What charter schools are open at all?

[Anonymous]

I used to really like our charter. I am not impressed with our teacher this year or the system in general. Trying to decide if we want to go back or stay at home or join a co-op. I am not sure we want to go back the busy weeks, spending 30-45 hours apart and everyone else's schedule.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I used to really like our charter. I am not impressed with our teacher this year or the system in general. Trying to decide if we want to go back or stay at home or join a co-op. I am not sure we want to go back the busy weeks, spending 30-45 hours apart and everyone else's schedule.

1. There's always a risk of a lousy teacher. That's true in every school across the globe. The only way to avoid that is to home school. And, spoiler alert, you might not be as good as you think. That's got nothing to do with a charter.
2. Go ahead, judge your school by how they teach in a once in a lifetime pandemic. Especially if you have previously been happy. That's a really logical and rational thought process you've got there. Also, have you read threads on DCPS? Are you under the impression that any school is truly excelling in this environment?
3. One of the challenges for all schools is that the skills to run an in-person classroom may not be the same ones that yield a successful DL classroom. The rough analogy would be hiring someone to do mostly manual labor and overnight switching their role to that of a technologist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Charters typically follow DCPS for most things that have risk and liability, such as closing for weather. I would be amazed if charters open before DCPS does, even though I believe schools should have been open since this Fall.

This is one of the most sensible posts I've read on DCUM regarding this school year. I just wish our charter school principal would tell us this simple truth, rather than presenting us with numerous and meaningless parental surveys.

Agreed. And, for me, it was helpful to understand the limits of autonomy.

Are you saying that an anonymous poster on DCUM who seems to believe in a secret conspiracy of silence from their charter "heled you to understand the limits of autonomy"? Do you know what a low information voter is?

P.S. Q wants you to quit your job and home school all our kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Folks on this board underestimate how many parents do kit want to send students back yet.

My kid goes to a Title 1 charter. 90% of parents didn’t want them to return — huge concern about putting kids on public transit right now. A high percentage of families had relatives members who became ill or died. They are wary.

Look at the neighborhood maps DOH puts out each day. The virus impacts vary a lot and have been high in Wards 7 and 8 since the beginning. Those are the places with both the most students AND the most students in charter schools.

This post got my attention because it destroys the DCUM twin fallacies of reopening. (1) Everyone but the WTU wants schools to reopen and (2) we have to reopen because of all the poor brown kids. As PP observes, the communities most hard hit are actually most acutely aware of the COVID risks and of the limits of medical care available and least likely to want to take the risk.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks on this board underestimate how many parents do kit want to send students back yet.

My kid goes to a Title 1 charter. 90% of parents didn’t want them to return — huge concern about putting kids on public transit right now. A high percentage of families had relatives members who became ill or died. They are wary.

Look at the neighborhood maps DOH puts out each day. The virus impacts vary a lot and have been high in Wards 7 and 8 since the beginning. Those are the places with both the most students AND the most students in charter schools.

This post got my attention because it destroys the DCUM twin fallacies of reopening. (1) Everyone but the WTU wants schools to reopen and (2) we have to reopen because of all the poor brown kids. As PP observes, the communities most hard hit are actually most acutely aware of the COVID risks and of the limits of medical care available and least likely to want to take the risk.

No, it does not destroy any fallacy.

Of course there are parents that don't want to return - they were never going to be forced back before they wanted.

And of course it's the poor kids in DC who need to go back the most. I haven't seen any survey saying that 100% of minority parents in DC want to keep their kids home - so you're making that up. Just as for white kids, all parents deserve the choice to send their kids back. And more importantly, since DL is going to leave so many kids so far behind, what we need to do now is reverse the FALSE notion (pushed by WTU, indeed) that returning to school will be incredibly dangerous. We have reams and reams of statements on this now, from Harvard epidemiologists to UNICEF to Nicolas Kristoff. If you follow the Twitter feed of Nikole Hannah-Jones (a huge champion and observer of the rights of black kids in public schools) you'll see that her position is that schools should reopen. Arguing to maintain the fear in Wards 7 and 8 so that their communities can be impacted even MORE by COVID through the loss of schooling is the opposite of helping them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks on this board underestimate how many parents do kit want to send students back yet.

My kid goes to a Title 1 charter. 90% of parents didn’t want them to return — huge concern about putting kids on public transit right now. A high percentage of families had relatives members who became ill or died. They are wary.

Look at the neighborhood maps DOH puts out each day. The virus impacts vary a lot and have been high in Wards 7 and 8 since the beginning. Those are the places with both the most students AND the most students in charter schools.

This post got my attention because it destroys the DCUM twin fallacies of reopening. (1) Everyone but the WTU wants schools to reopen and (2) we have to reopen because of all the poor brown kids. As PP observes, the communities most hard hit are actually most acutely aware of the COVID risks and of the limits of medical care available and least likely to want to take the risk.

No, it does not destroy any fallacy.

Of course there are parents that don't want to return - they were never going to be forced back before they wanted.

And of course it's the poor kids in DC who need to go back the most. I haven't seen any survey saying that 100% of minority parents in DC want to keep their kids home - so you're making that up. Just as for white kids, all parents deserve the choice to send their kids back. And more importantly, since DL is going to leave so many kids so far behind, what we need to do now is reverse the FALSE notion (pushed by WTU, indeed) that returning to school will be incredibly dangerous. We have reams and reams of statements on this now, from Harvard epidemiologists to UNICEF to Nicolas Kristoff. If you follow the Twitter feed of Nikole Hannah-Jones (a huge champion and observer of the rights of black kids in public schools) you'll see that her position is that schools should reopen. Arguing to maintain the fear in Wards 7 and 8 so that their communities can be impacted even MORE by COVID through the loss of schooling is the opposite of helping them.

OMG! I missed the meeting where we all voted for her to speak for all black families and kids. When was it?

Did you really just type that? Seriously???!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks on this board underestimate how many parents do kit want to send students back yet.

My kid goes to a Title 1 charter. 90% of parents didn’t want them to return — huge concern about putting kids on public transit right now. A high percentage of families had relatives members who became ill or died. They are wary.

Look at the neighborhood maps DOH puts out each day. The virus impacts vary a lot and have been high in Wards 7 and 8 since the beginning. Those are the places with both the most students AND the most students in charter schools.

This post got my attention because it destroys the DCUM twin fallacies of reopening. (1) Everyone but the WTU wants schools to reopen and (2) we have to reopen because of all the poor brown kids. As PP observes, the communities most hard hit are actually most acutely aware of the COVID risks and of the limits of medical care available and least likely to want to take the risk.

No, it does not destroy any fallacy.

Of course there are parents that don't want to return - they were never going to be forced back before they wanted.

And of course it's the poor kids in DC who need to go back the most. I haven't seen any survey saying that 100% of minority parents in DC want to keep their kids home - so you're making that up. Just as for white kids, all parents deserve the choice to send their kids back. And more importantly, since DL is going to leave so many kids so far behind, what we need to do now is reverse the FALSE notion (pushed by WTU, indeed) that returning to school will be incredibly dangerous. We have reams and reams of statements on this now, from Harvard epidemiologists to UNICEF to Nicolas Kristoff. If you follow the Twitter feed of Nikole Hannah-Jones (a huge champion and observer of the rights of black kids in public schools) you'll see that her position is that schools should reopen. Arguing to maintain the fear in Wards 7 and 8 so that their communities can be impacted even MORE by COVID through the loss of schooling is the opposite of helping them.

OMG! I missed the meeting where we all voted for her to speak for all black families and kids. When was it?

Did you really just type that? Seriously???!!!

She’s a well known advocate for black kids in public schools. I never said she spoke for everyone, obviously. The point is, an increasing number of scientists, journalists, advocates, experts, and public health organizations are calling for reopening.

[Anonymous]

Also, parents in Wards 7 and 8 are being convinced their kids are at risk from schools opening and that’s not really true. There’s no evidence of substantial transmission at school at all. Rates are lower than in surrounding communities. Also, let’s stop with this fiction that most kids are at home. The majority of kids are utilizing some non-parent form of childcare and many of them are mixing with other kids and families. Unfortunately a lot of parents in Wards 7 and 8 (end elsewhere to be honest) aren’t not particularly scientifically literate and are falling for scare tactics, which the WTU is happy about. Also, let’s not close our eyes to the fact that at some schools in Ward 8, grade 9 averages attendance around 70%. I pick that grade because everyone in that grade is required to be in school. Some of these families get in legal trouble and/or fear getting in trouble over truancy. Is it shocking that they’d prefer DL for reasons having nothing to do with COVID or that, for entirely different reasons, lots of teachers would? We don’t normally do opinion polling on whether you want to go to school or send your kids to school or actually do your job.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Folks on this board underestimate how many parents do kit want to send students back yet.

My kid goes to a Title 1 charter. 90% of parents didn’t want them to return — huge concern about putting kids on public transit right now. A high percentage of families had relatives members who became ill or died. They are wary.

Look at the neighborhood maps DOH puts out each day. The virus impacts vary a lot and have been high in Wards 7 and 8 since the beginning. Those are the places with both the most students AND the most students in charter schools.

This post got my attention because it destroys the DCUM twin fallacies of reopening. (1) Everyone but the WTU wants schools to reopen and (2) we have to reopen because of all the poor brown kids. As PP observes, the communities most hard hit are actually most acutely aware of the COVID risks and of the limits of medical care available and least likely to want to take the risk.

No, it does not destroy any fallacy.

Of course there are parents that don't want to return - they were never going to be forced back before they wanted.

And of course it's the poor kids in DC who need to go back the most. I haven't seen any survey saying that 100% of minority parents in DC want to keep their kids home - so you're making that up. Just as for white kids, all parents deserve the choice to send their kids back. And more importantly, since DL is going to leave so many kids so far behind, what we need to do now is reverse the FALSE notion (pushed by WTU, indeed) that returning to school will be incredibly dangerous. We have reams and reams of statements on this now, from Harvard epidemiologists to UNICEF to Nicolas Kristoff. If you follow the Twitter feed of Nikole Hannah-Jones (a huge champion and observer of the rights of black kids in public schools) you'll see that her position is that schools should reopen. Arguing to maintain the fear in Wards 7 and 8 so that their communities can be impacted even MORE by COVID through the loss of schooling is the opposite of helping them.

It’s so depressing watching the scientific consensus finally emerge too late.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Charters typically follow DCPS for most things that have risk and liability, such as closing for weather. I would be amazed if charters open before DCPS does, even though I believe schools should have been open since this Fall.

This is one of the most sensible posts I've read on DCUM regarding this school year. I just wish our charter school principal would tell us this simple truth, rather than presenting us with numerous and meaningless parental surveys.

Agreed. And, for me, it was helpful to understand the limits of autonomy.

Are you saying that an anonymous poster on DCUM who seems to believe in a secret conspiracy of silence from their charter "heled you to understand the limits of autonomy"? Do you know what a low information voter is?

P.S. Q wants you to quit your job and home school all our kids.

I feel like perhaps I'm responding to a low information voter right now! Ha. What on earth are you talking about?

There have long been debates about the benefits and costs of charter schools being independent LEAs or part of larger LEAs. Until the pandemic, I thought the benefits outweighed the costs and supported DC's approach. However, the pandemic made clear that charters, at least in this city, are not leveraging autonomy to make more creative solutions regarding distance learning or offering some in person supports. At least the school my kids attend is not.

For what it's worth, throwing about Q every time you encounter an idea or opinion you don't like isn't doing you any favors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Also, parents in Wards 7 and 8 are being convinced their kids are at risk from schools opening and that’s not really true. There’s no evidence of substantial transmission at school at all. Rates are lower than in surrounding communities. Also, let’s stop with this fiction that most kids are at home. The majority of kids are utilizing some non-parent form of childcare and many of them are mixing with other kids and families. Unfortunately a lot of parents in Wards 7 and 8 (end elsewhere to be honest) aren’t not particularly scientifically literate and are falling for scare tactics, which the WTU is happy about. Also, let’s not close our eyes to the fact that at some schools in Ward 8, grade 9 averages attendance around 70%. I pick that grade because everyone in that grade is required to be in school. Some of these families get in legal trouble and/or fear getting in trouble over truancy. Is it shocking that they’d prefer DL for reasons having nothing to do with COVID or that, for entirely different reasons, lots of teachers would? We don’t normally do opinion polling on whether you want to go to school or send your kids to school or actually do your job.

This! Black and brown people all over the U.S. are being convinced that COVID disproportionately impacts their communities. And even if those "facts" and "data" were true, why must they be so very sensitive to watching friends and neighbors get sick and/or die at alarming rates as compared to the rest of the general population. Black and brown people are so sensitive. They need to get outside their own bubbles and see the world through my white UMC glasses to truly understand the toll COVID is taking on our families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Charters typically follow DCPS for most things that have risk and liability, such as closing for weather. I would be amazed if charters open before DCPS does, even though I believe schools should have been open since this Fall.

This is one of the most sensible posts I've read on DCUM regarding this school year. I just wish our charter school principal would tell us this simple truth, rather than presenting us with numerous and meaningless parental surveys.

Agreed. And, for me, it was helpful to understand the limits of autonomy.

Are you saying that an anonymous poster on DCUM who seems to believe in a secret conspiracy of silence from their charter "heled you to understand the limits of autonomy"? Do you know what a low information voter is?

P.S. Q wants you to quit your job and home school all our kids.

I feel like perhaps I'm responding to a low information voter right now! Ha. What on earth are you talking about?

There have long been debates about the benefits and costs of charter schools being independent LEAs or part of larger LEAs. Until the pandemic, I thought the benefits outweighed the costs and supported DC's approach. However, the pandemic made clear that charters, at least in this city, are not leveraging autonomy to make more creative solutions regarding distance learning or offering some in person supports. At least the school my kids attend is not.

For what it's worth, throwing about Q every time you encounter an idea or opinion you don't like isn't doing you any favors.

Why do assume that because a school isn't doing what you want that they aren't embracing solutions? I guess we now know what happens to kids who are given participation trophys when they grow up. Your thoughts and feelings are not as valid as everyone else's. Sometimes you are wrong.

[Anonymous]

Sela is open.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, parents in Wards 7 and 8 are being convinced their kids are at risk from schools opening and that’s not really true. There’s no evidence of substantial transmission at school at all. Rates are lower than in surrounding communities. Also, let’s stop with this fiction that most kids are at home. The majority of kids are utilizing some non-parent form of childcare and many of them are mixing with other kids and families. Unfortunately a lot of parents in Wards 7 and 8 (end elsewhere to be honest) aren’t not particularly scientifically literate and are falling for scare tactics, which the WTU is happy about. Also, let’s not close our eyes to the fact that at some schools in Ward 8, grade 9 averages attendance around 70%. I pick that grade because everyone in that grade is required to be in school. Some of these families get in legal trouble and/or fear getting in trouble over truancy. Is it shocking that they’d prefer DL for reasons having nothing to do with COVID or that, for entirely different reasons, lots of teachers would? We don’t normally do opinion polling on whether you want to go to school or send your kids to school or actually do your job.

This! Black and brown people all over the U.S. are being convinced that COVID disproportionately impacts their communities. And even if those "facts" and "data" were true, why must they be so very sensitive to watching friends and neighbors get sick and/or die at alarming rates as compared to the rest of the general population. Black and brown people are so sensitive. They need to get outside their own bubbles and see the world through my white UMC glasses to truly understand the toll COVID is taking on our families.

Always love rich white women knowing what is best for brown and black women. But its the science- its minimal risk!!! Yeah - you have had to wait 3 hours for healthcare and miss 3 hours of a paycheck or losing your job. Oh and you have to take two buses in a pandemic to said healthcare. Oh and you are good when your school's pod closes that you can just pick them up and then take two buses home and not miss the paycheck or work. Oh and you can then just swing readjusting everything back to DL at the drop of a hat. Oh and if you get sick you can miss 3 months of work (which is happening to some).

Black women die disproportionally in childbirth that isn't a myth people are passing around.

STOP telling Black women their healthcare fears aren't founded in reality. Stop telling black women anything if you aren't black.

Oh but they don't know - stfu. Your well intentioned bigamy is not going to work.

Now grasp your pearls and go watch scandal and think you know what its like.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, parents in Wards 7 and 8 are being convinced their kids are at risk from schools opening and that’s not really true. There’s no evidence of substantial transmission at school at all. Rates are lower than in surrounding communities. Also, let’s stop with this fiction that most kids are at home. The majority of kids are utilizing some non-parent form of childcare and many of them are mixing with other kids and families. Unfortunately a lot of parents in Wards 7 and 8 (end elsewhere to be honest) aren’t not particularly scientifically literate and are falling for scare tactics, which the WTU is happy about. Also, let’s not close our eyes to the fact that at some schools in Ward 8, grade 9 averages attendance around 70%. I pick that grade because everyone in that grade is required to be in school. Some of these families get in legal trouble and/or fear getting in trouble over truancy. Is it shocking that they’d prefer DL for reasons having nothing to do with COVID or that, for entirely different reasons, lots of teachers would? We don’t normally do opinion polling on whether you want to go to school or send your kids to school or actually do your job.

This! Black and brown people all over the U.S. are being convinced that COVID disproportionately impacts their communities. And even if those "facts" and "data" were true, why must they be so very sensitive to watching friends and neighbors get sick and/or die at alarming rates as compared to the rest of the general population. Black and brown people are so sensitive. They need to get outside their own bubbles and see the world through my white UMC glasses to truly understand the toll COVID is taking on our families.

I know you’re trying to be cute, but the answer to the disproportionate impact of COVID on minorities is not to compound that impact by withholding schooling. The decision to keep schools closed came from the union, not the parents. And even if many parents fear school they need to be shown the research on safety, not have their fears compounded by the union.