Lottery/school choice hypothetical
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Anonymous
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For various reasons (but mostly anonymity), I don't want to name the schools involved in this decision. But I would love insight if anyone has anyone based on this hypothetical, because I don't know what to do.
We are currently at Red Elementary, a DCPS. We have had an okay but uneven experience there, and the most recent year was not great (partly just a bad class draw, but also partly due to things about the school's culture and physical setting). We do not want to spend the rest of elementary at Red. We did the lottery this year and got a very bad lottery number. Like REALLY bad -- we wound up last on the waitlist for pretty much every school we lotteried for. Right now, our best shot at moving this summer is for Blue Charter Elementary. Blue has very mixed reviews and has had issues recently retaining teachers. However, it has a philosophy we think would be better for our child, and it's in a better facility. It's very possible Blue will be the only school we get into this year. We are worried that if we switch to Blue, we will quickly become frustrated with teacher retention and administration issues, and regret leaving Red Elementary. But then be in a situation where if we move again, our kid will have attended 3 elementaries in 3 years, something we don't want. There is another school, Purple Elementary, that we have an extremely low chance of getting into this year, but we really like it. If we got a spot this year, we'd for sure stay through the end of elementary, no question. Also, our odds of getting into Purple next year would be much better, simply because lottery odds for higher grades are much better (they frequently clear waitlists fir the next grade up, but not our current grade). If you were in this situation, and you got an offer from Blue Charter, would you take it, hoping either Blue is better than you hoped or you get a spot at Purple in August or September? Or would you stay at Red and hold out hope for a spot at Purple either this year or next, knowing you'd be much more likely to be happy there over the longterm? Even though you know you'll probably be frustrated/unhappy at Red this year based on what you now understand about the school? If you followed that, congrats, and TIA for any suggestions or perspectives on what to do. |
Anonymous
| What grade is your child in this coming year? |
Anonymous
| I would sit tight at Red and hope for Purple next year. There's no point in disrupting your kid for Blue if you don't have confidence that you'll like it enough to stay. The lottery gets easier as your child moves up grades. Blue seems like trading one set of problems for another. |
Anonymous
| I would stay at Red and lottery again next year. I wouldn't want to switch my kid 2-3 years in a row if I could avoid it, and Red & Blue sound like a tossup. |
Anonymous
+1 Also, "philosophy" might sound nice, but it doesn't matter if it's not being implemented because of bad administration or turnover or whatever. |
Anonymous
This. Philosophy is basically worth nothing without effective implementation. |
Anonymous
| I’d stick with Red. |
Anonymous
| Think of it this way-- you know Red from the inside, and Blue from the outside, and you think it's a toss-up. But what might you learn if you knew Blue from the inside, the way you know Red? You probably wouldn't like it as much as you do now. |
Anonymous
| 100% stay at red and hold out for purple. Switching schools is stressful, even for kids who are good with transitions (at least that’s my experience). |
Anonymous
| This level of unanimity is rare for DCPS. Definitely stay where you are. |
Anonymous
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Meh. If we are talking about a PK4 kid and Langley/Noyes/BH/Burroughs and MVP/MV8, I'd probably go for it.
Also, if you accept, you still stay on the list for the other schools. And if your current school is your inbound, you'll have rights again next year in Kindergarten. Am I wrong in guessing PK4 parent? |
Anonymous
Yeah, this is important. If you child just finished PK3 and you're looking ahead to PK4 next year, I agree with the other posters - stay at Red. If your child just finished 1st and you've been talking to 2nd grade parents and have reason to think the next year will be more of the same of the problems you're seeing, I would be more willing to try to move (especially because at older grades you can always jump ship back to your in-bound, which I'm guessing is Red (obviously may not be)). |
Anonymous
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Is Red your IB?
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Anonymous
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OP here.
Red is IB, so yes, we could go back later if we needed to. But it's really hard to imagine that -- things would have to go very poorly somewhere else to make that worthwhile. I think we'd move before doing that. Current grade is 1st. So we've been at red for 3 years now, though the first was a Covid year. PK 3 was Covid, PK4 was great, K was not, but really our concerns are larger than classroom experience -- it has to do with the direction of the school, the administration, recent teacher losses (including the three most beloved teachers at the school, and only one to retirement), concerning attrition among IB parents, aftercare issues, etc. |
Anonymous
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Don’t understand why you don’t just share the schools .
The Blue Charter = Two Rivers. Folks are feeling like it is on a better trajectory than the spiraling out of control of the last few years. Morale is better it seems. But it will take years to completely recover |