Michelle Rhee, the D.C. schools chancellor, was hot and cold on the Government Accountability Office report, delivered yesterday on Capitol Hill, on how well the clunker of a school system has done in the last two years implementing reforms.

Which is to say, she liked the part where it said she and Mayor Adrian Fenty were doing a good job and didn't care so much for the part where it said they weren't.

Read More "Congress’s D.C. Schools Report, and Cash for Clunkers" »

More bodies pile up thanks to the scourge that is street racing. This time, the two victims had pulled over to check out a race along I-70 just beyond the Baltimore city line. Last time, eight people were killed in Accokeek.

Read More "Weekend in Review: The Menace of Street Racing" »

Every May 15, legions of city employees scramble to finish their financial disclosure statements---public documents collected by the Office of Campaign Finance laying out whether government managers and certain other workers have any real or potential conflicts of interest.

This year, for instance, LL walked into Phil Mendelson's office on May 15 to see the at-large councilmember hunched over a typewriter shortly before the deadline. Mendelson, as it happens, is one of the few folks in town who reports anything of substance on his forms.

Most declare nothing, and some haven't filed at all. Last week, OCF published a lengthy list of nearly 1,000 nonfilers. Many of those are low-level functionaries, many of them no longer work for the District, but a handful were top-level officials.

Read More "Top D.C. Officials Haven’t Filed Financial Disclosures" »

Good to see Michelle Rhee getting some ink these days. It's been two years since she started as chancellor of the D.C. public schools, a time the Washington Post figures is as good as any to go long on her performance.

The catchy lede, on why Rhee appeared on the cover of Time mag holding a broom---a cliched pose for a reformer of any institution. Here's the Post's Bill Turque, reporting Rhee's account to D.C. Council Chairman Vincent Gray of why she allowed this photo to go get shot:

Read More "Weekend In Review: Two Years for Rhee" »

It's high school graduation season here in the nation's capital which means two things: ridiculous crowds outside Constitution Hall all day, every day; and the publication of Education Week's graduation issue.  It's the latter that is causing greater concern because contained in the June 11 edition are the results of the magazine's ten-year analysis of public high school graduation rates across the country.  And unfortunately, D.C. Public Schools ranked 50th out of 51 states and territories.  According to the poll, 48.8 percent of public school students in the city graduated in 2006.  So what do we do now?

Read More "Are D.C. Public Schools a Lost Cause?" »

Since he moved last month to hold $27 million from the D.C. Public Schools budget over an enrollment dispute, Council Chairman Vincent C. Gray has been pleading for an answer to a simple question: Where are the schoolchildren that DCPS is projecting will enroll this fall---more than 3,000 more than if longstanding trends hold---going to come from?

Now Gray's crowing, because he says DCPS Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee has admitted he has a point in a letter sent to him yesterday.

In the letter, Rhee cites the work of independent researchers in coming up with the projections, but writes, "I understand your hesitance to accept the projected increase in enrollment....Based upon the assumptions we outlined...we believe we have sound evidence and data to suggest that DCPS's enrollment of October 2009 will increase slightly....However, as I shared with you Friday, I cannot guarantee that this will occur."

Gray sees vindication therein: "Basically, what I think it says is [that] I think we'll be proven right on the number," Gray said this morning at the council breakfast meeting. "It says in a lot of words that they don't know where 3,073 people are coming from."

As for a modus vivendi, a compromise has been fashioned: The council will vote today to restore DCPS funding on the October 2008 enrollment figure---meaning DCPS is free to spend about $24 million of the $27 million that council had threatened to place in escrow. The remaining $3 million will be set aside pending an audit of the fall enrollment.

For next year, however, Rhee and Gray have agreed to work together to "develop a uniform method by which enrollment projections will be completed by both DCPS and the charter schools." That would aim to end the inequity in the mechanics of charter funding versus DCPS funding: Charters have to refund money accepted due to overprojections, but DCPS doesn't.

Last week, on his way out of the door for a long weekend, LL threw up a post about how D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee, faced with threats from the D.C. Council to cut $27 million from her fiscal 2010 budget over an enrollment dispute, had sent letters to her principals telling them that their budgets are set to be cut.

Therein, LL asked a couple of questions: Why cut teachers first? Aren't there central-office savings to be reaped?

This week, some answers came to those questions, from DCPS spokesperson Jennifer Calloway. "DCPS has cut the central office budget to the bare minimum," she writes in a statement, "reducing spending over the past 2 years while significantly increasing funding going directly to schools."

"Central office," by the way, is shorthand for all school-system functionaries who aren't directly serving students in schools---not just those who work at DCPS headquarters at 825 North Capitol Street. And if the central office has indeed been cut to the bone, Rhee will have accomplished quite something.

Read More "DCPS: Central Office Budget Cut ‘to the Bare Minimum’" »

Yesterday, Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee dispatched letters to principals of DCPS schools informing them that their budgets next year stand to be cut, pending the D.C. Council's decision to put a hold on some $27 million due to concerns about possibly inflated enrollment projections. The letters included specific per-school figures on amount of money and number of teachers cut.

"As you know," the letter starts, "the DC City Council has proposed an amendment to set aside $27.5 million from the DCPS budget for the upcoming 2009-2010 school year.....In this smaller budget, the budget of [SCHOOL NAME] will be reduced by [DOLLAR AMOUNT], that is [NUMBER] teacher positions....I am hopeful that this situation can be rectified, however. We feel that the proposed amendment is based on inaccurate information, and we are working with Council in hopes that this can be corrected prior to the vote."

Here's the big question: Why would you cut the teachers first? Aren't there central-office savings to be reaped somewhere? Or is this just the most expedient way of fomenting outrage at the council's move?

Troy Mathieu has quit as athletic director of DC Public Schools. He didn't last a year. Mathieu had replaced Allen Chin, who had the AD job for decades but was an early sweepee of Michelle Rhee's broom. Based on limited exposure -- mainly the flip-flopping and bungling I witnessed from her office while she was trying to install a five-year eligibility rule in DCIAA -- I've never got the sense that Rhee takes school sports very seriously.

***

The streaking Nationals captured their seventh loss in a row. The long skein was in jeopardy until Joel Hanrahan's bases loaded wild pitch in the top of the ninth.

I'm no Casey Stengel, but does anybody get why Manny Acta keeps throwing Hanrahan out there as the closer? How many dead will it take 'til he knows that too many people have died?

I, for one, miss Charlie Slowes' "Curly W!" calls on the radio.

***

DC United took a four-goal lead and didn't blow it all in beating HATED RIVAL the New York Red Bulls, 5-3, at RFK. The game was billed as a play-in for the U.S. Open Cup, a tournament that goes back to 1914, and which United won last year. I always thought the defending champion automatically qualifies in major soccer tournaments -- World Cup, Champions League, etc. Only about 5,000 fans showed up for the game, so maybe United fans figured the same.

***

DeMatha's own Danny Ferry has been named NBA Executive of the Year by the Sporting News. The Cleveland Cavaliers GM, Bob Ferry, won the same award twice during his days as general manager of the Washington Bullets, despite making these first round picks over his years here: Tom Hammonds, Mugsy Bogues,

Read More "Cheap Seats Daily: Trouble at the Top of DC Schoolboy Sports, Nats Keep Hopelessness Alive, United Wins in Front of Nobody, Danny Ferry Wins GM Award" »

The Washington Post's Alan Goldenbach is reporting that Troy Mathieu, who took over as athletic director for the D.C. Public Schools not 10 months ago.

Mathieu had come form the top athletic post at Grambling State University in Louisiana, and had overseen athletics programs for the Dallas public schools.

The key portion of Goldenbach's report:

A source who has worked closely with Mathieu said it became difficult for him to enact change due to the structure of the DCPS administration.

"He has so many people over him that it's impossible to do anything," the source said. "The problem with this job is, nobody is going to allow you to make any major moves because they just want to save their job."

That'll be a tough thing to hear for a city administration supposedly devoted to cutting bureaucracy---especially at DCPS headquarters.

Yesterday, after the D.C. Council voted to hold back on some $27 million in D.C. Public Schools funding, Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee wasted no time writing a nastygram [PDF] to Vincent C. Gray and his colleagues.

The letter laid out all the money that would have to be pulled from schools---itemized and broken down by ward. (Smart move: Hey, Harry Thomas, want to explain to your constituents why you voted to cut $3.9 million from Ward 5 schools?)

This wasn't the first letter Rhee had sent Gray and the council.

Last week, she had sent another missive [PDF], asking the council to reconsider its moves to cut the budget of the Deputy Mayor of Education's office and to remove the State Board of Education from the Office of the State Superintendent of Education. Rhee says the council moves, which were ratified yesterday, "begin to erode the structure established by and the progress which has ensued under" school reform legislation passed in 2007.

Much of the letter concerns the decision to take the Interagency Collaboration and Service Integration Commission (aka ICSIC---"ick-sick") out of DME Victor Reinoso's shop and put it in the DCPS Office of Youth Engagement. That office, Rhee writes, "is building twilight programs, student attendance and truancy initiatives, and the Youth Engagement Academy," and as such "cannot take on the additional responsibilities of ICSIC without diverting its focus from these other important initiatives." Better, she says, to leave it with Reinoso, where it "has the force of the Mayor's office to coordinate across agencies and the dedicated focus and resources which would otherwise be lost in the day-to-day functions of another agency."

Rhee also takes issue with the council's move to pump up the SBOE's independence, saying it is "likely to lessen the policy focus of the Board and create the temptation to micromanage" and claiming that moving the school ombudsman's office under their aegis "is likely to politicize" that operation.

In closing, she writes, "we need to continue our progress within the structure and the time line promulgated by the Act. It is too early to turn back."

Full letter after the jump.

Read More "Michelle Rhee Annoyed By Council’s School Governance Moves" »

Frozen Tropics posts a sneak peak inside the nearly finished H Street Country Club: "They are still putting the finishing touches on the golf course, but the place is otherwise ready to go. With a capacity of 300 people, the space has great potential, and the owners have pushed it to the limits. The menu looks awesome, and one peak at the folks executing it will put any doubt to rest."

The New Teacher On The Block has a really dumb classroom aide: "Ms. Know-It-All (the mean aide in my classroom) just asked me if I had 'gained a little weight in my stomach.'"

DC Teacher Chic attends an event in which Rhee is asked to rate her performance on a scale of 1 to 10. Answer is not quite given. Rhee seems just not very revolutionary when compared to the Green Dot Charter leader profiled in the New Yorker.

The 42 writes on the glut of Thai restaurants, eating/not eating on the Metro, and so much more.

The Heights Life sees a new sign going up in Columbia Heights and it says something about chicken and steak.

Congress Heights On Rise posts pictures of the neighborhood's recent parade and festival.

Kurt Schmoke---former Baltimore mayor and now dean of Howard University's law school---has been selected to mediate the monthslong dispute over a new teachers contract, according to a joint statement released this evening by the D.C. Public Schools, the Washington Teachers' Union, and the American Federation of Teachers.

"Our goal is to begin this process immediately so that we can quickly come to an agreement that makes the district and teachers partners in providing our students with the rich, rigorous education they deserve," the short statement reads.

As WaPo's Bill Turque reported last month, both sides are ready to return to the table to hash out an agreement some 17 months in the making. Just who would serve as mediator at that table was a point of contention.

Schmoke, mayor from 1988 to 1999, is of course most famous for suggesting that drugs be legalized---a radical reform that might suggest some sympathy for the radical reforms pushed by Michelle Rhee. Then again, he's spent his career since inside the legal and academic establishments that might favor a more easygoing approach. Should be fun to watch!

The world-record holder for most consecutive kisses in a minute is no longer employed by the District of Columbia.

WaPo's Bill Turque is reporting that State Superintendent of Education Deborah Gist has resigned to take a similar top job with an actual state---Rhode Island, to be precise.

Turque includes some fun stuff about tensions over Gist's role in the District's newfangled edubureaucracy:

While her agency took on increased responsibilities for special education, charter schools and compliance with federal laws, her influence was limited by her peculiar status under the terms of the mayoral takeover in which she was, in effect, a state superintendent without a state. Chancellor Michelle A. Rhee, a Fenty appointee, has been the dominant force in school reform. On the District's organizational chart, Gist actually reported to [Deputy Mayor Victor Reinoso].

At one point she asserted that she had authority over Rhee's plans to restructure the management of schools deemed to be failing under the federal No Child Left Behind Law, but she was later overruled by District lawyers. Last year, she was forbidden by Fenty to discuss teacher certification policy with a Post reporter.

Gist will be replaced by former assistant education secretary Kerri L. Briggs, Turque reports.

From NYT columnist Nicholas Kristof's Twitter feed:

Just interviewed Michelle Rhee, head of schools in D.C. She's ground zero for school reform nationwide. I'll write for Sunday.

So much for that supposed national media blackout.