Ward/neighborhood preferences for Charter School admissions

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:why not just fix DCPS and allow them to have their own curriculum? allowing a for-profit school system to creep over and take over schools is not very smart. Charter is not the answer.

HEAR HEAR!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Charter neighborhood preference is a rotten idea. It completely screws over that part of the DC parent population living in areas where there is neither available nor affordable space to house a charter school, i.e., Most of Wards 1 through 3.

Neighborhood preference eviscerates the very idea of charters, i.e., that as a parent you have the opportunity to find a school that best meets your educational goals for your child---whether it be experiential learning (Cap City), language immersion (LAMB, Elsie Stokes, Mundo Verde, Yu Ying), classical and/or advanced curriculum (Latin/Basis)---regardless of where you happen to live.

I agree with you entirely. But Ward 1 (Columbia Heights, Georgia Avenue Corridor, Mt. Pleasant, Petworth, U Street) is home to an awful lot of charters.

I live in Ward 1, and don't want my kid going to any DCPS or Charters in Ward 1. I want my kids to learn French. Only one charter doing that in DC, so why should my kid be denied this because they don't live near Stokes? DC needs to leave the charters alone, and concentrate on fixing DCPS!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Meridian is on U. Inspired Teaching is near U. DC Bilingual, Mundo Verde, Creative Minds - all Ward 1.

And? I don't want my kid going to any of those schools, and someone else out of ward 1 may want their kid to go there. Why should either of us be forced to stay in our neighborhood?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:why not just fix DCPS and allow them to have their own curriculum? allowing a for-profit school system to creep over and take over schools is not very smart. Charter is not the answer.

HEAR HEAR!!!

DCPS needs to stick to its knitting, stop trying to win its own chartering authority, and turn over vacant and underutilized buildings to higher performing charters. DCPCSB and all charters must help fight against the natural tendency of DC Government to crush charters through more mandates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What do people think of this idea? We had better start asking our council members what they think. Hearing that Tommy Wells may be introducing a bill to give ward-based admissions preferences for charter schools.

The Tommy Wells plan and associated legislation would destroy specialized charters and leave kids East of the Park stranded. Tommy's staff point person should consider the needs of the whole City not just Hill people who want a "high-quality public school I can walk to." We can't all have that option right away. Specialized and other charters fill in the gaps for all of DC. It's not a matter of wooly-headed "fairness" or "equity" to destroy charters for the Hill and a few other places with resources as we return to the old system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What do people think of this idea? We had better start asking our council members what they think. Hearing that Tommy Wells may be introducing a bill to give ward-based admissions preferences for charter schools.

The Tommy Wells plan and associated legislation would destroy specialized charters and leave kids East of the Park stranded. Tommy's staff point person should consider the needs of the whole City not just Hill people who want a "high-quality public school I can walk to." We can't all have that option right away. Specialized and other charters fill in the gaps for all of DC. It's not a matter of wooly-headed "fairness" or "equity" to destroy charters for the Hill and a few other places with resources as we return to the old system.

Who is the lead for Wells on this legislation? We need a meeting.

[Anonymous]

I think 10:43 is right, there should be a meeting with Wells---but more importantly---people should be emailing their own Council representative. I imagine if Mary Cheh and Jack Evans heard from enough parents who desire to send their kids to Basis or Latin instead of Hardy, they might lurch to upright positions and realize how unfair this proposal is.


Is there someone who could post a link to the proposed legislation? People can start posting the link and describing the issue on various neighborhood listservs and the like---I know that a lot of people on my street send their kids to charters and would be out in the cold were this legislation to pass.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Meridian is on U. Inspired Teaching is near U. DC Bilingual, Mundo Verde, Creative Minds - all Ward 1.

And? I don't want my kid going to any of those schools, and someone else out of ward 1 may want their kid to go there. Why should either of us be forced to stay in our neighborhood?

Wow. That's amazing! You don't want your kids going to the large number of quality PCSs in your own neighborhood, and you don't want anyone else to be able to go to a quality PCS in their own neighborhood. How incredibly selfish. The reality is that the IFF report details a large service gap in Wards 4, 5, 7, and 8. No such gap in Wards 1-3, 6. So.....we need to encourage new charters to open up in their areas with the service gaps -not Ward 1-3. If the high-performing charters in your neighborhood are not good enough for Jasper and Zoe, send them to privates. Having a ward preference will allow new charters to serve the underserved (which doesn't mean FARMs per se - only means aren't enough schools in neighborhood clusters) because it gives them a built-in list of student candidates. Reducing commute time helps families and children spend more quality time with each other. Go Tommy!

[Anonymous]

This is why I would like to see a copy of the proposed legislation---

if the intent is to only apply it prospectively---i.e., no existing charter school would be subject to the locational preference requirement---that is a slightly different issue.

However, I still think it is a terrible idea. One of the core ideas behind charters is to allow the innovation to create schools that have a particularly bent and focus. Forcing a locational requirement undercuts that goal, e.g., if my only "locational perference" charter is Yu Ying and my choice is Yu Ying or an underperforming DCPS, then I would probably either suck it up and choose Yu Ying (and be a lackluster addition to their mission) or else move out of the District altogether. Neither of those results is what District policymakers should want.

[Anonymous]

Is there a listing somewhere of charter schools per Ward. People keep saying that Wards 1 - 3 are well served, I can only think of a few Charters in Ward 2. I must be forgetting some.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is there a listing somewhere of charter schools per Ward. People keep saying that Wards 1 - 3 are well served, I can only think of a few Charters in Ward 2. I must be forgetting some.

PP here - I just found it: http://www.dcpubliccharter.com/data/images/pcsb%20list%20by%20tiers_dec1.pdf.

Not much in Ward 2.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is there a listing somewhere of charter schools per Ward. People keep saying that Wards 1 - 3 are well served, I can only think of a few Charters in Ward 2. I must be forgetting some.

PP here - I just found it: http://www.dcpubliccharter.com/data/images/pcsb%20list%20by%20tiers_dec1.pdf.

Not much in Ward 2.

That link only includes schools which are in Tiers 1, 2 or 3, so it doesn't include early, adult, or special education schools.

This is a really good set of data from the PCSB among the package they distributed in advance of the first "Neighborhood Preference Task Force" meeting.

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B1jXQpCEXCTZdjFLYjJQYjc5eEk

Task Force Web Page:

http://www.dcpcsb.org/About-the-Board/Neighborhood-Preference-Task-Force.aspx

[Anonymous]

No legislation yet, just a task force:

http://m.washingtonpost.com/blogs/dc-schools-insider/post/dc-considers-neighborhood-admissions-preference-for-charter-schools/2012/10/03/b3934846-0cc6-11e2-bb5e-492c0d30bff6_blog.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is why I would like to see a copy of the proposed legislation---

if the intent is to only apply it prospectively---i.e., no existing charter school would be subject to the locational preference requirement---that is a slightly different issue.

However, I still think it is a terrible idea. One of the core ideas behind charters is to allow the innovation to create schools that have a particularly bent and focus. Forcing a locational requirement undercuts that goal, e.g., if my only "locational perference" charter is Yu Ying and my choice is Yu Ying or an underperforming DCPS, then I would probably either suck it up and choose Yu Ying (and be a lackluster addition to their mission) or else move out of the District altogether. Neither of those results is what District policymakers should want.

I get your point. But right now my only location preference is my in-bounds DCPS school, Bancroft, which offers a very specialized bent and low test scores to boot. I have no preference to attend any so-called traditional school (good or bad) and was shut out of all lotteries. Is that what policymakers -- and families -- should want?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I get your point. But right now my only location preference is my in-bounds DCPS school, Bancroft, which offers a very specialized bent and low test scores to boot. I have no preference to attend any so-called traditional school (good or bad) and was shut out of all lotteries. Is that what policymakers -- and families -- should want?

So you want locational preference at a charter school because you don't like your neighborhood option? Of course nobody is altruistic when they are thinking about their own kids. I don't have a neighborhood school that I like either, AND I don't have any charters I like around me either. I also was shut out of the top charters this year. So I should have an even smaller chance of getting into a great charter because I can't afford to move nearby? The idea that locational preference for charters is going to HELP regular or poor families in DC is pure fiction; on the contrary, it would help the most affluent, who would be able to pick from choice charter neighborhoods as well as choice DCPS neighborhoods.

PS - Lots of families would consider themselves lucky to be in-bounds for Bancroft.