Burgundy Farm

[Anonymous]

Ah, so teachers get to sit around doing 0-60 minutes of Zoom per day (that was our experience in the spring) while parents scramble to find child care and/or try to educate our young children while holding down full-time jobs.

Question for the teachers: I want to know when you are willing to come back to work so I can right-set my expectations for the rest of the school year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ah, so teachers get to sit around doing 0-60 minutes of Zoom per day (that was our experience in the spring) while parents scramble to find child care and/or try to educate our young children while holding down full-time jobs.

Question for the teachers: I want to know when you are willing to come back to work so I can right-set my expectations for the rest of the school year.

I wish parents would understand that the spring was an absolute dumpster fire change for everyone. No one was prepared for that and had to pivot to something no one was ready for. Many of the schools that I am aware of have spent money helping teachers become better teachers for virtual learning with professional development and more licenses for online teaching tools. Chances are your child's teachers are also scrambling to figure out child care. Also, from the school models I've seen, there is much more synchronous time online for all of the divisions compared with the spring experience, which was again, out of the blue and unexpected.

Schools and teachers are not to blame for the woefully incompetent national 'strategy' for combatting the pandemic. Be mad at the national response, the lack of testing ability, slow test results, patchwork restriction, families still hosting large parties, kids still playing and traveling with club sports, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Ah, so teachers get to sit around doing 0-60 minutes of Zoom per day (that was our experience in the spring) while parents scramble to find child care and/or try to educate our young children while holding down full-time jobs.

Question for the teachers: I want to know when you are willing to come back to work so I can right-set my expectations for the rest of the school year.

I wish parents would understand that the spring was an absolute dumpster fire change for everyone. No one was prepared for that and had to pivot to something no one was ready for. Many of the schools that I am aware of have spent money helping teachers become better teachers for virtual learning with professional development and more licenses for online teaching tools. Chances are your child's teachers are also scrambling to figure out child care. Also, from the school models I've seen, there is much more synchronous time online for all of the divisions compared with the spring experience, which was again, out of the blue and unexpected.

Schools and teachers are not to blame for the woefully incompetent national 'strategy' for combatting the pandemic. Be mad at the national response, the lack of testing ability, slow test results, patchwork restriction, families still hosting large parties, kids still playing and traveling with club sports, etc.

Of course I’m upset by the pandemic and those who aren’t following recommendations. I’m also angry at teachers from Burgundy who are refusing to come do their jobs despite the unique safety measures the school has been able to put into place.

Regarding the spring, there was something my kid’s teachers could have done. They could have scheduled one-on-one time to work on core competencies like reading and math instead of doing one 30-minute Zoom each and calling it a day. There is absolutely no excuse why all of that time was given up for 2.5 months.

Both my partner and I are expected on site at our jobs. Since Burgundy is turning out to be a colossal waste of money, we now have to come up with more for child care. I can’t even imagine what it will cost us if we want to find someone who can actually provide our child with the education Burgundy is supposed to, because we cannot do it while we are at work.

What do you propose we do?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a former parent I find this appalling. This school is the best situated to structure outdoor learning. They need to fire teachers who refuse. And to be honest that might be a good thing since it’s time for some of those teachers to move on.

The anonymous online petition posted by the Washington Post was signed by 17 Burgundy teachers. I am sure the number refusing to go in person is even higher. If they fire 17+ teachers, that is basically the entire lower school teaching staff.

Good. Fire them, clean house, refund parents so they can find other education options and start over. The teaching was always the weak point there. Maybe they can fix that by taking out the garbage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All money should be refunded. Their DL is on par with or worse than public. No one sends their kid there for the academics. If the campus isn’t available for the kids the value of that place zero.

Agree. The whole value is in the campus, which is pretty nice. Their DL is garbage and the quality of the teachers has always been mediocre.

Interesting that Browne is still proceeding with opening plans.

And their reopening plan is very good. I believe they in fact will re open ON CAMPUS.

[Anonymous]

Well, I'm saddened by the situation and somewhat mad at myself for paying the tuition when I should have seen this coming.... but Alexandria's numbers are higher now than they were when we all hurried to stay home in the spring. I'm not mad at Burgundy. The pandemic is affecting all of us, including the teachers and HOS, and we're all doing the best we can.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All money should be refunded. Their DL is on par with or worse than public. No one sends their kid there for the academics. If the campus isn’t available for the kids the value of that place zero.

Agree. The whole value is in the campus, which is pretty nice. Their DL is garbage and the quality of the teachers has always been mediocre.

Interesting that Browne is still proceeding with opening plans.

And their reopening plan is very good. I believe they in fact will re open ON CAMPUS.

Also, preschool and JK will stay open even if VA goes to phase 1. For what its worth, their childcare camp has been open since 2nd week of June with no problem. Kudos to Browne.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All money should be refunded. Their DL is on par with or worse than public. No one sends their kid there for the academics. If the campus isn’t available for the kids the value of that place zero.

Agree. The whole value is in the campus, which is pretty nice. Their DL is garbage and the quality of the teachers has always been mediocre.

Interesting that Browne is still proceeding with opening plans.

And their reopening plan is very good. I believe they in fact will re open ON CAMPUS.

Also, preschool and JK will stay open even if VA goes to phase 1. For what its worth, their childcare camp has been open since 2nd week of June with no problem. Kudos to Browne.

We’re looking at next fall and this whole episode made us realize we’d rather be at Browne than Burgundy.

[Anonymous]

Who are these teachers that can all afford to quit their jobs??? Burgundy should have called their bluff. Ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who are these teachers that can all afford to quit their jobs??? Burgundy should have called their bluff. Ridiculous.

Agreed. With the obvious exception being those who are in high-risk categories. And no, non-severe asthma doesn’t count.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well, I'm saddened by the situation and somewhat mad at myself for paying the tuition when I should have seen this coming.... but Alexandria's numbers are higher now than they were when we all hurried to stay home in the spring. I'm not mad at Burgundy. The pandemic is affecting all of us, including the teachers and HOS, and we're all doing the best we can.

The teachers and HOS are not doing their jobs at all but demanding they’re paid in full with parents’ tuition dollars. I’m mad at them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our kids are not at Burgundy, but I have friends there. I got an email from Arlington Magazine just days after APS announced a virtual start that was an ad from Burgundy advertising 5 days on campus in person.

I sent it to friends at Burgundy. All of our reactions were that it was a dangerous, dumb money grab.

See I have a real problem with this. Those money grabbing ads were everywhere (I’m in Alexandria).

[Anonymous]

Chances are your child's teachers are also scrambling to figure out child care.

Are they also paying $70K for virtual school for two kids at the same time? I am stretched to my limit by this cost. I simply do not have the capacity to pay for this plus a person to come in and watch my kids do virtual school all day while I go into the office.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Well, I'm saddened by the situation and somewhat mad at myself for paying the tuition when I should have seen this coming.... but Alexandria's numbers are higher now than they were when we all hurried to stay home in the spring. I'm not mad at Burgundy. The pandemic is affecting all of us, including the teachers and HOS, and we're all doing the best we can.

The teachers and HOS are not doing their jobs at all but demanding they’re paid in full with parents’ tuition dollars. I’m mad at them.

And they collected a $2 million PPP loan

[Anonymous]

The school and teachers are the only ones who are making out here. It feels like parents and kids come last.