Michelle Rhee removed the principal of Hardy Middle School because she worried he was stacking the admissions deck against low-income black students, according to a new book about Rhee.
The Greater Greater Washington blog has the story on journalist Richard Whitmire’s account of the firing in “The Bee Eater.” Allegedly, former principal Patrick Pope used in-person visits as part of Hardy’s application process to fill lottery seats with well-off students. Although principals have no control over the lottery used to fill open slots in schools, they exercise greater authority over the waitlists, GGW reports.
The concern of many DCPS officials, in other words, was this. By transforming Hardy Middle School into a haven for economically-advantaged African-American students, Pope was able to deliver discipline and academic results that pleased previous superintendents while making entitled in-boundary parents, and poor students, problems for other principals to deal with.
