Shining Stars Montessori in Brookland
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Anonymous
| The behavior management scores were not so good though |
Anonymous
No. These are part of the 5-year charter review process. They are very important (which is why SSMA had to do it twice when the first report was low) but separate from Tier ratings. |
Anonymous
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If you want to compare SSMA's QSR with other schools' reports, they are all posted here.
http://www.dcpcsb.org/report/qualitative-school-reviews |
Anonymous
Doesn't make it super easy to compare, does it? |
Anonymous
it's a nice snapshot of the school, which seems to be running much more smoothly than it was 2 years ago. I imagine the new building and better retention helped. |
Anonymous
Well since we have nothing at all like this for DCPS, I'm not going to complain about the presentation. You can use these to compare the Montessori charters against each other. Or get a better sense of what happens at KIPP and DC Prep vs. a so-called HRC. |
Anonymous
| To the PP asking about whether to enrol her/his child with special needs: We are one of the families who left/was counseled out a couple years ago due to the school's abysmal special ed system. It's great to hear that they have a new coordinator, but everyone involved at the time - from the E.D. to the principal to the classroom teacher to the sped coordinator and providers - had one goal, and that goal was to deny services to SN students. I would not feel comfortable recommending SSMA to another SN parent unless all of those people have been replaced and there has been some sort of radical shift in attitudes towards differential instruction. At the time, the party line was that they would only do things the Montessori way, and that did not include legally-mandated accommodations for children with different learning needs. I find the Montessori excuse rather specious because other Montessori charters manage to accommodate SN kids just fine. |
Anonymous
NP. Also Maria Montessori started her work with underprivileged and disabled children. No excuse for them not accommodating learning differences. |
Anonymous
| We were very happy there. Our child has moved onto middle school now (which they don't have, which is unfortunate)--but it was a very positive, nurturing experience. I don't get the naysaying either, except that some always tear down instead of up. |
Anonymous
| I have a rising Prek4 there and the school is a great diverse quiet gem. They raised a lot of money and they are training bright children which is evident in how polite they are in the halls and how they perform at the monthly peace assemblies. No snobs wanted! |
Anonymous
To be fair, public schools in DC are famous for not having it together for special needs. And DCPS is worse. They had a class action recently where it took them so long to provide child find services that they argued the case should be thrown out since the children had aged out of the program. Not that they weren't guilty (they were). Not that they had solved the problem (they hadn't). Just that if they could go without providing services for those particular children long enough, then the point was moot. Ah, a return to the days of Blackman-Jones is a'comin.... |
Anonymous
Only Problem with this is that the people interested in popularity contests also raise money and get things done. If there is a need on special ed front, you want exactly one of those parents to be around to throw the fit for you. They have pros and cons. |