Shake Up at SSMA?

[Anonymous]

Anyone know why the Director of Education at Shining Stars was suddenly let go, effective immediately?

[Anonymous]

I suspect no one who posts here actually knows; the suddenness implies that it was a personal decision, but that's not quite the tone of the announcement email.

My guess from the email is that the non-PMF test scores for K-2 kids were low for a second year in a row so they were ready to try someone new. I don't know why you'd make that switch in May instead of June, though.

Too bad; I always liked the way she interacted with the kids in the hall; I never dealt with her one-on-one, though.

[Anonymous]

That's pretty late in the year. Only a month to stick out...

[Anonymous]

Would you be able to post the announcement email?

[Anonymous]

In my opinion, she was less than stellar and unresponsive to a number of parents and issues. She seemed to simply be over her head. Her termination is a sign of a much larger problem at SSMA. There is a"crisis of leadership" that needs to be addressed. There were other terminations that happened during the year that were not communicated effectively. Parents bond with school officials than they are just gone. I doubt a strategic plan exists. SSMA should be very stable right now considering it's been around for 8-9 years. It is certainly not that. The next couple of weeks will go a long way in determining the future of the school.

[Anonymous]

The ongoing "crisis of leadership" would be the ED?

[Anonymous]

In my opinion, she was less than stellar and unresponsive to a number of parents and issues. She seemed to simply be over her head. Her termination is a sign of a much larger problem at SSMA. There is a"crisis of leadership" that needs to be addressed. There were other terminations that happened during the year that were not communicated effectively. Parents bond with school officials than they are just gone. I doubt a strategic plan exists. SSMA should be very stable right now considering it's been around for 8-9 years. It is certainly not that. The next couple of weeks will go a long way in determining the future of the school.

I kind of hate hashing this out here, but can you go into the "issues" a little more if they're not too personal. I was a little blindsided by this all: we use before- and aftercare, so we're really only interacting with our kid's teachers and a couple of staff and they've all been great.

Semi-related, and not really specific to SSMA, I wish someone could convince organizations going through moments of change that cryptic emails about "improving weaknesses" and "reenforcing strengths" usually look a lot worse than just being forthright about whatever is going on. I know if someone is fired/asked to resign there are legal reasons why you don't trumpet the reasons from the rooftop, but right now who the hell knows what's going on?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In my opinion, she was less than stellar and unresponsive to a number of parents and issues. She seemed to simply be over her head. Her termination is a sign of a much larger problem at SSMA. There is a"crisis of leadership" that needs to be addressed. There were other terminations that happened during the year that were not communicated effectively. Parents bond with school officials than they are just gone. I doubt a strategic plan exists. SSMA should be very stable right now considering it's been around for 8-9 years. It is certainly not that. The next couple of weeks will go a long way in determining the future of the school.

I had kids at the school the year that the ED was hired, during the location drama. Communication - clear, direct, and forthright - was not one of the ED's strong suits during that time either. I thought at that time that it was an organizational culture issue where the buck ultimately stopped with the board of directors. The way that they handled the removal of the previous ED and the principal that year was very unprofessional and is exactly what you described - parents (and students) bonding with staff who are then simply gone with limited explanations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The ongoing "crisis of leadership" would be the ED?

Ed and a absent Board

[Anonymous]

I don't think the ED can terminate her way out of the problems, when will there be a new ED? The board is a rubber stamp, so me thinks the school is in tough shape....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

In my opinion, she was less than stellar and unresponsive to a number of parents and issues. She seemed to simply be over her head. Her termination is a sign of a much larger problem at SSMA. There is a"crisis of leadership" that needs to be addressed. There were other terminations that happened during the year that were not communicated effectively. Parents bond with school officials than they are just gone. I doubt a strategic plan exists. SSMA should be very stable right now considering it's been around for 8-9 years. It is certainly not that. The next couple of weeks will go a long way in determining the future of the school.

I kind of hate hashing this out here, but can you go into the "issues" a little more if they're not too personal. I was a little blindsided by this all: we use before- and aftercare, so we're really only interacting with our kid's teachers and a couple of staff and they've all been great.

Semi-related, and not really specific to SSMA, I wish someone could convince organizations going through moments of change that cryptic emails about "improving weaknesses" and "reenforcing strengths" usually look a lot worse than just being forthright about whatever is going on. I know if someone is fired/asked to resign there are legal reasons why you don't trumpet the reasons from the rooftop, but right now who the hell knows what's going on?

The awful test scores and lack of a plan for lower and upper elementary are major issues. We had a phenomenal teacher before changing classes so we were blindsided by the "downgrade" in expectations. The pmf was a major eye opener back in November. It was awful and a pretty lackluster response. We learned a great teacher can mask a lot. One of the drawbacks of Montessori is the lack of visibility of a kid's performance. You have to consistently ask questions, monitor, and visit the class. The homework was key for us to really gauge what was going on. When that pretty much stopped after we changed classes, that was a red flag. School is supposed to get harder not easier. That was an indication of lack of curriculum development and expectations. Montessori was designed to only go to third grade so I was curious to see how it would work past that. At SSMA, it's been a very disappointing result this year. In a nutshell, they don't know what they don't know. This won't be fixed overnight. So plan accordingly......

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

In my opinion, she was less than stellar and unresponsive to a number of parents and issues. She seemed to simply be over her head. Her termination is a sign of a much larger problem at SSMA. There is a"crisis of leadership" that needs to be addressed. There were other terminations that happened during the year that were not communicated effectively. Parents bond with school officials than they are just gone. I doubt a strategic plan exists. SSMA should be very stable right now considering it's been around for 8-9 years. It is certainly not that. The next couple of weeks will go a long way in determining the future of the school.

I kind of hate hashing this out here, but can you go into the "issues" a little more if they're not too personal. I was a little blindsided by this all: we use before- and aftercare, so we're really only interacting with our kid's teachers and a couple of staff and they've all been great.

Semi-related, and not really specific to SSMA, I wish someone could convince organizations going through moments of change that cryptic emails about "improving weaknesses" and "reenforcing strengths" usually look a lot worse than just being forthright about whatever is going on. I know if someone is fired/asked to resign there are legal reasons why you don't trumpet the reasons from the rooftop, but right now who the hell knows what's going on?

The awful test scores and lack of a plan for lower and upper elementary are major issues. We had a phenomenal teacher before changing classes so we were blindsided by the "downgrade" in expectations. The pmf was a major eye opener back in November. It was awful and a pretty lackluster response. We learned a great teacher can mask a lot. One of the drawbacks of Montessori is the lack of visibility of a kid's performance. You have to consistently ask questions, monitor, and visit the class. The homework was key for us to really gauge what was going on. When that pretty much stopped after we changed classes, that was a red flag. School is supposed to get harder not easier. That was an indication of lack of curriculum development and expectations. Montessori was designed to only go to third grade so I was curious to see how it would work past that. At SSMA, it's been a very disappointing result this year. In a nutshell, they don't know what they don't know. This won't be fixed overnight. So plan accordingly......

What grade is your child in?

We're at another Montessori but still in primary so not sure how it looks later. But, we do get reports about every quarter on our child's progress through each Montessori area of work and specifics on what she's completed. From that I can see she's done a lot of math but not much language, etc. I don't however know how much she "should" have done by any point in time, but that may be because this isn't how Montessori works. Still, there does seem to be a lot of focus on tracking so kids who may fall behind in a key area could be supported. I am not sure, again, how this works in elementary but it gives me some confidence that there are expectations.

[Anonymous]

Its interesting. Our lower elementary-aged kid definitely has both math and spelling homework every week. I'm not sure what's going on in the other elementary class. I agree that the big risk with Montessori is that it REALLY depends on the teacher. In DC, especially, it depends on a teacher who can take kids at a variety of levels and keep them all moving forward at their own pace. This is obviously what you're SUPPOSED to do in Montessori but its a lot harder when the kids are 8 or 9 than it is when they're 3 or 4.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Its interesting. Our lower elementary-aged kid definitely has both math and spelling homework every week. I'm not sure what's going on in the other elementary class. I agree that the big risk with Montessori is that it REALLY depends on the teacher. In DC, especially, it depends on a teacher who can take kids at a variety of levels and keep them all moving forward at their own pace. This is obviously what you're SUPPOSED to do in Montessori but its a lot harder when the kids are 8 or 9 than it is when they're 3 or 4.

And how can you know if that's what the teacher is doing? Shouldn't there be some metrics on that? I mean, they have to track this progress for non-Montessori schools as well. And there is still a core curriculum requirement.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Its interesting. Our lower elementary-aged kid definitely has both math and spelling homework every week. I'm not sure what's going on in the other elementary class. I agree that the big risk with Montessori is that it REALLY depends on the teacher. In DC, especially, it depends on a teacher who can take kids at a variety of levels and keep them all moving forward at their own pace. This is obviously what you're SUPPOSED to do in Montessori but its a lot harder when the kids are 8 or 9 than it is when they're 3 or 4.

And how can you know if that's what the teacher is doing? Shouldn't there be some metrics on that? I mean, they have to track this progress for non-Montessori schools as well. And there is still a core curriculum requirement.

I thought the whole thing about Montessori was no homework?