MacArthur is the new Walls

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This school is too far out. The location is not a good one.

It’s designed to be a neighborhood school, serving families who are in boundary for the elementary feeders to go to Hardy. There is talk among parents of a private transportation system, picking up in three different places, including Spring Valley, Cleveland Park, and your Stoddard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This school is too far out. The location is not a good one.

It’s designed to be a neighborhood school, serving families who are in boundary for the elementary feeders to go to Hardy. There is talk among parents of a private transportation system, picking up in three different places, including Spring Valley, Cleveland Park, and your Stoddard.

[Anonymous]

Hard to get to keeps the riff raff out

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are in NE but getting closer on the waitlist. How do people from across the city get there? I would definitely need my kid to take public transportation.

Where in NE. The D6 goes from Stadium/Armory pretty much straight to MacArthur (with a stop at Union Station and in Chinatown if your kid is coming from Brookland or elsewhere in NE). But it takes an hour from RFK, probably still about that if you take metro to grab it closer to downtown.

A lot of kids take it though. Even kids from NW take it after school to get to Georgetown or connect to metro or a bus heading uptown.

NP but that is a hike. No wonder tardiness is so bad in DC.

That is crazy to make a kid commute over an hour just to go to this school which is not only new but untested and with very limited with options, sports, extracurriculars.

[Anonymous]

OP is trying to stir up interest. I am in bounds for Macarthur, and I don't know a single person even considering going there. Walls or private.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This school is too far out. The location is not a good one.

It’s designed to be a neighborhood school, serving families who are in boundary for the elementary feeders to go to Hardy. There is talk among parents of a private transportation system, picking up in three different places, including Spring Valley, Cleveland Park, and your Stoddard.

This. MacArthur is not a new citywide option. Its whole purpose is to absorb students who would otherwise have gone to J-R and fix the overcrowding. (There were a zillion Ward 3 engagement calls on the subject, and the options were a new HS, a new MS, or a 9th grade academy set-up, and they went with the first one.)

MacArthur feels like a citywide option right now because it's new and you can lottery in, but that may very well not be the case in a few years once Hardy students can no longer grandfather into J-R. My oldest is upper elementary, so I assume MacArthur will be a non-option by the time it's relevant to us.

[Anonymous]

NP. Fine. I'll take the bait. DD is in 8th next year so in next years class applying and we are looking at relocating in either MacArthur or J-R.

Is next year the first when in-bound kids no longer have the choice for J-R and have to go to MacArthur unless they have sib preference?

Is the current 10th grade a full class? If not, are they adding to fill that now so 11th grade is a full class next year? Curious on when they'll have enough upper class for full AP offerings.

What's the plan for rolling out more sports like basketball, swimming, soccer at J-R? Are those coming next academic year when they'll have 9-11 students or later?

Thanks

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are in NE but getting closer on the waitlist. How do people from across the city get there? I would definitely need my kid to take public transportation.

Where in NE. The D6 goes from Stadium/Armory pretty much straight to MacArthur (with a stop at Union Station and in Chinatown if your kid is coming from Brookland or elsewhere in NE). But it takes an hour from RFK, probably still about that if you take metro to grab it closer to downtown.

A lot of kids take it though. Even kids from NW take it after school to get to Georgetown or connect to metro or a bus heading uptown.

NP but that is a hike. No wonder tardiness is so bad in DC.

I wouldn't be surprised if MacArthur ends up having high absentee rates among OOB kids simply because it is so far from the other side of the city. When school is an hour bus ride away from Ward 6 - and even further from Ward 7 & 8 - those kids who are edge-cases are going to be tempted to just skip school. HS kids show up more frequently when their school is nearby and easy to access.

[Anonymous]

It’s going to be a top school. It’s not there yet. It will start to draw full cohorts of graduating Hardy kids next year. Hardy is increasingly a neighborhood school. And a small pool of parents from ES that have high PTO asks are looking at channeling those in the future toward a privately funded bus network. Stay tuned….

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I know 4 families who didn’t get in to Walls; all 4 are going to MA. 2 more are high on the wait list for MA and are hoping to get in. And then people I know who didn’t apply to walls (or at least didn’t tell me if they did) are on waitlist for MA and it’s their 1st choice. They are coming from Deal.

So you mean they are zones for MA or lotteried in?

Macarthur is giving preference to deal/JR families. So its a different situation that usual.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This school is too far out. The location is not a good one.

It’s designed to be a neighborhood school, serving families who are in boundary for the elementary feeders to go to Hardy. There is talk among parents of a private transportation system, picking up in three different places, including Spring Valley, Cleveland Park, and your Stoddard.

This seems very likely to happen as soon as Hardy no longer feeds to JR. We're close enough that our kids will probably just bike though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s going to be a top school. It’s not there yet. It will start to draw full cohorts of graduating Hardy kids next year. Hardy is increasingly a neighborhood school. And a small pool of parents from ES that have high PTO asks are looking at channeling those in the future toward a privately funded bus network. Stay tuned….

+1
Hardy parent

[Anonymous]

So all it takes to make a top school is build it in Ward 3? I know that sounds sarcastic but that’s what it sounds like.

[Anonymous]

All it takes to build a top school is to fill it with children of parents who value education and who are expected to arrive prepared to learn each day. The rest will take care of itself. Seriously.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So all it takes to make a top school is build it in Ward 3? I know that sounds sarcastic but that’s what it sounds like.

Correct.