Why are so many DC schools so bad?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The no one has solutions argument is bullshit. Poor people aren't stupid--give anyone access to opportunity and they'll take it.

My grandmother grew up doing migrant farmwork, but still, she--and many many others from her poor, rural high school went to a state school for college and worked their way up. My other grandmother was a war widow with an infant and 16. She grew up eating lard on toast. She, too, put herself through school (and at that point with four kids) and became successful selling real estate.

We were the gentrifying yuppies at my poor, inner city elementary school growing up, but we weren't the only ones. It was an amazingly diverse place, where students from all backgrounds learned together. And we all did learn. The magnet school I attended after skewed slightly more affluent, but there too were families from all over.

We mixed. And I think that is the key. The mantra that poor kids are just poor and that you can't risk your own children being "exposed" to them is bullshit and sadly pervasive now. And that is a new sentiment. And a disturbing one.

Your situation is an anecdote. Study after study now say that the US is behind the UK in social mobility. It's a fallacy. You will most likely die in the same social class in which you were born. I used to work at OSSE and am now at a nonprofit and saw a lot of data. Kids who make it out of poverty are literally extraordinary. Hands down.

But DCPS, despite its failed reform, would say that's because those poor kids did not get effective teachers. All childres can learn with effective teachers. Now DCPS has a teacher evaluation system that gaurantees bad teachers will be fired and still the kids aren't learning -- and the people who devised this system still have their jobs. What gives?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See, I see that as part of the middle class failing... You think the only schools that are good are the ones in neighborhoods that are not of your class. We are relatively umc, and my experience with DC schools has been that this poverty bugaboo everyone is so scared of? Not a huge deal. Kids are kids, and all want to learn.

And your school is where? ward 7 or 8?

And how old are your kids?

[Anonymous]

Poor kids are way behind by the time they start school, and they struggle to catch up. it's intervention from birth to 5 that is crucial in giving kids a chance to move out of generational poverty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My situation is not just an anecdote. If you look at the lives of many of your own relatives back from the 20s to the 60s in America, you will see the same pattern of an upward trajectory. Trust me, both of my grandmothers, while awesome, were not particularly extraordinary... I don't even think they worked very hard--but it was possible, common even.

That social movement has been lost, in favor of hand-wringing and economic segregation.

Your situation is, by definition, an anecdote. It is not the result of a study. It's your family's life experience, which is not, on its own, generalizable to the experiences of others, even others who share your family's characteristics.

That doesn't mean that it didn't happen, or that your family's experience was unique to them. My grandmother grew up on a dairy farm during the depression with parents who hadn't completed high school and she died with 2 PhDs and a $4M estate. My husband's grandmother grew up during the same time, on the other side of the country, and while she worked very hard, when she died, her estate barely covered her funeral.

The reality is that social mobility as it is popularly understood in the US, via stories like my grandmother and your grandmother and you, is largely a myth. Your family mixed, but many do not. How many white people do you know who live in Wards 7 or 8? How many white people do you know with kids above first grade who are attending non-charter public schools in DC outside of Ward 3 and a smattering of schools in Wards 1, 2, 4 and 6? This city is not mixed. It's not mixed racially, and while some neighborhoods are mixed economically, that is not reflected in the public school population outside the charter sector.

Motivated parents seek charters in order to avoid parents (and students) they perceive to be unmotivated. Not all of them are wealthy, of course, but there is probably a higher population of non-wealthy parents at charters than wealthy parents in DCPS.

[Anonymous]

School in ward 4, kids in upper elementary.

And yes, some poor kids are behind. And many can catch up. The attitude that poverty, like cooties, is catching, is part of the problem I see with many of you here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:See, I see that as part of the middle class failing... You think the only schools that are good are the ones in neighborhoods that are not of your class. We are relatively umc, and my experience with DC schools has been that this poverty bugaboo everyone is so scared of? Not a huge deal. Kids are kids, and all want to learn.

Diminishing the effects of poverty on children does not help children who are living in poverty. Poverty is a big deal to the people living in it, and it does have a huge impact on children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is hard for me to understand how fewer than 10-20% of students could be proficient in math and English in elementary school, but that's the case with a sizable portion of the schools in neighborhoods where I can afford to live in DC. How do kids get that far behind where they are supposed to be for their age? Is it the schools themselves? Is it the parents? Is it something else about their environment? What an incredibly sad state of affairs.

The answer is easy: look at their parents.

Schools can educate, but they can't perform miracles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Real issue is no one has solutions to poverty's multigenerational effects on education. No one likes to tell poor people their children will end up the same. It's just one more way the promise of the American Dream isn't available to all.

This is not true you know. There IS a solution and it is called extreme taxation, aka redistribution of wealth. It's just unpopular. If you taxed the UMC and rich at extremely high rates and redistributed this money to the poor such that every family had a living wage, you would see some progress. There is little support for it however.

That's always the solution that they want: gimme another check.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See, I see that as part of the middle class failing... You think the only schools that are good are the ones in neighborhoods that are not of your class. We are relatively umc, and my experience with DC schools has been that this poverty bugaboo everyone is so scared of? Not a huge deal. Kids are kids, and all want to learn.

And your school is where? ward 7 or 8?

Marion Barry was responsible for 35 years of stagnation and dysfunction in Ward 8, including in the schools. Thank God that he ceased having much of an impact on the rest of the city after 1997. Now that he's gone, Ward 8 is still going to take a while.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See, I see that as part of the middle class failing... You think the only schools that are good are the ones in neighborhoods that are not of your class. We are relatively umc, and my experience with DC schools has been that this poverty bugaboo everyone is so scared of? Not a huge deal. Kids are kids, and all want to learn.

And your school is where? ward 7 or 8?

Marion Barry was responsible for 35 years of stagnation and dysfunction in Ward 8, including in the schools. Thank God that he ceased having much of an impact on the rest of the city after 1997. Now that he's gone, Ward 8 is still going to take a while.

How can you blame an entire Ward on one person?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See, I see that as part of the middle class failing... You think the only schools that are good are the ones in neighborhoods that are not of your class. We are relatively umc, and my experience with DC schools has been that this poverty bugaboo everyone is so scared of? Not a huge deal. Kids are kids, and all want to learn.

And your school is where? ward 7 or 8?

Marion Barry was responsible for 35 years of stagnation and dysfunction in Ward 8, including in the schools. Thank God that he ceased having much of an impact on the rest of the city after 1997. Now that he's gone, Ward 8 is still going to take a while.

How can you blame an entire Ward on one person?

For the last 20 years DC could blame an entire Ward for one person!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:See, I see that as part of the middle class failing... You think the only schools that are good are the ones in neighborhoods that are not of your class. We are relatively umc, and my experience with DC schools has been that this poverty bugaboo everyone is so scared of? Not a huge deal. Kids are kids, and all want to learn.

And your school is where? ward 7 or 8?

Marion Barry was responsible for 35 years of stagnation and dysfunction in Ward 8, including in the schools. Thank God that he ceased having much of an impact on the rest of the city after 1997. Now that he's gone, Ward 8 is still going to take a while.

The "Ward 8 Problem" is the result of a failed urban renewal implemented by the federal gov't and business interests. Here was their brilliant idea: Take all of the poorest people in SW, NW, and NE and stick them in a faraway corner of town with the least amount of access to jobs, transportation and healthcare. But plenty of green trees and fresh air! The plan was doomed from the start.

Marion Barry was a late arrival and hardly had any effect on the condition of the community, outside of exploiting it for his own political gain.

[Anonymous]

The most housing projects are in Ward 6...the most prominent housing project is on Capitol Hill so affording DC and living DC comes are neighbors. Also, let the records show that the percentage is high on the sampling that's small. You can't have a school system of 25,000 and the testing population is less than 10,000 with a percentage showing 79%. That's why there's no uproar or outcry for Henderson to be removed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The most housing projects are in Ward 6...the most prominent housing project is on Capitol Hill so affording DC and living DC comes are neighbors. Also, let the records show that the percentage is high on the sampling that's small. You can't have a school system of 25,000 and the testing population is less than 10,000 with a percentage showing 79%. That's why there's no uproar or outcry for Henderson to be removed.

What housing project is that?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The most housing projects are in Ward 6...the most prominent housing project is on Capitol Hill so affording DC and living DC comes are neighbors. Also, let the records show that the percentage is high on the sampling that's small. You can't have a school system of 25,000 and the testing population is less than 10,000 with a percentage showing 79%. That's why there's no uproar or outcry for Henderson to be removed.

I think "the most prominent" housing project (and we can debate all day long how we are measuring prominent) - is Sursum Corda.