As someone who claims to have no interest in sending your kids to Yu Ying, you have a lot of opinions on how Yu Ying runs their lottery: Take it up with the charter board and start your own Chinese school.

As a Yu Ying parent, I like the lottery as is, with everyone having the same chance of getting in. So no, Cantonese speakers and ABCs should not get any preferential treatment simply due to race/ethnic heritage. Our family plans on going to China every summer for the foreseeable future for Chinese culture and enrichment.

None of the parents involved in my kid's Cantonese play group (with members from all four quadrants) seems interested in putting their kid(s) name in the lottery, although all sound serious about having them learn Mandarin eventually. We disagree that including more dialect speakers wouldn't "do much to boost" the Mandarin learning at Yu Ying, as the non-Chinese dad who's fluent in Chinese (good for him) asserts. In China, no matter which dialect a kid speaks at home, or where they hail from, full-time Mandarin instruction starts in kindergarten. 15 or 20 years ago, most provinces supported "transition" kindergartens in which instruction was half in a "primary" dialect and half in Mandarin, but these were phased out. Studies show that native speakers of a dialect other than Mandarin can learn the lingua franca in roughly one-third the time that most non-Chinese can, although they will speak it with a "regional accent" unless they start very young. The dialects are not different languages - it's mainly just pronunciation that's different from Mandarin's. Also, Yu Ying's current set-up tends to non plus us for subtle reasons unlikely to occur to non-Chinese parents. For example, go to an information night and hear from a non-Chinese administrator how the school teaches its families how to celebrate Chinese holidays, the assumption being that those those in the audience wouldn't know how. You think to yourself, what if these parents were being told that they'd be taught how to celebrate Thanksgiving, the 4th of July and Christmas? Of course the DC Chinese parents who were supposedly the beneficiaries of "extensive outreach" when Yu Ying was being launched want their kids to learn English well, but they also want them to learn Mandarin, preferably with other bilingual kids. If you're raising your kid bilingual, you tend to resent a brutal lottery in which a non-Chinese speaking child has the same shot as yours. So you probably stay away and make your their own plans to ensure that the Mandarin learning gets done. Many bilingual ABCs who avoid the Yu Ying lottery squire their kids to Mandarin classes in Rockville or Silver Spring, where they feel comfortable in settings with lots of other Chinese. We also support camps for our bilingual kids, mainly in NY and NJ. For a lot of us, Yu Ying is on a different planet.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'm a parent with a child who performs above grade level in both subjects. The quality of the teaching, for the most part, is weak at Yu Ying.

I get that the school and the boosters on this board don't want to admit or address this fact, but it doesn't change the reality of the situation.

What grades do you think are weak? I am a parent of a YY third grader and while I think that some teachers have been better than others, I feel that the quality of the education has been above average for the last two years (2nd and 3rd grades).

I'm another YY parent very curious for more information about what makes the teachers "weak." Is it simply a matter of inexperience? Are they judged as "weak" due to a combination of inexperience and disappointing CAS scores?

I'd really love to hear more.

" The quality of the teaching, for the most part, is weak at Yu Ying."

What I don't understand is how parents ascertain this if they aren't in the classroom and their kids aren't failing and/or showing obvious signs of academic stress--

I mean, if your kid comes home and is "above average" in subjects, are you suggesting you don't believe your kid is above average, you don't believe in the grading system, or believe that your kid is above average because of home/family life?

You give no credit to the teachers? Not understanding the sentiment here.

The teachers in general have not taught before. Specifically, the current 4th graders have only had 1 English lead teacher with experience (2nd grade) teaching the grade level that they were in.

This does not necessarily mean that the teaching is weak.

It does mean the teachers are inexperienced.

I wonder why the school does not attract applicants who have previously taught the upper grade levels. I wonder if the administration is threatened by experienced educators.

Anonymous wrote:I'm a parent with a child who performs above grade level in both subjects. The quality of the teaching, for the most part, is weak at Yu Ying.

I get that the school and the boosters on this board don't want to admit or address this fact, but it doesn't change the reality of the situation.

I wonder how your child's teachers would rate your parenting? My guess is Weak. I get it that you don't want to admit or address this fact, but it doesn't change the reality of the situation.

Anonymous wrote:I'm a parent with a child who performs above grade level in both subjects. The quality of the teaching, for the most part, is weak at Yu Ying.

I get that the school and the boosters on this board don't want to admit or address this fact, but it doesn't change the reality of the situation.

What grades do you think are weak? I am a parent of a YY third grader and while I think that some teachers have been better than others, I feel that the quality of the education has been above average for the last two years (2nd and 3rd grades).

PP, I'm also a parent at YY and I'm curious about your statement--could you provide more specifics? I am not in the education field and don't understand half of the "education speak" I read hear. I want my kid to be able to do math, love reading, write well, and be curious about the world. So when I hear that the "teaching is weak" I don't quite know what to make of it. Can you be more *detailed* about your statement because I am the type of parent who sends my kid to school, looks at the tests and report card, and if my kid seems happy I'm not going to question much.

I'm a parent with a child who performs above grade level in both subjects. The quality of the teaching, for the most part, is weak at Yu Ying.

I get that the school and the boosters on this board don't want to admit or address this fact, but it doesn't change the reality of the situation.

I like it when people acted as if they could predict the future. The way they have you believe is that next year's DCCAS score would be off the chart. Maybe they are the only ones who noticed/imagined: either the teachers got so much better than last year's or the current 3rd graders are so much smarter. So it wouldn't be a tough hike from the last DCCAS score which was 62% Reading and 57% Math. Reality might be just a little different. Guess it wouldn't have ocurred to them.

Anonymous wrote:18:41, keep telling yourself that boo-boo. But as up thread has indicated, the teaching is weak at Yu Ying. Very, very weak.

If you're correct, the present third grade class, that started YY in K, should be in the 90plus rate proficient in math and reading. We'll all be watching and popping the corn.

It must be your child whose performance is weak. Mine can read above grade level in English (and of course, Chinese).

Guess boo-boo doesn't have much to say now, huh??? Weak. Very weak.

heee heee!!! that is exactly what i thought! somebody's child is not doing well, so of course it is always the school's and teachers' fault!

Have been there since the beginning. Teaching and teachers are great and DS is doing incredibly well. PP: is your child not doing well? is that why you say the "teaching is weak"? Maybe the parenting is weak??????

18:41, keep telling yourself that boo-boo. But as up thread has indicated, the teaching is weak at Yu Ying. Very, very weak.

If you're correct, the present third grade class, that started YY in K, should be in the 90plus rate proficient in math and reading. We'll all be watching and popping the corn.