay - and implication to students and people will start to think twice about it.

It's well publicized that some people who commit crimes go to jail for a long time, but there's still plenty of crime - that's because criminals don't expect to get caught. Research consistently finds that "The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment." (https://nij.gov/five-things/pages/deterrence.aspx)

An out-of-district parent who knows of dozens of people who don't pay anything and a few who pay a lot, they are unlikely to be deterred. So while people who are caught shouldn't be let off the hook, the focus should be on removing out-of-district families.

Here's the other way to catch the scammers. Right now, many schools have a financial incentive not to worry about residency fraud. DC should make clear that if schools report fraud and expel scammers, that they will get to keep their funding and even get a bonus for each fraud case they uncover. On the other hand, if the fraud is uncovered by OSSE, then the school should lose 150% of the scammer's per pupil funding allotment. That will focus the principals on the problem damn quick.

I think that’s brilliant. Some tier 2/tier 3 charters are full of cheaters. I live by Perry street Prep and I would not be surprised if over 50% were residency cheaters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is the deal - all you need is a few well publicized stories on Families having to pay - and implication to students and people will start to think twice about it.

It's well publicized that some people who commit crimes go to jail for a long time, but there's still plenty of crime - that's because criminals don't expect to get caught. Research consistently finds that "The certainty of being caught is a vastly more powerful deterrent than the punishment." (https://nij.gov/five-things/pages/deterrence.aspx)

An out-of-district parent who knows of dozens of people who don't pay anything and a few who pay a lot, they are unlikely to be deterred. So while people who are caught shouldn't be let off the hook, the focus should be on removing out-of-district families.

Here's the other way to catch the scammers. Right now, many schools have a financial incentive not to worry about residency fraud. DC should make clear that if schools report fraud and expel scammers, that they will get to keep their funding and even get a bonus for each fraud case they uncover. On the other hand, if the fraud is uncovered by OSSE, then the school should lose 150% of the scammer's per pupil funding allotment. That will focus the principals on the problem damn quick.

You have this backwards. OSSE should do ALL of the residency verification and the schools should do none. Take it out of individual schools' hands just like they did with the lottery. It's either all above board or OSSE owns the failures.

Yeah what is one registrar or clerk supposed to do in a school, they are in the office and copy the docs, if they look fraudulent they don't register. These folks are not stupid they are using others addresses, fake docs, and fake letters from grandma!