How is the meeting at Dunbar going?

[Anonymous]

Any news

[Anonymous]

Lightly attended, but interesting. DME staff have lots of information when you engage them one on one.

[Anonymous]

Just got home--it was long, but I was glad I went. I was in the Cardozo breakout group. Here are the new things I learned (much of what they said was very clear in the proposal):

- 43% of students are at-risk, which confirms my view that if the at-risk preference is adopted, then the middle class will not have any OOB options--they will go charter or leave if they have a terrible in-boundary option.
- They flashed a screen of the schools that had under 30% at-risk, where the preference would apply, and it included some schools that I thought were more diverse--including Francis-Stevens. It was so fast that I wasn't able to write them down, it's just that F-S stood out to me. They really need to make that information public.
- The confirmed that under the new proposal, a principal would have no discretion to keep a family if they get in IB and then move OOB--the family would be able to stay only until the end of the academic year, unless they are high-risk. I think this is great and would prevent a lot of gaming of the system.
- In terms of how they would create room at overcrowded schools for the 10% minimum OOB population, they gave the example that at Janney, it is 8% OOB so they would only have to increase by 2%. And they said that at the elementary school level, this would not be by grade--they could have 10% in any combination of grades they want. So they could reserve those spots for kids in the upper grades if they wanted. But there was no good answer when it came to how can you physically put kids in the space.
- In the breakout, people were pretty skeptical of the middle school choices. One person pointed out that the CHEC feeders are not dual language schools, and the proposal only lets people who have dual-language-only options in elementary school have an alternative. The response was that CHEC is a program that is appropriate for someone who has never studied Spanish before. (The question asker was very skeptical of this answer.) Similarly, some Ross parents seemed concerned that the new Center City Middle School would not attract people from the feeder schools. And Francis-Stevens parents talked about how the shrinking of the boundary might mean that the middle school only has ten in-boundary kids per grade.

My biggest concern coming out of this meeting is the middle class issue--with 43% of people getting at-risk preference for the good schools, that tells me that the rest of us will have no luck. That's probably fine if you are in a rising school, but that's not my situation at all.

[Anonymous]

Thanks so much for these notes!

[Anonymous]

yes, thank you!

[Anonymous]

I guess I never thought my kid had a shot at winning the lottery to any DCPS that has a low % of kids receiving FARMs. Is that why people are upset? They thought they had a chance of getting in?

[Anonymous]

It's not FARMs; it's at risk. They are two different measures. Francis-Stevens is 48% FARM but less than 30% at risk. People get in OOB, but they won't under this proposal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just got home--it was long, but I was glad I went. I was in the Cardozo breakout group. Here are the new things I learned (much of what they said was very clear in the proposal):

- 43% of students are at-risk, which confirms my view that if the at-risk preference is adopted, then the middle class will not have any OOB options--they will go charter or leave if they have a terrible in-boundary option.
- They flashed a screen of the schools that had under 30% at-risk, where the preference would apply, and it included some schools that I thought were more diverse--including Francis-Stevens. It was so fast that I wasn't able to write them down, it's just that F-S stood out to me. They really need to make that information public.
- The confirmed that under the new proposal, a principal would have no discretion to keep a family if they get in IB and then move OOB--the family would be able to stay only until the end of the academic year, unless they are high-risk. I think this is great and would prevent a lot of gaming of the system.
- In terms of how they would create room at overcrowded schools for the 10% minimum OOB population, they gave the example that at Janney, it is 8% OOB so they would only have to increase by 2%. And they said that at the elementary school level, this would not be by grade--they could have 10% in any combination of grades they want. So they could reserve those spots for kids in the upper grades if they wanted. But there was no good answer when it came to how can you physically put kids in the space.
- In the breakout, people were pretty skeptical of the middle school choices. One person pointed out that the CHEC feeders are not dual language schools, and the proposal only lets people who have dual-language-only options in elementary school have an alternative. The response was that CHEC is a program that is appropriate for someone who has never studied Spanish before. (The question asker was very skeptical of this answer.) Similarly, some Ross parents seemed concerned that the new Center City Middle School would not attract people from the feeder schools. And Francis-Stevens parents talked about how the shrinking of the boundary might mean that the middle school only has ten in-boundary kids per grade.

My biggest concern coming out of this meeting is the middle class issue--with 43% of people getting at-risk preference for the good schools, that tells me that the rest of us will have no luck. That's probably fine if you are in a rising school, but that's not my situation at all.

The proposal gives us the 'neighborhood schools' that we asked for, just not the ones that we wanted.

[Anonymous]

The problem is that there is no plan in place to work with families to improve lower performing neighborhood schools.

Several families at the Anacostia meeting were willing and wanted to have their children attend neighborhood schools with a clear plan for how to improve them in the medium term. The proposal lacks clarity for how to improve these lower performing schools, that is why parents are concerned about quality. Further, many of these families are being asked to go to even lower performing schools than the ones they are currently zoned to in the current DCPS boundaries.

The OOB has been a way for parents in completely unacceptable schools to gain options. However with the new proposal unless you are very at-risk, you will have no chance of going anywhere but a poorly performing school. Families in all income levels have expressed that they will leave the system for charters, parochial schools, private schools, or the suburbs if they can. That is why some have said this proposal is forcing families into charter schools who would prefer to have a strong DCPS with good neighborhood schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The problem is that there is no plan in place to work with families to improve lower performing neighborhood schools.

Several families at the Anacostia meeting were willing and wanted to have their children attend neighborhood schools with a clear plan for how to improve them in the medium term. The proposal lacks clarity for how to improve these lower performing schools, that is why parents are concerned about quality. Further, many of these families are being asked to go to even lower performing schools than the ones they are currently zoned to in the current DCPS boundaries.

The OOB has been a way for parents in completely unacceptable schools to gain options. However with the new proposal unless you are very at-risk, you will have no chance of going anywhere but a poorly performing school. Families in all income levels have expressed that they will leave the system for charters, parochial schools, private schools, or the suburbs if they can. That is why some have said this proposal is forcing families into charter schools who would prefer to have a strong DCPS with good neighborhood schools.

Already largely the status quo.

[Anonymous]

Were people actually expecting the proposal to address improving schools? I thought the purpose was to right-size the boundaries. It seems to me the conversation or plans to improve schools should continue beyond this proposal.

[Anonymous]

What is the difference in definition between students "at-risk" and "FARMS?"

[Anonymous]

What does 48% FARMS and less than 30% at-risk tell us about student make-up at Francis Stevens?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just got home--it was long, but I was glad I went. I was in the Cardozo breakout group. Here are the new things I learned (much of what they said was very clear in the proposal):

- 43% of students are at-risk, which confirms my view that if the at-risk preference is adopted, then the middle class will not have any OOB options--they will go charter or leave if they have a terrible in-boundary option.
- They flashed a screen of the schools that had under 30% at-risk, where the preference would apply, and it included some schools that I thought were more diverse--including Francis-Stevens. It was so fast that I wasn't able to write them down, it's just that F-S stood out to me. They really need to make that information public.
- The confirmed that under the new proposal, a principal would have no discretion to keep a family if they get in IB and then move OOB--the family would be able to stay only until the end of the academic year, unless they are high-risk. I think this is great and would prevent a lot of gaming of the system.
- In terms of how they would create room at overcrowded schools for the 10% minimum OOB population, they gave the example that at Janney, it is 8% OOB so they would only have to increase by 2%. And they said that at the elementary school level, this would not be by grade--they could have 10% in any combination of grades they want. So they could reserve those spots for kids in the upper grades if they wanted. But there was no good answer when it came to how can you physically put kids in the space.
- In the breakout, people were pretty skeptical of the middle school choices. One person pointed out that the CHEC feeders are not dual language schools, and the proposal only lets people who have dual-language-only options in elementary school have an alternative. The response was that CHEC is a program that is appropriate for someone who has never studied Spanish before. (The question asker was very skeptical of this answer.) Similarly, some Ross parents seemed concerned that the new Center City Middle School would not attract people from the feeder schools. And Francis-Stevens parents talked about how the shrinking of the boundary might mean that the middle school only has ten in-boundary kids per grade.

My biggest concern coming out of this meeting is the middle class issue--with 43% of people getting at-risk preference for the good schools, that tells me that the rest of us will have no luck. That's probably fine if you are in a rising school, but that's not my situation at all.

But what if the 8% OOB from Janney are not from At-Risk schools. Does that mean Janney could end up at 18% OOB until the current 8% move up?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Were people actually expecting the proposal to address improving schools? I thought the purpose was to right-size the boundaries. It seems to me the conversation or plans to improve schools should continue beyond this proposal.

Well, I was at least hoping it wouldn't make things worse. And if you have middle income people "stuck" at low performing schools, unable to get out as they can now, ad the most motivated at-risk families leaving, the middle income families will opt out of DCPS entirely.