Anonymous
Post 09/09/2024 07:39     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I would add, however, that I definitely wouldn't count on a waitlist spot opening up unless maybe there's some lottery-based shuffling in ECE. 1st through 5th could all stand to have class sizes shrink, so even kids dropping out would not lead to additional waiting list spots.


Thanks, that's helpful.

Regarding class sizes, I think you need to check your expectations. We are at a Title 1 and we've had our kids in class sizes over 22 the last 3 years. Especially with the recent budget cuts, your expectations that you are going to be able to shrink class sizes at all, or resist pressure to add lottery spots, comes off as entitled to me. Especially on the Hill where elementary schools are very much a study of haves and have nots.


This fact might actually explain some of Miller's behavior and the animosity between some of the community and the admin. Parents and teachers want small classes, but DCPS is dealing with a major budget shortfall. A school like L-T that was fairly recently T1 you may have families and teachers who were shielded from the consequences of losing T1 status thanks to extra Covid funding. With that funding source disappearing L-T has to deal with what it looks like to have a non-T1 school in the district. Watching people complain about these class sizes and then looking at some of the class sizes (and budget cuts) in W3 schools makes me think that L-T families (and likely teachers too) are struggling to acclimate to what it looks like to be a relatively high income school in DCPS. If you think one first grade class with 26 kids is a major problem, well, best of luck.
Anonymous
Post 09/09/2024 07:28     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:I would add, however, that I definitely wouldn't count on a waitlist spot opening up unless maybe there's some lottery-based shuffling in ECE. 1st through 5th could all stand to have class sizes shrink, so even kids dropping out would not lead to additional waiting list spots.


Thanks, that's helpful.

Regarding class sizes, I think you need to check your expectations. We are at a Title 1 and we've had our kids in class sizes over 22 the last 3 years. Especially with the recent budget cuts, your expectations that you are going to be able to shrink class sizes at all, or resist pressure to add lottery spots, comes off as entitled to me. Especially on the Hill where elementary schools are very much a study of haves and have nots.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2024 15:48     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
I would add, however, that I definitely wouldn't count on a waitlist spot opening up unless maybe there's some lottery-based shuffling in ECE. 1st through 5th could all stand to have class sizes shrink, so even kids dropping out would not lead to additional waiting list spots.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2024 15:46     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Excellent BS’r is an understatement. Totally disenfranchised largely underserved AA community and when it looks like fairness will slither through she closes the door. Parents from all economic backgrounds and color have reached out to OSSE and even the Chancellor regarding the disparate treatment. DC only wants a warm body in the seat and is happy to have one that shows up and smiles apparently. PP is a mean girl and extremely passive aggressive. I smell a lawsuit coming if negligence of SPED and those lacking IEP’s due to understaffing isn’t addressed and quickly.


The administration has done more to aggravate/alienate community members this year, and we are only in early September! School registration/renewal/disenrollmemt forms for current and former students weren’t processed all summer leading to a couple different challenges. Class numbers weren’t accurate, which lead to some teachers and parents not knowing class assignments until they arrived at school the first day. This also resulted in being oversubscribed in first grade by 20 students (a whole classroom’s worth!), and nearly as many in the third grade, without enough teachers or physical seats for the over enrolled students to sit in. The classes are oversized, resulting in a more challenging teaching environment. Disenrolled families were still getting notices for school and rumors of some others receiving calls from MPD for wellness checks due to prolonged absence of their “enrolled” children.

Most recently, in their first opportunity to build bridges to the school community, the administration kicked out the community members and PTO from the year’s first PTO meeting because the administration failed to coordinate adequate staffing of required DCPS personnel for the time of the scheduled meeting. I say administration because Miller wouldn’t show up and sent the AP to the meeting.

While there may have been hopes when she arrived (beginning of the thread) that this would be good, Miller has taken every opportunity to undermine the involved members of the community (PTO, LSAT, teachers). She continues to refuse to be a presence at school-related events outside of school hours that would give her any opportunity to meet parents and be present with them. She turns a blind eye to safety issues within the school (student-on-student assaults). She underserves those students with special needs at the school. She calls the police on her own staff for having impassioned conversations with her. On the whole, the teachers don’t respect her. Parents, when they do get a response after reaching out to her, are generally left disappointed or frustrated by the lip service and lack of action. She is the worst.

And the most frustrating part of all of this is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The school has amazing parent and teacher involvement. Community members want a principal that will just COMMUNICATE with them in an honest way and respond to their needs with empathy and understanding. They are looking for ways to help the school and have no shortage of volunteers, but are foiled at every turn by Miller.


You sound a lot like a PITA parent. The role of a school is to teach the kids, not to be a forum for your “involvement.” Parents are not in fact entitled to every single detail and should keep their contact with the principal to the most necessary. Get empathy and understanding from your friends not your kids’ principal!

I am not an LT parent but was at a different Hill school. So no direct opinion on this principal but just observing that being a Hill ES principal must be HARD given the, erm, intense parents around here.


Truth. Also a Hill parent and the intensity of many parents around school issues is a bigger issue for me than most administrative eff ups.

Also I am confused about the details offered here about enrollment and class assignment because we were on the waitlist for LT and saw steady movement throughout the summer even in July when most schools don't touch the waitlist because that's when admin go on vacation. So I'm not getting how the school could possibly not have processed enrollment and disenrollment if it was making waitlist offers.

Would be interested to hear from other LT families if they have the same opinion as the PP (and especially if those reports of overenrollment are true -- what are class sizes like) as we are high on the waitlist and had planned to take a spot if offered in September.


1st grade was overenrolled without any real explanation so far, but definitely not by 20. There are 76 students across 3 classes. DCPS will tell you their ideal class size is 22, but up to 25 is considered standard sized; so there is technically only 1 student above the normal limit or 10 extra if we're looking at the DCPS ideal. 3rd grade is 25 or under in every class. L-T has historically had smaller class sizes, so these class sizes are unusual for us, but not actually that unusual for non-T1 DCPSes. I think the issue is that DCPS keeps making L-T add lottery slots based on what attrition was like years ago. Now that there's much less attrition (except between 4th and 5th like all Hill schools), we simply shouldn't be offering so many lottery spots.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2024 09:00     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Excellent BS’r is an understatement. Totally disenfranchised largely underserved AA community and when it looks like fairness will slither through she closes the door. Parents from all economic backgrounds and color have reached out to OSSE and even the Chancellor regarding the disparate treatment. DC only wants a warm body in the seat and is happy to have one that shows up and smiles apparently. PP is a mean girl and extremely passive aggressive. I smell a lawsuit coming if negligence of SPED and those lacking IEP’s due to understaffing isn’t addressed and quickly.


The administration has done more to aggravate/alienate community members this year, and we are only in early September! School registration/renewal/disenrollmemt forms for current and former students weren’t processed all summer leading to a couple different challenges. Class numbers weren’t accurate, which lead to some teachers and parents not knowing class assignments until they arrived at school the first day. This also resulted in being oversubscribed in first grade by 20 students (a whole classroom’s worth!), and nearly as many in the third grade, without enough teachers or physical seats for the over enrolled students to sit in. The classes are oversized, resulting in a more challenging teaching environment. Disenrolled families were still getting notices for school and rumors of some others receiving calls from MPD for wellness checks due to prolonged absence of their “enrolled” children.

Most recently, in their first opportunity to build bridges to the school community, the administration kicked out the community members and PTO from the year’s first PTO meeting because the administration failed to coordinate adequate staffing of required DCPS personnel for the time of the scheduled meeting. I say administration because Miller wouldn’t show up and sent the AP to the meeting.

While there may have been hopes when she arrived (beginning of the thread) that this would be good, Miller has taken every opportunity to undermine the involved members of the community (PTO, LSAT, teachers). She continues to refuse to be a presence at school-related events outside of school hours that would give her any opportunity to meet parents and be present with them. She turns a blind eye to safety issues within the school (student-on-student assaults). She underserves those students with special needs at the school. She calls the police on her own staff for having impassioned conversations with her. On the whole, the teachers don’t respect her. Parents, when they do get a response after reaching out to her, are generally left disappointed or frustrated by the lip service and lack of action. She is the worst.

And the most frustrating part of all of this is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The school has amazing parent and teacher involvement. Community members want a principal that will just COMMUNICATE with them in an honest way and respond to their needs with empathy and understanding. They are looking for ways to help the school and have no shortage of volunteers, but are foiled at every turn by Miller.


You sound a lot like a PITA parent. The role of a school is to teach the kids, not to be a forum for your “involvement.” Parents are not in fact entitled to every single detail and should keep their contact with the principal to the most necessary. Get empathy and understanding from your friends not your kids’ principal!

I am not an LT parent but was at a different Hill school. So no direct opinion on this principal but just observing that being a Hill ES principal must be HARD given the, erm, intense parents around here.


Truth. Also a Hill parent and the intensity of many parents around school issues is a bigger issue for me than most administrative eff ups.

Also I am confused about the details offered here about enrollment and class assignment because we were on the waitlist for LT and saw steady movement throughout the summer even in July when most schools don't touch the waitlist because that's when admin go on vacation. So I'm not getting how the school could possibly not have processed enrollment and disenrollment if it was making waitlist offers.

Would be interested to hear from other LT families if they have the same opinion as the PP (and especially if those reports of overenrollment are true -- what are class sizes like) as we are high on the waitlist and had planned to take a spot if offered in September.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2024 08:38     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Excellent BS’r is an understatement. Totally disenfranchised largely underserved AA community and when it looks like fairness will slither through she closes the door. Parents from all economic backgrounds and color have reached out to OSSE and even the Chancellor regarding the disparate treatment. DC only wants a warm body in the seat and is happy to have one that shows up and smiles apparently. PP is a mean girl and extremely passive aggressive. I smell a lawsuit coming if negligence of SPED and those lacking IEP’s due to understaffing isn’t addressed and quickly.


The administration has done more to aggravate/alienate community members this year, and we are only in early September! School registration/renewal/disenrollmemt forms for current and former students weren’t processed all summer leading to a couple different challenges. Class numbers weren’t accurate, which lead to some teachers and parents not knowing class assignments until they arrived at school the first day. This also resulted in being oversubscribed in first grade by 20 students (a whole classroom’s worth!), and nearly as many in the third grade, without enough teachers or physical seats for the over enrolled students to sit in. The classes are oversized, resulting in a more challenging teaching environment. Disenrolled families were still getting notices for school and rumors of some others receiving calls from MPD for wellness checks due to prolonged absence of their “enrolled” children.

Most recently, in their first opportunity to build bridges to the school community, the administration kicked out the community members and PTO from the year’s first PTO meeting because the administration failed to coordinate adequate staffing of required DCPS personnel for the time of the scheduled meeting. I say administration because Miller wouldn’t show up and sent the AP to the meeting.

While there may have been hopes when she arrived (beginning of the thread) that this would be good, Miller has taken every opportunity to undermine the involved members of the community (PTO, LSAT, teachers). She continues to refuse to be a presence at school-related events outside of school hours that would give her any opportunity to meet parents and be present with them. She turns a blind eye to safety issues within the school (student-on-student assaults). She underserves those students with special needs at the school. She calls the police on her own staff for having impassioned conversations with her. On the whole, the teachers don’t respect her. Parents, when they do get a response after reaching out to her, are generally left disappointed or frustrated by the lip service and lack of action. She is the worst.

And the most frustrating part of all of this is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The school has amazing parent and teacher involvement. Community members want a principal that will just COMMUNICATE with them in an honest way and respond to their needs with empathy and understanding. They are looking for ways to help the school and have no shortage of volunteers, but are foiled at every turn by Miller.


You sound a lot like a PITA parent. The role of a school is to teach the kids, not to be a forum for your “involvement.” Parents are not in fact entitled to every single detail and should keep their contact with the principal to the most necessary. Get empathy and understanding from your friends not your kids’ principal!

I am not an LT parent but was at a different Hill school. So no direct opinion on this principal but just observing that being a Hill ES principal must be HARD given the, erm, intense parents around here.
Anonymous
Post 09/08/2024 08:28     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:Excellent BS’r is an understatement. Totally disenfranchised largely underserved AA community and when it looks like fairness will slither through she closes the door. Parents from all economic backgrounds and color have reached out to OSSE and even the Chancellor regarding the disparate treatment. DC only wants a warm body in the seat and is happy to have one that shows up and smiles apparently. PP is a mean girl and extremely passive aggressive. I smell a lawsuit coming if negligence of SPED and those lacking IEP’s due to understaffing isn’t addressed and quickly.


The administration has done more to aggravate/alienate community members this year, and we are only in early September! School registration/renewal/disenrollmemt forms for current and former students weren’t processed all summer leading to a couple different challenges. Class numbers weren’t accurate, which lead to some teachers and parents not knowing class assignments until they arrived at school the first day. This also resulted in being oversubscribed in first grade by 20 students (a whole classroom’s worth!), and nearly as many in the third grade, without enough teachers or physical seats for the over enrolled students to sit in. The classes are oversized, resulting in a more challenging teaching environment. Disenrolled families were still getting notices for school and rumors of some others receiving calls from MPD for wellness checks due to prolonged absence of their “enrolled” children.

Most recently, in their first opportunity to build bridges to the school community, the administration kicked out the community members and PTO from the year’s first PTO meeting because the administration failed to coordinate adequate staffing of required DCPS personnel for the time of the scheduled meeting. I say administration because Miller wouldn’t show up and sent the AP to the meeting.

While there may have been hopes when she arrived (beginning of the thread) that this would be good, Miller has taken every opportunity to undermine the involved members of the community (PTO, LSAT, teachers). She continues to refuse to be a presence at school-related events outside of school hours that would give her any opportunity to meet parents and be present with them. She turns a blind eye to safety issues within the school (student-on-student assaults). She underserves those students with special needs at the school. She calls the police on her own staff for having impassioned conversations with her. On the whole, the teachers don’t respect her. Parents, when they do get a response after reaching out to her, are generally left disappointed or frustrated by the lip service and lack of action. She is the worst.

And the most frustrating part of all of this is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The school has amazing parent and teacher involvement. Community members want a principal that will just COMMUNICATE with them in an honest way and respond to their needs with empathy and understanding. They are looking for ways to help the school and have no shortage of volunteers, but are foiled at every turn by Miller.
Anonymous
Post 08/25/2024 23:02     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Excellent BS’r is an understatement. Totally disenfranchised largely underserved AA community and when it looks like fairness will slither through she closes the door. Parents from all economic backgrounds and color have reached out to OSSE and even the Chancellor regarding the disparate treatment. DC only wants a warm body in the seat and is happy to have one that shows up and smiles apparently. PP is a mean girl and extremely passive aggressive. I smell a lawsuit coming if negligence of SPED and those lacking IEP’s due to understaffing isn’t addressed and quickly.
Anonymous
Post 03/12/2024 08:08     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Strange.
Anonymous
Post 03/10/2024 20:24     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Not the sped teacher I’m talking about. Agreed she had no choice with the one you’re talking about… You’ll see when you see who doesn’t come back next year. Teachers are not speaking up because they are weary of turnover and Miller isn’t awful, and gotta give her credit for staying the course in a tough role in a tough year. That doesn’t mean no one resents the way she was assigned and now made permanent.


It's very difficult for a principal to remove an incumbent DCPS teacher from a position they aren't excising and the new principal hasn't even been at LT long enough to have put that process in place. So unless the teacher wasn't well loved by past admin either, wasn't on a normal contract (which would normally be a short-term thing then), was trying to switch positions or her position was being excised, then I don't understand how this is possible.

Resenting how she was assigned is baffling to me. The principal split with almost no notice and DCPS gave the school its second choice from the panel who still happened to be available. What method assignment would have been preferable from the teachers' perspective? There's no way it could have gone to the brand new AP (new to being an AP and new to the school) and there was no one else at the school who even meets the technical requirements to be principal, so what should DCPS possibly have done instead? Serious question. And did they really want yet another hiring committee, so the school remained in limbo longer? And it's not like the committee has a great track record.

I don't think PP is wrong to say that some people enjoy and benefit from stirring the pot and so they do.


Yes you can, through the teacher’s evaluation.


Try reading the first sentence again. Then read the thread where it turns out this PP was totally correct and the issue was that she denied someone a promotion. FWIW I 100% think she screwed up and should have supported the promotion; the person she hired is also awful, so terrible choices all around. But PP was correct that she didn’t fire someone.
Anonymous
Post 03/10/2024 16:31     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Not the sped teacher I’m talking about. Agreed she had no choice with the one you’re talking about… You’ll see when you see who doesn’t come back next year. Teachers are not speaking up because they are weary of turnover and Miller isn’t awful, and gotta give her credit for staying the course in a tough role in a tough year. That doesn’t mean no one resents the way she was assigned and now made permanent.


It's very difficult for a principal to remove an incumbent DCPS teacher from a position they aren't excising and the new principal hasn't even been at LT long enough to have put that process in place. So unless the teacher wasn't well loved by past admin either, wasn't on a normal contract (which would normally be a short-term thing then), was trying to switch positions or her position was being excised, then I don't understand how this is possible.

Resenting how she was assigned is baffling to me. The principal split with almost no notice and DCPS gave the school its second choice from the panel who still happened to be available. What method assignment would have been preferable from the teachers' perspective? There's no way it could have gone to the brand new AP (new to being an AP and new to the school) and there was no one else at the school who even meets the technical requirements to be principal, so what should DCPS possibly have done instead? Serious question. And did they really want yet another hiring committee, so the school remained in limbo longer? And it's not like the committee has a great track record.

I don't think PP is wrong to say that some people enjoy and benefit from stirring the pot and so they do.


Yes you can, through the teacher’s evaluation.
Anonymous
Post 03/10/2024 16:10     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Bitter much?
Anonymous
Post 03/10/2024 14:51     Subject: Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Felt the need to share 2 years later- former Murch teacher here. Penelope Miller is a terrible leader and an excellent bullshitter (hence why some parents are “happy.”) She has no follow through and, at least in her time at Murch, could always be found in her office. She is fake AF and manipulative.
Anonymous
Post 10/29/2022 10:15     Subject: Re:Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
Anonymous wrote:LT knows Murch was happy with her. We also don’t think she’s a terrible person. That doesn’t mean she’s handling the stresses of heading an understaffed school perfectly. Or even, at times, adequately. Multiple emails/texts about things that are important and time sensitive and no response… In person is better but then you have to track her down when she has time, and that’s a pain and often too late.


Another Murch teacher here. She sounds like she is handling them about as well as the current Murch principal is. Im not sure what you all expected, but it stinks everywhere. About 5-6 years ago, the schedule changed at Murch two or three times a year with about a week notice. So what is happening at LT is literally no different than what happened at her old school.
Anonymous
Post 10/29/2022 07:39     Subject: Re:Ludlow-Taylor principal made permanent!
LT knows Murch was happy with her. We also don’t think she’s a terrible person. That doesn’t mean she’s handling the stresses of heading an understaffed school perfectly. Or even, at times, adequately. Multiple emails/texts about things that are important and time sensitive and no response… In person is better but then you have to track her down when she has time, and that’s a pain and often too late.