MCPS and Starr will probably need to change boundaries

[Anonymous]

The same folks who would fight boundary changes would fight zoning and housing policy changes. At some point somebody is going to have to do something very unpopular to bring about change.

[Anonymous]

Taking the best and brightest out of low performing schools won't fix the problem...and that's what would happen with new consortia. How do you change boundaries that result in improvement at Kennedy? You can't. The people living in the nicest surrounding neighborhoods already send their kids to private schools or they have been in the HGC and magnet programs from early on. These are social issues, not purely educational ones. No quick fix.

[Anonymous]

Starr needs to go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Taking the best and brightest out of low performing schools won't fix the problem...and that's what would happen with new consortia. How do you change boundaries that result in improvement at Kennedy? You can't. The people living in the nicest surrounding neighborhoods already send their kids to private schools or they have been in the HGC and magnet programs from early on. These are social issues, not purely educational ones. No quick fix.

People who live in the nicest surrounding neighborhoods sure have smart kids, I guess.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The same folks who would fight boundary changes would fight zoning and housing policy changes. At some point somebody is going to have to do something very unpopular to bring about change.

I agree.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Starr needs to go.

But will his replacement be any better? The BOE picked Starr. Would they be using different criteria to select someone new? Starr drives me nuts, but there's always the potential for his replacement to be even worse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Starr needs to go.

But will his replacement be any better? The BOE picked Starr. Would they be using different criteria to select someone new? Starr drives me nuts, but there's always the potential for his replacement to be even worse.

I don't know if you can find anyone worse.

People hated Weast, but at least he had a vision - especially when it boiled down to professional development.

And while Weast labeled low performing schools as red zone schools, he did acknowledge there was a disparity among area schools.

Starr has nothing to his name. He tried to highlight social-emotional learning, but no one - aside from school psychologists - really understands the research behind it and how it can be applied to instructional practices.

He may have a PhD from Harvard, but based upon those he's brought in with Harvard degrees, I'm not impressed.

Anyone can look good on paper. My former principal is one example!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Taking the best and brightest out of low performing schools won't fix the problem...and that's what would happen with new consortia. How do you change boundaries that result in improvement at Kennedy? You can't. The people living in the nicest surrounding neighborhoods already send their kids to private schools or they have been in the HGC and magnet programs from early on. These are social issues, not purely educational ones. No quick fix.

People who live in the nicest surrounding neighborhoods sure have smart kids, I guess.

They have the means and the time to investigate. That's the difference. There is a fairly nice area zoned for Kennedy (DCC), but I know of several parents who are taking the private route. Before we moved, we sent our kids to private school b/c our local elementary was stretched to its limit and underperforming.

I would do the same again, tbh, and my kids are not magnet kids.

[Anonymous]

MoCo is doing all it can to drive itself into the ground. Redistricting to smooth an achievement gap that only does away with the few remaining high performers will be another nail in the coffin.

[Anonymous]

Does Starr have a contract of specified duration or does he occupy the position indefinitely?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Starr needs to go.

But will his replacement be any better? The BOE picked Starr. Would they be using different criteria to select someone new? Starr drives me nuts, but there's always the potential for his replacement to be even worse.

How would getting rid of Starr address the issues of:

1. an increasing number and proportion of poor immigrant students in Montgomery County
2. residential segregation by income

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MoCo is doing all it can to drive itself into the ground. Redistricting to smooth an achievement gap that only does away with the few remaining high performers will be another nail in the coffin.

Yes. On the other hand, redistricting to decrease the concentration of poverty and the number of very-high-poverty schools would be a good thing.

[Anonymous]

I don't know if you can find anyone worse. People hated Weast, but at least he had a vision - especially when it boiled down to professional development. And while Weast labeled low performing schools as red zone schools, he did acknowledge there was a disparity among area schools.

Starr has nothing to his name. He tried to highlight social-emotional learning, but no one - aside from school psychologists - really understands the research behind it and how it can be applied to instructional practices.

This. You can't solve a problem if you keep trying to hide that you have it. The whole 2.0 and everyone is a P disaster is all about hiding the achievement gap rather than solving it. Bussing kids around isn't going to make any difference either. It will just divert funds to buses not actually teaching students.

If MCPS wants to solve the achievement gap, it needs to stop passing the buck until its too late. This starts in ES with giving actual assessments and tests to identify early on when students are failing. It means giving after school tutoring programs and rewarding students for improvement. It means giving kids back their tests and exams and requiring every kids that scored below a certain percentage to attend tutoring, correct their mistakes and take a make up until they pass.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What specific boundary changes do you think will help?

Take a school like Kennedy which is low performing but high poverty. The school is next to a solidly middle class neighborhood ranging off Randolph Rd toward White Oak. But kids from that neighborhood rarely go to Kennedy. I'd take it out of the DCC so that area kids can't escape to Northwood or Blair.

This is the problem with adding more schools to the consortia. It just gives more options for families to escape poor performing schools instead of working to improve them.

What makes the schools poor performing? The schools or the kids going to them? If you swapped the kids going to Whitman w/ those going to Wheaton suddenly Wheaton would be the "good" school. Spreading out the high performing kids will make the schools look more similar on paper but I doubt it will change the performance of many of the kids.[/quote]

I would agree with this - I went to one of the DCC schools mentioned here that families "choose to leave for other options" and we had a very big mix of students. There was a nice core of us who went on to be very successful after HS - but there were plenty of kids I'd guess that were just being moved through the system.... We may have averaged up the scores a bit - but it wasn't helping those kids at all.

I do think it's too bad that now even that core of very good students would need/want to completely leave for a different option, however.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I don't know if you can find anyone worse. People hated Weast, but at least he had a vision - especially when it boiled down to professional development. And while Weast labeled low performing schools as red zone schools, he did acknowledge there was a disparity among area schools.

Starr has nothing to his name. He tried to highlight social-emotional learning, but no one - aside from school psychologists - really understands the research behind it and how it can be applied to instructional practices.

This. You can't solve a problem if you keep trying to hide that you have it. The whole 2.0 and everyone is a P disaster is all about hiding the achievement gap rather than solving it. Bussing kids around isn't going to make any difference either. It will just divert funds to buses not actually teaching students.

If MCPS wants to solve the achievement gap, it needs to stop passing the buck until its too late. This starts in ES with giving actual assessments and tests to identify early on when students are failing. It means giving after school tutoring programs and rewarding students for improvement. It means giving kids back their tests and exams and requiring every kids that scored below a certain percentage to attend tutoring, correct their mistakes and take a make up until they pass.

Starr is constantly talking about the achievement gap. That's not what I would do, if I were trying to hide the achievement gap.