--The council is holding a public roundtable about the DCPS teachers’ contract renewal this Friday December 20, for invited witnesses. See here for more information. Expect charters to get a chunk of money associated with this renewal because of previous sector payment parity. BTW if you want to see how our charter teachers are paid … Continue reading Oh, The Places We Need To Go

The posted materials for the December 4 working session of the DC state board of education (SBOE) meeting contained a curious summary document about an SBOE working group that met twice in 2024 to discuss establishing education as a civil right here in DC. Some recent coverage suggested that codifying such a right would be voted on at SBOE’s regular December 11 meeting. … Continue reading The Strange Journey Of A Civil Right To Education In DC

In what one might interpret as a sign, the October 29 council hearing on teacher retention started half an hour late and went past midnight. Dozens of public witnesses testified, while the three government witnesses were called up at 10 pm. They included no one from DC’s charter sector. The only council member by that … Continue reading DC’s Teacher Retention Is Bad–And So Is DC’s Data On It

--The DC Council is teeing up some more education hearings, to accompany previously scheduled ones: 1. On November 13 at 1 pm, the council will hold a hearing on the use of athletic fields and facilities owned by DC. Expect outrage from DCPS families over lack of control of their school assets—and unhappiness from charter … Continue reading What’s Happening This Toasty DC Autumn

DCPS advocate Peter MacPherson died last month. Among his many public education advocacy roles, Peter was for more than a decade DCPS’s school library champion. For all the years I have had the great fortune of working with excellent public education advocates in DC, I never was pushed so relentlessly, and for so long, by … Continue reading The Fight For DCPS & Democracy: The Living Work Of Peter MacPherson

This week, a coalition of education advocates demanded a public hearing around the collapse of Eagle Academy. Sadly, they have ample reason for that demand. Consider that on August 23, Phil Mendelson, the chair of the DC council (i.e. pretty much the only person exercising any education oversight in the Wilson Building), sent a letter … Continue reading Inaction In The Face of Obfuscation & Misrepresentation Around Eagle

--On October 9, at 9:30 am, the council will hold a hearing on two bills, one of which is B25-0690, introduced in February. The bill would require 30 hours of nursing coverage per week at all DC publicly funded schools. Ahead of the hearing, it may be worth recalling that the DC state board of … Continue reading What’s Happening At The DC Council (And, Notably, What’s Not)

On September 16, the DC charter board voted to approve an expansion of BASIS into elementary grades. A large part of the board’s justification was that BASIS offers “high-quality seats.” This is hardly surprising, as the (racist, ableist, classist) lie of “high-quality seats” has been embraced by education reform proponents nationwide. But the charter board’s … Continue reading Exploring The Lie Of “High-Quality Seats”

--On August 30, the charter board presented to the DC council its SY23-24 attendance and discipline report. Despite listing a few details of high absenteeism and suspensions in some of DC’s charter schools, the report has no data on discipline at all of DC’s charter schools—much less the percentages of specific student groups disciplined. And … Continue reading A Stunning Lack Of Truth & Action (And Other Recent Events in DC Education)

In the wake of the closure of Eagle Academy, Phil Mendelson, chair of the DC council, sent a letter on August 23 to the executive director of the DC charter board with questions around the charter board’s actions. As a first step toward true oversight, the questions were fine (well, once Mendelson got to them … Continue reading The Unanswered Questions Around Eagle Academy