Protest at Mundo on P street

[Anonymous]

We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

We probably know each other. Totally agree with all of this. I hold little hope of the Board doing anything (either school Board or charter board). The saddest thing to me is that Kristen made the decision to take the option for the school to favor low income kids in the lottery. Those are the kids who are most vulnerable to all of MV's flaws. But their parents may be less likely to organize and complain. I assume that is Kristen's hope.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

Thank you for sharing this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

We probably know each other. Totally agree with all of this. I hold little hope of the Board doing anything (either school Board or charter board). The saddest thing to me is that Kristen made the decision to take the option for the school to favor low income kids in the lottery. Those are the kids who are most vulnerable to all of MV's flaws. But their parents may be less likely to organize and complain. I assume that is Kristen's hope.

Blatantly anti this preference? Your privilege is showing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

We probably know each other. Totally agree with all of this. I hold little hope of the Board doing anything (either school Board or charter board). The saddest thing to me is that Kristen made the decision to take the option for the school to favor low income kids in the lottery. Those are the kids who are most vulnerable to all of MV's flaws. But their parents may be less likely to organize and complain. I assume that is Kristen's hope.

Blatantly anti this preference? Your privilege is showing.

I would totally support a Kipp school using this kind of preference - or any other school with a demonstrated track record of doing a good job.

But for Mundo, which is failing all kids, I would honestly rather see it fail more upper middle class kids because their parents can afford tutors and other things to make up for the school's failures. Not sure why this makes me a bad person.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

This. Honestly, you could be one of 10 people. Pretty telling this isn’t outing you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

This. Honestly, you could be one of 10 people. Pretty telling this isn’t outing you.

This is a weird comment. Are you threatening to out this person? What is the intent of this?

[Anonymous]

New poster. I took the comment to mean that under most circumstances providing this level of detail could reveal the poster’s identity but because the negative experience was so widely shared among more people, such detail could be provided without fear of revealing identity. It’s telling when someone’s negative experiences are from unique and so many can relate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:New poster. I took the comment to mean that under most circumstances providing this level of detail could reveal the poster’s identity but because the negative experience was so widely shared among more people, such detail could be provided without fear of revealing identity. It’s telling when someone’s negative experiences are from unique and so many can relate.

PP here. This exactly. Thank you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

Well this is upsetting. We were hoping to lottery in next year for our twins. We live close to the P street campus and I would love my kids to be bilingual! But, given comments line these I think we will look at other opportunities for bilingual programs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We sent our two kids to MV. Only one graduated from there. We pulled the other one out after five years. Like many, we were wooed by the community, bilingual program and sustainability focus. Like many we wanted it to work. We knew of its potential. We loved many of the teachers and still hold relationships with several of them.

However, since 2016 (at least) MV has had an issue with teachers leaving and administration failing to communicate the departure or their plan to replace staff. Even then, there was one classroom that lost five teachers over the course of a year.

When MV wanted to expand (which was not shared by the administration but with a community member who happened upon the plans for a second campus), the parent community begged the school not to. We all knew the school was not ready to scale. There were issues with testing scores, teachers leaving, and the fact that the school was so new it wasn’t a proven model yet. They held off on expanding a year, but in that year only more problems began to show.

Over the years (pre pandemic), principals would last only one year, teachers left in droves mid year, and violence amongst students did not result in consequences. The teachers decided to unionize and the community supported them as a way to get the administration to listen. Instead of supporting the teachers, the administration brought in union busters.

When my oldest started DCI, every daywear heard how MV had failed to equip them with the knowledge to keep up with peers from other schools. When our youngest was behind in reading by two years, we decided enough was enough. We left after being with the school for more than a decade.

We had planted the school’s garden, built furniture for the school, fundraised for their kitchen and ridiculously expensive playground, and more. When we sent an email to the administration to explain our decision to leave, we got zero response.

I’m not surprised to hear any of the current gripes of parents. This isn’t new. This has been festering since pre pandemic years. I only hope the board finally gets wise and takes action. The school holds promise but not with the current administration at the helm.

Well this is upsetting. We were hoping to lottery in next year for our twins. We live close to the P street campus and I would love my kids to be bilingual! But, given comments line these I think we will look at other opportunities for bilingual programs.

If you want your kids to be bilingual, start now. No school will be able to make them fully bilingual, but hard, hard work especially when they’re younger will help.

[Anonymous]

Does anyone have any updates on the protest? Was there any response from the MV Board or the PCSB? I'm a former MV parent and really hoping for some accountability.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Does anyone have any updates on the protest? Was there any response from the MV Board or the PCSB? I'm a former MV parent and really hoping for some accountability.

Crickets...who's surprised?

[Anonymous]

^^^
Wow. How was I falling into the trap of optimism there?

[Anonymous]

Pay attention, prospective MV families. Don’t enroll hoping and assuming things will change. Go in with open eyes and be willing to take things as they are. You get what you get.