Can Gentrifers Use Their Skills and Resources to "Make" a Great School?

[Anonymous]

OP, if you were so great, you'd probably be able to make enough money to afford a better house in a better neighborhood OR be able to afford tuition for a diverse-in-every-way progressive private school.

So, check your smugness maybe.

[Anonymous]

It is amazing the anxiety privileged white parents feel when they come face to face with income disparity and contemplate having to share the same public resources.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We live in Petworth and are considering our options for elementary schools. I can't help feeling that with the recent neighborhood improvements in housing stock and HHI that there are is now a critical mass of highly educated and well off parents.

Has anyone ever tried to form an action group with other higher SES parents to work on their local school. We are looking at Powell and wondering if 30-40 well of parents enrolled their children and took an active interest in the school they could really turn things around and continue to increase the school quality through raising additional funds, establishing more after school programs, increasing the clubs and holding teachers and the principal to account etc.. If it can happen at Janney etc, why not elsewhere?

We have some decent teachers, and alot of momentum. Do people think a group of parents could really make the difference in one DC school. Or are we stuck with the poorly performing students dragging everyone else down?

I am not sure when Janney was gentrified?
But when Powell parents are ready to give the PTA half a million dollars you will have enough funds to start doing things.

[Anonymous]

Yes, that's the other thing, OP. Janney's population are mostly all able to give significantly to the PTA. You are never going to have that happen in Petworth. If your 30-40 gentrifier families all kick in $100, per child, every year they're at Powell, they still will not come anywhere close to the budget of the Janney PTA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes, that's the other thing, OP. Janney's population are mostly all able to give significantly to the PTA. You are never going to have that happen in Petworth. If your 30-40 gentrifier families all kick in $100, per child, every year they're at Powell, they still will not come anywhere close to the budget of the Janney PTA.

I would guess most "gentrifier" families are able/willing to give more than $100, but the point is still taken.

[Anonymous]

OP- Poster here. This is a great debate. I can take the criticism because I am willing to ask the questions that most of peers would not. Most people who can leave- don't ask what they can do for DC schools- they just leave or go private.

If I wanted to live in Arlington or Bethesda it wouldnt be a problem. But I'm not putting myself in that suburban nightmare. I'd prefer to stay in the city and really help to improve things.

When I look at the resources that DCPS has to spend its hard to think that an active PTA can't help transform any school into a great school. I'm just wondering if too many DC parents of underperforming schools aren't willing (or aren't able) to do all they can to turn things around.

[Anonymous]

Just a C-Note? Sacre bleu!

[Anonymous]

Are you really that clueless, OP?

[Anonymous]

Don't like Powell! (says the super close to the neighborhood yet OOB parent desperate to send her kid there!)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, that's the other thing, OP. Janney's population are mostly all able to give significantly to the PTA. You are never going to have that happen in Petworth. If your 30-40 gentrifier families all kick in $100, per child, every year they're at Powell, they still will not come anywhere close to the budget of the Janney PTA.

I would guess most "gentrifier" families are able/willing to give more than $100, but the point is still taken.

For most families I know in the Petworth area giving $2,000-$5000 a year would be a very doable thing. This is becoming an affluent area now and these parents would be very willing to help out their schools- even if it means that other children benefit as much as their own.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP- Poster here. This is a great debate. I can take the criticism because I am willing to ask the questions that most of peers would not. Most people who can leave- don't ask what they can do for DC schools- they just leave or go private.

If I wanted to live in Arlington or Bethesda it wouldnt be a problem. But I'm not putting myself in that suburban nightmare. I'd prefer to stay in the city and really help to improve things.

When I look at the resources that DCPS has to spend its hard to think that an active PTA can't help transform any school into a great school. I'm just wondering if too many DC parents of underperforming schools aren't willing (or aren't able) to do all they can to turn things around.

Eyes, they are rolling so hard! Your enthusiam is great, but your ignorance about poverty is irritating. You seem to think you are smart or brave for asking these questions, but you come off as ignorant.

[Anonymous]

Where are all these pet worth families planning to go to MS?

[Anonymous]

You do know that it is not an issue of resources, right? Lots of PTA spending is not going to solve the problems you are referring to (which in all honesty seem to be race and SES, at least that is what I am reading btw your lines).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP- Poster here. This is a great debate. I can take the criticism because I am willing to ask the questions that most of peers would not. Most people who can leave- don't ask what they can do for DC schools- they just leave or go private.

If I wanted to live in Arlington or Bethesda it wouldnt be a problem. But I'm not putting myself in that suburban nightmare. I'd prefer to stay in the city and really help to improve things.

When I look at the resources that DCPS has to spend its hard to think that an active PTA can't help transform any school into a great school. I'm just wondering if too many DC parents of underperforming schools aren't willing (or aren't able) to do all they can to turn things around.

I think it's great that you want to help your IB school, but Powell isn't "underperforming". This is not to say that they couldn't use any assistance or help that you can offer, but you seem to think that it's a much worse school than it is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yes, that's the other thing, OP. Janney's population are mostly all able to give significantly to the PTA. You are never going to have that happen in Petworth. If your 30-40 gentrifier families all kick in $100, per child, every year they're at Powell, they still will not come anywhere close to the budget of the Janney PTA.

I would guess most "gentrifier" families are able/willing to give more than $100, but the point is still taken.

Yes, they would be able to do that. We're at a Title 1 school EOTP and have given somewhere between $200 and $500 to our school's parent organization. We are able to do that, while other families are not able to give anything. I do not want my school to be run only by the people who can afford to give a lot of money. I don't want those to be the only contributions that are valued or visible at our school.