Anonymous
Post 05/18/2024 08:22     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Melissa Kim was the one who pushed XQ the heaviest before she got bounced from the district.
Anonymous
Post 05/17/2024 16:51     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:XQ is a gimmick. When will DCPS quit chasing shiny baubles and stick to doing a good job with basic education.


Yep, exactly. The work of improving a school isn’t so flashy. It’s hard and requires leaders with a deep understanding of good instruction, building on a solid curriculum, supported with effective PD for teachers, and consistent, supportive administrators. XQ has been a scam since it was introduced and when it started being pushed centrally, some good people just left because it was obvious it wasn’t going to work. They had tried the approach at Anacostia and Ballou and had zero academic data to support its effectiveness when they decided to scale it to more schools. The people pushing it (Chancellor Ferebee, Sarah Navarro, Paige Hoffman) had no interest in engaging with serious questions raised by staff in the Office of Teaching and Learning, but they all wanted innovation without actually understanding what supports already existed and whether those supports were being used effectively or not already. And they tried to buy off school leaders, teachers, and key central staff by sending them on boondoggle “site visits” to XQ schools in other states for inspiration. Despite my skepticism, I went on one of these trips and saw a school struggling without any kind of proper curriculum, with kids who wandered around playing on laptops without anything specific to do, with vague project-based integrated units that had very little connection to any learning standards or the disciplines to which they were supposedly aligned. The experiences of the kids and teachers described in this thread are altogether predictable but still make me sad to see it’s going just as badly as many smart people assumed it would.


It sounds like Ferebee and his minions don’t actually know how to improve schools and are just throwing anything at them to see if something might stick. They need to roll up their sleeves and do the hard work to turn schools around. This means actually spending time in schools. Ferebee should move his office to Cardozo for a week. He would learn a lot
Anonymous
Post 05/17/2024 16:04     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Anonymous wrote:XQ is a gimmick. When will DCPS quit chasing shiny baubles and stick to doing a good job with basic education.


Yep, exactly. The work of improving a school isn’t so flashy. It’s hard and requires leaders with a deep understanding of good instruction, building on a solid curriculum, supported with effective PD for teachers, and consistent, supportive administrators. XQ has been a scam since it was introduced and when it started being pushed centrally, some good people just left because it was obvious it wasn’t going to work. They had tried the approach at Anacostia and Ballou and had zero academic data to support its effectiveness when they decided to scale it to more schools. The people pushing it (Chancellor Ferebee, Sarah Navarro, Paige Hoffman) had no interest in engaging with serious questions raised by staff in the Office of Teaching and Learning, but they all wanted innovation without actually understanding what supports already existed and whether those supports were being used effectively or not already. And they tried to buy off school leaders, teachers, and key central staff by sending them on boondoggle “site visits” to XQ schools in other states for inspiration. Despite my skepticism, I went on one of these trips and saw a school struggling without any kind of proper curriculum, with kids who wandered around playing on laptops without anything specific to do, with vague project-based integrated units that had very little connection to any learning standards or the disciplines to which they were supposedly aligned. The experiences of the kids and teachers described in this thread are altogether predictable but still make me sad to see it’s going just as badly as many smart people assumed it would.
Anonymous
Post 05/15/2024 19:35     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Hmm..
Anonymous
Post 03/27/2024 10:23     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
The idea that every student straight out of high school will own their own business is so outlandishly dumb.

Mr. Mola has no vision and Dr. Blake has no place in education.

Learning Lab Friday’s are a joke. The kids just roam the halls instead of going to their assigned programming.
Anonymous
Post 03/27/2024 06:56     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:XQ could be good, but whoever is in charge of the communication needs to pass that responsibility to someone else.

Mixed messages. One day every kid will own their own business. Then, it’s every kid will learn about business. Next, it’s every kid who graduates must have a business plan.

You don’t have to attend LL Fridayz, now you do.

Dr. Blake isn’t an AP and can’t do impact evaluations, but now he can.

It’s just poorly communicated.


To own your own business, learning about business and having a business plan seem to be both reasonable and useful. Sad that such a potentially useful initiative isn't being perceived well by all stakeholders.


Yes something like that makes a great elective class when taught with an appropriate curriculum and a qualified teacher.

Self directive business creation from the ground up is hard for adults. But somehow kids show up at school and will automagically know how to do it and of course be self motivated to do it every day with little to no guudance 🤷‍♂️

The XQ plan is fine when applied to a single class in a public school It’s just not scalable for an entire public school.

XQ would be a perfect fit for a private school.In fact Fusion Academy sounds like it.
Anonymous
Post 03/26/2024 06:55     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Ah, basic education.

Now thats a fancy idea!
Anonymous
Post 03/24/2024 18:27     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
XQ is a gimmick. When will DCPS quit chasing shiny baubles and stick to doing a good job with basic education.
Anonymous
Post 03/24/2024 18:23     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
To Cardozo Teachers:

What about XQ is working?

What isn’t?
Anonymous
Post 03/24/2024 14:20     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Anonymous wrote:Is this still being discussed 🙄


I expect it to be discussed until it actually works or it is ditched.

(And I expect the later because the premise of XQ is fundamentally flawed.)
Anonymous
Post 03/24/2024 13:42     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Is this still being discussed 🙄
Anonymous
Post 03/24/2024 10:34     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Anonymous wrote:I am a teacher at C and I see many seniors with 1-2 empty blocks every day. Is this ok, what do you think?


Sounds like those kids are getting a quality education.

What’s the principal saying about this?
Anonymous
Post 03/21/2024 12:51     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
Anonymous wrote:9 APs next year. Mola’s personal guards? Or killers that carry on his personal revenge?


For how many grades? How does that even fit in the budget?!
Anonymous
Post 03/21/2024 12:13     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
I am a teacher at C and I see many seniors with 1-2 empty blocks every day. Is this ok, what do you think?
Anonymous
Post 02/23/2024 17:10     Subject: Cardozo: XQ is it Working?
9 APs next year. Mola’s personal guards? Or killers that carry on his personal revenge?