SSFS Will Stay Open

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Yeah, it definitely felt that way to me. But whatever, it's all over now.

I think some people could see that the forecast was not looking good, and were trying very hard to encourage people to stick with SSFS. I get it, I've done that myself for certain things. It's not like attrition doesn't matter. But fixing the underlying problems, the underlying cause of elevated attrition, is what really needed to be done, and it was always very frustrating for me when people couldn't see that. I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me.

You claim, "whatever, it's all over now" but here you are watching this forum and calling others rude or assuming they are defensive while you make gaslighting comments yourself such as, "I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me."

Well, why would anyone stay if that's not what they want? Because that's what it is.

Well that’s what happened isn’t it? 200+ ppl left cause they didn’t get what they wanted. That was enough to close the school until they found someone who apparently has loads of cash to throw at the problem to keep it afloat. They couldn’t stay open with 500 but are not projected to reopen with 300 because of the nameless persons sacks of cash. The school isn’t staying open because a majority of ppl actually want to stay.

[Anonymous]

In a slight shift of the conversation, our family has not been able to recommit our child, but haven’t said a final goodbye yet. I just feel so in the dark about the going-ons at the school for the last year-and-half. Under the guise of privacy, no one has even really explained why the head of school abruptly quit in June of last year, why the upper and lower school heads left months before that. Why the interim head left after 2 months - everything is rumor and uncertainty. After all that, the school shuts down out of nowhere and then reopens because basically one rich donor bails us out. I don’t understand any of this. Our kids have been at other private schools and our larger friend circle has kids at private schools all over the city. This is unprecedented in the DC area in the recent past and to be a parent who couldn’t answer a single question as to why any of these things happened is very unsettling.

And I personally don’t love having to express this all to DCUM, but with the emotions within SSFS - on slack, on our class text thread - it’s really hard to still have serious doubts and talk about that openly. If you look at Slack over the last few days, there are really only positive posts and why we are staying posts that are still active. All of us that are unhappy with how little we know - we’ve all shut up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Absolutely. Clearly you didn’t leave so had no reason to experience this. But you could not say why you left without feeling dismissed.

So you've changed from describing it as people "socially punishing" you to "feeling dismissed".

Not a change, that's a different poster.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Absolutely. Clearly you didn’t leave so had no reason to experience this. But you could not say why you left without feeling dismissed.

So you've changed from describing it as people "socially punishing" you to "feeling dismissed".

Huh? I’m saying the same thing. Since you never left you didn’t feel ppl dismissing you/socially punishing you. But many ppl who left last year experienced this and could not say anything without feeling like ppl were dismissing them. And that is what continues to happen even now on this forum. It’s like the ppl who stay are part of a cult or something. Can’t tolerate any criticism of the school

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Yeah, it definitely felt that way to me. But whatever, it's all over now.

I think some people could see that the forecast was not looking good, and were trying very hard to encourage people to stick with SSFS. I get it, I've done that myself for certain things. It's not like attrition doesn't matter. But fixing the underlying problems, the underlying cause of elevated attrition, is what really needed to be done, and it was always very frustrating for me when people couldn't see that. I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me.

You claim, "whatever, it's all over now" but here you are watching this forum and calling others rude or assuming they are defensive while you make gaslighting comments yourself such as, "I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me."

Well, why would anyone stay if that's not what they want? Because that's what it is.

No, that's what the school was to you. You don't seem to understand that opinions can and do differ.

Obviously opinions vary. That's why some people are staying, or held on longer than we did. But I do believe those three descriptions are accurate.

I would rather the school had chosen to have much lower-end facilities and better financial health, personally.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Yeah, it definitely felt that way to me. But whatever, it's all over now.

I think some people could see that the forecast was not looking good, and were trying very hard to encourage people to stick with SSFS. I get it, I've done that myself for certain things. It's not like attrition doesn't matter. But fixing the underlying problems, the underlying cause of elevated attrition, is what really needed to be done, and it was always very frustrating for me when people couldn't see that. I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me.

You claim, "whatever, it's all over now" but here you are watching this forum and calling others rude or assuming they are defensive while you make gaslighting comments yourself such as, "I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me."

Well, why would anyone stay if that's not what they want? Because that's what it is.

No, that's what the school was to you. You don't seem to understand that opinions can and do differ.

Obviously opinions vary. That's why some people are staying, or held on longer than we did. But I do believe those three descriptions are accurate.

I would rather the school had chosen to have much lower-end facilities and better financial health, personally.

Those three descriptions are accurate ...to you. Obviously they are not accurate to those who are staying.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Absolutely. Clearly you didn’t leave so had no reason to experience this. But you could not say why you left without feeling dismissed.

So you've changed from describing it as people "socially punishing" you to "feeling dismissed".

Huh? I’m saying the same thing. Since you never left you didn’t feel ppl dismissing you/socially punishing you. But many ppl who left last year experienced this and could not say anything without feeling like ppl were dismissing them. And that is what continues to happen even now on this forum. It’s like the ppl who stay are part of a cult or something. Can’t tolerate any criticism of the school

I don't think what happens on DCUM is an accurate account of any larger community. These are single posters with issues good or bad. Anyone who is even using this forum is likely indifferent to criticism. The continued problems are (a) posters who use their personal opinion to overgeneralize; and (b) posters who assume that anyone offering a differing opinion are dismissing them

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In a slight shift of the conversation, our family has not been able to recommit our child, but haven’t said a final goodbye yet. I just feel so in the dark about the going-ons at the school for the last year-and-half. Under the guise of privacy, no one has even really explained why the head of school abruptly quit in June of last year, why the upper and lower school heads left months before that. Why the interim head left after 2 months - everything is rumor and uncertainty. After all that, the school shuts down out of nowhere and then reopens because basically one rich donor bails us out. I don’t understand any of this. Our kids have been at other private schools and our larger friend circle has kids at private schools all over the city. This is unprecedented in the DC area in the recent past and to be a parent who couldn’t answer a single question as to why any of these things happened is very unsettling.

And I personally don’t love having to express this all to DCUM, but with the emotions within SSFS - on slack, on our class text thread - it’s really hard to still have serious doubts and talk about that openly. If you look at Slack over the last few days, there are really only positive posts and why we are staying posts that are still active. All of us that are unhappy with how little we know - we’ve all shut up.

You’re not alone and I agree. I could have written this myself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In a slight shift of the conversation, our family has not been able to recommit our child, but haven’t said a final goodbye yet. I just feel so in the dark about the going-ons at the school for the last year-and-half. Under the guise of privacy, no one has even really explained why the head of school abruptly quit in June of last year, why the upper and lower school heads left months before that. Why the interim head left after 2 months - everything is rumor and uncertainty. After all that, the school shuts down out of nowhere and then reopens because basically one rich donor bails us out. I don’t understand any of this. Our kids have been at other private schools and our larger friend circle has kids at private schools all over the city. This is unprecedented in the DC area in the recent past and to be a parent who couldn’t answer a single question as to why any of these things happened is very unsettling.

And I personally don’t love having to express this all to DCUM, but with the emotions within SSFS - on slack, on our class text thread - it’s really hard to still have serious doubts and talk about that openly. If you look at Slack over the last few days, there are really only positive posts and why we are staying posts that are still active. All of us that are unhappy with how little we know - we’ve all shut up.

Let’s not forget the other admin losses in the last few years, the cfo leaving last fall. There is so much we will never know.

But everything is great ! Re enroll!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In a slight shift of the conversation, our family has not been able to recommit our child, but haven’t said a final goodbye yet. I just feel so in the dark about the going-ons at the school for the last year-and-half. Under the guise of privacy, no one has even really explained why the head of school abruptly quit in June of last year, why the upper and lower school heads left months before that. Why the interim head left after 2 months - everything is rumor and uncertainty. After all that, the school shuts down out of nowhere and then reopens because basically one rich donor bails us out. I don’t understand any of this. Our kids have been at other private schools and our larger friend circle has kids at private schools all over the city. This is unprecedented in the DC area in the recent past and to be a parent who couldn’t answer a single question as to why any of these things happened is very unsettling.

And I personally don’t love having to express this all to DCUM, but with the emotions within SSFS - on slack, on our class text thread - it’s really hard to still have serious doubts and talk about that openly. If you look at Slack over the last few days, there are really only positive posts and why we are staying posts that are still active. All of us that are unhappy with how little we know - we’ve all shut up.

Let’s not forget the other admin losses in the last few years, the cfo leaving last fall. There is so much we will never know.

But everything is great ! Re enroll!

Slack has been eerily quiet overall during the past several days but I agree that the overall sentiment on Slack is hope, trust, love for the school, and please re-enroll. I don't have a problem with that since Slack is operated by the Coalition and the Coalition is after all trying to save the school. And I'm glad that's happening. However, we are also on the fence and not sure if we will stay. We are waiting to hear from several other schools this week and then we will decide. I agree that there's no real place to go to discuss concerns that are keeping us on the fence about SSFS. Slack doesn't feel like the place but neither does DCUM. Maybe we should start our own Slack? Or Whatsapp? Just for those of us who are on the fence to discuss more comfortably while we continue to monitor slack for any new developments.

[Anonymous]

Parent at another school here, but with several ties to SSFS. Something seems amiss, and who knows who is responsible for it. I’m sure emotions are running high, and there are few places to direct that. But wow, this is sad to witness.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In a slight shift of the conversation, our family has not been able to recommit our child, but haven’t said a final goodbye yet. I just feel so in the dark about the going-ons at the school for the last year-and-half. Under the guise of privacy, no one has even really explained why the head of school abruptly quit in June of last year, why the upper and lower school heads left months before that. Why the interim head left after 2 months - everything is rumor and uncertainty. After all that, the school shuts down out of nowhere and then reopens because basically one rich donor bails us out. I don’t understand any of this. Our kids have been at other private schools and our larger friend circle has kids at private schools all over the city. This is unprecedented in the DC area in the recent past and to be a parent who couldn’t answer a single question as to why any of these things happened is very unsettling.

And I personally don’t love having to express this all to DCUM, but with the emotions within SSFS - on slack, on our class text thread - it’s really hard to still have serious doubts and talk about that openly. If you look at Slack over the last few days, there are really only positive posts and why we are staying posts that are still active. All of us that are unhappy with how little we know - we’ve all shut up.

Let’s not forget the other admin losses in the last few years, the cfo leaving last fall. There is so much we will never know.

But everything is great ! Re enroll!

Slack has been eerily quiet overall during the past several days but I agree that the overall sentiment on Slack is hope, trust, love for the school, and please re-enroll. I don't have a problem with that since Slack is operated by the Coalition and the Coalition is after all trying to save the school. And I'm glad that's happening. However, we are also on the fence and not sure if we will stay. We are waiting to hear from several other schools this week and then we will decide. I agree that there's no real place to go to discuss concerns that are keeping us on the fence about SSFS. Slack doesn't feel like the place but neither does DCUM. Maybe we should start our own Slack? Or Whatsapp? Just for those of us who are on the fence to discuss more comfortably while we continue to monitor slack for any new developments.

Yes! I feel exactly the same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Yeah, it definitely felt that way to me. But whatever, it's all over now.

I think some people could see that the forecast was not looking good, and were trying very hard to encourage people to stick with SSFS. I get it, I've done that myself for certain things. It's not like attrition doesn't matter. But fixing the underlying problems, the underlying cause of elevated attrition, is what really needed to be done, and it was always very frustrating for me when people couldn't see that. I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me.

You claim, "whatever, it's all over now" but here you are watching this forum and calling others rude or assuming they are defensive while you make gaslighting comments yourself such as, "I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me."

Well, why would anyone stay if that's not what they want? Because that's what it is.

No, that's what the school was to you. You don't seem to understand that opinions can and do differ.

Obviously opinions vary. That's why some people are staying, or held on longer than we did. But I do believe those three descriptions are accurate.

I would rather the school had chosen to have much lower-end facilities and better financial health, personally.

Those three descriptions are accurate ...to you. Obviously they are not accurate to those who are staying.

Dude no. SSFS is a medium-level academic school. Some people like that, because that's what they want and need for their child. Some people had great teachers, sure, some people had not-so-great teachers. But in the ecosystem of area private schools, it's in the middle. And that's okay!

Similarly, does anyone really dispute that it leans left? Come on.

And I described the buildings as "moderately expensive". I guess if people are super duper wealthy they might not see it that way? But still, I think that's what it is, and some people are fine with it but that doesn't change what it is.

If I described SSFS as "recently about to close" would you say some people didn't see it that way? I guess you could, but hon, we all have to deal with reality at some point.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Yeah, it definitely felt that way to me. But whatever, it's all over now.

I think some people could see that the forecast was not looking good, and were trying very hard to encourage people to stick with SSFS. I get it, I've done that myself for certain things. It's not like attrition doesn't matter. But fixing the underlying problems, the underlying cause of elevated attrition, is what really needed to be done, and it was always very frustrating for me when people couldn't see that. I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me.

You claim, "whatever, it's all over now" but here you are watching this forum and calling others rude or assuming they are defensive while you make gaslighting comments yourself such as, "I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me."

Well, why would anyone stay if that's not what they want? Because that's what it is.

No, that's what the school was to you. You don't seem to understand that opinions can and do differ.

This is a perfect example of some people just will not open their minds to anything negative, even if it means running a school into the ground. And the different opinions thing only goes so far. For example, to me, SSFS is a school that recently announced it was closing and is now trying to survive thanks to a rescue donor. Do other people have a different opinion? Did they get a different email than I did, which rather than saying "We are closing" said "Everything is fine"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The collective action thing was never going to work. "Oh, if more people stayed, everything would be fine." Therefore, socially pressuring people to stay is the solution! Socially punishing those who leave is the strategy! No. That's not how it works. If everyone stayed, it would still be a school with a useless board, middling academics and really terrible leadership! Not fine at all.

Oh good grief, "socially punishing those who leave"?

Yeah, it definitely felt that way to me. But whatever, it's all over now.

I think some people could see that the forecast was not looking good, and were trying very hard to encourage people to stick with SSFS. I get it, I've done that myself for certain things. It's not like attrition doesn't matter. But fixing the underlying problems, the underlying cause of elevated attrition, is what really needed to be done, and it was always very frustrating for me when people couldn't see that. I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me.

You claim, "whatever, it's all over now" but here you are watching this forum and calling others rude or assuming they are defensive while you make gaslighting comments yourself such as, "I dunno-- maybe a left-leaning school with middling academics and moderately expensive facilities is what a lot of people actually want. But not me."

Well, why would anyone stay if that's not what they want? Because that's what it is.

No, that's what the school was to you. You don't seem to understand that opinions can and do differ.

Obviously opinions vary. That's why some people are staying, or held on longer than we did. But I do believe those three descriptions are accurate.

I would rather the school had chosen to have much lower-end facilities and better financial health, personally.

Those three descriptions are accurate ...to you. Obviously they are not accurate to those who are staying.

Dude no. SSFS is a medium-level academic school. Some people like that, because that's what they want and need for their child. Some people had great teachers, sure, some people had not-so-great teachers. But in the ecosystem of area private schools, it's in the middle. And that's okay!

Similarly, does anyone really dispute that it leans left? Come on.

And I described the buildings as "moderately expensive". I guess if people are super duper wealthy they might not see it that way? But still, I think that's what it is, and some people are fine with it but that doesn't change what it is.

If I described SSFS as "recently about to close" would you say some people didn't see it that way? I guess you could, but hon, we all have to deal with reality at some point.

Totally agree with everything you said!