ME: I have to say that this discussion gets people really worked up. It is a good discussion though and its too bad some people (who spend a lot of time on this forum ) seem to jsut hate it and those of us posting so much. I have enough friends with kids in the grade and middle school to know that there are two different stories going on at the same time and I think it’s more dangerous to attack people that are speaking up for one side because you don’t want your side tarnished......... and, sorry, but without this forum I wouldn’t have known what an ASS Dunton really was! OR what kind of things we should ALL BE AWARE OF!!!
To your very lengthy responses and questions to me....
JW: Just who is this, “…anyone else directly benefiting from moving to an experimental educational model and expanding a Charter School without community support.” Really, just who is this?
ME: Bob Dunton, and those that support Bob Dunton. There. Happy now? That, obviously, includes you too.
JW: In some realms (e.g., math), he is thriving well beyond what we ever expected and experienced, ...
ME: Great. Glad your son is doing so well in math .... BUT it is Saxon Math. It is not taught. There is no traditional instructional time in most classes for math in the grade school..... A teacher in the middle school has gone against this recently because the kids weren’t learning on their own... And now, strange enough... they are! Saxon math means students work at their own pace and when you get stuck you have to wait for help from a teacher or another student ( if it ever comes ) mostly parents I know say they are the math teachers at home.
Kids are learning math from their parents along with the guided lessons in a book. So the fact your son is excelling is less a reflection of the school than it is a reflection on your son enjoying math. For those kids that do not like math... they spend a lot of time alone in the commons area of the grade school. I know for a fact they don’t learn sitting by themselves. How is that “model” so amazing for them?
JW: Now to my next point: Education is not “fixed” and constant.
ME: Well spelling and writing should be constant. The Grade school and this EXPERIMENTAL EDUCATIONAL MODEL doesn’t put any weight on how well kids can spell or write. Kids are told spelling doesn’t matter in the fourth and fifth grade – there are no spelling tests they are just supposed to “get it”
I have a friend who pulled her kids from CSD this year and they are VERY behind at their new school in reading and writing from the new classroom. It sounds like you have no use for those damn traditional models or those pesky state assessments. How did our third graders do again this year on the AYP Report?
JW: I agree that community support is an essential component of a community school. .. This being said, your statement ignores the facts of our district’s financial situation and assumes that all moves made by the district must be tacitly approved by your notion of the Corbett “community”.
ME: All moves? Who cares about all moves a district makes. I don’t ----- but the change that has occurred that allowed the Charter to get its start here should have been something the community had a chance to at least consider or hear about first – are you so deluded you don’t think that is why people are pissed off about it being here in the first place? Cause unless you were following along – there was no way to know until after it happened. And this year they should have had a chance to weigh in on the idea of expanding and extended for years to come.
The school board did that talking in executive session. DUNTON, CHILDS, ONEAL, AND TRANI AND OTHERS say it is successful based on Dunton saying it’s successful. But who is keeping count of the kids that are leaving and why? Why is it such a bad thing to ask for an outsider ( not someone in Corbett serving or drinking the Koolaide ) to look at the program and give it a once over and review before giving it a pass?
And why have other districts DENIED Dunton to keep popping up his new schools in their districts based on his MODEL?
Are they also just wrong?
Why doesn’t anybody want to stand up for the kids that are leaving or having to leave because they are told they aren’t good enough?
? What about the kids that come to the Charter under all this fanfare only to realize it is not as great....
And why should CSD become a school full of kids that are from outside of Corbett?
?? Why can’t we commit to educate all our kids and not just “most” as Trani has said. The home-schooled, privately educated kids come in and artificially inflate our numbers/tests as to how well we educate in CSD overall. Period. You can’t deny that.
JW: I’m not going to waste time validating the financial facts. They are readily available to anyone who bothers to ask the district or attend the appropriate meetings. We need more revenue and the charter represents the easiest path to get more revenue without inflicting undue harm on the district.
ME: You are a head nodder. You’ve never looked into anything. I choose to believe the people I know who have!!! I have talked, first hand, to folks that have been given directions to the door for doing nothing more than trying to get help for their own kid get an education.
JW: The issues at play are far more complex than a simple black and white perspective can comprehend.
ME: Only you and a few of your like-thinking-head-in-the-sand types can fathom the complexity.... Ooooohhhhhh..... Thank you .... Truly, you have a dizzing intellect.
ME: “Here's a question, where did all the kids in the Charter go this year? Grade school district side have classes pushing 30 and Charter side less than 20?”
JW: The charter school has an enrollment cap and it filled its classes to the cap. To assume otherwise is silly.
ME: Hope you enjoy eating crow. That will be your starter COURSE before the main course of all your ignorant words.... I know one parent collecting a list of names and MOST kids leaving the district are CHARTER KIDS. ( 35-40 kids this last year alone! ) Over ten percent of a schools population is leaving ( not cause they are graduating or moving ) and that is OK with you? Really? Well glad everything, again, is SO GREAT FOR YOU AND YOUR KID. The numbers distict side will be even more interesting after this year! OH... And what about all the parents that won’t even enroll kids IN CORBETT into CSD cause of charging them for Kinder ( while Charter gets a ride on it ) and you don’t even get a kindergarten class you get a K-3 for $2500 a year....
ME: “There is something very unequitable going on and if you think it is OK for a director and his wife to make over 300,000 off our community, by pushing through a Charter like this, then you and I obviously have a difference in opinion. “
JW: First, the word in inequitable, not ‘unequitable’; if you want to argue about education, come to the table educated.
ME: “Can you hear this? Can I turn it up?” The amount of money the director pays himself is a reflection of the size of his ego and it has nothing to do with how amazing he is, how much he is worth or what he is doing in Corbett. He comes first on his priority list and anyone that questions him is not worthy of a response without heaps of sarcasm because he ( a lot like you... ) is just so full of himself.
JW: Attempting to direct undue and misguided vitriol against an entire school, district, its teacher or administrators due to misconceptions and ignorance is dangerous. I’m saddened that anyone from outside the district would stumble upon this rumor mill and see it as a barometer of the school communities. It’s just not.
ME: You are the one playing the rumor mill fella. I am surprised you didn’t say “fifth in the nation” or “doing more with less” a couple times. GEEEeeeshhh.
JW: If you’re going to get on this rumor mill and share your jaded misconceptions, consider having a real heart to heart conversation with yourself about your intentions and motives. Do you really give a darn about education for all, or is it more about your own situation and frustrations? If so, work hard to improve that which you control instead of working tirelessly to break down our schools.
ME: You need to have that conversation with yourself. Maybe YOU COULD HELP improve the schools by demanding they get honest with EVERYONE and while they are at that – you could do it too.