Anonymous wrote:High income parents send their kids to private school, not charter schools or other public schools (unless it's TJ in Virginia).

Nope. Wrong again.

Anonymous wrote:I think it's great that parents have charter schools as an option. I think it is unfair that they don't have to play by the same rules as DCPS while accepting the same money.

But, life is unfair.

Some of the rules are tougher- like not being able to restrict your student body to a specific geography, or not being able to shape your incoming student body language dominance for immersion schools.

And charters don't accept the same money. They get around $3,000-4,000 less per student than DCPS for facilities, but that can't be found anywhere because DCPS doesn't receive facilities money directly, but rather through services provided by DGS. Source from 2012:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/dc-charter-schools-fight-second-class-status/2012/08/21/b98961ce-bc1f-11e1-9134-f33232e6dafa_story.html

"The District is spending $5,986 per student this year for construction and renovation of [DCPS] buildings. Charter schools, not included in the capital budget, received $3,000 per student to lease or purchase buildings."

I think it's great that parents have charter schools as an option. I think it is unfair that they don't have to play by the same rules as DCPS while accepting the same money.

But, life is unfair.

High income parents send their kids to private school, not charter schools or other public schools (unless it's TJ in Virginia).

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wish charter schools didn't exist. If they were outlawed tomorrow, my neighborhood school would basically immediately become great. However, because they exist, and because I got into a good one, I'm going to use it.

False. Charter schools have only been around a few years. Its wishful thinking to assume that high income parents would just attend their local if they didn't have a charter option. We would be back to the way things were 10 years ago when parents just moved to burbs or went private.

Nah. My IB school is close enough. It would for sure flip if it was the only option.

Anonymous wrote:I wish charter schools didn't exist. If they were outlawed tomorrow, my neighborhood school would basically immediately become great. However, because they exist, and because I got into a good one, I'm going to use it.

Agreed.

Most people probably choose charters based on a broad, deep-seated desire to avoid failing schools. They recognize that there is a collective action problem in establishing diverse school communities as well as corrective government intervention needed to make things work.

Successful families choosing school communities where most students fail is not normal in America, and that is, effectively, the choice presented to most (but not all) families in DC east of Rock Creek Park. Confidence in success for your children in such a situation is based on going against the flow, not acting like most people like you. It is an affirmative choice. And many are unwilling to make it.

Many families that have not succeeded in DCPS for generations also have a right to be displeased with this situation. They want alternatives to failure. The American educational system does not appear to have come up with good answers for students whose parents have poor educational attainment in schools surrounded by students with poor educational attainment. (Best I've heard of for this situation is taking small numbers of would-be striver children of uneducated parents and placing them in schools surrounded by only high achievers, in schools with minimal disruptions and deep student support, i.e., rich suburbs, which is not a solution for entire DC wards' worth of children.)

Charter schools have been posed as the alternative. They certainly have served as such, and have grown with the frustration with DCPS as people have sought alternatives.

I believe that charter openings were too easily allowed and it made joining a charter community rather than joining a DCPS community too easy a choice. I believe that there are differing intensities of interest in (1) alternatives-to-DCPS or (2) the niche-bases of certain charters, and the rapid expansion of these schools as DC family numbers have rebounded since that Mayor Williams inflection point of interest in living in DC has made them easier to wrap your head around than joining schools made up exclusively of failing students from cultures considered less-than by most Americans and parents resentful of your place in society.

The right answer would be a carrot-and-stick approach to encourage a desegregation of DC's schools. Desegregating DC's schools is probably the best way to see them succeed over time. Successful parents' their political voices in DC politics can help demand their transformation. A mix of at-grade, above-grade, and below-grade students can help make success more normal for all students.

DCPS has not moved fast enough to encourage the development of schools that create mixed communities, e.g., bilingual schools. Nothing says DCPS couldn't have its next elementary school in booming Ward 4 be an Amharic bilingual school, just to cite one example, or make Hardy a straight-up just-sue-me knockoff of BASIS MS, but that kind of creativity and entrepreneurial approach is only being pursued in the charter sector. DCPS could throw more money at must-have programming or niche staff than at building empty cathedrals, but has instead favored the buildings.

DC government could also work some sticks in that will make people whine, then turn to put in some elbow grease. Actually place limits on the expansion of the charter sector so that it can't just be the mindless choice of every white upper-class couple with a condo, dog and a 3 year-old in Ward 1 or 5. Take a hardass approach to boundary changes that will reliably place successful students a path from places like Bancroft through Roosevelt. Don't like it? Don't want to or can't move or get your kid into WLPCS or DCI? Well, maybe in the end you and yours get a differentiated program through MS and HS that means your snowflakes only have to mix with the children of the ghetto at lunch and recess, but that's the start of investment and involvement rather than out-and-out shunning, and mark my words it's the start of a move toward an integrated, reasonable system.

People can call it "social engineering," but how do you think you live your lives? Why does my family speak English rather than Spanish? Why can we afford mortgages? Does the trash get picked up if you leave it behind your house? How do we have 13 Council members and zero Congressmen? WE make choices that create societal outcomes, and I think we can design better ones in this area based on what we know and what's happened.

Let's go beyond complaints about people acting the best way the system lets them and the side-effects and problems the system hasn't fixed and design what we want.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They do their best to justify it but they are selfish, liberal hypocrites.

Know what they did in the South, in particular VA, when Supreme Court ruled separate but equal was unconstitutional? School boards diverted the money to private schools. Charter schools are the same but with a different name.

Not only that, but charter non-FARM parents, especially at the high school level are supposed to either donate thousands of dollars or do substantial fundraising. If not, your child will suffer tremendously. It has happened to many many parents and their kids.

How, specifically? That should be illegal. If it's public education then donating time, money, etc. should be voluntary.

Anonymous wrote:They do their best to justify it but they are selfish, liberal hypocrites.

Know what they did in the South, in particular VA, when Supreme Court ruled separate but equal was unconstitutional? School boards diverted the money to private schools. Charter schools are the same but with a different name.

Not only that, but charter non-FARM parents, especially at the high school level are supposed to either donate thousands of dollars or do substantial fundraising. If not, your child will suffer tremendously. It has happened to many many parents and their kids.

They do their best to justify it but they are selfish, liberal hypocrites.

Know what they did in the South, in particular VA, when Supreme Court ruled separate but equal was unconstitutional? School boards diverted the money to private schools. Charter schools are the same but with a different name.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, look at the data. DCPS schools were on a long enrollment decline. People used to not live in the city at all, because of the schools. They were bad long before charters got started in any significant numbets.

The relationship between neighborhood schools and charters is more nuanced than you may realize. Personally, I have children at our IB Title I and am busting my ass to make it work. But the possibility of charter middle school is the only reason I'm willing to be there at all, because the neighborhood middle school is unacceptable. Without charters, I'd be gone.

I agree with a lot of what you said, but I think if you look far enough back the reason for the decline in DC population wasn't that the schools were bad. There were a lot of racial aspects tied to suburban flight around the time of the riots.
For example, Roosevelt used to be a great school with notable graduates. Not so much in the last 30-40 years.

When my 10 year old was born, people told me to leave because of DCPS, not because of racial issues. Had I not had a good charter option, I would have had to leave. DCPS was acting continuously recklessly with regard to our neighborhood school. I could not have trusted that my child would be safe. 7 year olds were eating crack in the classroom.

I'll bold it for you: "if you look far enough back". How do you think it ended up like that 10 years ago? It wasn't spontaneous, and didn't arise out of nowhere.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, look at the data. DCPS schools were on a long enrollment decline. People used to not live in the city at all, because of the schools. They were bad long before charters got started in any significant numbets.

The relationship between neighborhood schools and charters is more nuanced than you may realize. Personally, I have children at our IB Title I and am busting my ass to make it work. But the possibility of charter middle school is the only reason I'm willing to be there at all, because the neighborhood middle school is unacceptable. Without charters, I'd be gone.

I agree with a lot of what you said, but I think if you look far enough back the reason for the decline in DC population wasn't that the schools were bad. There were a lot of racial aspects tied to suburban flight around the time of the riots.
For example, Roosevelt used to be a great school with notable graduates. Not so much in the last 30-40 years.

When my 10 year old was born, people told me to leave because of DCPS, not because of racial issues. Had I not had a good charter option, I would have had to leave. DCPS was acting continuously recklessly with regard to our neighborhood school. I could not have trusted that my child would be safe. 7 year olds were eating crack in the classroom.

Anonymous wrote:I wish charter schools didn't exist. If they were outlawed tomorrow, my neighborhood school would basically immediately become great. However, because they exist, and because I got into a good one, I'm going to use it.

False. Charter schools have only been around a few years. Its wishful thinking to assume that high income parents would just attend their local if they didn't have a charter option. We would be back to the way things were 10 years ago when parents just moved to burbs or went private.

Anonymous wrote:OP, look at the data. DCPS schools were on a long enrollment decline. People used to not live in the city at all, because of the schools. They were bad long before charters got started in any significant numbets.

The relationship between neighborhood schools and charters is more nuanced than you may realize. Personally, I have children at our IB Title I and am busting my ass to make it work. But the possibility of charter middle school is the only reason I'm willing to be there at all, because the neighborhood middle school is unacceptable. Without charters, I'd be gone.

I agree with a lot of what you said, but I think if you look far enough back the reason for the decline in DC population wasn't that the schools were bad. There were a lot of racial aspects tied to suburban flight around the time of the riots.
For example, Roosevelt used to be a great school with notable graduates. Not so much in the last 30-40 years.

OP, look at the data. DCPS schools were on a long enrollment decline. People used to not live in the city at all, because of the schools. They were bad long before charters got started in any significant numbets.

The relationship between neighborhood schools and charters is more nuanced than you may realize. Personally, I have children at our IB Title I and am busting my ass to make it work. But the possibility of charter middle school is the only reason I'm willing to be there at all, because the neighborhood middle school is unacceptable. Without charters, I'd be gone.