Bowser’s first community outreach mtg since re-election: education focused
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Anonymous
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Bowser attended our neighborhood community meeting on Thursday night. It was her first public outreach mtg since her Tuesday night re-election.
On the recent scandals: “This year has been tough for DCPS. We have learned a lot and Chancellor Alexander is taking steps to ensure the attendance and grading issues never happen again. It’s unacceptable. We have zero tolenace for this stuff and I am working close with her to put in safe guards.” A father of a Wilson senior student asked about school crowding and lowering head count at Wilson. He complained that teachers are stuggling with large classes. He asked what Bowser is doing to create more options for Wilson-quality education. Here are Bowser’s latest talking points: “The quickest way I can reduce crowding and demand for Wilson is to get Banneker at Shaw opened as quickly as possible. 100% of Banneker kids go to college; these are some of the best kids in the District. If we move them to Shaw, I have 350 more seats we can fill; these are families who would otherwise be clamoring to get into Wilson or SWW.” “We can also increase high quality middle school seats by taking the current Banneker space and creating a new, high quality middle school open to all District residents.” Someone else mentioned that Duke Ellington is under capacity and that more general education kids should be housed the building: “I think Duke Ellington needs to remain arts focused. We have the kids in the District to fill this space; the hardest part is identifying them and getting them prepared prior to high school for a rigorous arts education.” However, she left open the possibility of adding another WOTP high school to relieve crowding at Wilson: “Our decisions about the future will be driven by the population patterns. We know the Wilson feeders are reaching capacity as District parents return to DCPS. We thank them for choosing to remain and be involved; this is a great thing. I think we may need to consider opening another western high school - sorry, I mean another high school on the west side of town. But will be driven by the population patterns and demand.” At that point, Bowser’s time was up. It left me with more questions than answers, but I think we may see in the medium term so progress on WOTP over crowding and perhaps more resources, especially if school age population booms. |
Anonymous
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Thank you for sharing. |
Anonymous
| Where was this? Just curious if she was speaking to WOTP or EOTP audience. I know my EOTP neighborhood had a meeting Thursday night.. |
Anonymous
WOTP audience. |
Anonymous
| I think she’s spot on with the reasoning for moving Banneker. Whites are now mingling with browns/blacks and with a new building with an established track record of a high quality school, this is an “If we build,they will come” example. |
Anonymous
+1. Just build it. |
Anonymous
Mingling, seriously? 75.9% Black, non-Hispanic 2.7% Asian 18.0% Hispanic / Latino 0.2% Native American / Alaska Native 0.2% Native Hawaiian / Other Pacific Islander 1.0% White non-Hispanic 1.9% Multiracial YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME. |
Anonymous
| I am all for reducing pressure on Wilson, but for what a new school would cost, they could invest substantially in magnet programs at Eastern amd Coolidge to draw more kids that way. |
Anonymous
They've been doing this but it hasn't worked. |
Anonymous
They need a more effective strategy and a lot more money. The new plan for Coolidge has not been rolled out yet. Maybe it will help, but without intense, personalized academic intervention at the feeder elementaries and the new middle school, I am not optimistic. |
Anonymous
DCPS has substantially invested in magnet programs at Eastern and Coolidge? They absolutely have not. Paying for programs doesn't constitute making a substantial investment. No, that takes astute planning, research, outreach, community buy-in etc. All DC needs to do is copy highly successful test-in/magnet programs in the Metro area burbs. Hardly rocket science. DCPS leaders don't bother because their political patrons don't lose their jobs for failing to support more than one high performing neighborhood high school. |
Anonymous
| Shaw needs to be reopened as a middle school. The city promised that in the last DCPS boundary redraw. Making usable feeder patterns in the whole city is what will fix overcrowding in the Wilson feeder. Also, the mayor is shady AF — there was no process of community engagement around moving Banneker to the Shaw space. As usual, she makes a plan with almost no input and plays only to upper NW. And her plan to help upper northwest won’t even work. Expanding Banneker that much right now will only undermine non-Wilson high schools that are slowly starting to improve. Privilege hoarders too scared for high schools that aren’t Wilson, won’t try Banneker either. |
Anonymous
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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am all for reducing pressure on Wilson, but for what a new school would cost, they could invest substantially in magnet programs at Eastern amd Coolidge to draw more kids that way.[/quote]
They've been doing this but it hasn't worked.[/quote] DCPS has substantially invested in magnet programs at Eastern and Coolidge? They absolutely have not. Paying for programs doesn't constitute making a substantial investment. No, that takes astute planning, research, outreach, community buy-in etc. All DC needs to do is copy highly successful test-in/magnet programs in the Metro area burbs. Hardly rocket science. DCPS leaders don't bother because their political patrons don't lose their jobs for failing to support more than one high performing neighborhood high school.[/quote] Are you for real? They did invest in Eastern and now at Coolidge. Throwing money at this does not work. You can't be cookie cutter with this stuff- you can't just plop down a program that works somewhere else. That suburb shit isn't gonna work here. |
Anonymous
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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am all for reducing pressure on Wilson, but for what a new school would cost, they could invest substantially in magnet programs at Eastern amd Coolidge to draw more kids that way.[/quote]
They've been doing this but it hasn't worked.[/quote] DCPS has substantially invested in magnet programs at Eastern and Coolidge? They absolutely have not. Paying for programs doesn't constitute making a substantial investment. No, that takes astute planning, research, outreach, community buy-in etc. All DC needs to do is copy highly successful test-in/magnet programs in the Metro area burbs. Hardly rocket science. DCPS leaders don't bother because their political patrons don't lose their jobs for failing to support more than one high performing neighborhood high school.[/quote] Are you for real? They did invest in Eastern and now at Coolidge. Throwing money at this does not work. You can't be cookie cutter with this stuff- you can't just plop down a program that works somewhere else. That suburb shit isn't gonna work here. [/quote] They didn't invest anywhere near what it takes, nor did they create a program that was the right sort of thing. I agree that they're a bunch of morons. |
Anonymous
| The Mayor’s statement is clearly a knock on Eastern, Coolidge, and Roosevelt. |