Reply to 2/22/24 BOE meeting

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I wish they'd once and a while focus on educating children instead of everything but...[/quote]

Title 1 funding is about educating children.[/quote]

Title 1 funding, like all other funding, is a necessary support for providing education, but it does not directly educate children. MCPS could have all the money in the world in its bank account, but that doesn’t  mean all our children would know how to read, do basic math (let alone advanced math), know the history and civics necessary for citizens in a democracy, know enough about economics to manage their personal finances, etc.

While MCPS can always use more money, it is relatively well-funded. We live in a prosperous county that values education and is politically liberal, so we have both the motive and the means to support it.

However, we need to focus on education itself. To me, that means focusing on curriculum, grading, grouping, and especially discipline/safety.  If a class is evacuated to the hallway while one student rampages in the classroom, none of the kids involved (including the one remaining in the classroom) are learning anything, no matter how much funding (Title 1 or otherwise) the school received. [/quote]

I am a teacher at a Title 1 school. Title 1 often funds smaller classroom sizes, which improves education for students. So yes, Miss Oh-my-God-students-are rampaging-next-door, Title 1 is about education.[/quote]

As I said before, I agree that funding is important. I just think more discussion needs to be held about what we do with funding.

Smaller classroom sizes sound great. Maybe we also need more counselors, or aides, or different procedures, etc.  I’m no expert, but I think it’s a complex situation that needs to be discussed.  I’m not at all certain that the discipline/safety issues are confined to Title 1 schools, but even if they are, do you think the smaller class sizes they can fund will be sufficient to ensure that students and teachers no longer have to evacuate classrooms for their personal safety and that high school bathrooms can be unlocked without being taken over by vapers?

Will the smaller class sizes in Title 1 schools mean that all kids are being taught with an effective curriculum?  MCPS spent a great deal over the years developing their own (terrible) curriculum. After an outside curriculum concluded that it was, indeed terrible, it was supposed to be replaced by the rollout of a new curriculum, but then COVID occurred. Has the new curriculum rollout been completed?  Is it actually effective, or even better than what we had?  From what little I’ve been able to glean, it appears that MCPS overruled the reading curriculum recommendations and selected a curriculum that has had problems and may be itself replaced soon?  I have no idea about the current status of the math curriculum. I think curriculum should be a primary focus for all students, regardless of where they go to school.  I’m sure smaller class sizes may help Title 1 students learn any curriculum more effectively, but if that curriculum is deficient, we’ve still got a problem.

Will Title 1 funding and smaller class sizes make grading practices more useful to students and parents?  When assignments are checked for completion but not graded, no one has any idea whether the student really knows the material. Doing the assignment gave them practice, but they may have been practicing and reinforcing bad habits. The same holds true for assignments that are graded but where the teacher deliberately only corrects some errors, not remarking on others.  I’ve heard MCPS curriculum personnel say that they instruct teachers as policy to only focus on correcting one type of error at a time so that students don’t get discouraged.  While I don’t want students to get discouraged, I think it would be pretty discouraging to find out that the way you’ve been doing something all along is actually wrong and nobody told you. Then you have the 50% rule, test retakes, and the prohibition of finals.  I think the grading system has evolved to mask student’s lack of performance (which might reflect badly on MCPS), rather than to give parents an accurate understanding of a student’s mastery (or lack thereof) of the subject matter.

What about grouping practices?  While I certainly oppose tracking, I think FLEXIBLE ability grouping (where students are grouped by ability with the intention of preparing them to move to higher levels) could be beneficial to all students and would be relatively cost neutral. You’d still have the same number of teachers, students, and classrooms, but each student would be able to have more time and attention focused at their instructional level.  Here’s an article from the Washington Post discussing the successful use of flexible ability grouping in MCPS:  https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/11/03/AR2007110301167.html?sid=ST2007110301386

Funding is important.  I’m proud that Montgomery County generously funds MCPS.  I’m glad that our federal government recognizes that low-income students may need extra support and is willing to provide the necessary extra funding. However, I think we ALSO need to discuss what we DO with the funding. We need to talk about what will best help educate our kids. Smaller classes are a great step in the right direction, but it can’t be the only one. [/quote]

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