Schools

Georgetown Resident Offers Alternate View of Hardy Middle School Upheaval on DC Blog

Ken Archer, a local blogger, posited that Michelle Rhee's motivation for removing a popular local Principal may have been driven by admissions concerns.

In an article on Greater Greater Washington (GGW) Monday, Ken Archer, a Georgetown resident, that former D.C. Public Schools (DCPS) Chancellor Michelle Rhee removed Principal Patrick Pope form his position at the local middle school because of fears he was weeding out poor children. Patch's request to DCPS for comment on the motivations suggested in the article have not been returned.

In his article, Archer cites a new book on Michelle Rhee, The Bee Eater by Richard Whitmire, and a "high-level education administrator" as sources for his assertions. Archer wrote:

"Rhee and her team discovered that Hardy, whose students are 75% black, had a far lower percentage of poor students than other schools with a similar racial makeup, despite students being selected by a lottery.

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Officials worried that Pope was making Hardy into a haven for out-of-boundary, well-off African-American students, disadvantaging others from poorer backgrounds."

The suggestion that Rhee was a champion of disadvantaged African-American students does not jive with the current narrative, namely that Rhee fired Pope to make way for a principal who would change the middle school into a community-serving school for the children of, mostly white, Georgetown residents.

Find out what's happening in Georgetownwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Archer wrote, that many out-of-boundary parents "have claimed that Rhee's removal of Pope as principal was an attempt to "whitewash" the mostly black school by replacing him with a principal who will reach out to in-boundary families."

To an extent some local parents have said they felt unwelcome at Hardy. At a recent ANC meeting, Melanie Gisler, a Georgetown resident, said her impression of Pope was that he was "unwilling to reach out" to the Georgetown community. Gisler perceived Pope to be "not that interested in our children" and felt he treated Georgetown families as "less important."

Other parents have suggested it was more about control, Pope ran a tight ship his way and that did not meld well with Rhee's desire to manage the schools her way.

A group of parents and students just two weeks before Pope's replacement, Dana Nerenberg, was removed from her position at Hardy. Issues including scheduling and discipline problems have been of constant concern to many parents at the middle school since the year began under new leadership.

At the time of the January protest, Linda Wharton-Boyd, the director of communications for the executive office of the mayor, that the group "did not say they needed the principal (Nerenberg) replaced,"  but that Pope's return would be the Hardy protesters "most desirable outcome."

Two weeks later . Parents continue to ask for Pope's return. Councilmember Jack Evans , trying to legislate Pope's reinstatement at the helm of Georgetown's only middle school.

Archer's article received several quick and exacting criticisms from GGW readers. The first comment came from the moniker "HogWash" who wrote, "that this well-loved and respected principal's "secret plan" was to weed out the poor black kids and Michelle Rhee, The SuperWoman, had to do something about it. Doesn't that read odd?"

Whatever the reasons for Pope's removal, Hardy is still searching for a permanent replacement, Pope is currently serving as the principal at Savoy Elementary and Chancellor Kaya Henderson continues to resist calls for his return to Hardy.


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