Doran Flowers blathering on about education? I can sense a horde of blog contributors/followers descending already!
The point of this blog will be that my family has made the decision that countless have made before: uprooting a young family from a great DC neighborhood (Mt. Pleasant!) and moving to a close-in suburb (Glen Echo Heights, MD). Stately elms and maples, friendly and caring neighbors, access to a open park space, an overabundance of dogs walking people... it sounds like a checklist for moving into Mt. Pleasant, DC, not out! Except for the fact that our old house didn't feed our kids into Walt Whitman High School.
And there it is: the inchoate fear that the DC school system wouldn't have what it takes to serve our children (2nd, K and just born) well, but Montgomery County probably will. A perfectly rational move? Or is this the kind of muddled thinking that gets you a Log Cabin Republican? Or the poor, white, uneducated American decrying universal health care, a public education, environmental protection, and a safety net in a patriotic defense of capitalism? Once the best and brightest of our policy-makers have mastered the field of economic behaviorism, I'm hoping they can turn to the field of education: is the generations old "flight to quality" legit? Or is a decision made over and over again based on imperfect information?
My Viewpoint:
1. Parent of Children at Wood Acres Elementary School. Wood Acres feeds into Pyle Middle School and Whitman High School. Our daughter is currently in 2nd grade. Our son is in K.
2. Alumni of Capital City Public Charter School. Our daughter attended from Pre-K through 1st, and our son attended Pre-K there.
3. Senior Advisor at Turning the Page.* The nonprofit I work for serves 7 partners schools, located in Wards 5-8 in DC. A large part of the work includes helping DC public school parents understand and act within the school system that is DCPS.
*The Obligatory Disclaimer: All the views expressed by me in this blog do not represent the views of Turning the Page. As anyone at Turning the Page would attest, take my views with a grain of salt as they often derive from a contrarian and/or human-irony place.
NEXT ENTRY: Assessments! Wading into what my kid knows, should have known, and could know if my teacher realized what genius lay underneath.
