Anonymous wrote:The story is - Ellington has poor records management.

It really is an easy problem to fix - if anyone wanted to.

No. The story is - Ellington is failing to effectively deal with rampant residency fraud because it also has poor records management.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Needs to be shut down. The city can not justify spending so much on so few.

The city spends the same on Ellington per pupil as every other high school. The extra money spent there for the arts faculty and curriculum is raised from private sources.

The capital budget is a whole separate thing.

The capital budget is money, just like the operating budget.

Process to register at Ellington was the same as at Deal. Submit paperwork. Neither school asked me to prove I was my child's parent. Neither checked to see whether my lease was forged (you can print a DC lease and stick signatures on it). Neither checked to see whether I'd lied about my address to to HR in order to have the right address on my pay stubs.

No employer has ever asked me to prove my address.

Since a pay stub is enough on its own, schools aren't responsible for investigating, and DC government doesn't bother to investigate, residency fraud is easy (I haven't done it).

DC government is extremely dysfunctional and that's one reason they don't even stop their own employees from gaming the system.

Mayor Bowser is the worst joke yet.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The entire escapade is amusing: the crooks squawk, squawk because they expected, and seemingly continue to expect, D.C. to be as incompetent in policing their fraud as it always has; but City politics require the AG to get it right this time. And the AG is doing that, after a few false starts. Once more than a few dozen birds are cooked, the squawking will end. The observers will look back and marvel at the self-righteousness of the crooked crowd.

For 99% of cases, it is simply NOT difficult to prove residency.

The AG isn't even involved yet because the referrals from OSSE to them had so many issues.

Right now the ball is in OSSE's court. Then the AG will decide which of these cases -- IF ANY -- to prosecute. Racine hasn't committed to anything yet. What he has said is that pursuing these cases must be balanced against other crimes, and how to deploy resources.

Squawk, squawk!! How DARE they investigate these patrons of the arts for fraud?! Catch some REAL criminals! Squawk!

Racine doesn't seem to think this is a priority. From the WashingtonPost in April https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/stop-enrollment-fraud-dc-school-officials-are-often-the-ones-committing-it/2018/04/16/03b816c0-3ce7-11e8-8d53-eba0ed2371cc_story.html?utm_term=.ebb7f5d10fb5

..."Since 2013, education officials have investigated and referred 182 residency fraud cases to the attorney general’s office. Just 39 — fewer than 1 in 4 — led to settlements or enforcement actions. During the same period, the attorney general has collected approximately 20 percent of the $1.5 million families were required to pay as the result of settlements or court judgments.

Robert Marus, a spokesman for D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine (D), said parents found liable frequently agree to pay in installments over years, which accounts for the discrepancy between fines and tuition owed and what has been collected.

Not every referral from the school system merits enforcement, he said. The office’s lawyers “must perform an independent review of the evidence presented and the facts of the case to determine if further action is merited and is likely to produce a positive result, either through a judgment or settlement, that would justify the use of our limited resources,” he said. "

And since then, the AG has had to defend OSSE (as its attorney) in court when some of the Ellington parents pushed back on the findings.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we can say the evidence appears to be that the students mostly appear to be DC residents - I think we have evidence that in a few cases Ellington families identified as non-DC residents have demonstrated that they live in DC.

What we have evidence of is OSSE’s inability to follow the administrative procedures related to allegations of residency fraud.

We know that some families have been able to prove they are residents.

We don’t know of anyone who has said “yeah, you got me here is your check / we’re out of here” and we know that at least 90% of students re-enrolled, suggesting they feel they have a winn key case.

It will be months before anyone knows the full story.

OSSE is using the records provided by Ellington. If the Ellington registrar did their job, this would never have been a story.

The OSSE's failure was not to tell each family why their documents were found inadequate (e.g. "you submitted a lease for an address that is a commercial establishment" or "the guardianship document you provided appears to be fake") which they must do under DC's law. They just said "we think you don't live in DC" without saying why.

And the registrar isn't supposed to determine whether a document is real or fake. That's not their role.

Right we get that. But OSSE can only go on WHAT ELLINGTON GAVE THEM FROM THE FAMILIES. OSSE didn't make up a fake address for the family in the article who has lived in the same location for 27 years (they say). There was something Ellington had in THEIR records that was incorrect.

Anonymous wrote:The entire escapade is amusing: the crooks squawk, squawk because they expected, and seemingly continue to expect, D.C. to be as incompetent in policing their fraud as it always has; but City politics require the AG to get it right this time. And the AG is doing that, after a few false starts. Once more than a few dozen birds are cooked, the squawking will end. The observers will look back and marvel at the self-righteousness of the crooked crowd.

For 99% of cases, it is simply NOT difficult to prove residency.

The AG isn't even involved yet because the referrals from OSSE to them had so many issues.

Right now the ball is in OSSE's court. Then the AG will decide which of these cases -- IF ANY -- to prosecute. Racine hasn't committed to anything yet. What he has said is that pursuing these cases must be balanced against other crimes, and how to deploy resources.

The entire escapade is amusing: the crooks squawk, squawk because they expected, and seemingly continue to expect, D.C. to be as incompetent in policing their fraud as it always has; but City politics require the AG to get it right this time. And the AG is doing that, after a few false starts. Once more than a few dozen birds are cooked, the squawking will end. The observers will look back and marvel at the self-righteousness of the crooked crowd.

For 99% of cases, it is simply NOT difficult to prove residency.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we can say the evidence appears to be that the students mostly appear to be DC residents - I think we have evidence that in a few cases Ellington families identified as non-DC residents have demonstrated that they live in DC.

What we have evidence of is OSSE’s inability to follow the administrative procedures related to allegations of residency fraud.

We know that some families have been able to prove they are residents.

We don’t know of anyone who has said “yeah, you got me here is your check / we’re out of here” and we know that at least 90% of students re-enrolled, suggesting they feel they have a winn key case.

It will be months before anyone knows the full story.

OSSE is using the records provided by Ellington. If the Ellington registrar did their job, this would never have been a story.

The OSSE's failure was not to tell each family why their documents were found inadequate (e.g. "you submitted a lease for an address that is a commercial establishment" or "the guardianship document you provided appears to be fake") which they must do under DC's law. They just said "we think you don't live in DC" without saying why.

And the registrar isn't supposed to determine whether a document is real or fake. That's not their role.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we can say the evidence appears to be that the students mostly appear to be DC residents - I think we have evidence that in a few cases Ellington families identified as non-DC residents have demonstrated that they live in DC.

What we have evidence of is OSSE’s inability to follow the administrative procedures related to allegations of residency fraud.

We know that some families have been able to prove they are residents.

We don’t know of anyone who has said “yeah, you got me here is your check / we’re out of here” and we know that at least 90% of students re-enrolled, suggesting they feel they have a winn key case.

It will be months before anyone knows the full story.

OSSE is using the records provided by Ellington. If the Ellington registrar did their job, this would never have been a story.

Anonymous wrote:I don't think we can say the evidence appears to be that the students mostly appear to be DC residents - I think we have evidence that in a few cases Ellington families identified as non-DC residents have demonstrated that they live in DC.

What we have evidence of is OSSE’s inability to follow the administrative procedures related to allegations of residency fraud.

We know that some families have been able to prove they are residents.

We don’t know of anyone who has said “yeah, you got me here is your check / we’re out of here” and we know that at least 90% of students re-enrolled, suggesting they feel they have a winn key case.

It will be months before anyone knows the full story.

I don't think we can say the evidence appears to be that the students mostly appear to be DC residents - I think we have evidence that in a few cases Ellington families identified as non-DC residents have demonstrated that they live in DC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Needs to be shut down. The city can not justify spending so much on so few.

The city spends the same on Ellington per pupil as every other high school. The extra money spent there for the arts faculty and curriculum is raised from private sources.

The capital budget is a whole separate thing.

You're ignoring the main point: that well over 1/5 of the students at Ellington may be going there on the taxpayers' EXTRA dime. If those kids are not D.C. residents, the effect is DCPS paying twice, three times, as much per (real) D.C. student at Ellington than for D.C. students at other DCPS schools, where hopefully all of the students are actually D.C. residents.

Is this new math. If these were all DC students (and the evidence is that they mostly appear to be anyhow and OSSE was wrong), the school would still have the same number of students and would be paying the same amount per pupil.
And since that number of out of town students would be well over the 10% cap, DC would not be getting any of that back in tuition.

Ellington should be a DC school, not a PG school!

The story is - Ellington has poor records management.

It really is an easy problem to fix - if anyone wanted to.