Reply to Basic urban planning, child development and evidence-based practice ignored in "policy options"

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[quote=Anonymous]Questions I have yet to see addressed by any of the policy options:

1. What are the implications for traffic and urban planning to be shifting entire populations of students across the city--some who would not have "chosen" to do so under the previous system? If  your "choice set" of middle schools, for example, means you end up with a school 4 city miles from your home with no clear public transportation route, what is your option for getting your child to and from school? I'm not just talking about Ward 3 parents getting from upper, upper northwest to Georgetown to go to Hardy instead of Deal. I'm talking about parents with inflexible, shift work jobs, too. And this question becomes exponentially magnified with a citywide lottery without any geographic preference.  Are we really talking about kids travelling--against their families' preference or will--across multiple wards because they have no other "choice" and lost their lottery pick?

2. As a corollary, when public health and health professionals are urging later school start times for adolescents and early adolescents to support healthy development, what are the effects of making kids get up 45 minutes or more earlier so they can accommodate new travel times? What are the social effects for peer relationships when kids who go to elementary schools together are split off into different middle schools and high schools, again not of their families' choosing?

3. Where is the evidence that "choice sets" or force redistribution of students in other major urban school districts has not negatively affected quality at high performing schools due to flight of parents from the system who no longer wish to gamble that their kids can access schools they once had rights to attend? This is an issue for ALL kids--not just the rich ones, but also the disadvantaged ones who are ostensibly supposed to gain from getting access to higher performing schools. What happens if they show up and the quality declines because the added resources that were once propping up these schools have now left for the suburbs or private schools?

I know this is only the beginning of questions that need to be asked (and I plan to ask them myself).  But in all the threads here I haven't seen a lot this basic line of questioning, and I hope to see more of it take off. It only improves the conversation to have more folks ask the tough stuff to make sure whatever plan gets put in place is all the way thought through.[/quote]

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