Reply to WaPo Editorial today on DCPS/charter collaboration

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]See the thing is, if we didn't have charters we'd have a greater number of better neighborhood schools because the many families that flee for HRCS would be forced to put their resources into their "focus" or "rising" schools that a few are already trying to improve. Yeah, some would move, but not all.

We will NEVER have universally good by-right schools if we perpetuate an easy opt-out for families. It will never happen. I'm not suggesting improvement would stretch east of the river immediately, but our Wests and Garrisons and Brookland Middles and Coolidges and Amidon-Bowens and Takomas and Truesdells would be much improved if all the families that go charter were there instead. I'm also not suggesting that we shouldn't have initiated charters when we did; it seems like it was necessary for our failing city schools at the time. But now? We can reevaluate our definition of and path to "excellence for everyone."

The mayor knows this, and to not continue to move us down this separate-but-equal-but-not-really road we are on is the right move. [/quote]

Not true.  I would NEVER send my child to our IB schools. [b] If not for charters, I would be living in Maryland[/b].[/quote]

You and most transplants.[/quote]

I'm not a transplant, well - I've got 30 years living in the city.  [/quote]

I was born here and educated here (private) and if it weren't for our IB DCPS and our charter that goes all the way through high school (BASIS) we would have moved to Montgomery County for our 4 kids.  Wilson is not a solution for everyone and some of us cannot afford private school and will not risk Wilson for our kids because they may go off course.  We would have been Pyle Whitman all the way.  We almost bought a house and then we heard about BASIS and decided to give it one more year.  And we are so happy that we did.

If all the non-Ward 3 people like us leave because you get rid of the charters, what you will have left are a few people who are willing to sacrifice their kids to their ideologies when they are young, but will pony up for private or move later on, and these wards will be left with the entrenched families who have been there for generations who are primarily poor and AA, and for some of whom KIPP has been a miracle for their kids.  [b]You cannot turn around a school that is 80% "at risk" (remember DCPS is something like 70% FARMS - at risk means TANF, foster children, other issues) unless you become KIPP.[/b]  DCPS has not been able to do this, all the studies prove it cannot be done, and they have had 40 years to try. Oh and the many families from El Salvador who have recently moved here and do not have the money to move to Md.

We were very glad we could stay (this is my hometown) but there is no way anyone could FORCE us to stay in a non-functioning school because we have the means to move to Md. and education is one of the most important gifts you can give your child.  Doing anything else but finding the best school you can starting in MS is not fair to your children.  And for us, our children always have and always will come first.  Although I LOVED  that beautiful HUGE house in Md, our children love BASIS DC.[/quote]

Last I checked even KIPP failed when it tried to turn around a school with that level of poverty when they kept the same enrollment.[/quote]

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