@thehillishome.com/ @popville.bsky.social readers may find this of interest: petition to include a sauna and jacuzzi at the new Rumsey Aquatic Center (rather than the currently proposed “tech lounge” and “business incubator,” odd for a community pool) sign.moveon.org/petitions/wa...

IES is the federal agency with the second largest reduction in staff this year, narrowly behind USAID

Take a survey on celebrity singers rank choice voting style! I must add though that the tool should not let you submit more than one response at each rank.

NEWS: In a report detailing an October public hearing on MPD's cooperation with ICE, @brianneknadeau.bsky.social says that @mayorbowser.dc.gov should rescind the mayoral order that allows local police to work with federal agencies and the D.C. Council should strengthen the sanctuary-city law.

These shootings, and the more aggressive stance that federal agents have taken in many U.S. cities, can create a vicious cycle. Say someone with a record is pulled over. If they're afraid a federal agent is involved, might they be more likely to try and run?

I don’t understand the end goal here. Kill more pedestrians in DC? What if that’s you or your staff?

From Chicago: What happens when school climate ratings are released?

Other people are real and the United States should not murder them

In the last half of 2025, the President of OpenAI donated $25 million to the SuperPAC MAGA, Inc — the single largest contributor

No!!!

2025 was a rough year for the education sector. This 🧵 outlines some of the major cuts and areas of destruction.

USPS quietly changed its postmark rules — mail is no longer dated when you drop it off. The “official” date is when it hits automated sorting — sometimes days later Which could have major implications for mail in voting — it’s a clever way to disenfranchise voters that’s going largely overlooked

🖊️ Good news, DC! You can now get Notary Public services at the MLK Library. Need help with a Power of Attorney, ID copies, or real estate paperwork? Stop by the 2nd floor on the 2nd and 3rd Saturdays of the month, 10 AM–1PM. Learn more: https://bit.ly/4pEnGcR

Free DC has been an incredible grassroots response to the relentless federal attacks against our city. At a time when DC residents were told they have no voice and no say, @freedcproject.bsky.social empowered people to speak up and take concrete actions in defense of our communities and Home Rule.

This reminds me of the movie, Leave the World Behind 💀☠️

"This promise of an AI future, is really just a collective anxiety that wealthy people have about how well they're gonna be able to control us in the future." - @tressiemcphd.bsky.social with an absolute mic drop moment about AI bullshit. Incredible words. Listen to all of it!

Interesting: New data from @brookings.edu shows that spending in D.C. dropped significantly when President Trump deployed the National Guard in mid-August. Similarly, hotel revenue has been on a steady decline since mid-summer. www.brookings.edu/articles/con...

We need local leaders willing to represent the majority of their constituents.

Glad to see this work by #sanfordstudent published on the problems of translating effect sizes in educational research into months/years of learning. People assume the same annual growth (in a grade) on any test when it actually differs quite a lot across tests. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

NEWS: At-Large Councilember Anita Bonds will try to delay ranked-choice voting's rollout at next Tuesday's D.C. Council session. She has an emergency bill that would push RCV to 2027, instead of it being used next year. She says there isn't enough time for outreach and education.

My favorite event of the season!

Let's gooooooooo!

The partisan divide has grown, too. The wealthiest 100 tended to give more to Republicans than to Democrats before last year. But giving to the GOP spiked in 2024, with *84%* of donations going to back Republicans or conservative PACs.

Within a month, federal agents from Homeland Security Investigations shot at D.C. drivers two separate times. The incidents highlight significant differences in how local and federal police respond to crime, as well as what systems of accountability exist, @maustermuhle.bsky.social reports.

DC absolutely needs statehood so that the people who live there aren't ruled by goons they never elected. A genuine ongoing scandal and absolute betrayal of the principles of the country.

The House has passed H.R. 5214, a bill to return DC to cash bail. Cash bail creates two tiers of justice, one for people with money and one without. DC abolished it more than 30 years ago and crime has dropped precipitously since. H.R. 5214 is wrong and we will continue to fight its passage.

Now that SCOTUS has given the administration a blank check to dismantle agencies required by law without congressional approval, this was the obvious next step.

An official update from the US Department of Education.

A federal judge ruled that the First Amendment rights of U.S. Department of Education employees were violated by the Trump administration when their out-of-office emails were replaced with partisan messages. LEARN MORE: buff.ly/WO2A2Oy

DC could do this with its equitable access lottery preference but most schools choose not to: reserve up to 15% open seats for SNAP/TANF eligible.

We’ve set up school choice as a zero sum game, making it even harder for public schools to survive. It doesn’t have to be this way.

When you actually want to be on the jury... wtop.com/local/2025/1...

This was the right decision.

This is really bad.

BREAKING: A Department of Homeland Security officer shot at an unarmed black man during a traffic stop in DC, and the DC police officer said he was told by superiors not to mention the shooting in his incident report. 1/ www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/202...

To be clear, #project2025 seeks to eliminate income restrictions for vouchers.

This is death from a thousand paper cuts. It would be too easy to say everything has a cost so we can’t implement anything differently.

A key point in this article is whether OMB will allow agencies to have funds and whether legislation by Congress will be respected. www.insidehighered.com/news/governm...

I would like to think that Democrats have learned their lesson that writing stern letters about mass layoffs isn’t going to cut it.

For my practitioner friends, people who managed Title I funds (among others) were laid off today.

Another 466 employees being laid off from the Department of Education. Remember this was the plan all along: Traumatize the federal workforce. Dismantle ED. Break the institutions.

More RIFs including a lot at ED. I want to reiterate: layoffs could happen at any time under this Administration. There is no guarantee that caving on the budget will get us anything other than loss of healthcare for many people.

This is a great expose on segregation academies in my home state and an explanation of how vouchers are likely to increase inequity.

DCPS reneged on its promise to help hundreds of international teachers secure a green card. Many may now be forced to leave the country. Read the full story from @maustermuhle.bsky.social 51st.news/dc-green-car...

NEW! Dept of Education workers say their OOO replies were forcibly changed to blame Democrats for shutdown. When employees changed their responses back to the more neutral language, it changed yet again to the partisan response. @wired.com @leahfeiger.bsky.social www.wired.com/story/govern...

NEW—US Department of Education sent out standard Out of Office language to employees on Wednesday in light of shutdown. Later yesterday, workers tell me they found someone had updated their auto-responses without consent to a new one blaming Democrats. Version of original on left, updated on right:

And, for some agencies, the Administration changed employee away messages and replaced them with a partisan message unbeknownst to the employees.

Trump's FCC yesterday voted to kill a program that provided free Wi-Fi to rural school kids at no cost to taxpayers, falsely claiming the program was "illegal" and was being used to "censor Conservative ideology."