Time to tweet my SBOE testimony. I'm on a panel with the DFER lobbyist. Oh joy of joys. Makes my testimony extra delicious.

Our District leadership needs to wake up, especially our Mayor and we need YOUR help to do it. It is not business as usual right now for students, educators and our families and just wishing it could be so will not make it so.

Perhaps now that we have an opportunity for new leadership we should reconsider the STAR report card. I would personally start by not using STARs at all. We don’t need to minimize schools to a simplistic rating and paste it everywhere. It is not productive.

Instead we should be looking at how we can better measure growth, look at more inputs than outputs, and find systems that are more flexible and less easily gamed.

Others will speak to this better than I ever can but the status quo was garbage, is garbage and will continue to be garbage.

So lets actually build something that won’t be used as a tool to close our schools and instead can actually help us grow.

When looking for a new OSSE superintendent I hope we use this as an opportunity for the SBOE, Council and public to really discuss and give input on what we want out of OSSE.

I hope we choose someone who actually believes the public should be listened to and not just paid lobbyists from Democrats for Education Reform and their affiliates.

I hope we choose someone who thinks that charter schools should be held and measured on the same standards as DCPS, not just the standards that help them fill their narrative.

I hope that we choose someone who believes in transparency, not hiding key data points that make the mayor look bad.

I hope we choose someone from DC, not someone who needs months to “get the lay of the land” i.e., read the mayor’s talking points which were handed to her by a DFER lobbyist.

I hope we choose someone who believes in holding schools accountable for Special Education students and families, not just saying the status quo is fine.

I hope we find someone who is interested in keeping students and families safe from COVID-19 not letting it be a free for all with minimum standards set by TRUMP and hellbent on getting students in classrooms that are not safe.

Finally, the mayor’s team keeps repeating that before November 9th small groups of students will enter DCPS schools for in person instruction. I want to be very clear that conditions in our buildings have not changed at all, despite DCPS narratives to the contrary.

There is no reason to believe that HVAC systems have truly been addressed, that signage is present (it is not), that there is adequate PPE and staffing to clean buildings once students return regularly.

There are no real protocols, teachers are JUST figuring out how to do distance learning and then we switch to hybrid which is like doing 3 jobs at once – healthcare enforcer, distance learning and in person learning...

...without any real plan beyond a hunger-games style staffing model where our colleagues are expected to fight to the death in an attempt to not die in a classroom?

All while we have no idea what the results of this election may bring as far as protests? This is morally irresponsible on every level – from pedagogy to health to social emotional welfare.

Distance learning is not perfect, but it is far better than I thought and we can continue to do more to invest in doing it right and reaching out to those families who are struggling with it and getting them what they need to be successful if we want to.

So lets do it and do it right. I hope the SBOE members will all be exceptionally involved in all of these fights because these are fights for the heart and souls of education, educators and our students. One that we don’t aim to lose.