Reply to Experience with Macfarland?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Idk, this is a great case study in how schools stay segregated. Posters are actively trying to convince someone who they've never met and know nothing about to not attend a school.[/quote]

Oh please. DCPS MS and HS stay segregated specifically because parents who ask for reasonable things (like appropriate curriculum and challenge, and basic safety) are called “Karens” and “Nice White Parents.” (Let’s leave aside for the moment that POC parents with resources generally don’t even entertain the idea of the poorly performing schools.) Look at schools like Hardy and Deal, where the IB parents bought in because school leadership acknowledged their kids needs and showed they were willing to meet them. That’s how you get white parents to attend. (Meanwhile most wealthy/educated POC depart for privates or the burbs, but I digress.)[/quote]

So what specifically does Hardy offer that other DCPS middle schools don’t?

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Classes with the majority of kids at or above grade level, which means teachers can teach accordingly. Much smaller proportion of kids completely failing, meaning resources can be distributed more evenly. I believe they also offer geometry. [/quote]

That’s circular logic. The post above suggested that Hardy did something to attract IB parents to the school in the first place. What exactly did it do that other schools are not doing?

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It's absolutely circular: That's why you hear about tipping points, where there are enough kids from UMC families to provide a peer group of academically on-grade students. Part of it is a coordination issue, which schools can't affect. But there are often a few inbound/UMC students who schools can retain by 1) actively recruiting, and 2) having a school culture that encourages behavior. We moved back and forth between a couple of EOTP schools. We left one (more than 10 years ago) when the principal said explicitly to a group of pre-K parents who were deciding whether to stay, "Your kids are not my priority. There are other kids with much great needs." Which is absolutely true. We moved to another, which had behavioral problems AND a principal who said almost exactly the same thing (in an all-school meeting) about prioritizing kids who were struggling academically. We moved back to school 1, which had much fewer behavioral problems and therefore had attracted a lot more inbounds, UMC (and yes, predominantly white) families. Our kids were happier with less chair throwing in the classroom. School 1 is now predominantly UMC and inbounds; school 2 is still struggling.[/quote]

Sorry, forgot to mention a critical fact: School 1 had gone through several new principals, who didn't think it was necessary to neglect kids who were on grade level to help those who weren't.[/quote]

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