Stevens (or other DCPS) Experience for PreK ELS/CES?

[Anonymous]

Hi, I saw there was an earlier thread inquiring about Stevens generally, but was specifically wondering if anyone has had fist-hand experience with their ELS/CES programs?
Or have you had experience with another CES/ELS program within DCPS for Pre-K?

We are moving, our child with autism needs to be placed in a restrictive setting per IEP. However we'd have to transition out somewhere else after PreK, so if another school also offers this from K > onwards, maybe that makes more sense/less disruption?

Also really just curious with people's experience with the CES/ELS program in general.

Many thanks.

[Anonymous]

Whittier has setting C CES classrooms. I used to work there and found it to be a solid school (along with the CES classrooms), but it’s been a few years. I don’t have any experience with Stevens.

[Anonymous]

Whittier has a very robust program. It may still have the the most self-contained classrooms in the city. It is slated for modernization in a year and a half but the swing space will be across the street.

[Anonymous]

I would not bother unless you are just looking for babysitting. PK especially has been overcrowded. It is supposed to be a 1:2 ratio. 6 kids and 1 teacher, with 2 assistants. They are getting 8,9,10,11 students.

If you think this makes no difference you are mistaken. Whittier? Ha. Ask them how long they have retained their PK CES teacher. Ask Stevens.
Ask if they have 2 paras and if the class is overcrowded.

It does not matter if the teacher is magic. Once they get to 8 kids it’s babysitting, unless it’s a magical year and you don’t have a students who elopes, hits, screams, refuses to sit for 3 min, etc.

ELS is often worse, more students and they put students who should be in CES in there too. ELS and CES are not interchangeable. The fact that you stated both means either you think they’re similar or Early Stages is lying to parents as usual.

I’d ask Whittier and Stevens how they plan to support the classroom when it becomes over capacity.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would not bother unless you are just looking for babysitting. PK especially has been overcrowded. It is supposed to be a 1:2 ratio. 6 kids and 1 teacher, with 2 assistants. They are getting 8,9,10,11 students.

If you think this makes no difference you are mistaken. Whittier? Ha. Ask them how long they have retained their PK CES teacher. Ask Stevens.
Ask if they have 2 paras and if the class is overcrowded.

It does not matter if the teacher is magic. Once they get to 8 kids it’s babysitting, unless it’s a magical year and you don’t have a students who elopes, hits, screams, refuses to sit for 3 min, etc.

ELS is often worse, more students and they put students who should be in CES in there too. ELS and CES are not interchangeable. The fact that you stated both means either you think they’re similar or Early Stages is lying to parents as usual.

I’d ask Whittier and Stevens how they plan to support the classroom when it becomes over capacity.

The class size probably varies wildly depending on year. When I was at Whittier (granted it was a few years ago) there were only 4 students in the CES with 2 paras for pre-k 3/4. Lower elementary was higher, but it definitely wasn't 10+ kids. And all the classrooms had 2 paras.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would not bother unless you are just looking for babysitting. PK especially has been overcrowded. It is supposed to be a 1:2 ratio. 6 kids and 1 teacher, with 2 assistants. They are getting 8,9,10,11 students.

If you think this makes no difference you are mistaken. Whittier? Ha. Ask them how long they have retained their PK CES teacher. Ask Stevens.
Ask if they have 2 paras and if the class is overcrowded.

It does not matter if the teacher is magic. Once they get to 8 kids it’s babysitting, unless it’s a magical year and you don’t have a students who elopes, hits, screams, refuses to sit for 3 min, etc.

ELS is often worse, more students and they put students who should be in CES in there too. ELS and CES are not interchangeable. The fact that you stated both means either you think they’re similar or Early Stages is lying to parents as usual.

I’d ask Whittier and Stevens how they plan to support the classroom when it becomes over capacity.

The class size probably varies wildly depending on year. When I was at Whittier (granted it was a few years ago) there were only 4 students in the CES with 2 paras for pre-k 3/4. Lower elementary was higher, but it definitely wasn't 10+ kids. And all the classrooms had 2 paras.

Some schools start with 2 kids, it never ends up that way by March. They start primarily sending kids who live in SE. If Whittier has 4 kids all year then the program is bad and kids were being pulled out by parents.

There is no PK CES program that has 4 kids all school year. At least now because like I said they will send kids whose closet program is full, some parents will send their kid on that bus ride for the free childcare and/or the promise of a ‘quality.’ education.

[Anonymous]

DCPS will try to place your child in the CES or ELS program that is closest to your in-boundary option and has capacity. CES and ELS are different programs, so it will depend on their IEP which your child is determined to need. That said, as PPs have mentioned, class size and teacher experience (and culture of inclusion/school leadership style) varies a lot by school.

There are also many students with autism/IEPs in the gen-ed/inclusion setting, esp. in preK, depending on your child's needs. If you haven't already reached out to Early Stages at DCPS, start there.

You might also want to ask this Q in the Disabilities and Special Needs Forum to find more parents with direct experiences with these classrooms. This site has the self-contained classroom feeder patterns: https://dcpsspecialed.wixsite.com/home/self-contained-feeder-patterns

[Anonymous]

For pre-K and k-2. Ces and els are no longer different programs. In fact, DCPS is now calling them CELS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would not bother unless you are just looking for babysitting. PK especially has been overcrowded. It is supposed to be a 1:2 ratio. 6 kids and 1 teacher, with 2 assistants. They are getting 8,9,10,11 students.

If you think this makes no difference you are mistaken. Whittier? Ha. Ask them how long they have retained their PK CES teacher. Ask Stevens.
Ask if they have 2 paras and if the class is overcrowded.

It does not matter if the teacher is magic. Once they get to 8 kids it’s babysitting, unless it’s a magical year and you don’t have a students who elopes, hits, screams, refuses to sit for 3 min, etc.

ELS is often worse, more students and they put students who should be in CES in there too. ELS and CES are not interchangeable. The fact that you stated both means either you think they’re similar or Early Stages is lying to parents as usual.

I’d ask Whittier and Stevens how they plan to support the classroom when it becomes over capacity.

The class size probably varies wildly depending on year. When I was at Whittier (granted it was a few years ago) there were only 4 students in the CES with 2 paras for pre-k 3/4. Lower elementary was higher, but it definitely wasn't 10+ kids. And all the classrooms had 2 paras.

With due respect, even a few years ago was very different. They keep increasing the cap for these classrooms because they don't have enough teachers.