Reply to Fix the Cluster/Stuart Hobson

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Reply to "Fix the Cluster/Stuart Hobson"

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[quote=Anonymous]I liked this quote from a Watkins parents at the end of the concurrent "Another Brent Question Thread" because it offers insight into high IB attrition in the Cluster.  Obviously IB families should "own" Hill schools.  I can't see how you could accomodate most in neighborhood middle schools without extensive tracking, given the vast low-SES/high-SES achievement gap in the city.  Grabbing the property tax dollars of high-SES Hill residents, soon to be majority, to provide remedial education for OOB children without furnishing comensurate challenge for the offspring of those paying the bulk of the tax is fundamentally unfair.

But as long as high-SES families collectively allow city politicians to continue to "throw high-SES kids under the bus" by failing to organize to vote them out if they keep it up, they'll keep it up.  It's worth considering that the most popular MS charter choice, Latin, hardly tracks, so if SH did extensively, in the long-run. a hill MS with a city-wide draw to a test-in magnet could become the "it" school both for high-SES families and low-SES families with high-performing students.   I don't think this will happen, but with political will, it could.

"Yes. But I'm not active in PTA and so can't claim insight into what issues these proposals would run up against. I loved Peabody and have been okay with Watkins, but the older grades/middle school seem like such a crap shoot. Racial and class tensions seem palpable at times among the various parent groups. The PTA works hard but is dominated by white and higher income families and, I think, is discounted by other stakeholders for that reason. I wonder if the sheer number of families at Watkins makes change hard and, over time, families who push for higher standards peel off in dismay. There are so many different cohorts, all with their causes. Some parents vocally support gifted programs, for example. But push back comes from other quarters who feel, at least as strongly, that resources should be aimed at improving scores for lower performing children. I can't tell you how many times I've heard teachers and parents of older children urge me and others to support tracking for the upper grades. But for reasons not fully clear to me this seems politically unpalatable. [b]Ultimately, who "owns" the school?[/b] I live in bounds and am committed to public schools but don't want to push my kid under the bus to make a point. So, like many others, unless things change, we'll likely switch to a charter, if we can get in, or maybe even move if that seems more economical than private school tuition. And, for what it is worth, my kid is smart but not exceptional. I would be willing to stay for something that is decent but not for something that is notably sub-par."

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