DCPS "Whole Child" marketing campaign: A waste of money

[Anonymous]

Why is a school system that is 83% BIPOC spending one cent or one minute on anti racism? And the 17% white kids come from liberal Democrat families. Every minute and every penny should be spent on getting at risk kids up to grade level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is a school system that is 83% BIPOC spending one cent or one minute on anti racism? And the 17% white kids come from liberal Democrat families. Every minute and every penny should be spent on getting at risk kids up to grade level.

BC a student - teacher relationship carries a significant power dynamic and many teachers come into the profession with implicit biases that can make life much worse for those BIPOC students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why is a school system that is 83% BIPOC spending one cent or one minute on anti racism? And the 17% white kids come from liberal Democrat families. Every minute and every penny should be spent on getting at risk kids up to grade level.

Because adults love to teach what their generation should have learned sooner, even if contemporary kids don't need exactly the same lessons. For some adults, it's a way of shining recognition on a problem they've experienced; for other adults, it's about atonement.

That the kids have less need for those specific lessons is ignored because they are an easy, controllable target. Sort of like how school closures for Covid were so much easier than other closures even though kids were less at risk.

[Anonymous]

leftist ideology run amok.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is a school system that is 83% BIPOC spending one cent or one minute on anti racism? And the 17% white kids come from liberal Democrat families. Every minute and every penny should be spent on getting at risk kids up to grade level.

BC a student - teacher relationship carries a significant power dynamic and many teachers come into the profession with implicit biases that can make life much worse for those BIPOC students

Only 15 percent of black boys meet expectations on English and 9 percent on math. Every minute of every day should be spent on these two core subjects. No more anti racism or woke nonsense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everything in education, and particularly urban education, is cyclical. A heavy focus on attending to the needs of the whole child and social-emotional learning is not new. However, after 20+ years of high-stakes accountability and testing ad nauseam, the system is churning out grads who get to college or the workplace and are maladjusted/ therefore not performing optimally and/or quickly dropping out. Whole-child/SEL work is an evolution of government and philanthropic efforts centered on persistence-- not just getting kids to college but through. Those who complain about infusing this into a child's educational program likely have the resources and awareness to socialize this at home and/or within other engagements (sports, faith-based activities, etc.)

So the schools are supposed to raise these kids because their parents can't be bothered to? This is why people leave public schools. It's not fair to kids who are there to learn and whose instructional time is eaten away by whatever trendy useless nonsense ed schools and social justice activists want taught these days. I mean, math and reading scores in the city are abysmal:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/09/02/dc-schools-parcc-test/

There is only so much time in a school day.

THIS x 1 million. And you wonder why DCPS is bleeding all the middle class higher performing kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is a school system that is 83% BIPOC spending one cent or one minute on anti racism? And the 17% white kids come from liberal Democrat families. Every minute and every penny should be spent on getting at risk kids up to grade level.

BC a student - teacher relationship carries a significant power dynamic and many teachers come into the profession with implicit biases that can make life much worse for those BIPOC students

Only 15 percent of black boys meet expectations on English and 9 percent on math. Every minute of every day should be spent on these two core subjects. No more anti racism or woke nonsense.

Did you post this from 1996 or something? What outdated bunk

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here - agree. We are being told that making eye contact and developing relationships with students & families is important. As if none of us already realized this.

Unfortunately, many teachers have not realized this. I am a classroom teacher and an SEL lead and the amount of students I talk to who don't trust, respect, or feel supported by their teachers is staggering. I'm sure you are a great teacher and implement many of these practices already, but the truth is that in many DCPS schools, particularly those where the students are majority black and teaching staff majority young and white, there are serious tensions that hinder learning. That is why there is such a focus on whole child. It may seem unimportant to the demo on this forum, but it's essential

And you feel this trumps learning basic math and English?? Use the money to help support these kids with an extra social worker or in after school tutoring. This support will matter more than some transient hype of the moment program.

In addition, many schools don’t need above that don’t have the characteristics you describe so all these teachers and staff have to spend extra time doing this when it would be better to give them more time for prep, etc..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here - agree. We are being told that making eye contact and developing relationships with students & families is important. As if none of us already realized this.

Unfortunately, many teachers have not realized this. I am a classroom teacher and an SEL lead and the amount of students I talk to who don't trust, respect, or feel supported by their teachers is staggering. I'm sure you are a great teacher and implement many of these practices already, but the truth is that in many DCPS schools, particularly those where the students are majority black and teaching staff majority young and white, there are serious tensions that hinder learning. That is why there is such a focus on whole child. It may seem unimportant to the demo on this forum, but it's essential

And you feel this trumps learning basic math and English?? Use the money to help support these kids with an extra social worker or in after school tutoring. This support will matter more than some transient hype of the moment program.

In addition, many schools don’t need above that don’t have the characteristics you describe so all these teachers and staff have to spend extra time doing this when it would be better to give them more time for prep, etc..

I'm the PP and trust me, you can build relationships and support the whole child while still having significant blocks of time for core content. DCPS spent 22m on after school tutoring last year and it went nowhere bc nobody wanted to do the jobs.

Your second paragraph is incoherent to me so I'm not really sure how to respond. What more is there to prep? Run a morning meeting. Spend 3-5 mins having an SEL warmup. These aren't hard asks.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why is a school system that is 83% BIPOC spending one cent or one minute on anti racism? And the 17% white kids come from liberal Democrat families. Every minute and every penny should be spent on getting at risk kids up to grade level.

BC a student - teacher relationship carries a significant power dynamic and many teachers come into the profession with implicit biases that can make life much worse for those BIPOC students

Only 15 percent of black boys meet expectations on English and 9 percent on math. Every minute of every day should be spent on these two core subjects. No more anti racism or woke nonsense.

DP: The WaPo article about PARCC that is cited above has 20% of Black students in DCPS and DCPCS proficient in English. So 15% for Black boys is not far off.

The article says about 20% of all students (all ethnic groups, all genders) were proficient in Math. 20% overall suggests to me something higher than 6% for Black boys, but neither number is very good.

In sny event, the data exists if you want to address PP's assertion with facts.

The PARCC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here - agree. We are being told that making eye contact and developing relationships with students & families is important. As if none of us already realized this.

Unfortunately, many teachers have not realized this. I am a classroom teacher and an SEL lead and the amount of students I talk to who don't trust, respect, or feel supported by their teachers is staggering. I'm sure you are a great teacher and implement many of these practices already, but the truth is that in many DCPS schools, particularly those where the students are majority black and teaching staff majority young and white, there are serious tensions that hinder learning. That is why there is such a focus on whole child. It may seem unimportant to the demo on this forum, but it's essential

And you feel this trumps learning basic math and English?? Use the money to help support these kids with an extra social worker or in after school tutoring. This support will matter more than some transient hype of the moment program.

In addition, many schools don’t need above that don’t have the characteristics you describe so all these teachers and staff have to spend extra time doing this when it would be better to give them more time for prep, etc..

I'm the PP and trust me, you can build relationships and support the whole child while still having significant blocks of time for core content. DCPS spent 22m on after school tutoring last year and it went nowhere bc nobody wanted to do the jobs.

Your second paragraph is incoherent to me so I'm not really sure how to respond. What more is there to prep? Run a morning meeting. Spend 3-5 mins having an SEL warmup. These aren't hard asks.

For the kids that need the whole child approach the most, this doesn't come close. What you consider not "hard asks" work for the kids that come to school on time, are fed and regularly attend. Morning meeting and an SEL warmup builds the classroom community, whole child is much more than that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everything in education, and particularly urban education, is cyclical. A heavy focus on attending to the needs of the whole child and social-emotional learning is not new. However, after 20+ years of high-stakes accountability and testing ad nauseam, the system is churning out grads who get to college or the workplace and are maladjusted/ therefore not performing optimally and/or quickly dropping out. Whole-child/SEL work is an evolution of government and philanthropic efforts centered on persistence-- not just getting kids to college but through. Those who complain about infusing this into a child's educational program likely have the resources and awareness to socialize this at home and/or within other engagements (sports, faith-based activities, etc.)

So the schools are supposed to raise these kids because their parents can't be bothered to? This is why people leave public schools. It's not fair to kids who are there to learn and whose instructional time is eaten away by whatever trendy useless nonsense ed schools and social justice activists want taught these days. I mean, math and reading scores in the city are abysmal:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/09/02/dc-schools-parcc-test/

There is only so much time in a school day.

THIS x 1 million. And you wonder why DCPS is bleeding all the middle class higher performing kids.

Because you don't want your kids in classes where the average kid is years behind. My kids go to a charter that is very instruction focused. But most of the kids are still not at grade level, and that limits how much useful instruction advanced or even grade level kids get. By contrast, the school with the craziest race stuff was an upper NW school with high test scores and I'd send my kids there in a second, and so would many of the middle class families who leave if they could afford to live in that neighborhood.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here - agree. We are being told that making eye contact and developing relationships with students & families is important. As if none of us already realized this.

Unfortunately, many teachers have not realized this. I am a classroom teacher and an SEL lead and the amount of students I talk to who don't trust, respect, or feel supported by their teachers is staggering. I'm sure you are a great teacher and implement many of these practices already, but the truth is that in many DCPS schools, particularly those where the students are majority black and teaching staff majority young and white, there are serious tensions that hinder learning. That is why there is such a focus on whole child. It may seem unimportant to the demo on this forum, but it's essential

And you feel this trumps learning basic math and English?? Use the money to help support these kids with an extra social worker or in after school tutoring. This support will matter more than some transient hype of the moment program.

In addition, many schools don’t need above that don’t have the characteristics you describe so all these teachers and staff have to spend extra time doing this when it would be better to give them more time for prep, etc..

I'm the PP and trust me, you can build relationships and support the whole child while still having significant blocks of time for core content. DCPS spent 22m on after school tutoring last year and it went nowhere bc nobody wanted to do the jobs.

Your second paragraph is incoherent to me so I'm not really sure how to respond. What more is there to prep? Run a morning meeting. Spend 3-5 mins having an SEL warmup. These aren't hard asks.

For the kids that need the whole child approach the most, this doesn't come close. What you consider not "hard asks" work for the kids that come to school on time, are fed and regularly attend. Morning meeting and an SEL warmup builds the classroom community, whole child is much more than that.

Im a whole child lead at my school who talks weekly with my lead at central. This is all we're asking of teachers this year. We know that some teachers are ready to dive into doing more (and you're right more is definitely needed for our harder to reach children), but for now we just want teachers to get into these positive culture building routines. Please trust that all of this is heavily backed in research. Check out the turnaround for children program. They have a lot of great information by the why

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Everything in education, and particularly urban education, is cyclical. A heavy focus on attending to the needs of the whole child and social-emotional learning is not new. However, after 20+ years of high-stakes accountability and testing ad nauseam, the system is churning out grads who get to college or the workplace and are maladjusted/ therefore not performing optimally and/or quickly dropping out. Whole-child/SEL work is an evolution of government and philanthropic efforts centered on persistence-- not just getting kids to college but through. Those who complain about infusing this into a child's educational program likely have the resources and awareness to socialize this at home and/or within other engagements (sports, faith-based activities, etc.)

So the schools are supposed to raise these kids because their parents can't be bothered to? This is why people leave public schools. It's not fair to kids who are there to learn and whose instructional time is eaten away by whatever trendy useless nonsense ed schools and social justice activists want taught these days. I mean, math and reading scores in the city are abysmal:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/09/02/dc-schools-parcc-test/

There is only so much time in a school day.

THIS x 1 million. And you wonder why DCPS is bleeding all the middle class higher performing kids.

Because you don't want your kids in classes where the average kid is years behind. My kids go to a charter that is very instruction focused. But most of the kids are still not at grade level, and that limits how much useful instruction advanced or even grade level kids get. By contrast, the school with the craziest race stuff was an upper NW school with high test scores and I'd send my kids there in a second, and so would many of the middle class families who leave if they could afford to live in that neighborhood.

Our experience is different at our charter. They do a good job of grouping kids in general and provide good content homework in upper grades to help keep kids on track.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Teacher here - agree. We are being told that making eye contact and developing relationships with students & families is important. As if none of us already realized this.

Unfortunately, many teachers have not realized this. I am a classroom teacher and an SEL lead and the amount of students I talk to who don't trust, respect, or feel supported by their teachers is staggering. I'm sure you are a great teacher and implement many of these practices already, but the truth is that in many DCPS schools, particularly those where the students are majority black and teaching staff majority young and white, there are serious tensions that hinder learning. That is why there is such a focus on whole child. It may seem unimportant to the demo on this forum, but it's essential

And you feel this trumps learning basic math and English?? Use the money to help support these kids with an extra social worker or in after school tutoring. This support will matter more than some transient hype of the moment program.

In addition, many schools don’t need above that don’t have the characteristics you describe so all these teachers and staff have to spend extra time doing this when it would be better to give them more time for prep, etc..

I'm the PP and trust me, you can build relationships and support the whole child while still having significant blocks of time for core content. DCPS spent 22m on after school tutoring last year and it went nowhere bc nobody wanted to do the jobs.

Your second paragraph is incoherent to me so I'm not really sure how to respond. What more is there to prep? Run a morning meeting. Spend 3-5 mins having an SEL warmup. These aren't hard asks.

For the kids that need the whole child approach the most, this doesn't come close. What you consider not "hard asks" work for the kids that come to school on time, are fed and regularly attend. Morning meeting and an SEL warmup builds the classroom community, whole child is much more than that.

Im a whole child lead at my school who talks weekly with my lead at central. This is all we're asking of teachers this year. We know that some teachers are ready to dive into doing more (and you're right more is definitely needed for our harder to reach children), but for now we just want teachers to get into these positive culture building routines. Please trust that all of this is heavily backed in research. Check out the turnaround for children program. They have a lot of great information by the why

With all respect that this initiative leads to long term positive outcomes, my harder to reach children don't have time for the adults to catch up. Morning meeting and responsive classroom is not new, there is nothing innovative about any of it. The problem extends beyond the research, and beyond what long term outcomes can be influenced/changed by teachers during a traditional school year.