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Three weeks before school starts and 8,000 Boston students still don't know where they're going to school
By adamg on Thu, 08/20/2015 - 9:08am
New Superintendent Tommy Chang blames a software glitch for the issue, the Herald reports.
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Comments
Well if we had neighborhood schools
They'd know exactly where their kids would be attending.
Exactly. Since Boston is
Exactly. Since Boston is minority majority, what is the benefit of not sending kids to their nearest neighborhood school?
Institutional Racism
Because of institutional racism, schools in minority neighborhoods are subpar, therefore if students are bused around, the powers that be will magically make all schools par or above.
And there are plenty of lily white neighborhoods.
algorithms
I think it's a fallacy to claim that neighborhood schools would make school assignment software work. In fact the current school assignment model is an expansion of neighborhood school model. i don;t know the specifics of the software but I do know the model was developed in part at MIT. So what we have is an exercise in fixing new software or modifying old software with new algorithms both of which are challenging and time consuming. That said, hup hup, the time us now.
How much would you pay?
Open your wallet and say "ahhhh".
Pay?
You surely meant to say "save," right?
It can only get better....
... after this. Right?
This is an embarrassment
And not being able to get basics like this squared away is exactly why many responsible people, types the city should be working so hard to keep and improve our civic life, leave the school system and Boston all together. There is not this uncertainty and stress relating to your children in the suburbs.
Reminds me of a joke
Pilot, hippie, priest and Henry Kissinger on a plane. Engines fail and pilot says - "there are only three parachutes and four of us - the airline needs me to tell them what happened - good luck guys". He grabs a parachute and jumps.
Kissinger grabs a parachute and says - I'm the smartest man in the world and the world needs me - good luck guys", grabs a parachute and jumps.
Priest says - my son, I'm old, have lived a good life and comfortable in my faith that God will take me to his bosom - you may have the last parachute.
Hippie says - "all cool padre. Smartest man in the world just jumped out of the plane with my backpack."
We claim to be one of the smartest cities in the world - ready to even host an Olympics on budget (yeah, right Shirley) - yet we can't even match a bunch of names and numbers using a computer.
Smartest city in the world just sent 8000 kids into the street with just a backpack - jump kids, jump.
new school assignment model
We have a new school assignment model worked out by a graduate MIT student and vetted by everyone. We wanted more kids to attend the school of their choice closer to their home. It's not surprising that there are issues to work out on the software side. We closed two schools to consolidate our public school portfolio. That the issues haven't been solved yet is an problem. Pilot, hippie, priest and Henry Kissinger, meh.
The level of incompetence,
The level of incompetence, negligence, and indifference at BPS knows no bounds.
Not unique to Boston
I've worked in lots of school districts and the Peter Principle is well-represented in education.
Sounds like inside dissent
Sure some folks don't want him to succeed, unfortunate for the children.
Have any of these administrators ever been teachers?
Is that the career path anymore?
Seriously - I can't think of any teacher accepting this sort of excuse for a late project.
In fact, when they screwed up the registration a couple of years ago in our schools (on a massive scale), I brought this up directly at a parent information meeting: Would you, as a teacher, accept this sort of excuse from a student for a late project or homework? "I just didn't look at it until last week"??? No? Then why do you expect students and parents to accept it from you?
Administrators don't like being held to account for the sort of behavior that students are disciplined for, but lets talk about leadership, eh?
I've known quite a few administrators who were awful teachers
In fact, they went into leadership when they couldn't cut in the classroom.
You're beginning to get it.
You're beginning to get it. Now apply that to society at large.
.
.
Shit happens but....
A glitch is a glitch but something as important as this should be glitch proof.
It reminds me of the bus routing fiasco from 2 years ago.
"Software glitch"
is apparently the BPS's equivalent of "dog ate my homework."
Glitch proof does not exist
Doing things a couple of months earlier such that any glitches may be straightened out is a much better insurance policy.
yeah, it's a project
yeah, it's a project management failure. it may rest in coding and testing or third party software yielding unexpected and incorrect results. the school assignment model is unique to the district. I suspect they all are.
2020
Is it crazy and ignorant of me to hope that by the time my little guy goes to kindergarten in 2020 that BPS will be better and have their shit together?
If there's one thing parents LOVE
it's uncertainty and turmoil when dealing with important aspects of their child's growth and development.