Charter School Amendment (Atlanta: public school, lawsuits, plantation)

[chalvey]

Originally Posted by RoslynHolcomb

Sorry, of course she was only counting two grades. Not thinking. Forgot about Hightower, which is one of the reasons for my concern. I'm not as worried about Dunwoody High.

I am with you about Hightower, those students do not even try and it drags the entire class back.

[aries4118]

Originally Posted by chalvey

I am with you about Hightower, those students do not even try and it drags the entire class back.

This post is gross.

Remember, these are 9, 10, and 11 year-olds you are talking about.

[chalvey]

Originally Posted by aries4118

This post is gross.

Remember, these are 9, 10, and 11 year-olds you are talking about.

I do apologize if it offends you, but I still stand by what I say. I went there (albeit about a decade ago). The school does not provide enough resources to help the kids, granted their parents weren't as active either. It was so frustrating trying to learn new information and ideas, when the teachers kept having to repeat themselves. I honestly didn't learn much that year. These are 11, 12, & 13 year olds. Some do brilliantly, they were in my honors classes. Prep classes on the other hand were a whole other story.

[RoslynHolcomb]

Does anyone really understand the situation at Hightower? Is it the transistory nature of the communiy? Parental involvement? Administration? All of the above. I don't even teally understand which kids are zoned there. I thought it was Winter's Chapel, but apparently that's in Kingsley district. I understand the school os in Doraville. Is this typical for Doraville schools, or is it an anomaly? What would it take to elevate it. It'snot test scores I'm particularly worried about, it's culture and desire to succeed. Middle school is such a treacherous time, and peer pressure can be deadly. If the kids from Hightower are culturally different (note, by culture I don't mean ethnicity or race I mean desire or incentive to do schoolwork) I can see where it might poison the pot so to speak.

We've got such a good groove amongst the parents at Kingsley, and I'm horrified to think it will just evaporate when it's time for middle school. I might be fretting over nothing. Presumably the parents who are most likely to go private are Vanderlyn and Austin. Still, it is troubling.

[aries4118]

Originally Posted by RoslynHolcomb

Does anyone really understand the situation at Hightower? Is it the transistory nature of the communiy? Parental involvement? Administration? All of the above. I don't even teally understand which kids are zoned there. I thought it was Winter's Chapel, but apparently that's in Kingsley district. I understand the school os in Doraville. Is this typical for Doraville schools, or is it an anomaly? What would it take to elevate it. It'snot test scores I'm particularly worried about, it's culture and desire to succeed. Middle school is such a treacherous time, and peer pressure can be deadly. If the kids from Hightower are culturally different (note, by culture I don't mean ethnicity or race I mean desire or incentive to do schoolwork) I can see where it might poison the pot so to speak.

We've got such a good groove amongst the parents at Kingsley, and I'm horrified to think it will just evaporate when it's time for middle school. I might be fretting over nothing. Presumably the parents who are most likely to go private are Vanderlyn and Austin. Still, it is troubling.

Mrs. Holcomb:

Hightower has a large transient population full of apartment dwellers. Moreover, a lot of its student body are immigrants or the children of immigrants--where English is not the first language or the language spoken at home.


You can see Hightower's attendance zone here:

http://www.dekalb.k12.ga.us/www/docu...chools-map.pdf


Just about all of Hightower's zone consists of the area southeast of Peachtree Industrial Boulevard, northwest of the "railroad tracks," and northeast of I-285.

In addition, Hightower is only one of the six elementary schools that now feed into Peachtree Middle School.

[aries4118]

Originally Posted by chalvey

I do apologize if it offends you, but I still stand by what I say...

Offending me?

Sorry sir, that's not it--I'm not a student at Hightower Elementary and never have been (raised in tony East Cobb, actually). No need to apologize.


This is more about the type of person/adult that would make disparaging comments about elementary students.

We all have a choice in the type of person we want to be.

[RoslynHolcomb]

Originally Posted by aries4118

Mrs. Holcomb:

Hightower has large transient population full of apartment dwellers. Moreover, a lot of its student body are immigrants or the children of immigrants--where English is not the first language or the language spoken at home.

Yeah, Ichecked it out over at Great Schools. Most of the students are ESOL. So this is an administrationproblem, if they're not getting the resources they need. I think Kingsley has a similar problem, though our ESL numbers aren't as high. The change in demographics is hitting hard and it doesn't seem that the administration is equipped to deal with it, nor does it have the will to do so. Kingsley's Great Schools score has fallen from an eight to a four in less than four years, due to some of the same issues. Though I must our Hispanic parents are very involved and seem eager to participate. Even the ones in apartments.

[AcidSnake]

I grew up in the Dekalb County school system. I came from a single parent household. And I personally know what it feels like to sit in a classroom with students who do not want to learn or have desire to try.

I wish that there was a way to force our leaders to look outside Georgia's borders to the world and see how other nations instruct their children. I know that people get tired of me saying it, but I have to: Why not look at Finland or Singapore? Why is our state so bereft of imagination, so insular in culture, that a true conversation on education reform is all but impossible?

I'm simply afraid that if this charter-amendment goes though, it will simply be a revamp of the segregation academies of the bad ol' days, where only those who are well-heeled will have access to a decent education.

I know that my mother simply did not have the capability to be as attentive to me as she wanted to be given her struggling with money and trying to take time off. Our economic system is so predatory that it does not give parents the opportunity to take time to attend to their kids' academic needs.

A potential charter school law will simply make this situation worse, if you take the few meager resources that the public school system has left. Georgia might as well be racing with Mississippi for the bottom.

And yet, I don't know of a way to get these idiots who do sit on the DCSS board to think on a different tune...to try something new. God bless Dr. Eugene Walker because he fought some great battles in his lifetime, but he is waaay too old for the job, and definitely should've retired long ago.

When a person can simply vote to put a cellphone-tower on a school ground without so much as a thought as to the health risks of the children, then it is an obvious sign that this person is out of touch and needs to go.

And I guess for the moment, those are my thoughts on the DCSS situation.

[RoslynHolcomb]

I think you and I are in the same space AcidSnake. It's crazy frustrating to me that the DCSS is so thickheaded. It goes against all my progressive principles to even consider voting for this amenment. Factor in the ALEC involvement and I want to run screaming in the other direction. Of course they're going to create "seg academies" with taxpayer money. Anyone who thinks otherwise is delusional. I don't think this is the amendment Georgia needs. What Georgia needs is an amendment to allow new cities to form their own school systems. For the life of me I don't know why this is not on the agenda. Even if the board wasn't full of criminally inclined morons, this school system is just too big.

I think this notion of judging parental involvement by how much time parents spend at the school is a tad misguided. My folks were blue collar. My mama was a cook/housekeeper, my dad did construction and odd jobs. I really can't tell you a time either of them were at my school OR helped with homework. They made their expectations clear: Anything less than an A was unacceptable. I was to do my work, obey the rules and stay out of trouble. If either had to leave their jobs to come to my school, my butt was grass and they were the lawnmower. I think parental expectations are crucial. Parental involvement? I'm not convinced.

[lastminutemom]

Originally Posted by chalvey

I do apologize if it offends you, but I still stand by what I say. I went there (albeit about a decade ago). .

Chalvey, I am curious how old you are. Do you mind sharing?


Hightower is actually an award winning school, doing very well considering its population.

For the record, Gwinnett has a much better system of teaching non-English students. It is a shame that DCSS won't even consider what other systems do. In fairness, Gwinnett has much larger schools and therefore, each school has more resources to do things with. DeKalb desperately needs to get to larger schools for a whole host of reasons. This is one of them. (Gwinnett has a multi-step approach to teaching English language learners. )