Reply to Revised Boundary Recommendations to be released on or about June 13

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Reply to "Revised Boundary Recommendations to be released on or about June 13"

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=jsteele][quote=Anonymous]Who gave the DME this assignment? If the DME wants to keep busy in her final months she can work on a recommendation to the new administration for improving the quality of schools, not just changing boundaries without a plan based on limited data, poor assumptions and no indicators for what success should look like. This is why families city-wide are up in arms. 
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It looks like many have forgotten the origins of the boundary process. Because of overcrowding in Ward 3 schools, Mary Cheh introduced legislation in 2012 requiring periodic boundary reviews. She was very vocal in demanding that something be done about boundaries. Catania suggested that he would begin hearings about boundaries since nothing was being done. Gray's tasking Smith with this job was clearly a response to Council pressure. Here is a discussion of Cheh's bill:

http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/277212.page

Also, the DME does have a strategy (perhaps plan?) for improving schools. I have no idea whether they are implementing it. But, the more paranoid among us may want to read this with caution. Some of your worst fears will be confirmed. One could argue that the boundary process is being manipulated to focus on the goals of this plan:

http://dme.dc.gov/sites/default/files/dc/sites/dme/publication/attachments/IFF_Final_Report.pdf

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For me, the first few sentences in the Recommendations section of that plan confirm what I've believed from the start - that the none of the various policy examples would be implemented city-wide, but rather cherry-picked and tailored to meet needs of various areas of the city.  What Cleveland Park needs is different from Brightwood and more different still from Congress Heights.  From page 42, emphasis mine:

[quote]To accelerate performance in the District, add 27,070 performing seats in the [b]Top Ten priority neighborhood[/b] clusters by 2016.  Closing the service gap necessitates a coordinated effort between the District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) and the Public Charter School Board (PCSB) as well as a focused implementation strategy.  IFF recommends the development of cluster specific strategic plans.  To develop each strategic plan, consult the detailed analysis for each of the Top Ten clusters in the Profiles section, immediately following this section.  [b]Because of the distinct characteristics of each neighborhood, each Top Ten cluster will have a separate strategy that accounts for local variation.[/b][/quote]

Since my own neighborhood ranks at number 2 on the Top Ten priority clusters, I'm not joining the ranks of protesters.  I may not be all that excited by the some of the policies that have been floated thus far, but I'd be MUCH angrier to be stuck with status quo.[/quote]

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