Compacted Math- FYI

[Anonymous]

LOL. You call it conjecture and yet verify the basic facts. A key person in the procurement process left MCPS in the middle of it and went to work for Discovery. That caused a delay in the procurement process. These are all facts, correct?

Here’s a question for you, would this MCPS official who had a key role in the procurement process, what value do you think they would have for discovery once the RfP was issued?

And here’s a question I honestly don’t know the answer to but perhaps you can help, seeing that you seem to have an “insider view” of MCPS, who was the winning bidder?

As far as I understand, yes. A key person retired from MCPS and took a job in the private sector, which is a pretty typical trajectory. This caused a delay either due to an abundance of caution or due to perceived malfeasance. Either way, the delay was the correct choice.

I want to be clear. I have no relationship with MCPS. I'm not an employee or a vendor. But I am a person who deals with procurements for a living, and I don't like seeing MCPS maligned for doing what I believe was the right thing. If there is even the perception of a conflict of interest, you should pull back and evaluate the bids anew.

As for who "won" the bid, anyone with ES-aged kids knows the answer. Rather than going with a single vendor for both math and ELA, MCPS "split" the tender and issued math to Eureka (with textboks, yay!) and ELA to Benchmark. That's not insider knowledge. It's been all over DCUM for months.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Any word on Math during the BOE meeting?

Only the briefest mention. Not really during the recovery of education piece, but there was a bullet item that referenced acceleration in item 9.1, the 2.5 year plan. The discussion began around the 3:39:32 mark of youtu.be/2yJB-9bIbWY, and there was some discussion by Dr. McKnight beginning around the 4:19:50 mark about some students having had success during pandemic learning and summer factoring in to identification of gaps, with families and schools maybe having the opportunity to reevaluate a student's needs at the beginning of the next school year. It was clearly focused on the learning loss aspect, but she did mention considering "if there are not gaps...how can we continue to accelerate?" There really was no detail offered. We're in the dark until at least the next BOE meeting or until we hear more official word from our local schools, I suppose, though it may be too late at that point to make substantive changes to the approach in response to family input.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Any word on Math during the BOE meeting?

Only the briefest mention. Not really during the recovery of education piece, but there was a bullet item that referenced acceleration in item 9.1, the 2.5 year plan. The discussion began around the 3:39:32 mark of youtu.be/2yJB-9bIbWY, and there was some discussion by Dr. McKnight beginning around the 4:19:50 mark about some students having had success during pandemic learning and summer factoring in to identification of gaps, with families and schools maybe having the opportunity to reevaluate a student's needs at the beginning of the next school year. It was clearly focused on the learning loss aspect, but she did mention considering "if there are not gaps...how can we continue to accelerate?" There really was no detail offered. We're in the dark until at least the next BOE meeting or until we hear more official word from our local schools, I suppose, though it may be too late at that point to make substantive changes to the approach in response to family input.

Like Ms. O'Neill said, I don't trust MCPS. I think, despite assurances to the contrary and "engagement" with stakeholders, that they have a whiff of pushback from parents, so they're going to announce major math curriculum changes over the summer and hope that some large portion of the usually more informed parents are busy with life and won't be available to sound the alarm (again).

[Anonymous]

This is such a weird thread. I just read through more than 20 pages and found no actual citation for these decisions and changes.

[Anonymous]

There has been such varying views (from central, teachers, and principal input), that central office keeps changing their guidelines. We are supposed to get “final” guidelines next week, however this will be the 3rd set of final guidelines, so everyone is unsure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is such a weird thread. I just read through more than 20 pages and found no actual citation for these decisions and changes.

Crazy that it's all word of mouth, isn't it? The only thing that has been announced is that math sequence is under review but they're keeping acceleration options And then there are rumors and this thread that say that they want to make changes that make the acceleration pool smaller, or kick kids off of the accelerated track on the basis of grades and test scores - something they've never done before.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There has been such varying views (from central, teachers, and principal input), that central office keeps changing their guidelines. We are supposed to get “final” guidelines next week, however this will be the 3rd set of final guidelines, so everyone is unsure.

I'm not a teacher, but why does the central office expect that teachers be so robotically wedded to a canned curriculum that they can't respond to conditions on the ground? If it turns out that the little Larlos and Larlas in accellerated math don't remember how to divide fractions, how long does it take for a quick review? (And why wouldn't that be in the curriculum, anyway?)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is such a weird thread. I just read through more than 20 pages and found no actual citation for these decisions and changes.

Funny that that is what happens when there's an issue of concern and MCPS doesn't communicate about it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is such a weird thread. I just read through more than 20 pages and found no actual citation for these decisions and changes.

Funny that that is what happens when there's an issue of concern and MCPS doesn't communicate about it.

MCPS is not reading DCUM!

[Anonymous]

Yes, it is disappointing that this is not communicated more by MCPS. I first heard by word of mouth, and then during a middle school enrollment meeting (when kids enroll for classes). At that point, the local school administrators said that central office was going to re-evaluate kids and they would receive direction regarding whether our compacted math kids would be put in IM. They said if your child was identified for the Takoma pool, there was a strong indication that you would be place. If not, just wait and see. There was a bit of debate with one administrator saying their "hands were tied" with central office decisions, and the other saying that they support kids with a desire to try more rigorous courses (leaving the door open to appeals).

My child is doing well in math (I know, I know...everyone is getting As), but we actually checked in with the teacher 3/4 of the way in to see if our child was actually grasping the concepts and if there was anything we could do to support. We were told DD was doing great and would be recommended for IM and no concerns. Fast forward to the MAP test, where we lost track of when DD was taking it. So she took it flopped on the couch with no breakfast (told us that she clicked through a few things to just "finish it") and...needless to say...not as good as her typical scores. So, we are waiting to hear what in the world next year will bring and whether we are going to have to appeal to prevent her from repeating a grade.

Just in case we don't have enough things up in the air this year...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is such a weird thread. I just read through more than 20 pages and found no actual citation for these decisions and changes.

Funny that that is what happens when there's an issue of concern and MCPS doesn't communicate about it.

MCPS is not reading DCUM!

Some parents do. Some teachers do. Some of MCPS might. Whether or not, parents ask, they don't answer and then folks come here or other places to see if anyone knows. The speculation and trolling are a given at that point, and the work MCPS has to put in to manage things becomes greater than the burden that communicating would have been.

[Anonymous]

I don’t trust MCPS on anything, particularly when it involves acceleration for advanced students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t trust MCPS on anything, particularly when it involves acceleration for advanced students

I agree and its unfortunate that MCPS has proven itself to be untrustworthy, particularly in this area.

[Anonymous]

Talked our principal last week. According to her, MCPS still has not decided whether it will offer compacted math next year for fourth graders.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Talked our principal last week. According to her, MCPS still has not decided whether it will offer compacted math next year for fourth graders.

Ours said it will, but MCPS hasn't made the MAP cutoffs clear for current 3rd graders/next year's 4th graders.