Reply to Proposal Implications: Loss of Proximity, Forced to go to Lowest Performing School, Concerns OOB

Forum Index » DC Public and Public Charter Schools

Reply to "Proposal Implications: Loss of Proximity, Forced to go to Lowest Performing School, Concerns OOB"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Please get over yourselves people who are fortunate to have have good pathway through DCPS.

To the rest of the city you're known as www3.  Whiney white ward 3.[/quote]
Odd how people fight to send their kids to a area they seem to really dislike.[/quote]
I agree PP.  People love to talk about their hatred of Ward 3, but fight tooth and nail to ensure their kids can go to school there.

I get similarly annoyed by the hand-wringing we sometimes see over how Ward 3 schools will lose diversity if certain neighborhoods are zoned out.  But it's most often the people who are being zoned out who worry so much about diversity in Ward 3 schools.  Am I really supposed to believe they're so concerned about the social and emotional development of other children?  Or (more likely) are they just disingenuously faking concern about diversity to support their own rights to access those Ward 3 schools?

I admit this is a rant.  I'm frustrated by this whole process though.  Initially, I was most annoyed by those people who selfishly shout that they will never, ever attend any other school besides Deal and Wilson, and threaten to leave DCPS if they lose favored status.  But now, while I still think they're being selfish and self-destructive, I at least respect them for their honesty.  Now, I'm most frustrated by those who trot out arguments about fairness and equity, when it's obvious that some of them just want access.  The hypocrisy of many posters really disappoints me.

(No, I'm not in Ward 3, and my neighborhood has no possible right to access Deal, Wilson, or any Ward 3 school.  So don't bother accusing me.)[/quote]

Yeah, I've seen you make this rant in multiple threads now. You are saying it here, to criticize Murch parents for focusing on definitions of proximity, and you were also in the recent Bancroft/Shepherd thread, where you criticized those parents for focusing on diversity.

Even if you truly have no interest in this, you would be more credible if you disclosed your IB school. Keep in mind, most of your posts are about questioning other people's motives and calling other people out for their hypocrisy, so with that in mind, you may want to walk your talk and disclose your own potential interests.

Also, you seem to lack experience and maturity in policy-making. This is a policy discussion, first and foremost. There will be self-interest in this. But because we live in a rules-based democracy, for the most part, success in policy means making persuasive arguments on the basis of agreed-upon principles. If there is a broadly accepted principle that diversity is good in education, or that students should not have to walk more than a certain distance to ES, whatever it is, then it is perfectly acceptable to make arguments appealing to those principles, provided you disclose your own self-interest.

For example, someone who discloses that they are IB for Murch and being rezoned to Hearst, who then goes on to make the EPA proximity argument, that is legitimate. A Bancroft or Shepherd parent who discloses their self-interest and then makes a diversity argument (as I have done elsewhere), also legitimate. What is less admirable is someone who repeatedly criticizes others for their bias while never disclosing their own.

[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics