Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That was a pretty enlightening Reddit thread. If a student is not self-motivated and high-performing, they are completely failed by MCPS schools today. It's a race to the bottom for average kids. And it's entirely caused by central office bureaucrats. Monica McKnight cannot leave soon enough.

Exactly. It’s a damn shame. How do we change this?

We don't. Progressives live in a fantasy world and implement solutions that only work in that world. Because they control MoCo from to to bottom, things cannot get better.

Anonymous wrote:I know parents hate hearing this, but this is a huge parent problem. (And no, just because I'm writing this doesnt mean ALL parents. I'm not attacking you personally.) In general though...I had a girl walking around my class, filming kids WITHOUT their permission, she was defiant as I told her to put it away or I'd take it away. Instead, she called her mom on speaker and told her mom I threatened to take her phone away...mom started screaming through the phone I had zero rights to do this, started yelling profanity, etc...she shut off her phone smugly...smiled at me and said, "see, it doesnt matter. My mom doesnt care." I wish I was making this up. I informed principal and she just said, "our hands are tied." This isn't a sustainable profession or job anymore. The future is bleak.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is an American culture problem. We want to pretend everyone is the same, but they aren't. Not every kid is college-bound. But every kid should be able to learn and thrive and end high school able to read and understand enough math to live life and pursue higher education if desired. Everyone who has an average IQ (and I mean everyone) can learn to read and do algebra. Also, we can teach kids what tools they can use to have success. What we can't do is pretend every kid needs to or is able to make it through AP calculus by their senior year in high school. Kids unfortunately do not start school on a level playing field. Schools can't level all the differences. If we were able and willing to meet kids where they are, spend more time reteaching kids who need repetition to get concepts and spend time building background knowledge for kids that need that, we'd end up with more kids happy and thriving in school. Unfortunately, we want to pretend different needs don't exist, all kids can meet the same benchmarks in the same time frame, and we consequently teach to an almost non-existent middle which leaves a lot of kids bored and a lot of kids perpetually confused.

But why????? How do we change this?

First, you have to admit far leftist policies resulted in this disaster. Then you have to get back to the basics of accountability. Kids don't hand in he on time? Zero. Kids don't attend class? Zero. There are no make up sessions and 50% awards for not showing up to work in real life. Look, accountability and common sense education WILL mean there will be some brown kids who fail and cannot keep up. So what? It is far more racist to assume they cannot do the work and be held accountable to high quality standards.

Everyone wants equitable outcomes, for sure. But throwing all standards out the window to reach that goal is a fatal mistake. Nothing will change until voters stop voting for far left liberal loons and their policies. It's truly remarkable how people have congitive dissonance and cannot associate the rapid decline of MCPS with their voting behaviors.

MCPS and MoCo are permanently screwed and will be in steep decline, because do you think they'll ever stop voting far left? One party rule with carte blanche to do whatever and never be held accountable to anyone.

Change all of that first and then you can get back to the basics of quality education.

I would say right-wing policies resulted in this. The GOP's whole jam is to dumb down the population in order to expand their base. This is who mainly benefits from these policies.

Anonymous wrote:That was a pretty enlightening Reddit thread. If a student is not self-motivated and high-performing, they are completely failed by MCPS schools today. It's a race to the bottom for average kids. And it's entirely caused by central office bureaucrats. Monica McKnight cannot leave soon enough.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is an American culture problem. We want to pretend everyone is the same, but they aren't. Not every kid is college-bound. But every kid should be able to learn and thrive and end high school able to read and understand enough math to live life and pursue higher education if desired. Everyone who has an average IQ (and I mean everyone) can learn to read and do algebra. Also, we can teach kids what tools they can use to have success. What we can't do is pretend every kid needs to or is able to make it through AP calculus by their senior year in high school. Kids unfortunately do not start school on a level playing field. Schools can't level all the differences. If we were able and willing to meet kids where they are, spend more time reteaching kids who need repetition to get concepts and spend time building background knowledge for kids that need that, we'd end up with more kids happy and thriving in school. Unfortunately, we want to pretend different needs don't exist, all kids can meet the same benchmarks in the same time frame, and we consequently teach to an almost non-existent middle which leaves a lot of kids bored and a lot of kids perpetually confused.

But why????? How do we change this?

First, you have to admit far leftist policies resulted in this disaster. Then you have to get back to the basics of accountability. Kids don't hand in he on time? Zero. Kids don't attend class? Zero. There are no make up sessions and 50% awards for not showing up to work in real life. Look, accountability and common sense education WILL mean there will be some brown kids who fail and cannot keep up. So what? It is far more racist to assume they cannot do the work and be held accountable to high quality standards.

Everyone wants equitable outcomes, for sure. But throwing all standards out the window to reach that goal is a fatal mistake. Nothing will change until voters stop voting for far left liberal loons and their policies. It's truly remarkable how people have congitive dissonance and cannot associate the rapid decline of MCPS with their voting behaviors.

MCPS and MoCo are permanently screwed and will be in steep decline, because do you think they'll ever stop voting far left? One party rule with carte blanche to do whatever and never be held accountable to anyone.

Change all of that first and then you can get back to the basics of quality education.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I teach dance at a high school in MCPS (dream job-or so I thought). The students in the ALL of my classes don't want to do anything except TikTok dances. They don't want to learn anything. They don't think they need to because they can do a 10 second TikTok dance and therefore, they are "dancers." They get tired after about 5 minutes of moving. They complain everything is "too hard." It's pathetic and embarrassing. I don't know where everything went wrong, but it's a joke. Quitting at the end of this year, if I make it that long.

Ha, I saw these two girls watching and doing a Tik Tok dance and thought it was sad. In our day (I am 35), we used to make up our own dances! At least they were getting some physical activity

Different dance teacher, but YES this. Choreography is part of their curriculum. Asking them to make up their own dances..you'd think I was torturing them. They can't think of songs. They can't get started. "What songs do you listen to at home?" "I don't listen to music..." "What songs do you ever hear do you think, 'this would be such a good dance song!'" "I don't ever dance at home or think about dance." "Why are you taking dance?" Blank stares...We used to jump at the chance to make up our own dances. We were obsessed with music. We were always doing this stuff for fun. I truly don't understand it, but I'm so glad I am not growing up right now. I feel sorry for them. They have no intellectual curiosity, they have no passion for anything, they just want to be on their phones for the rest of their lives.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think enough criticism or scrutiny is being aimed at MSDE. Some of these idiotic policies are being driven by equally idiotic demands, audits, arbitrary metrics, etc. from the bureaucrats in Annapolis. They’ve picked some random number of what percentage should be in self-contained classes, how much suspension makes you racist, etc. based on fantasyland research from their third-rate PhD program and use it as a cudgel. The push toward inclusion for all that is dumping kids in classrooms with inadequate support is not just an MCPS initiative and MSDE wants to make it even worse, without realizing that not every county is the same or that their pie in the sky figures on paper don’t work in reality.

Who do we write to about this?

It’s useless. MCPS is just too large and it’s a bureaucratic mess so it’s almost impossible to get things done. The hyper-focus on race and equity has led to a huge decline in standards and a lack of differentiation.

There is no accountability for bad behavior so the kids get away with anything and everything. Admin gets pressure from Central Office not to crack down on students so teachers can’t do anything. It’s horrible and our kids are suffering.

But this is what voters in this county (and this country) want.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is an American culture problem. We want to pretend everyone is the same, but they aren't. Not every kid is college-bound. But every kid should be able to learn and thrive and end high school able to read and understand enough math to live life and pursue higher education if desired. Everyone who has an average IQ (and I mean everyone) can learn to read and do algebra. Also, we can teach kids what tools they can use to have success. What we can't do is pretend every kid needs to or is able to make it through AP calculus by their senior year in high school. Kids unfortunately do not start school on a level playing field. Schools can't level all the differences. If we were able and willing to meet kids where they are, spend more time reteaching kids who need repetition to get concepts and spend time building background knowledge for kids that need that, we'd end up with more kids happy and thriving in school. Unfortunately, we want to pretend different needs don't exist, all kids can meet the same benchmarks in the same time frame, and we consequently teach to an almost non-existent middle which leaves a lot of kids bored and a lot of kids perpetually confused.

But why????? How do we change this?

First, you have to admit far leftist policies resulted in this disaster. Then you have to get back to the basics of accountability. Kids don't hand in he on time? Zero. Kids don't attend class? Zero. There are no make up sessions and 50% awards for not showing up to work in real life. Look, accountability and common sense education WILL mean there will be some brown kids who fail and cannot keep up. So what? It is far more racist to assume they cannot do the work and be held accountable to high quality standards.

Everyone wants equitable outcomes, for sure. But throwing all standards out the window to reach that goal is a fatal mistake. Nothing will change until voters stop voting for far left liberal loons and their policies. It's truly remarkable how people have congitive dissonance and cannot associate the rapid decline of MCPS with their voting behaviors.

MCPS and MoCo are permanently screwed and will be in steep decline, because do you think they'll ever stop voting far left? One party rule with carte blanche to do whatever and never be held accountable to anyone.

Change all of that first and then you can get back to the basics of quality education.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think enough criticism or scrutiny is being aimed at MSDE. Some of these idiotic policies are being driven by equally idiotic demands, audits, arbitrary metrics, etc. from the bureaucrats in Annapolis. They’ve picked some random number of what percentage should be in self-contained classes, how much suspension makes you racist, etc. based on fantasyland research from their third-rate PhD program and use it as a cudgel. The push toward inclusion for all that is dumping kids in classrooms with inadequate support is not just an MCPS initiative and MSDE wants to make it even worse, without realizing that not every county is the same or that their pie in the sky figures on paper don’t work in reality.

Who do we write to about this?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They raised our taxes for this freakshow too.

Can we just admit MCPS is one giant baby sitting program for a bunch of delinquent losers with trash parents?

Zero education is going on. I am sick and tired of the argument 'It's for the schools!' as justification for constantly raising our taxes.

They raised taxes less than inflation. Doesn't take a CPA to see the inherent problem there.

Motivated kids will get their education. We can't make schools into prisons. There is definitely a societal cost when there are a bunch of undereducated adults roaming around. How enforcement oriented to we expect the schools to be? If the parents aren't reinforcing the value of education, attending class, good grades, how do we expect the schools to deal with it?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is an American culture problem. We want to pretend everyone is the same, but they aren't. Not every kid is college-bound. But every kid should be able to learn and thrive and end high school able to read and understand enough math to live life and pursue higher education if desired. Everyone who has an average IQ (and I mean everyone) can learn to read and do algebra. Also, we can teach kids what tools they can use to have success. What we can't do is pretend every kid needs to or is able to make it through AP calculus by their senior year in high school. Kids unfortunately do not start school on a level playing field. Schools can't level all the differences. If we were able and willing to meet kids where they are, spend more time reteaching kids who need repetition to get concepts and spend time building background knowledge for kids that need that, we'd end up with more kids happy and thriving in school. Unfortunately, we want to pretend different needs don't exist, all kids can meet the same benchmarks in the same time frame, and we consequently teach to an almost non-existent middle which leaves a lot of kids bored and a lot of kids perpetually confused.

But why????? How do we change this?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That was a pretty enlightening Reddit thread. If a student is not self-motivated and high-performing, they are completely failed by MCPS schools today. It's a race to the bottom for average kids. And it's entirely caused by central office bureaucrats. Monica McKnight cannot leave soon enough.

I just read the reddit post, and agree with all, but I don't think what's happening in MCPS started with McKnight. It's been sliding for a while all in the name of equity.

The sad part of all this is that the system is failing the most neediest. What happens to these types of kids once they graduate HS? I guess it's no longer MCPS problem, so.. shrug. As long as their numbers look good.

I have one who graduated from a magnet program in MCPS, and now at college. Doing very well.

The other is an above average student who is taking a couple of AP classes, but the rest of the "honors" classes is a joke. Such a joke. They struggled a lot in the beginning of their AP classes because the lack of HW in the MS didn't teach them to study. They got such easy As, and then all of a sudden, the AP classes expected more. It was too high of a leap. I had to teach DC how to study. Luckily DC got their grades up in their AP classes.

MCPS is really doing a disservice to kids all around.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I teach dance at a high school in MCPS (dream job-or so I thought). The students in the ALL of my classes don't want to do anything except TikTok dances. They don't want to learn anything. They don't think they need to because they can do a 10 second TikTok dance and therefore, they are "dancers." They get tired after about 5 minutes of moving. They complain everything is "too hard." It's pathetic and embarrassing. I don't know where everything went wrong, but it's a joke. Quitting at the end of this year, if I make it that long.

Ha, I saw these two girls watching and doing a Tik Tok dance and thought it was sad. In our day (I am 35), we used to make up our own dances! At least they were getting some physical activity