Good schools EoTP

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This. SH is actually going downhill. They scrapped honors English this school year and last, after a decade of offering it, on the grounds that the PARCC test wasn't given during the pandemic.

They could easily have given entering students a home-grown ELA assessment to make intelligent placements. They couldn't be bothered so your middle schooler winds up in ELA class with a bunch of students who can barely read. Not clear if honors English will be restored in the future.

Anyone who uses the terms "easily", "it's not hard" or similar destroy their credibility before they start.

[Anonymous]

Give it up. Hobson has given entering 6th graders a "home grown" math assessment to place them on higher or lower math tracks for the past several years. Easily.

[Anonymous]

It’s obvious DCPS is moving towards de-tracking. Efforts will likely be even more now with how awful the PARCC scores are since the pandemic. PP above is right. You are going to have kids in English class who can barely read with kids who are above grade level.

Now, more than ever, DCPS will redouble their efforts to focus on the bottom performers while caring nothing about the top. To them, the top are “fine” to cruise along as status quo without learning much or being challenged at all

I went to public school and always thought that my kid would go public. But their definition of fine is far from what my definition is. We are out and not playing this game of race to the bottom.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s obvious DCPS is moving towards de-tracking. Efforts will likely be even more now with how awful the PARCC scores are since the pandemic. PP above is right. You are going to have kids in English class who can barely read with kids who are above grade level.

Now, more than ever, DCPS will redouble their efforts to focus on the bottom performers while caring nothing about the top. To them, the top are “fine” to cruise along as status quo without learning much or being challenged at all

I went to public school and always thought that my kid would go public. But their definition of fine is far from what my definition is. We are out and not playing this game of race to the bottom.

But BASIS doesn't have a library!!!

[Anonymous]

True, and pathetic, along with your puerile obsession with the issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s obvious DCPS is moving towards de-tracking. Efforts will likely be even more now with how awful the PARCC scores are since the pandemic. PP above is right. You are going to have kids in English class who can barely read with kids who are above grade level.

Now, more than ever, DCPS will redouble their efforts to focus on the bottom performers while caring nothing about the top. To them, the top are “fine” to cruise along as status quo without learning much or being challenged at all

I went to public school and always thought that my kid would go public. But their definition of fine is far from what my definition is. We are out and not playing this game of race to the bottom.

This. Bowser and the city council are perfectly OK with Stuart Hobson detracked, no matter how many in boundary UMC families vote with their feet as a result.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s obvious DCPS is moving towards de-tracking. Efforts will likely be even more now with how awful the PARCC scores are since the pandemic. PP above is right. You are going to have kids in English class who can barely read with kids who are above grade level.

Now, more than ever, DCPS will redouble their efforts to focus on the bottom performers while caring nothing about the top. To them, the top are “fine” to cruise along as status quo without learning much or being challenged at all

I went to public school and always thought that my kid would go public. But their definition of fine is far from what my definition is. We are out and not playing this game of race to the bottom.

This. Bowser and the city council are perfectly OK with Stuart Hobson detracked, no matter how many in boundary UMC families vote with their feet as a result.

From Bowser's perspective (this is not true of much of the Council), this is an ideal political situation for her. As long as there are enough charter options for MC and UMC parents to reasonably satisfied, even enthusiastic about immersion, Montessori, and other specialty programming, there is not significant incentive to offer DCPS options for these families EotP. These tend to be the most demanding, hardest to satisfy public school parents. Look at how much drama gets stirred up by WotP parents over schools that are already high performing. For Bowser, what advantage is there to catering to this demographic EotP when there are already a number of charters targeting these kids, with expansion in the works? Once these parents are at charters, Bowser has limited-to-no responsibility and will no longer be the target of their ire.

Meanwhile, this frees up Bowser to focus on at risk kids and equity initiatives. Does she do this well? No, not at all, but the people negatively impacted aren't as vocal and demanding as the charter school parents.

This is key to Bowser's education approach, which continues to permit new and growing charters while limiting the ability of DCPS schools to serve students performing at or above grade level. It simplifies things for her. And since the Council has no real power over DCPS, their opposition on some of these matters is of limited influence.

[Anonymous]

Thank you for this smart analysis, PP.

Parents of little kids in DCPS elementary schools on Capitol Hill might want to take note. You sound naive when you chime in declaring your intent to send your children to one of the Ward 6 DCPS middle schools or Eastern.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the bolded statement reads as incredibly privileged. it should be about providing everyone at all levels with great schools. (while improving the middle schools could use more attention, my overall impression of bowser is that she does for the most part care about kids in dc.)

Incredibly privileged people like us on Capitol Hill (read many Federal employees) deserve neighborhood middle and high schools most of us are OK with for our tax dollars. Unfortunately, we're almost as far from having them as we were nearly 20 years ago, when my spouse and I bought our first property in the neighborhood.

Our overall impression is that Bowser could absolutely care less if UMC families with school-age kids, particularly whites, bail on city schools, and the District itself for that matter. Fenty cared, Gray, too. Not this short-sighted mayor.

Being OK with is such a BS target. You have MS and HS available to you. Attend them. They will become OK enough for you.

You first, mate.

If the elementary schools are good enough, then why wouldn’t the middle and high schools be good enough? It would be the same children from elementary.

Because the ES kids peel off starting in 5th (BASIS, Latin, private, parochial) and then again in 6th. The reality of ES on the Hill is that ECE is very strong but parents who really wanted to buy in realize in upper ES that the academics are lackluster and behavioral issues get much worse as hormones kick in. At that point a lot of parents who wanted to buy in can't take the risk. In all fairness I think this is also the reality at several HCS as well. This is the fundamental challenge facing DCPS/Charters and education in general. How much (if at all) wills schools cater to or even care about high performing kids? What does "equity" mean?

Just weighing in as a family in this situation, and this is spot on. And it's really the way that behavioral issues interact with academics that pushes you to start looking at charters. Our kid is mostly on grade level academically, maybe a little above grade level in ELA. But not an academic superstar. But one of the main things she has going for her in a DCPS elementary is that she is attentive, a good listener, has strong emotional regulation skills, and no behavioral concerns. As we progress in elementary, what this means is that she is used as an emotional regulator in some groups (assigned to pairs and groups with kids who struggle with these things, in the hopes she will be a tempering influence) or is left to her own devices while teachers focus on kids who need more one-to-one help with behavioral issues, since she can function independently without help.

At first this doesn't seem like such a bad thing. I recognize many of the kids with bigger issues are dealing with issues my child had never dealt with. I also think it's positive for her to learn to work independently, and to learn to work with different kinds of people. But the situation gets more pronounced past ECE, as some of the other kids with her emotiona/behavioral skills leave for other schools. This makes it harder for her to make friends because where in younger grades she would have gravitated to the other quiet, studious kids in class, she might not find another such kid in mid-to-late elementary. And we start to worry that what was benign neglect may actually hold her back, especially as we get closer to middle school. It was one thing when she was one of the early readers in class, and could sit and read or work on writing while the teachers provided intensive phonics help to other kids. But now she needs to be refining writing and critical thinking skills, and it doesn't feel like that's happening at schools. We're supplementing, but that takes time away from other activities, including just playing and building friendships.

We're not going to make it past 4th in DCPS and there is no way our kid is going to SH. It's not the right environment for her and I think both academically and socially, she will do much better in an environment where there are more kids who are working at her level academically and not struggling with basic behavioral expectations. I don't expect a school with no behavioral problems. But we have the option, through the lottery or by moving, to send her to a school where the majority of kids have basic emotional regulation skills. I'm no longer convinced we can find that in DCPS at the MS and HS level.

+1000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s obvious DCPS is moving towards de-tracking. Efforts will likely be even more now with how awful the PARCC scores are since the pandemic. PP above is right. You are going to have kids in English class who can barely read with kids who are above grade level.

Now, more than ever, DCPS will redouble their efforts to focus on the bottom performers while caring nothing about the top. To them, the top are “fine” to cruise along as status quo without learning much or being challenged at all

I went to public school and always thought that my kid would go public. But their definition of fine is far from what my definition is. We are out and not playing this game of race to the bottom.

This. Bowser and the city council are perfectly OK with Stuart Hobson detracked, no matter how many in boundary UMC families vote with their feet as a result.

From Bowser's perspective (this is not true of much of the Council), this is an ideal political situation for her. As long as there are enough charter options for MC and UMC parents to reasonably satisfied, even enthusiastic about immersion, Montessori, and other specialty programming, there is not significant incentive to offer DCPS options for these families EotP. These tend to be the most demanding, hardest to satisfy public school parents. Look at how much drama gets stirred up by WotP parents over schools that are already high performing. For Bowser, what advantage is there to catering to this demographic EotP when there are already a number of charters targeting these kids, with expansion in the works? Once these parents are at charters, Bowser has limited-to-no responsibility and will no longer be the target of their ire.

Meanwhile, this frees up Bowser to focus on at risk kids and equity initiatives. Does she do this well? No, not at all, but the people negatively impacted aren't as vocal and demanding as the charter school parents.

This is key to Bowser's education approach, which continues to permit new and growing charters while limiting the ability of DCPS schools to serve students performing at or above grade level. It simplifies things for her. And since the Council has no real power over DCPS, their opposition on some of these matters is of limited influence.

This post is so spot on, a cautionary tale, essential reading.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:True, and pathetic, along with your puerile obsession with the issue.

Pretty sure the post you replied to was sarcasm.

[Anonymous]

What this sounds like to me is that parents of kids doing well in elementary and middle schools outside Ward 3 feeder patterns should do is show up to Council budget meetings and testify.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:True, and pathetic, along with your puerile obsession with the issue.

Pretty sure the post you replied to was sarcasm.

. Hilarious. Just so funny that the best school EotP can’t afford a library.

[Anonymous]

See the intelligent post above that opens with "from Bowser's perspective."

If the District needed to fork out for good facilities at the handful of middle/high school charters that work to appease UMC parents EotP, the budget masters would....pay up. They don't need to because parents mob these schools despite their weak facilities.

Just no incentive for Bower or the city council to create line items for charter libraries etc. If you want good facilities, serious extra-curriculars/enrichment and/or above grade level course work at the ms level you move to the burbs or go private. That's how it works in DC.

[Anonymous]

the charters get slightly over 3k per student per year specifically for facilities. it doesnt go far in dc. that said, the charters take a lot of money away from dcps and are one reason dcps is not as strong as it might potentially otherwise be