Haricots Verts (French Green Immersion Charter)

[Anonymous]

Hi all, we really hijacked the "What PS3 spot are you giving up?" thread, so thought I'd start a new one for further discussion of this idea. A generous person has already posted her email as a way to get us talking offline, but just to make it easier to stay in touch if this idea takes off, started our own thread on it as well.

Interested in being at the very beginning of the possible founding of a French, Green Immersion charter school? Have skills, experience, commitment, time, connections, or just plain energy and good will to bring to the idea?
Then please join us in this very very early conversation on the idea. Contact [e-mail] so we can all be connected, and at some point we'll figure out our next step in getting the conversation going.

[Anonymous]

Hi all, it's my email address and I've had some great responses. I plan to send a group email out at the end of the day linking us all together to those who respond.

[Anonymous]

Also, I'll add that we understand this will be a huge undertaking and very difficult. That said, please only post here if you have something positive to add. All too often people post discouraging comments letting everyone know that it'll probably never take off. I, for one, understand the difficulty, but appreciate that if we do nothing and focus on failure, we'll get exactly that- NOTHING!. The energy, commitment and positivity is what we need! If that you, please join the email group!

[Anonymous]

RE middle school vs. elementary school: I really think a MS would only work with an ES (or multiple ESes) to feed into it. Would it be possible to set up a new charter as PK-8, or is it better to just start PK-5 and then amend later?

[Anonymous]

It's wide open... and as PP pointed out, hopefully no one is coming into the beginning of this conversation thinking this is easy. It most definitely is NOT easy to start a school. Quite possibly the hardest thing (but one of the most rewarding as well) next to parenting!

Just re-posting these quotes, as they bring up interesting considerations...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For those of us interested in Haricots Verts but with kids who are already in PS or PK and, realistically, we'd want them to be settled in a great school well before it's even possible we'd ever get this school going, another thing to think about is the lack of great middle school options. The few great middle schools in DC are all overfed, and even though DCI sounds like it will be great and there may be many new feeder schools over the years, there is no question that demand will still outweigh supply for middle school.

The more I think about the idea of getting a school going, my demanding full time work schedule, and parenting, I gotta be honest: it would be hard for me to really dive into this if I thought my children would not really benefit. Which is why I'm also raising the idea that maybe it's also worth thinking about/looking at founding a French or language oriented, green middle school, not to compete with DCI but basically to be inspired by it and maybe take that in a different direction, maybe more specialized or dually focused on green and language?

It's all just ideas, but as I printed up the "Application Guidelines for New Charter Schools Start Ups" that our lovely Contact Coordinator is already sending out to people in this thread (we already have titles! ), I'm really thinking that if I'm going to seriously think about doing this work, I'll need a personal stake in it, which for me will mean middle school, not elementary. And there is no question that there is a dearth of great middle school options that are not already over-subscribed.

Just throwing this out there. This idea began as an elementary school idea, and if that is where the group wants to keep it, I totally understand. But just thought I'd throw the idea out there, while we're brainstorming...

No matter what, DC can't go wrong with more great school options. It would be an honor to be part of helping that be improved by one more school.

+1 I agree that I want all kids to have more options, mine included! I'm doing some digging to make sure, but there's no reason why a start-up has to be focused on pre-k. We can figure out when the school could likely open (say two or three years from now or whatever) and have the flagship grade be the grade where our kids will be. For mine, it'll like be 1st. We would have a flagship K and 1st or 1st and 2nd. However, if that's not reasonable, I'm all for making it higher grades. Maybe a middle school with an IB focus would be great. I'm hopeful for the DCI as well, but we can't all put our eggs in that basket, especially because we (at least I) don't have access to a feeder. I'm praying for Stokes next week, but will probably be shut out again. Anyways, I'm excited about this thread and hope, if nothing else, we can get the information that we need to see if this really is doable. Haricot Verts- here we come!

[Anonymous]

My DC is in middle school already, but this sound like a great idea!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:RE middle school vs. elementary school: I really think a MS would only work with an ES (or multiple ESes) to feed into it. Would it be possible to set up a new charter as PK-8, or is it better to just start PK-5 and then amend later?

This is a good point, because without a few French feeder schools (other than Stokes, which we've established is the only public DC French bilingual other than Oyster, right?), and without the ability to do language testing, where would the students come from for only a middle school?

I like the idea of doing the charter as PK-8, but as another PP pointed out, the first entry grades don't have to be PS and PK, they can be K or 1st and build from there.

[Anonymous]

April Fool!!!

[Anonymous]

Oyster doesn't have French.

Are you thinking of a curriculum focused primarily on France, or on the whole Francophone world? Are you thinking of a French curriculum, such as offered in a Lycee or of an American or IB curriculum taught in French?

[Anonymous]

This group is newly formed and we will have a lot of thoughts and ideas to get down before we start moving forward with full curriculum ideas.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oyster doesn't have French.

Are you thinking of a curriculum focused primarily on France, or on the whole Francophone world? Are you thinking of a French curriculum, such as offered in a Lycee or of an American or IB curriculum taught in French?

Give us 24 hours to get back to you. We only came up with the idea today.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:April Fool!!!

Nope, jokes on you. This is a totally serious idea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oyster doesn't have French.

Are you thinking of a curriculum focused primarily on France, or on the whole Francophone world? Are you thinking of a French curriculum, such as offered in a Lycee or of an American or IB curriculum taught in French?

Give us 24 hours to get back to you. We only came up with the idea today.

Yesterday actually, which means we should have the final curriculum ironed out by 3:00pm today.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oyster doesn't have French.

Are you thinking of a curriculum focused primarily on France, or on the whole Francophone world? Are you thinking of a French curriculum, such as offered in a Lycee or of an American or IB curriculum taught in French?

Give us 24 hours to get back to you. We only came up with the idea today.

Sorry, I didn't mean that as demanding an answer now, just putting out there some questions to think about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oyster doesn't have French.

Are you thinking of a curriculum focused primarily on France, or on the whole Francophone world? Are you thinking of a French curriculum, such as offered in a Lycee or of an American or IB curriculum taught in French?

These are poignant considerations. I'm sure it will take us a while to figure it out. What are your thoughts? Let's get a real conversation going. I'm thinking about this now. What I know is I have the passionate interest, but I don't know anything about what you've described. Anyone with real world knowledge out there? Please chime in. This has the makings of a start-up!!!