HD Cooke parents

[Anonymous]

What do you love/or not about the school? What is the student population breakdown? We are looking for preK. Thanks for any feedback!

[Anonymous]

My daughter is in PK4 at HD Cooke this year. We are very happy and will be returning for K-5, having chosen not to enter the lottery for DD's kindergarten year.

I love the Creative Curriculum in the early childhood classes. I love that the teachers coordinate and plan things together. I just came from a wonderful Black history month celebration that really highlighted the teamwork that I think makes the school great. I love our principal - it's her first year and she had a lot on her plate, but has really followed through on the things she said she was going to do this year. We have spent many hours together at open houses and community outreach events speaking with prospective families. This spring, she is planning to walk around the neighborhood to meet more community members - whether their kids go to the school or not. She is actually local - Cooke is her neighborhood school and was also her first choice for posting last summer. The PTO is fairly active - we meet once a month and generally have a guest speaker from one of our partner organizations and internal updates from the IB coordinator and the principal. We are planning a series of restaurant nights and movie nights this spring. We've also had a series of well-attended open houses, so I am hoping that parent engagement will increase next year as well.

There are actually not very many things that I do not like about the school. I think the only critique I can really make is that there has definitely been a culture change this year. Ms. Larkin has put a lot of effort into instituting a discipline system, ensuring that students come in uniform every day, etc. There are definitely some families with older children who have not been very receptive to these changes, but from what I can tell, they are in the minority in their dissatisfaction.

As far as population, it's definitely true that the upper grades are almost exclusively (if not exclusively) black and Latino. The early childhood classes are much more racially diverse. My daughter is the only white girl in her PK class and one of just a handful of white kids in the class overall. It has not proved to be a problem for her socially, though I've been unable to connect with the parents of her friends to set up playdates outside school.

We are having an open house tomorrow morning at 10am. I will be there, as will other current parents. Please join us so that we can talk more!

[Anonymous]

We have had a great year at Cooke--honestly, we were a little surprised by how much we liked it. We are inbounds and it was almost the last school on our list last year. We thought the facilities were excellent, but we also thought that the old principal (who ran last year's open houses) was not very good, and she set the tone. Well, she left at the end of last year, and the new principal is really changing things. She's fantastic and very experienced, having spent 12 years at Ross as a teacher/administrator and then a year at Hearst as an AP. Among the major things she's done is to put in place a new discipline system (PBIS - Positive Behavior Intervention System, or something like that), which has really brought an end to the behavior problems we heard about at the school before. She's also worked closely with all the teachers, meeting with each grade level weekly to coordinate a curriculum. And she uses the assessments that DCPS mandates to understand where kids are struggling, and as a result teachers are able to help kids in the areas where they are specifically struggling. The school has a very different feel from last year, having spoken to families and teachers that were there before.

What we like:
- We especially like the PK3 teachers. They are both excellent and have been at the school a number of years. We also like the PK4 teachers, from our limited interactions with them. One is new (was an assistant at Janney), and the other two have been at Cooke for a number of years.
- The IB curriculum. It's inquiry-based, which means that kids do 8-10 week thematic units throughout elementary school. In PK3/PK4, they use the Creative Curriculum, rather than Tools of the Mind. the CC lets teachers have more autonomy, choosing units the kids are really interested in.
- Parent involvement. Last year, the PTA had very little participation. This year, it's much more active (likely because the principal has worked with parents to build it up). What I appreciate most about the PTA is that it's not just middle-class parents who show up; there are a wide range of parents who participate. The PTA does some fundraising (nothing at all like the WOTP schools), but the focus is just as much on building the parent community through different events.
- The "extras." I consider a renovated building a be an extra, and Cooke's is gorgeous. There are also two playgrounds for the kids We also really like the specials teachers (art, PE, Spanish, library, and music). A lot of the charters we ranked above Cooke didn't have these extras.
- We've had a good experience in after care this year. It's free, and we didn't have high expectations, but my child participates in JumpStart twice a week, gets art once a week, and has library time once week. It's not fancy, but it suits our needs well.
- (This one is specific to us) -- the location. Going to our IB school means that our mornings are so much less stressful. It's easy to get up and walk to school. If we had to drive, bike, metro, or bus, it would just add a lot of stress to our day.

What I don't like
- I very much dislike the middle-school feed. Cooke is not dual language and currently feeds to a school that is dual language (with no English track). This really irks me, and I feel like DCPS has not thought this through at all. (I realize I should not be surprised by that, but it still bothers me.)
- Like a lot of EOTP schools, I think that Cooke has a very different profile for the younger grades vs. the older. It is much more diverse in younger grades and has many more inbounds families in the early grades. This means that it will probably take some time for test scores to recover. I think a lot of people look at Cooke and dismiss it over the test scores; honestly, I almost did. But in the younger grades, which are not testing grades, the situation is totally different.

My list of likes is a lot longer than my list of dislikes, and I feel so lucky that we were matched with Cooke, as my child has really thrived this year.

Best of luck in the lottery, OP! If you have other questions, please post them, and I'll do my best to answer them.

[Anonymous]

What great and honest feedback! We are not IB but have very close proximity- what are chances for prek4?

[Anonymous]

Very good. Pk4 is an expansion year at Cooke - there are 2 pk3 classes capped at 16 (1 for early stages set aside, 15 for lottery) while pk4 has 3 classes of 20 (1 also for early stages, 19 for the lottery per class).

I'm the first poster with the daughter in pk4. We are out of bounds with no preference and were matched on the first lottery last year.

[Anonymous]

Another parent who loves H.D. Cooke. I too have a daughter in the PK class. I feel like it is a school that while it has a ton of potential, it is also doing an excellent job of meeting the educational and social needs of my child currently. As an added bonus, there is a really good mix of students both in terms of racial diversity as well as income diversity. Although most students are from the neighborhood, there are also a sizable portion that our outside of the boundary. I love that my daughter has a chance to really get to know and become good friends with a wide range of kids from very different backgrounds from ours.

The facilities are top-notch. Everything is sparkling and new, lots of light, and lots of space. The principal is simply amazing. She made some quick fixes straight away and certainly has a medium- and long-term plan in place to put the school on a trajectory for success. Whereas the school used to be one of our back-up choices, it is now moving toward being one of the schools to beat, at least for our circumstances.

I am not as familiar with the upper grades, and that will certainly be a test for us when we make decisions about what to do in the long term (but that is several years down the road). That said, the school increasingly seems to be drawing a very strong cadre of students and involved parents dedicated to keeping the school on an upward trajectory. If a good portion of those kids stay and the school attracts more high-quality students, I really do feel like the sky's the limit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Very good. Pk4 is an expansion year at Cooke - there are 2 pk3 classes capped at 16 (1 for early stages set aside, 15 for lottery) while pk4 has 3 classes of 20 (1 also for early stages, 19 for the lottery per class).

I'm the first poster with the daughter in pk4. We are out of bounds with no preference and were matched on the first lottery last year.

The cap for PK4 is 21 (20 through lottery and 1 through early stages), so if Cooke has 3 PK4 classrooms and only 2 PK3 classrooms, there should be 30 PK4 spots in the lottery (or more if there is attrition).

[Anonymous]

Bumping this thread. Are there any current K parents who can speak to how this year has gone? We are looking for K next year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Bumping this thread. Are there any current K parents who can speak to how this year has gone? We are looking for K next year

I am the PP up thread with the PK4 daughter. The only thing I can really tell you about K is that we are definitely going next year. My DD has spent some time in the kindergarten rooms when she refuses to nap and wants to do something more than color quietly while other kids sleep.

Kindergarten is a weird transitional area at Cooke because it's in the early childhood wing, but the K classes gather in the cafeteria in the morning and eat there and don't nap. I am looking forward to it, and am sorry that I cannot give you a better feel for the structure.

[Anonymous]

I think that the early childhood program at Cooke is solid and has been for years both under the previous principal and the new principal. I'm unsure if the K team is going to be in place next year. I heard at least one of the teachers is not planning on returning which is a huge loss based on what people have said about her.

I'm curious about the grades beyond K and with the diverse group of parents. I'm starting to hear that there are challenges with both.

I know that the rumblings about Cooke have been largely around the early childhood program but I'd love to hear about the upper grades from current parents with actual experience and not anecdotal references.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think that the early childhood program at Cooke is solid and has been for years both under the previous principal and the new principal. I'm unsure if the K team is going to be in place next year. I heard at least one of the teachers is not planning on returning which is a huge loss based on what people have said about her.

I'm curious about the grades beyond K and with the diverse group of parents. I'm starting to hear that there are challenges with both.

I know that the rumblings about Cooke have been largely around the early childhood program but I'd love to hear about the upper grades from current parents with actual experience and not anecdotal references.

I don't think you are going to find that. There are very few parents at Cooke who check DCUM. I can think of three parents who do out of the 400 kids who are enrolled.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think that the early childhood program at Cooke is solid and has been for years both under the previous principal and the new principal. I'm unsure if the K team is going to be in place next year. I heard at least one of the teachers is not planning on returning which is a huge loss based on what people have said about her.

I'm curious about the grades beyond K and with the diverse group of parents. I'm starting to hear that there are challenges with both.

I know that the rumblings about Cooke have been largely around the early childhood program but I'd love to hear about the upper grades from current parents with actual experience and not anecdotal references.

I've posted on this thread a couple of times. My daughter will be going into K next year.

My understanding of the history of Cooke is that a couple of years ago, there was a strong, committed group of parents. Of the group of parents who formed the core of the PTA in years past, only one parent is still at the school and I don't know if she reads these boards. She does have a kindergartener, so I will ask her for her impressions of kindergarten and also see if she knows anything about a kindergarten teacher leaving. We have had some teacher turnover this year, mostly in the specials department, but as far as I know, those vacancies are filled already. My understanding is that the departures have been the result of a combination of family issues and no desire to work with the new principal any longer. Whenever there is an administration change, there is going to be at least a little turn over. I haven't heard anything about hiring a new kindergarten teacher, but I also haven't talked to the principal in a couple weeks, nor should she feel obligated to tell me about her personnel's employment status. She informed about the vacancies when she found out about them. Nothing was kept secret, so at this point, what you're talking about is unofficial gossip, unless a letter about it has gone home sometime in the last hour.

As for the "rumblings" about Cooke this year, those "rumblings" are from early childhood because the 3-4 parents who post here all have early childhood kids. The reality is that for many east of the park schools, including Cooke, most of what you are going to hear in places like DCUM is going to come from the newer cohort of parents. Not everyone reads this site. If you would like to talk to a kindergarten family to hear about their experience, that sounds like a good thing to ask the school or the PTO to facilitate for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that the early childhood program at Cooke is solid and has been for years both under the previous principal and the new principal. I'm unsure if the K team is going to be in place next year. I heard at least one of the teachers is not planning on returning which is a huge loss based on what people have said about her.

I'm curious about the grades beyond K and with the diverse group of parents. I'm starting to hear that there are challenges with both.

I know that the rumblings about Cooke have been largely around the early childhood program but I'd love to hear about the upper grades from current parents with actual experience and not anecdotal references.

I don't think you are going to find that. There are very few parents at Cooke who check DCUM. I can think of three parents who do out of the 400 kids who are enrolled.

Um, did you poll parents about their DCUM usage? What a weird post.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that the early childhood program at Cooke is solid and has been for years both under the previous principal and the new principal. I'm unsure if the K team is going to be in place next year. I heard at least one of the teachers is not planning on returning which is a huge loss based on what people have said about her.

I'm curious about the grades beyond K and with the diverse group of parents. I'm starting to hear that there are challenges with both.

I know that the rumblings about Cooke have been largely around the early childhood program but I'd love to hear about the upper grades from current parents with actual experience and not anecdotal references.

I don't think you are going to find that. There are very few parents at Cooke who check DCUM. I can think of three parents who do out of the 400 kids who are enrolled.

Um, did you poll parents about their DCUM usage? What a weird post.

Yup, that's part of the PTO survey at the start of the year.

[Anonymous]

We were previously at Cooke and left after being discouraged by the former principal, who basically discouraged parental involvement. We were there through first grade. There were three K teachers then, one of whom left when my kids were in 1st grade out of frustration with the principal. Ms. Kenney was a jewel--I hope she is still there. Ms. Watkins (I think she now has a new name?) was the other K teacher and she was very strict and stressed out most of the time. I believe she is still at the school but now teaches 4th grade or something, which is good. She was not very good at teaching Kindergartners, and the principal didn't give her (or any teacher) much support.

At HD Cooke, they used to take Kindergarten quite seriously, it being viewed as the first "academic" year. So there was a lot of pressure on learning to read and a lot of emphasis on academic achievement. I've heard anecdotally that this is the case in schools across the system, but it certainly made school less fun for my kids.

I have no idea whether any of the K teachers mentioned above are at the school anymore, nor any insight into the new principal's philosophy about Kindergarten. it might be a good thing to ask her.