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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]There's this conspiracy theorist idea permeating this thread that somehow "DCPS" or "DC" are conspiring to keep quality MS education away from Capitol Hill. No one who understands how decisions in government or at DCPS are made would ever allege such a thing. I know a lot of us (me too, btw) are not getting what we want. And that for many of us this is the first time in our privileged lives we can't argue for or leverage relationships to get our desired outcome. But how self centered and entitled are we therefore conclude it must be an intentional conspiracy? Plus, apparently the conspirators are doing the bidding of poor people and the underserved, because that's something that actually happens...anywhere.
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Hardly a conspiracy theory: reality. DCPS could have changed the Hill ES feed arrangements during the 2013-2014 boundary review to create a high-performing pan Ward 6 MS.  There was, and is, widespread support for the initiative at the grassroots across on CH, just not on the part of the ed powers that be and their parent shills in the Cluster school community.  DCPS could also have introduced a full complement of not just "honors" classes, but GT programming in this new MS, and/or created at least one test-in MS program in the District. Other US cities have one or more test-in middle school programs, e.g. Boston, NYC and our near neighbors in MoCo and Fairfax.  Michelle Rhee used to speak of her plans to add MS GT testing and programming.  But she and Fenty went down too early for GT to launch.

Privileged lives, entitled? Speak for yourself. I grew up in a rural area, read a lot, took math classes I paid for at a community college, went to an Ivy on a Full Pell Grant. [/quote]

You need to get together with the other conspiracy theorists and decide who your boogeyman is. Most of your foil hat buddies seem to think Rhee and Fenty were the masterminds behind undermining schools on the CH. Now here you come into the mix claiming they were going to fix it and it was the boundary review or 2013 that perpetuated the conspiracy. I'm so confused!

The point you seem unable to grasp is that decisions were made because people in power have to make decisions. They may have been the best decisions at the time based on available info and projections or they may have been terrible decisions. Even assuming every decision was wrong and there were no justifications for them, it does not mean it was a conspiracy. Sometimes people make decisions that don't work out. Jack Welsh wasn't trying to destroy GE. Time Warner wasn't conspiring to destroy shareholder value when it overpaid for AOL. John McCain wasn't trying to upend democracy and the Republican party when he chose Sarah Palin as his running mate. Decisions can have bad outcomes without having been made with malintent.  [/quote]

Not buying it, not by a long shot. We voted against Vincent Gray by a margin of 5-1 on Capitol Hill. The point you seem unable to grasp is that we've paid for our choice. [/quote]

Your post makes zero sense. Even if I try and parse it so it does it seems like your response is that you voted for the other guy 15 years ago and him not winning was part of the conspiracy?

What is clear here is that you were invested in the state of CH Middle Schools and you feel like your ideas and concerns were rebuffed or ignored. You feel like things would have been better now if they had listened to you. And you are ANGRY and HURT. The problem is that this all happened in 2007-2010 or 2013 and it is now 15 years later. So maybe concentrate less on being all up in your feelings and living in the past and more on where we are and how we move forward from here.

At my place of work we have a senior leader who will throw people out of meetings if they spend time and energy rehashing things we could have done or should have done. She will give them one chance to rephrase their concern in term of what action they advocate now. If they return to what was done without reframing it she'll toss them.[/quote]

Ignore the sanctimonious armchair shrink and advocate for nothing. I send my kid to a public MS school in Arlington, where my ex lives. The school has a terrific auditorium, gym, indoor track, greenhouse/gardens, instrumental music lessons for all/bands and orchestras for each grade, tennis courts, playing fields, many sports, 6th grade algebra, instruction in 5 foreign languages plus American Sign Language, English classes with no more than 15 students. Rent out your DC house, return as an empty nester. [/quote]

You got DIVORCED!!! OMG. That's just terrible for your kids. I cannot believe you were so self centered as to deprioritize a stable home because you and your ex decided to choose to divorce.

(Oh, wait. I don't know you or your ex or your kids or your job or family situations and I can't possibly understand or begin to understand the choices and trade-offs you make because, presumably, you know what's best for and matters most to your children. You made a choice to divorce based on all available information.) Yes, now where we? Oh yes, you were excoriating DC school families for the choices they make in public education. By all means, please continue... [/quote]

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