Reply to Are the wealthy leaving MCPS?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]What happened in Hawaii could happen here.

So the story goes, back in the 60's Hawaii tried to have a solid public school system.  However, there was a lot of local pushback in the 70's about some public schools having more resources than others, so there was a pullback and the affluent put their kids into privates.  By the 80's there was a huge difference between Private and Public schools that privates (ex. Punahou where Obama went to school) did exceptionally well but not so much the publics.

When the 70's housing market temporarily collapsed (reducing collected taxes), public education budgets were slashed and never really recovered after that. Taxpayers didn't want to sink a lot of money into a poor school system.  That became an entrenched cycle and a classic tale of have-and-have-nots that, I feel, continues to this day.

Currently the "best" #1 public HS in Hawaii is Roosevelt.  However, the AP participation rate is only 66%, and it's #550 in National rankings.

So, by all means, MCPS Central Office and MC BoE - go ahead and alienate the high SES families.  Given that the rumor is Ms. McKnight doesn't even send her kids to Public school in this County, who knows - it may already be happening?[/quote]

People on this board like to pretend that it doesn’t matter if higher-income families leave the school system.  However, it matters very much.  We have seen this play out in other areas.

I’m from a country where the public school system is only for lower-income families.  Anyone middle-class and above goes private.  And there are clear differences.  Talk about widening the achievement gap.

A strong school system needs support from families at various income levels.  When the schools system only serves lower-income families, it is not good for public education.  [/quote]

No its not good for public education to only serve low income.  Its also not good for it to only care about and serve those with a high income.  Which is the entire point.  Right now it serves both and all sides want it to do more and more and more, which is really hard to do without alienating the other side and totally forgetting about those in the middle.  The problem is that whereas the public school system keeps trying to find a balance, many parents want to keep threatening it with leaving for the private school system or vouchers or some other paradigm that its never going to be able to compete with fully as the variables are different.[/quote]

Agree many of the posters here seem to believe it should cater to the wealthy and resent the concern for anyone else.[/quote]

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