[Ed. Note: The following is by DCPS parents and education advocates Iris Bond Gill and Erin Roth, who unlike many other education reformers in DC actually have skin in this game. Visit them on twitter at @iris007gill (Iris) and @erotheroth (Erin)] By Iris Bond Gill & Erin Roth In our nation’s capital, where school reform … Continue reading Still Segregated 64 Years After Brown v. Board: It’s Past Time To Do Better, DC

We unelected and unappointed DC citizens apparently know more about our president’s sexual proclivities than we do about residency fraud or graduation accountability in our publicly funded schools. For instance, back in March, during her agency’s performance oversight hearing before the council’s education committee, state superintendent of education Hanseul Kang promised to provide a list … Continue reading It’s Not Just Ellington—Or Ballou

Billed as only for government witnesses, the city council’s April 19 DCPS budget oversight hearing also featured public witnesses who had been unable to testify during the DCPS budget hearing for public witnesses, held over spring break. (Minor aside: Despite a petition to move that DCPS public witness hearing, the city council moved only the … Continue reading Springtime For DC Schools: Begging, Diamond-Encrusted Door Locks & An Independent Commission

As with getting a straight answer on hair dye (or paying off people for the occasional indiscretion), tracking whether our publicly funded schools use at risk funds appropriately appears to be difficult. Given that DC’s two schools systems (DCPS and charters) outline the use of at risk funds differently, even simple measurements become a tough … Continue reading Do They—Or Don’t They?

In a 2003 interview, novelist Kurt Vonnegut was quoted saying the following: “It’s perfectly ordinary to be a socialist. It’s perfectly normal to be in favor of fire departments.” I was forcibly reminded of that statement during meetings in the last few weeks to get public feedback for cross sector task force recommendations; the master … Continue reading It’s Perfectly Normal To Be In Favor Of By Right Schools

The following is a transcript (starting at 2:28:45 in the video available here) from the budget oversight hearing of the public charter school board on April 11, before the education committee of the city council. In it, committee chair David Grosso asks charter board executive director Scott Pearson about illegal out of school suspensions. Besides … Continue reading “This Is Not A Law That We Are Enforcing”

Our office of the state superintendent of education (OSSE) is developing school report cards, per our city's adoption of the Every Student Succeeds act (ESSA) . (See here for background information (and see OSSE's official outline here). Our city's adoption of a plan for ESSA was to replace the prior rules of the No Child Left Behind … Continue reading School Report Cards: What’s Your Grade?

Ed. Note: Below are graphs created by two DCPS parents, Betsy Wolf and Amber Gove, that tell a story of inequitable funding of DCPS schools along socioeconomic lines. This is in line with what many public witnesses testified about during the recent DCPS budget hearing on March 28, citing concerns with inadequate staffing and cutbacks … Continue reading Inequitable Funding In DCPS (Yes, It Is As Bad As You Feared)

The deputy mayor for education's office has been busy, setting upcoming meetings for the master facilities plan (MFP) as well as cross sector task force recommendations. More information on the MFP is here. The master facilities plan is late in coming, but is the basis for future building needs for DC's public school students. (For … Continue reading Facilities & Cross Sector Task Force Meetings

[The following is a guest editorial by public school advocate Peter MacPherson] During much of human history, state power has resided with just a few people. Sometimes that power was applied fairly, for the common good--though many self-appointed leaders, or those receiving their command as a birthright, have applied power capriciously, to the benefit of … Continue reading Editorial: Mayoral Control Has Failed DCPS