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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I agree with about every subpoint made in 12:26's opus.

But I disagree with the assumed premise:  that "we" should undertake efforts to amend, upend and blow up the current system with the primary goal of making schools better for poor kids in DC.

12:26 uses the words "underserved" and "poorly served" repeatedly --- as though we all agree that it's just the poor who are the ones being screwed **specifically by DCPS*** (and not society and their own birth families).

We, the taxpayers of DC, don't all agree that that's our most important goal.

It's one goal, sure, but for my family and many others like ours, OUR top goal is to make DCPS better for OUR underserved kids.  The pressing educational needs of OUR underserved kids in almost no respect resemble the needs of  say, ward 7 and 8's underserved kids.

In fact, they are directly competing needs.  A solution that improves the educational outcome of one group may well diminish the prospects of the other group of kids.

DCPS does an abysmal job with our subset of children already. The notion that they should be screwed even further by taking away what little they have so that "the worst schools" get some of our magic ingredients is tiresome social engineering from 1968 Berkeley. 
[/quote]

Glad you agree with a lot of my points, but I truly don't understand where you get ANY proposal to "blow up" anything from my post.  I actually don't really suggest any ANSWERS, just pointing out that neighborhood schools are NOT the answer.  Where do you see me assuming anything about all taxpayers' goals?  I even say "What is most important depends on who you ask".  So where AT ALL did you get the idea that I think the underserved (the truly underserved - because I don't know what you mean when you say "your family's most underserved" and it's about something other than Ward 7/8-type underserved) are the only ones getting screwed???

Crazy gigantic demand for tiny supply of quality public school seats creates a situation where OBVIOUSLY not everyone who wants a public school seat can get a great one.  That goes without saying, and it would be beyond naive to think that parents who are living in Petworth, Mount Pleasant, Edgewood, Brookland don't feel screwed by the current system.

Once again, I only had 2 main points:

1. Neighborhood schools are not the answer, because they didn't solve the problem in DC before and won't now; and '

2. Advocate for what you feel you need to advocate for, but do NOT advocate for changing charters to neighborhood schools as a way to somehow HELP improve DC schools, especially for the most underserved.

Other than that, where are you pulling an actual proposed plan to blow anything up out of my post??  Or an assumption that everyone prioritizes the poorest, most underserved families over everything else?  If that were true... DC would be a very different place.  I'm very clear, that is NOT true![/quote]

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