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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am very much not a troll and I agree that there is a lot of entitlement on this thread.  First, this is a poor city that had for many years extremely poor citizens.  The city designed the free PS and PK as an offshoot of Head Start to provide free early education to kids whose parents can't afford it.  It's great that you would prefer to have your child spend time with a nanny or you and only attend preschool part time.  Then do that.  But it is entitled to demand that the city offer you the free preschool that you want in addition to the free preschool that the city believes the poor children of this city need.  Second, the problem that people seem to have really stems from your own decision to live in a neighborhood that does not offer a school that you find acceptable.  Living here requires trade offs.  If you choose to live in the biggest house you can afford in a transitional neighborhood then you have to play the lottery and take the full day PS and PK.  If you want to pick your preschool and still have a guaranteed K then you will have to move to a neighborhood that allows that.[/quote]

Let's have a conversation. Okay? Let's drop the "troll" and the "entitled" stuff and just listen to one another. Because you, poster, and possibly the other posters, are not reading carefully. To understand one another, let's read. Respond, sure. Disagree, sure. But read what I'm saying first. And stop name-calling. PP was called a troll because she just provoked and responded to a sincere dialogue with insults (go move to a mcmansion in loudon) that did nothing to advance the conversation. She later made a more legitimate post, but that was trollish posting, previously.

And FWIW, I am not just responding to you here, but to the few posters who I feel have been somewhat antagonistic towards those of us who feel locked into unattractive choices.

To begin: I do not want free preschool. I DO love the fact that this city does provide free preschool for some (not all) of the nation's poor children. And, you are mistaken in your own perceptions of what and how this preschool is designed to do for kids in the city. You say that PS and PK is designed as an offshoot of head start to provide free early education to kids whose parents can't afford it? That is the definition of headstart itself. The OFFSHOOT of head start, however is NOT INCOME BASED. DC's preschools were opened up to all families, not just poor families. In fact, one could easily make the argument that these schools are not serving the poor kids nearly as well as the original head start programs would have, considering there's no income requirement now, and there are limited spots, and there are no in boundary guarantees for preschool. All of this means that poor kids who would have qualified for the free services previously only had to compete with one another for these spots, but now have to compete with children of all income brackets. So really, that argument does not carry. Now, the upside of this might be the benefits of mixing up poor kids with children of means, due to a host of complex issues that is tough to unpack on this post. Anyway, it's not that I am not saying there is no benefit to the "free" preschool. I'm just saying that the expansion of the program came with some drawbacks. The above is the most obvious. The poor kid might really benefit from preschool, but might get closed out if too many other kids (including those of affluent families who could afford to pay for it anyway) take the few spots. It's musical chairs, to begin with, and not every kid gets a seat. So, if you think this program should be about helping poor families, we agree. BUT, it isn't. That is a different post, but it's worth saying since PP tried using it to suggest I'm entitled.

As I said, I do not want "free" preschool. There are some programs that seem nice but, given the fact that they are all day, every day, I am not into them. Still, paying for preschool is possible, although we are NOT a wealthy family (more on that later). I'm not looking for a handout.

If you think that it's as simple as just skipping the whole deal and just hoping a new charter that is anywhere near your kids' needs will open up magically and have spots for your kid, it's not. If it were that simple, that's what we'd be doing. We would continue on in our 2x a week playschool and enroll in kindergarten.

Finally, your guess about my housing choice is just silly. Perhaps YOU had a complete set of CHOICES to make about where to live. I live in a very small house - tiny 2 bedroom - in a marginal neighborhood. We could NOT afford a condo in a good school district. Never in my life would I call us "poor" but we do not make six figures here, which is not an anomaly in real life, but I realize is a huge anomaly among DCUMers. You don't just get to live wherever you want on that kind of salary. And don't kid yourself that we could afford a condo in a nice neighborhood. Add in the fact that we had unplanned twins, and we did the best we could with our situation. We didn't like the school options here, but hey, we couldn't afford better. Many people are not as lucky as you are. It really only says something about you, and not me, that you take the jab (without knowing anything about me other than the fact that I don't want to send my kid to all day every day school at four) that I want to live in "the biggest house we can afford."

It's just interesting to me to see someone get as rude as you were to me, and yet be factually incorrect in half her message. Your assumptions were wrong, and you had some of your facts about preschool wrong, too. I could take a guess about you (you like that free preschool and are afraid that I might get others on board to make changes that somehow threaten it) but I won't. Because it's just a distraction.

I'm a parent doing the best I can for my kids and believe it or not, I want you to be able to get what is best for your kids, too. They are all going to share the same world, and this world needs smart kids of all stripes getting the best start they can get. It would not be so hard to mix the system up to allow kids an entry point that isn't defaulted at age 3 or 4. Maybe a few new charters that begin catering to parents like mine? Trust me, I dno't want to compete with you for resources you are already enjoying. I just don't want to be forced into this system that does not work for my family the way it is working for yours. 
 
[/quote]

NP, and the above is a very thoughtful post.

It might bear mentioning that some schools have legitimate pedagogical reasons for the early all-day model.  I'm thinking specifically of those which are designed to serve special needs children (Bridges and Creative Minds, I'm not aware of any others).  Early intervention has been proven to make profound differences in the development of children with special needs, and these "inclusion" schools which blend the special needs students with typical students are well-designed.  When they also provide therapeutic services, it's even better.

Also, there is a trend in DC charter schools towards "language immersion" - where the students literally grow up speaking a second language.  In a way, it could be seen as the reverse of ELL (English Language Learning).  When the goal is for the child to be bilingual, then the earlier he(she) spends as many hours as possible in a bilingual environment, the more successful this would be.  If you want your child to speak French (or Spanish or Chinese or, now Hebrew) - and you don't speak it at home - then 7 or 8 hours of playing, counting, napping, lunching, etc. in French, so that it is ordinary conversation to your child, would be desirable.

If this doesn't apply in your family, the frustration is understandable, but it is worth knowing that there is sound logic - beyond convenience - for some kinds of all-day pre-schools.[/quote]

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