DC Graduation Problems Extend to Wilson High School, Councilmember Says

[Anonymous]

Not surprised that it's happening at Wilson, as it seems system-wide, but surprised that it's as high as 1 out of 3 graduates.

"Councilmember Mary Cheh said Wednesday that the study done by an independent auditing firm indicates that 34 percent of graduates at Woodrow Wilson High School in Northwest did not meet attendance requirements."

https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Councilmember-Wilson-High-School-Also-Guilty-of-Graduating-Unqualified-Students-469845083.html

[Anonymous]

Maybe we should just have a thread on all DCPS high schools about this issue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe we should just have a thread on all DCPS high schools about this issue.

We already do. http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/696688.page

[Anonymous]

LOL 12:59

[Anonymous]

agree, we have the general one and the ballou one. Now the Wilson thread started. who wants to create the next thread for another school?

[Anonymous]

agree, we have the general one and the ballou one. Now the Wilson thread started. who wants to create the next thread for another school?

[Anonymous]

agree, we have the general one and the ballou one. Now the Wilson thread started. who wants to create the next thread for another school?

[Anonymous]

All the high schools will have graduation issues except for the magnets that are allowed to kick out students. I think the superintendents above schools force principals to set very aggressive goals that are pretty much unreachable in the current climate. Then the principals are told they will be fired if they don’t achieve their goals. If they try and complain, they are told they are incompetent because look at the remarkable results that Ballou and CHEC are achieving. Principals value their job so they resort to underhand methods. This started in Rhees time with her no excuses for any reason approach.

[Anonymous]

the bigger issue are the test scores. the HS kids are so far behind why should they bother showing up? At ballou less than 3% meet grade expectations? how about you must have a 3 on a parcc test to move on?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:the bigger issue are the test scores. the HS kids are so far behind why should they bother showing up? At ballou less than 3% meet grade expectations? how about you must have a 3 on a parcc test to move on?

That has been shown to increase drop out rates -- same problem by a different name. The kids who aren't showing up have effectively dropped out, but they are on the books all the way to graduation.

[Anonymous]

Can schools remove OOB kids who don’t meet attendance requirements and not have them count against that school’s graduation rate?

* I realize they can’t do this now, but it might be a piece of the solution.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can schools remove OOB kids who don’t meet attendance requirements and not have them count against that school’s graduation rate?

* I realize they can’t do this now, but it might be a piece of the solution.

They do this already -- typically at the beginning of the year. In fall 2016 I know many students who were not allowed to re-enroll at Wilson and went back to their IB schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can schools remove OOB kids who don’t meet attendance requirements and not have them count against that school’s graduation rate?

* I realize they can’t do this now, but it might be a piece of the solution.

They do this already -- typically at the beginning of the year. In fall 2016 I know many students who were not allowed to re-enroll at Wilson and went back to their IB schools.

If that’s the case, how are we seeing 1 in 3?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can schools remove OOB kids who don’t meet attendance requirements and not have them count against that school’s graduation rate?

* I realize they can’t do this now, but it might be a piece of the solution.

They do this already -- typically at the beginning of the year. In fall 2016 I know many students who were not allowed to re-enroll at Wilson and went back to their IB schools.

If that’s the case, how are we seeing 1 in 3?

The report is looking at senior year attendance -- they would have had to screw up junior year attendance to be sent to neighborhood school.

Also why do you assume that the kids with attendance problems are all OOB?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:the bigger issue are the test scores. the HS kids are so far behind why should they bother showing up? At ballou less than 3% meet grade expectations? how about you must have a 3 on a parcc test to move on?

That has been shown to increase drop out rates -- same problem by a different name. The kids who aren't showing up have effectively dropped out, but they are on the books all the way to graduation.

You need to do this from day one starting at elementary school.

DCPS should ship all youth who are over 2 years behind to either a KIPP or DC Prep school. They are the only ones that can get results from these populations. For the extra hard discipline cases there needs to be a military style school (this would be less than 5% per school)

by high school its too late and I agree most would drop out. Over time kids would get on grade level following the above, until then if kids are more than 3 grad levels behind in 9th grade they should go straight to an apprenticeship program. We are wasting time with the kids who can learn and these kids keeping them in a traditional high school program.