What To Do About the Assignment Plan?
Lynne Varner at the Times is the latest to weigh in on the problems of changing the assignment plan (and here we thought it was going to be hard to draw the boundaries). As usual, her rhetoric is overblown and it's as if she is taking Superintendent Goodloe-Johnson to task for things that other superintendents and Boards did before she got here. At least she hired Don Kennedy who had the courage to tell the truth (outloud and in public) about the situation. She did have one line of good sense:
"Better to have lasting policy than short-lived plans made in haste."
I agree. Director de Bell and Director Martin-Morris seem urge to forge ahead.
Which do you want - forge ahead with the plan to change the high school enrollment process by the fall of 2009 (but with the understanding that if the system blows there will be mass confusion on a huge scale) or make sure they do it right and commit the time and resources to both the system and the assignment plan and thus postponing any changes? (Of course, the question could also be asked that if it implementation is postponed, would they still only do high school or could they do the whole plan at once because of the new computer system that could handle it?)
"Better to have lasting policy than short-lived plans made in haste."
I agree. Director de Bell and Director Martin-Morris seem urge to forge ahead.
Which do you want - forge ahead with the plan to change the high school enrollment process by the fall of 2009 (but with the understanding that if the system blows there will be mass confusion on a huge scale) or make sure they do it right and commit the time and resources to both the system and the assignment plan and thus postponing any changes? (Of course, the question could also be asked that if it implementation is postponed, would they still only do high school or could they do the whole plan at once because of the new computer system that could handle it?)
Comments
A) isn't the computerized assignment plan merely (!) a set of logarithms that is programed into a computer?
B) I know 45,000 is a lot of students, but many are simple, and couldn't, say, A PERSON or a team spend a couple weeks going through the list and making fits?
Call me a simpleton (many do) but it seems that, as Ms. Varner said in her opinion piece, in this land of high tech we should be able to get some good-hearted soul(s) to donate a few programming hours and/or a few days of labor to get assignments made...WHY is this so complicated?
Gordon, who has some extra time lately
But no Anonymous, 9:51, it isn't as simple as a set of logarithms - the system they use is so old that if you try to change or migrate the information in it, it might crash. (Roosevelt crashed the system last year and that was just overenrollment.)
And by hand? Can you imagine the charges of cheating by parents if it were done by hand? It would take a lot longer than a couple of weeks because of the tie-breakers, programs. etc.
I'm not putting you down; I, too, wish it wasn't so complicated.
Urgghh.
Meanwhile Facilities continues its shell game of busily moving money around. I'm counting on COO, Don Kennedy to assert himself in this case to get this assignment plan rolling. That said, it can't happen overnight.