Kindergarten teacher is out at MV. Parents notified today, two days after the kids were told. The teaching fellow is stepping up to be the lead teacher in the classroom.

Anonymous wrote:We're at a dcps immersion school where there discipline is not a problem. The teachers are experienced and the school is small. Kids are kept under control. Some of you may not like it, but they enforce strict rules about behavior in the hallways, classrooms and the school's values, integrity, ownership, nurture, and stamina. These are reinforced everywhere. We have a much higher quotient of low incone children than MV, and in the last couple years we're gained some former MV families who were also driven away by rude behavior and discipline problems at MV. Im hoping MV gets a handle on this issue, but wanted to tell those who are not already there to consider DCPS schools that have less hype. Sometimes old fashioned values work. But along with those, you'll have to accept homework and rigor, which I know many parents attracted to charters like MV are not looking for (and I dint necessarily disagree). For us, kindergarten was very rigorous, but I was amazed at how much my child learned in every subject.

So which school is this?

Hope the situation improves in the New Year.

We're at a dcps immersion school where there discipline is not a problem. The teachers are experienced and the school is small. Kids are kept under control. Some of you may not like it, but they enforce strict rules about behavior in the hallways, classrooms and the school's values, integrity, ownership, nurture, and stamina. These are reinforced everywhere. We have a much higher quotient of low incone children than MV, and in the last couple years we're gained some former MV families who were also driven away by rude behavior and discipline problems at MV. Im hoping MV gets a handle on this issue, but wanted to tell those who are not already there to consider DCPS schools that have less hype. Sometimes old fashioned values work. But along with those, you'll have to accept homework and rigor, which I know many parents attracted to charters like MV are not looking for (and I dint necessarily disagree). For us, kindergarten was very rigorous, but I was amazed at how much my child learned in every subject.

Thank you MV parents for chiming in. Appreciate your candor (and to those complaining about not hearing from MV parents, read the entire thread - they are represented throughout).

MV parent- I feel for the kids and their families being impacted by ongoing classroom management issues. We've seen the school try to make changes, but the results seem tenuous. DC is not part of the ongoing concern, but nevertheless expresses dismay that his bf is being picked on and hurt, on a regular basis. When pressed further, it seems that all children - both the disrupters and their targets and the bystanders- are largely missing out. Yes, there have been lessons learned- but wonder over long term development issues stemming from this fall.

Good luck to all returning to school on Monday!

MV parent here with kids in two different grades. I have been holding off on responding but this thread is just getting so negative and mean that I feel like I must pipe up.

I think MV is a great school. My kids are really happy. Some of the things that bothered me at our previous, very decent neighborhood school just aren't an issue at MV.

There have been discipline issues in one of my kid's classes this year due in part to a newish teacher struggling with responsive classroom techniques, but the school has thrown a tremendous amount of resources at the issue to support the teacher and the situation has improved dramatically. I don't know what else parents could expect.

Honestly, I sometimes wish my kids went to school with kids who were at a similar place as them in terms of behavior, but they go to public school, not private school. And my very focused daughter has learned a lot from the situation in her classroom this year, namely, don't give up on people. She has befriended one of the kids who was originally causing the most disruptions.

I think if you hop from school to school every time there is a bump along the way, you will end up doing a lot of hopping.

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Anonymous wrote:So your child does NOT attend MV and never has and you are basing everything you say on a tour and stuff you read on DCUM?

Doubtful that other parents considering MV really need to hear from you.

So just listen to the parents that DID attend MV and have had bad experiences. No need to be so defensive. Come on, people ask for opinions of open house, there are going to be people that will want to know impressions of yours as well.

We are considering MV and it's helpful to hear from parents who actually have or had kids there. Not interested in what people's impression of the open house is since we attended ourselves and anyone can do so if they wish.

There are many posts from current and former students out there.

And they are all buried by negative posts by people who never had kids at MV.

No I meant there are many "negative" posts explaining why it's not what it's cracked up to be and why people are leaving.

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Anonymous wrote:So your child does NOT attend MV and never has and you are basing everything you say on a tour and stuff you read on DCUM?

Doubtful that other parents considering MV really need to hear from you.

So just listen to the parents that DID attend MV and have had bad experiences. No need to be so defensive. Come on, people ask for opinions of open house, there are going to be people that will want to know impressions of yours as well.

We are considering MV and it's helpful to hear from parents who actually have or had kids there. Not interested in what people's impression of the open house is since we attended ourselves and anyone can do so if they wish.

There are many posts from current and former students out there.

And they are all buried by negative posts by people who never had kids at MV.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So your child does NOT attend MV and never has and you are basing everything you say on a tour and stuff you read on DCUM?

Doubtful that other parents considering MV really need to hear from you.

So just listen to the parents that DID attend MV and have had bad experiences. No need to be so defensive. Come on, people ask for opinions of open house, there are going to be people that will want to know impressions of yours as well.

We are considering MV and it's helpful to hear from parents who actually have or had kids there. Not interested in what people's impression of the open house is since we attended ourselves and anyone can do so if they wish.

There are many posts from current and former students out there.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So your child does NOT attend MV and never has and you are basing everything you say on a tour and stuff you read on DCUM?

Doubtful that other parents considering MV really need to hear from you.

So just listen to the parents that DID attend MV and have had bad experiences. No need to be so defensive. Come on, people ask for opinions of open house, there are going to be people that will want to know impressions of yours as well.

We are considering MV and it's helpful to hear from parents who actually have or had kids there. Not interested in what people's impression of the open house is since we attended ourselves and anyone can do so if they wish.

Anonymous wrote:So your child does NOT attend MV and never has and you are basing everything you say on a tour and stuff you read on DCUM?

Doubtful that other parents considering MV really need to hear from you.

So just listen to the parents that DID attend MV and have had bad experiences. No need to be so defensive. Come on, people ask for opinions of open house, there are going to be people that will want to know impressions of yours as well.

So your child does NOT attend MV and never has and you are basing everything you say on a tour and stuff you read on DCUM?

Doubtful that other parents considering MV really need to hear from you.

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Anonymous wrote:Some immersion models require an even number of classes so that two classes can alternate days with and English teacher and target language teacher. Both YY and MV work like this in upper grades.

You are confusing immersion with bilingual. They are used interchangeably but they are not the same.

Yes clearly I meant bilingual - it's the switching back and forth that may require even numbers of classrooms depending on the set up.

But you can also accomplish this by wrapping grades--ie, the same teaching team teaches k and 1st.

Is that right? Wouldn't you then need an even number of grades? And the same number of classes in each grade? I am not familiar enough with how MV expanded - but I would think that a charter would want to start expanding in earlier grades and then let those kids age up and have the upper grades expand only as those cohorts got older. If you wanted to add a third kindergarten class (and had kinder be bilingual) and had 3 kinder classes, you'd then need to add a third 1st grade class so that you could wrap the grades. I would think it would be better to add two more kinder classes than to add a new classroom of first graders off the lottery. I assume that is why YY added two classes as it's bubble year instead of one.

Clearly MV agreed with you. But we toured last year after being admitted, and it struck us as aan over-hyped school that was clearly going to have growing pains as a result of expanding too quickly. It's in devoplment phase. They should have maintained their size for a year or two more to make sure they could manage. Other parents may feel differently and be willing to ride it out. Personally, I prefer experience over shiny new untested.

Stop it. Just stop picking on MV.

I was not "picking on" MV. I went on the tour expecting to love it, and expecting to enroll at the conclusion of the tour. Instead, we left with a lot of unanswered questions, and with concerns. It's not "picking on" a school to note that it appears to be having growing pains, when it in fact appears to be having growing pains. I honestly WANT MV to succeed. I want every school in this city to succeed. But a lot of people come to these boards looking for information, and it does them as much of a disservice to blow nothing but sunshine and unicorn sparkles.

Look, there are ways to talk about actual issues that schools face without it turning into education trench warfare.

A lot of people love MV and its model - the focus on environmentalism + Spanish is attractive to a lot of people. But no school is perfect. There are real problems that are affecting a lot of people's kids. The more people dig in and try to paint those problems as a handful of disgruntled parents with poorly behaved children bashing the school for no reason (or painting the school as a terrible environment that doesn't live up to the hype), the less grounded in reality any of these conversations are.

If the point is for people to make informed decisions, the hyperbole needs to get walked back, as well as the people taking things personally.