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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Can you give an example of the woke stuff at ITS? [/quote]

They're often talking and talking and talking about equity using all the modern terminology, but their actions just don't match up.  Like today-- three half days more than what was already scheduled, and the school is paying so that families enrolled in YMCA aftercare can have free care.  But everyone who's not enrolled in the aftercare (which costs way more than DCPS aftercare!) is just SOL and gets no help.  They treat parents like everyone has a flexible job or SAHP, basically.  And that's not equity.  Soooo many of the families say all the woke stuff, but really they're at ITS to avoid the high-poverty, high-trauma environment of Ward 5 DCPS, and they know it.  So it's really awkward.[/quote]

Pretty much every liberal parent who is not sending their kid to their IB school (and staying in that feeder through HS) is living with this dissonance (myself included).[/quote]  Yep, me too.  At ITS there's no target language or educational philosophy to use as a fig leaf, so it's really kind of awkward.  I did give our IB a real try so I don't feel too bad about it, but I'm happy to see the at-risk preference happening and hope that the school and parents will live up to their rhetoric.[/quote]

What would it have taken to get you to stay in your IB school? [/quote]

The main thing is a cohort of kids performing above grade level in upper elementary and especially in the feeder middle school.  I just didn't want my kid to be working alone or on a computer so much of the time, and they weren't able to provide an age-appropriate grouping in other classrooms because the higher-grade kids weren't performing on grade level. 
 I also wanted a much higher level of organization in general.  ITS has its flaws but is generally organized and runs smoothly, the IB school really struggled with basics like communication.  Cultural things like being consistent about outdoor play (even when it's "cold"), not feeing the kids so much sugar, too much TV.  And there were significant behavior issues, not that ITS is completely free of them but it isn't as bad.  Preschool parents are sometimes more tolerant or oblivious to behaviors if their child doesn't tell them about what happens, but an upper elementary kid will tell you exactly who punched who.

I hope that the at-risk preference at ITS will bring more economic diversity to ITS and that ITS will still be able to maintain high academic performance and differentiate effectively.  I have a lot of hope for our IB as it has made good strides lately, but it didn't happen in time for my DC's academic needs.  I'm very fond of the IB school and donate and advocate for it, I don't think I'll ever love ITS as much as I loved the IB.[/quote]

I have no idea if we're at your IB, likely not, but I'll just say that I would probably be less than patient with those issues as well. Ours has too much sugar and we haven't hit upper elementary yet, but they go outside until it hits 32 degrees, has almost too much communication (emails, school app, text messages, robo calls), no TV except once a week in aftercare, and no behavior issues that I've heard from any of the older kids I know or my, ahem, tattle tale first grader. If you don't mind me asking, what are the percent of 4s and 5s PARCC scores at your IB? [/quote]

PARCC testing was suspended due to COVID, so I don't have up to date information for you.  In the most recent year available, maybe 20-25% of the kids were on grade level in reading and less than 5% above.  Math scores were worse.  So that means my double-5-scoring kid would be working alone or with one other kid a lot of the time.  When she began at the school she had peers who were on her level but over time they left.  About 1/3 of the class was scoring a 1, which is really concerning.  I could live with a lot of 3s but a lot of 1s means the teacher has to differentiate across a really wide range and it's very difficult to do well.  It just isn't realistic.  I did think the teachers were pretty good, it's just that the kids are so high-needs and so many kids come into the upper grades every year who are already way behind.

Our school's policy was also to go outside unless it was 32 degrees or lower, and the principal would tell you what you wanted to hear.  But many days they didn't actually go-- it annoyed me so much that I started walking by on my lunch hour to check.  The aftercare staff was minimum wage teenagers who saw no reason to take the kids out if they or the kids didn't happen to feel like it.  There was always some different excuse, but the bottom line is the staff wasn't willing to do it and the principal wasn't willing to enforce it.  I would ask yourself how sure you are that the 32 degrees policy is what's actually happening.  The outdoor time thing is a cultural difference and the staff will get an earful from parents who oppose outdoor time as well as parents who support it.  Diversity requires flexibility and compromise, but sometimes all these compromises add up to too much.[/quote]

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