From the Bloomfield-Garfield post:
PPSparent said...
Did anyone go to the magnet fair? One person who went, looking for her 8th grader said that the CAPA presenters were awesome and that the IB group was disorganized and off-putting. She knew people that had liked IB, and had also liked Schenley, but said that after talking to the people at the fair, she crossed it off their list. I'm not sure who was there at the fair, but I can think of a couple of people associated with the program whose gloomy/snippy presentations are off-putting to those of us with kids already in the program! Threatening that kids will never get jobs in the coming economy without a global outlook is not as inspiring as they seem to think. The same message could be much more positively presented.Instead of selling what is a great program, they make it sound like taking bad-tasting medicine.
January 4, 2009 11:53 AM
Mark Rauterkus said...
I was at the magnet fair in Frick. It was jammed. It was not well done. Okay, but not well. And, at the magnet fair, there was a lot more push to the Sci Tech, of course.But, you know, that is not a deal breaker. Not ideal. Can be improved upon. But the one fair experience isn't the end-all-be-all. The whole event was a blunder -- however, some good info was delivered if you could extract it.
January 4, 2009 3:56 PM
8 comments:
The open house at Reizenstein was not particularly well done either.
"Open house" gave the impression that families should drop in at any time during the posted hours, but there was actually a scheduled presentation and many families missed the first part. The teachers gave good answers but it was hard to hear. Also it was not clear that a tour would be included at the end and so families left b/f the tour.
Also, many important issues were still undecided- such as, must students with no foreign language background or a weak language background take Japanese? And is it clear to those families that to earn the full IB students will need to manage to skip 2 years of Japanese to catch up to the expected standard? What can the school do to help them manage this?
Here are two major thoughts:
1. Allow those that go to the IB Program to take a 13th hear.
2. Furthermore, allow anyone who graduates in good standing at any other high school to go to the IB High and take a 13th year as well. So, let's say you graduate from Brashier / Carrick / Langley -- whatever. Then you could go to IB High for a prep year, get IB courses as prepared and as available, of course, and then take the test and get out of some college classes, perhaps.
Lots of our kids are not fully prepared for college. A 13th year for them -- given jobs, etc., is going to really help them get a leg up and perhaps some courses / credits too.
Here is another wild idea:
Those that go to the IB High and Graduate with an IB Diploma should be able to apply the funds from the Pittsburgh Promise to any college -- throughout the nation and thoughout the world.
It really sucks to have the Pittsburgh Promise money be good for IUP and not be good for UNC or Yale or Vandy or Northwestern or even Out of State U.
This would make the IB Diploma carrot much more rewarding. And, it would allow for the justification of the rigor in grade 11 and 12 too.
Likewise, according to my last wild idea -- 13th grade for all grads of other schools too -- you could allow those that go to 13th Grade with say 2 or 3 IB classes and positive IB Test Scores -- would too be able to apply the Pittsburgh Promise money to schools beyond the region.
Mark Rauterkus, you do know your niche is really education issues, don't you?
These are GREAT ideas! The Promise idea would give students a strong reason to attend IB and earn the diploma, and gives them credit for pursuing a particularly difficult program under less than ideal circumstances.
Now, how can we pursue this and get some serious consideration of the idea?
Blush. Thanks.
The best way to get these ideas out there is to blab about them. Internet, public comment, letters to the editor would help.
I love to lean upon REASON as well.
Also worth noting about the open house is that there were very few African American families. The school's website pictures a majority of AA students but based on the open house, to make this a reality at the high school level more will need to be done. And these efforts probably need to start much earlier than 8th or even 6th grade.
Yesterday's PG had a letter to the editor from a parent who would have welcomed more options for using Promise funds.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09004/939280-110.stm
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