More reason for there to be zero available slots at bilingual schools...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Usefulness is in the eye of the beholder. Clearly people wouldn't be going into Hebrew or Mandarin or Spanish or whatever if they didn't have some ideas about its usefulness.

I hope you're not this naive or this UNclear. People chosing SELA has more to do with there being nothing else available than Hebrew's usefulness. Believe me, if SELA was Spanish or Mandarin immersion, people would be tearing the hinges off the door to get it. People are SETTLING for SELA because they'd rather have this option than NOTHING. DENIAL from these SELA boosters is more than obnoxious- it's SAD!!!

I think there must be a twelve step program for this level of narcissism where you believe you have any insight into what other parents think when they fill out applications. Do you think people are settling for Sela in a way they are not settling for any other new school on the market when little Sienna or Jasper gets rejected by LAMB or Brent or wherever. Crack is whack.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Usefulness is in the eye of the beholder. Clearly people wouldn't be going into Hebrew or Mandarin or Spanish or whatever if they didn't have some ideas about its usefulness.

I hope you're not this naive or this UNclear. People chosing SELA has more to do with there being nothing else available than Hebrew's usefulness. Believe me, if SELA was Spanish or Mandarin immersion, people would be tearing the hinges off the door to get it. People are SETTLING for SELA because they'd rather have this option than NOTHING. DENIAL from these SELA boosters is more than obnoxious- it's SAD!!!

I think there must be a twelve step program for this level of narcissism where you believe you have any insight into what other parents think when they fill out applications. Do you think people are settling for Sela in a way they are not settling for any other new school on the market when little Sienna or Jasper gets rejected by LAMB or Brent or wherever. Crack is whack.

PP who asked if posters like this last PP are naive or unclear, do you feel like your question is answered? This last person actually thinks Sela is starting in the same place as Mundo Verde or Yu Ying. Honestly, to all the folks sincerely trying to reality check the Sela folks as confused as this person (and I'm sure it can't be ALL Sela supporters who are this misinformed, because the school couldn't have gotten approved if they were), at this point isn't it pretty clear people believe what they believe and won't be swayed. It really will be the actual enrollment and retention that shows where the general draws of bilingual education and the draws of specific languages diverge. Sela has to show it's sustainable with a majority non-Jewish student body, and this last poster sees no difference between a start up Hebrew school and start up Mandarin or Spanish. There is no point trying to explain. We all just need to see how it plays out.

[Anonymous]

There are plenty of families who "settled" for LAMB, MV, YY, Stokes etc not b/c they have any interest or connection to Spanish, Mandarin, etc but b/c it was the best school option their child got into. There will be many families who "settle" for SELA for the same reason. unfortunately, Hebrew is a about as useful as Albanian, Tagalog, etc for most people.

- signed Mom of child at another immersion charter who has to learn Hebrew for his bar mizvah but have no interest in sending him to SELA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Usefulness is in the eye of the beholder. Clearly people wouldn't be going into Hebrew or Mandarin or Spanish or whatever if they didn't have some ideas about its usefulness.

I hope you're not this naive or this UNclear. People chosing SELA has more to do with there being nothing else available than Hebrew's usefulness. Believe me, if SELA was Spanish or Mandarin immersion, people would be tearing the hinges off the door to get it. People are SETTLING for SELA because they'd rather have this option than NOTHING. DENIAL from these SELA boosters is more than obnoxious- it's SAD!!!

I think there must be a twelve step program for this level of narcissism where you believe you have any insight into what other parents think when they fill out applications. Do you think people are settling for Sela in a way they are not settling for any other new school on the market when little Sienna or Jasper gets rejected by LAMB or Brent or wherever. Crack is whack.

PP who asked if posters like this last PP are naive or unclear, do you feel like your question is answered? This last person actually thinks Sela is starting in the same place as Mundo Verde or Yu Ying. Honestly, to all the folks sincerely trying to reality check the Sela folks as confused as this person (and I'm sure it can't be ALL Sela supporters who are this misinformed, because the school couldn't have gotten approved if they were), at this point isn't it pretty clear people believe what they believe and won't be swayed. It really will be the actual enrollment and retention that shows where the general draws of bilingual education and the draws of specific languages diverge. Sela has to show it's sustainable with a majority non-Jewish student body, and this last poster sees no difference between a start up Hebrew school and start up Mandarin or Spanish. There is no point trying to explain. We all just need to see how it plays out.

I actually think Sela is starting in the same place as Creative Minds or IT or Two Rivers - or any new school. And I have been DC long enough to remember all of the crazy reaction to YY when it first started. I'm not even a Sela supporter, I actually oppose charter schools in general - and I can be smug like that because my children had a great neighborhood school and I can afford to send them to an excellent private high school. Because I work in education I haven been following these threads, and I have to say there is a lot of anti-Sela rhetoric that seems pretty unearned. Though I agree that the market is the ultimate dictator whether any charter flourishes our fails. And even though I am opposed to charters, I try to have a positive will towards any new school, because after all, it's about children having more opportunities. I wish other DCUM people could have this capacity as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Usefulness is in the eye of the beholder. Clearly people wouldn't be going into Hebrew or Mandarin or Spanish or whatever if they didn't have some ideas about its usefulness.

I hope you're not this naive or this UNclear. People chosing SELA has more to do with there being nothing else available than Hebrew's usefulness. Believe me, if SELA was Spanish or Mandarin immersion, people would be tearing the hinges off the door to get it. People are SETTLING for SELA because they'd rather have this option than NOTHING. DENIAL from these SELA boosters is more than obnoxious- it's SAD!!!

I think there must be a twelve step program for this level of narcissism where you believe you have any insight into what other parents think when they fill out applications. Do you think people are settling for Sela in a way they are not settling for any other new school on the market when little Sienna or Jasper gets rejected by LAMB or Brent or wherever. Crack is whack.

PP who asked if posters like this last PP are naive or unclear, do you feel like your question is answered? This last person actually thinks Sela is starting in the same place as Mundo Verde or Yu Ying. Honestly, to all the folks sincerely trying to reality check the Sela folks as confused as this person (and I'm sure it can't be ALL Sela supporters who are this misinformed, because the school couldn't have gotten approved if they were), at this point isn't it pretty clear people believe what they believe and won't be swayed. It really will be the actual enrollment and retention that shows where the general draws of bilingual education and the draws of specific languages diverge. Sela has to show it's sustainable with a majority non-Jewish student body, and this last poster sees no difference between a start up Hebrew school and start up Mandarin or Spanish. There is no point trying to explain. We all just need to see how it plays out.

I actually think Sela is starting in the same place as Creative Minds or IT or Two Rivers - or any new school. And I have been DC long enough to remember all of the crazy reaction to YY when it first started. I'm not even a Sela supporter, I actually oppose charter schools in general - and I can be smug like that because my children had a great neighborhood school and I can afford to send them to an excellent private high school. Because I work in education I haven been following these threads, and I have to say there is a lot of anti-Sela rhetoric that seems pretty unearned. Though I agree that the market is the ultimate dictator whether any charter flourishes our fails. And even though I am opposed to charters, I try to have a positive will towards any new school, because after all, it's about children having more opportunities. I wish other DCUM people could have this capacity as well.

That's probably true about CM, IT and TR. But of those, only TR is bilingual. And as crazy as a lot of people thought YY was, there were a TON of people who got why Mandarin was something they wanted to get in on. There were parents who said in any other situation they would NOT be willing to be in the founding class but because it was Mandarin, they were willing. Mundo Verde is in a whole other class because of its connections to an already-established popular charter. Jewish families who value Hebrew bilingual will of course be willing to be first class, but success as a DCPCS requires non-Jewish families to go to Sela. Maybe Sela is starting in similar place as IT and CM, but it's quite unrealistic to think the non-Jewish demand will be even close to the non-Chinese demand of YY or the non-Latino demand of MV.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

[snipped]

That's probably true about CM, IT and TR. But of those, only TR is bilingual. And as crazy as a lot of people thought YY was, there were a TON of people who got why Mandarin was something they wanted to get in on. There were parents who said in any other situation they would NOT be willing to be in the founding class but because it was Mandarin, they were willing. Mundo Verde is in a whole other class because of its connections to an already-established popular charter. Jewish families who value Hebrew bilingual will of course be willing to be first class, but success as a DCPCS requires non-Jewish families to go to Sela. Maybe Sela is starting in similar place as IT and CM, but it's quite unrealistic to think the non-Jewish demand will be even close to the non-Chinese demand of YY or the non-Latino demand of MV.

TR is not bilingual. It's Expeditionary/Outward Bound (not sure what the current term is).

[Anonymous]

What does Expeditionary/Outward Bound even mean? All of these schools are niche schools...quasi-private schools designed to help people avoid local schools. Then the local schools fail for want of students and are shuttered. If the charters fail, they are shuttered. If DCPS is really going to work, all of the DCPS need to implement the common core and close all of the charter schools, so parents are forced to send their kids to the corner school or pay for private. We always act as if charters are the results of bad DCPS schools, but what if charters are just the result of Congress, and act to make DCPS schools worse and worse...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Also, the fact that Hebrew is spoken by some Jews and nobody likes Jews. We should all admit that that is part of the discussion.

I like my many Jewish friends, so that has little to do with the discussion. And, btw, none of them speak Hebrew.

Ah, the old some of my best friends are black/gay/Jewish defense. When you have to whip that one out, you know your sunk.

Yep, as an AA mom, I know that all too well.

Nope, sorry, I have the fortune to know many Jewish and gay folks, but rellatively few AA moms, and the ones I know don't show such a chip on their shoulders.

[Anonymous]

[quote=Anonymous]What does Expeditionary/Outward Bound even mean? All of these schools are niche schools...quasi-private schools designed to help people avoid local schools. Then the local schools fail for want of students and are shuttered. If the charters fail, they are shuttered. If DCPS is really going to work, [b]all of the DCPS need to implement the common core and close all of the charter schools, so parents are forced to send their kids to the corner school or pay for private.[/b] We always act as if charters are the results of bad DCPS schools, but what if charters are just the result of Congress, and act to make DCPS schools worse and worse...[/quote]


Won't work. You can't force parents to enroll their children in schools they don't approve of. It was tried in the 50s and the result was "white flight" and MoCo & NoVa grew at DC's expense as their taxpayer base abandoned the city. DC got a double-dose when high SES AAs were equally fed up with DCPS and left for PG County.

Some 43% of public school students are now in charters, so you don't have the power to inflict that kind of damage you'd like. (Not to mention, how is DCPS going to find room for them anyway? Or recreate the language options, advanced classes, year-round programs etc. that these families now expect?)

Finally, it might seem simple to you to create social experiments of all those children, but when you suggest you know more about what's best for them, you are trying to usurp their parents' rights to make those decisions. It might not have occurred to you, but that is morally wrong. Controlling other people's lives is morally wrong. My child is not going to be a slave to the betterment of your system. I'm confident I'm not alone in that opinion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are plenty of families who "settled" for LAMB, MV, YY, Stokes etc not b/c they have any interest or connection to Spanish, Mandarin, etc but b/c it was the best school option their child got into. There will be many families who "settle" for SELA for the same reason. unfortunately, Hebrew is a about as useful as Albanian, Tagalog, etc for most people.

- signed Mom of child at another immersion charter who has to learn Hebrew for his bar mizvah but have no interest in sending him to SELA.

There are certainly jobs out there where having some mastery of Chinese or Spanish gives a person an edge over the monolingual competition.

I don't see many opportunities for using Hebrew. Maybe to tutor bar/bat mitzvah students? Although presumably they are doing modern Hebrew immersion which might be different than the Hebrew taught in synagogue.

[Anonymous]

It's a puzzle... SELA won't be Jewish enough for the Jews (I'm Jewish) but has a mission of teaching modern Hebrew in an immersion setting. Guess SELA will be a choice for parents who strike out in the lottery elsewhere and have unacceptable in bound options.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are plenty of families who "settled" for LAMB, MV, YY, Stokes etc not b/c they have any interest or connection to Spanish, Mandarin, etc but b/c it was the best school option their child got into. There will be many families who "settle" for SELA for the same reason. unfortunately, Hebrew is a about as useful as Albanian, Tagalog, etc for most people.

- signed Mom of child at another immersion charter who has to learn Hebrew for his bar mizvah but have no interest in sending him to SELA.

There are certainly jobs out there where having some mastery of Chinese or Spanish gives a person an edge over the monolingual competition.

I don't see many opportunities for using Hebrew. Maybe to tutor bar/bat mitzvah students? Although presumably they are doing modern Hebrew immersion which might be different than the Hebrew taught in synagogue.

One of the more ignorant statements I have heard on this thread. Not a Hebrew speaker, but I can tell you that several of the scientists on my team at NIH are, and they do lots of research projects with counterparts in Israel and go back and forth in Hebrew. Israel, sadly, has a more sophisticated, and active scientific research community (thank you, Republicans!). Honestly, useful is subjective. I think we should just disband all charter schools and create magnate DCPS for MATH AND SCIENCE. No languages, no green-centered, no Afro-centered. Just math and science. That's what I define as useful.

[Anonymous]

Useful is not subjective when it comes to languages. Just b/c there are people you work with who speak to others in Hebrew does not mean Hebrew will be useful for most people. By your logic why not have Hungarian, Korean, Albanian, Dutch... Immersion language schools in DC?

Most people in the US only use Hebrew in synagogue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are plenty of families who "settled" for LAMB, MV, YY, Stokes etc not b/c they have any interest or connection to Spanish, Mandarin, etc but b/c it was the best school option their child got into. There will be many families who "settle" for SELA for the same reason. unfortunately, Hebrew is a about as useful as Albanian, Tagalog, etc for most people.

- signed Mom of child at another immersion charter who has to learn Hebrew for his bar mizvah but have no interest in sending him to SELA.

There are certainly jobs out there where having some mastery of Chinese or Spanish gives a person an edge over the monolingual competition.

I don't see many opportunities for using Hebrew. Maybe to tutor bar/bat mitzvah students? Although presumably they are doing modern Hebrew immersion which might be different than the Hebrew taught in synagogue.

One of the more ignorant statements I have heard on this thread. Not a Hebrew speaker, but I can tell you that several of the scientists on my team at NIH are, and they do lots of research projects with counterparts in Israel and go back and forth in Hebrew. Israel, sadly, has a more sophisticated, and active scientific research community (thank you, Republicans!). Honestly, useful is subjective. I think we should just disband all charter schools and create magnate DCPS for MATH AND SCIENCE. No languages, no green-centered, no Afro-centered. Just math and science. That's what I define as useful.

Generally, if someone who actually knows the language tells you that they don't find it very useful and therefore they are not interested having their kid learn it in an immersion setting, it's probably a good idea to listen rather than bringing up your colleagues who use the language to communicate with other scientists in their area of research.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Usefulness is in the eye of the beholder. Clearly people wouldn't be going into Hebrew or Mandarin or Spanish or whatever if they didn't have some ideas about its usefulness.

I hope you're not this naive or this UNclear. People chosing SELA has more to do with there being nothing else available than Hebrew's usefulness. Believe me, if SELA was Spanish or Mandarin immersion, people would be tearing the hinges off the door to get it. People are SETTLING for SELA because they'd rather have this option than NOTHING. DENIAL from these SELA boosters is more than obnoxious- it's SAD!!!

I think there must be a twelve step program for this level of narcissism where you believe you have any insight into what other parents think when they fill out applications. Do you think people are settling for Sela in a way they are not settling for any other new school on the market when little Sienna or Jasper gets rejected by LAMB or Brent or wherever. Crack is whack.

Crack is whack... That's why you should stop smoking it while posting to this board. Now you've taken obnoxious SELA booster to a whole new level. Now it's obnoxious Sela crackhead! Way to go! Hope you're as crazy as it gets over there. Not likely. What's Hebrew for that? Never mind, 'cause nobody cares. Anybody know it in Spanish or Mandarin? Now we're listening!