APS School Board race

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:NYT finds connections between the Open Schools parents and the parents' rights anti-LGBTQ set. This is why a lot of people are worried about the leader of the local Open Schools group being on the APS Board.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/07/upshot/school-curriculums-survey-lgbtq.html?fbclid=IwAR28go5nsGsmnYRmXr5OaTHgHdOIvoQK55vK-DaZmKIUhM9XWYiOFNCXuGw

You are really stretching. There is literally not even a hint of this in her personal statements or campaign materials, etc.

--someone who has actually engaged with her directly and personally and could not be less worried about this as a possibility

Of course she is too smart to put this kind of stuff in her campaign materials or to say it out loud. But she didn't run away from it either, and she embraced those in the group that she led. I was in APE for a little while. People have choices about who to associate with and their choices are telling. I left when I realized who else was in APE with me and that those views were welcomed. It made me very uncomfortable. Miranda, on the other hand, led the group.

So you're saying you want a group-think board that only listens to one type of person and sticks to the party line. Got it.

I don't want someone who listens to the hateful anti LGBTQ crowd. All viewpoints are not equal.

You definitely are the majority in Arlington. But then you can’t wonder why things are so poorly done in APS. I mean no one ever had any differing viewpoint and everyone says they are do everything perfectly. So I don’t understand why people like you even bother to get upset at anything in the schools? It doesn’t make sense - you got what you asked for and voted for 🤷‍♀️

Maybe you will rethink your position on group think after missing middle passes and a nice little condo building goes up a few houses down from you. I know there are older residents salivating at the prospect of this passing. Up until it passes they will say it’s a terrible thing, ruining the neighborhood, and so on. Week after it passes they will be looking for an agent to market their property to developers ….

So you are ... sticking up for the hateful anti LGBTQ crowd because you think we need their differing viewpoint? Got it.

+1

Let’s not normalize LGBTQ bigotry in Arlington.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I look forward to the debates where Miranda can go on the record to say how she feels about learning loss and who it affects, trans rights, "CRT", SROs, banning books and the like.

I don't want to vote for that kid Antonio, but he may be the one based on her answers instead of people here speaking for her.

She wouldn’t say anything openly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you are still having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that schools WERE closed for too long with disastrous results. That’s not even a controversial opinion at this point.

You’re blinded by hindsight.

It was reasonable to wait until teachers had vaccines.

Bullying others was not reasonable.

Except that many red states had schools that were open before vaccines, and did just fine. Plus all the local privates. It was not reasonable. It was a disaster, still is, and will take years or possibly decades to recover from. (Thus all the focus on learning loss.)

Your true colors are showing.

I was skeptical when Florida, Georgia, etc. opened full time in person in fall 2020. It felt very risky. The thing is, nothing bad happened. We could have learned from that, but we didn't because politics.

This 100%. I'm purple all the way. I was nervous about sending kids to school with masks in fall 2020 in Aug/September. By October it was obvious it was fine. By January I was dying inside at what a normal, non-traumatizing school year my red state niece and nephew were having while my APS kid was sitting in her bedroom by herself all year. And even now, when the data clearly show what an unmitigated disaster that was, still so many people in Arlington defend it like it was no big deal, completely out of touch with the reality of most of the rest of the nation. APS was in the bottom 10% of all districts nationally in terms of days of in person school. We were objectively worse. And it was a a bad call.

People, this was not just happening in red states, especially as teachers were vaccinated. You're just reinforcing the connection between republicans and open schools. Many democrats supported open schools, including President Biden and Democratic Governors.

As teachers became vaccinated our kids did go back in the building.

We were very much in line with other blue areas.

The # of days may be skewed because VA has fewer school days in general.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Hi all - APE Board Member here - our group rules are posted on our Facebook forum if anyone would like to take a look. Bullying comments are not allowed and are deleted or requested to be edited at our request. We strongly encourage respectful debate and disagreement. Our forum has over a thousand parents and teachers who may have different POVs on a wide range of issues (something I think is unique in todays world) but ad hominem attacks are not allowed and respect is required. Also, as we mention in our rules, the forum (aka fb group) is NOT Arlington Parent’s official platform, you can find that on our Facebook page and website at Arlingtonparents.org. We want the forum to be an asset for all arlingtonians as a place to learn from each other, ask for information, etc. Our moderators try very hard to facilitate conversation and dialogue while respecting differences of opinion. Thanks!

That doesn’t change the fact that many of your members were openly bullying teachers, parents, and administrators during the pandemic.

We all saw it so it’s pointless to pretend like it didn’t happen.

[Anonymous]

That is not correct. APS did not open till mandated to by the Governor. https://www.insidenova.com/headlines/northam-orders-all-virginia-schools-to-plan-for-in-person-learning-by-march-15/article_3110e7a4-67ce-11eb-9c20-a7413b721660.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you are still having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that schools WERE closed for too long with disastrous results. That’s not even a controversial opinion at this point.

You’re blinded by hindsight.

It was reasonable to wait until teachers had vaccines.

Bullying others was not reasonable.

Except that many red states had schools that were open before vaccines, and did just fine. Plus all the local privates. It was not reasonable. It was a disaster, still is, and will take years or possibly decades to recover from. (Thus all the focus on learning loss.)

Your true colors are showing.

I was skeptical when Florida, Georgia, etc. opened full time in person in fall 2020. It felt very risky. The thing is, nothing bad happened. We could have learned from that, but we didn't because politics.

This 100%. I'm purple all the way. I was nervous about sending kids to school with masks in fall 2020 in Aug/September. By October it was obvious it was fine. By January I was dying inside at what a normal, non-traumatizing school year my red state niece and nephew were having while my APS kid was sitting in her bedroom by herself all year. And even now, when the data clearly show what an unmitigated disaster that was, still so many people in Arlington defend it like it was no big deal, completely out of touch with the reality of most of the rest of the nation. APS was in the bottom 10% of all districts nationally in terms of days of in person school. We were objectively worse. And it was a a bad call.

People, this was not just happening in red states, especially as teachers were vaccinated. You're just reinforcing the connection between republicans and open schools. Many democrats supported open schools, including President Biden and Democratic Governors.

As teachers became vaccinated our kids did go back in the building.

We were very much in line with other blue areas.

The # of days may be skewed because VA has fewer school days in general.

It is very easy to fact check this claim. https://about.burbio.com/school-opening-tracker

See this one coded by color of governor’s party: https://twitter.com/kerpen/status/1383775621780697088?s=46&t=EXKqT88PtkuZNoKMxI9zGQ

It absolutely was political, not science-driven and kids were the victims. Here is an economics paper on the correlation with remote school (you’ll see on that Burbio chart how Virginia stacked up against the other 50 states - hint it wasn’t good) and learning loss. “We find that pass rates declined compared to prior years and that these declines were larger in districts with less in-person instruction. Passing rates in math declined by 14.2 percentage points on average; we estimate this decline was 10.1 percentage points smaller for districts fully in-person.”

You all can continue to debate about “meanies” who fought for their kids when they were advocating to open school but you can’t dispute they were right about the harms. What would be GREAT for the children is if everyone can move on past 2020 and focus on what’s needed NOW and that’s parents being grown ups and trying to center children and help them now. Adults were the center of focus for years and that needs to stop now.

[Anonymous]

Can we for the love of Pete have one APS thread not hijacked by the APE haters? Yes you disagreed with them. PLEASE MOVE ON.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can we for the love of Pete have one APS thread not hijacked by the APE haters? Yes you disagreed with them. PLEASE MOVE ON.

But the thread is predominately about a candidate whose reputation is largely based on her role in that organization. If people don’t want to talk about it or hear views about it, maybe don’t start threads involving this candidate? I’m personally more interested in knowing the ACDC’s view of MT than the views of anonymous posters who like or dislike MT and APE. Does anyone know how the ACDC views her?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Some of you are still having a hard time coming to terms with the fact that schools WERE closed for too long with disastrous results. That’s not even a controversial opinion at this point.

You’re blinded by hindsight.

It was reasonable to wait until teachers had vaccines.

Bullying others was not reasonable.

Except that many red states had schools that were open before vaccines, and did just fine. Plus all the local privates. It was not reasonable. It was a disaster, still is, and will take years or possibly decades to recover from. (Thus all the focus on learning loss.)

Your true colors are showing.

I was skeptical when Florida, Georgia, etc. opened full time in person in fall 2020. It felt very risky. The thing is, nothing bad happened. We could have learned from that, but we didn't because politics.

This 100%. I'm purple all the way. I was nervous about sending kids to school with masks in fall 2020 in Aug/September. By October it was obvious it was fine. By January I was dying inside at what a normal, non-traumatizing school year my red state niece and nephew were having while my APS kid was sitting in her bedroom by herself all year. And even now, when the data clearly show what an unmitigated disaster that was, still so many people in Arlington defend it like it was no big deal, completely out of touch with the reality of most of the rest of the nation. APS was in the bottom 10% of all districts nationally in terms of days of in person school. We were objectively worse. And it was a a bad call.

People, this was not just happening in red states, especially as teachers were vaccinated. You're just reinforcing the connection between republicans and open schools. Many democrats supported open schools, including President Biden and Democratic Governors.

As teachers became vaccinated our kids did go back in the building.

We were very much in line with other blue areas.

The # of days may be skewed because VA has fewer school days in general.

It is very easy to fact check this claim. https://about.burbio.com/school-opening-tracker

See this one coded by color of governor’s party: https://twitter.com/kerpen/status/1383775621780697088?s=46&t=EXKqT88PtkuZNoKMxI9zGQ

It absolutely was political, not science-driven and kids were the victims. Here is an economics paper on the correlation with remote school (you’ll see on that Burbio chart how Virginia stacked up against the other 50 states - hint it wasn’t good) and learning loss. “We find that pass rates declined compared to prior years and that these declines were larger in districts with less in-person instruction. Passing rates in math declined by 14.2 percentage points on average; we estimate this decline was 10.1 percentage points smaller for districts fully in-person.”

You all can continue to debate about “meanies” who fought for their kids when they were advocating to open school but you can’t dispute they were right about the harms. What would be GREAT for the children is if everyone can move on past 2020 and focus on what’s needed NOW and that’s parents being grown ups and trying to center children and help them now. Adults were the center of focus for years and that needs to stop now.

Oh look. Blue areas tend have denser populations with increased needs.

Waiting until teachers were vaccinated was reasonable for the info we had at the time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can we for the love of Pete have one APS thread not hijacked by the APE haters? Yes you disagreed with them. PLEASE MOVE ON.

Then stop pushing APE candidates.

Who actually agrees with their bullying and RWNJs?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:That is not correct. APS did not open till mandated to by the Governor. https://www.insidenova.com/headlines/northam-orders-all-virginia-schools-to-plan-for-in-person-learning-by-march-15/article_3110e7a4-67ce-11eb-9c20-a7413b721660.html

We were already planning to reopen. Duran announced that before the mandate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can we for the love of Pete have one APS thread not hijacked by the APE haters? Yes you disagreed with them. PLEASE MOVE ON.

But the thread is predominately about a candidate whose reputation is largely based on her role in that organization. If people don’t want to talk about it or hear views about it, maybe don’t start threads involving this candidate? I’m personally more interested in knowing the ACDC’s view of MT than the views of anonymous posters who like or dislike MT and APE. Does anyone know how the ACDC views her?

Many of them are supporting her: https://www.mirandaturner.org/my-supporters

[Anonymous]

Burbio’s interpretations were off.

From an old thread:

Anonymous wrote:Burbio needs to share more details about their "in-person index". Seems like they may not be comparing apples to apples.

Were they calculating based on the # of days? Hours?

According to this piece, Burbio is using a different baseline number of days/hours than VA uses. They are using 1170 hours.
https://www.the74million.org/article/one-fate-two-fates-red-states-blue-states-new-data-reveals-a-432-hour-in-person-learning-gap-produced-by-the-politics-of-pandemic-schooling/
Using Burbio’s data, The 74 calculated the average days and hours of in-person learning in each state based on a 180-day school year and a 6.5-hour school day.

Virginia's standard is 990 hours.
https://law.lis.virginia.gov/admincode/title8/agency20/chapter131/section150/
The standard school year shall be 180 instructional days or 990 instructional hours. The standard school day, including passing time for class changes and excluding breaks for meals, shall average a minimum of five and one-half instructional hours for students in grades 1 through 12 and a minimum of three hours for kindergarten

And what % of K classes in Virginia are still half-day? How did Burbio count those?

How did Burbio take this discrepancy into account when calculating their "in-person index"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is not correct. APS did not open till mandated to by the Governor. https://www.insidenova.com/headlines/northam-orders-all-virginia-schools-to-plan-for-in-person-learning-by-march-15/article_3110e7a4-67ce-11eb-9c20-a7413b721660.html

We were already planning to reopen. Duran announced that before the mandate.

Evidence:
https://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/946414.page

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That is not correct. APS did not open till mandated to by the Governor. https://www.insidenova.com/headlines/northam-orders-all-virginia-schools-to-plan-for-in-person-learning-by-march-15/article_3110e7a4-67ce-11eb-9c20-a7413b721660.html

We were already planning to reopen. Duran announced that before the mandate.

No Northam updated guidance in January, that thread started early November. They then didn’t open till mid March. What took so long?!