Sports at Walls (WaPo article)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can't believe there's no mention of Jelleff in this story. It's walkable from Walls.

That's a great question! I know Jelleff has a relationship with the Boys and Girls Club. That may have something to do with access for the SWW students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can't believe there's no mention of Jelleff in this story. It's walkable from Walls.

Other schools and clubs use Jelleff as well. Walls has to compete for space with all of those groups.

[Anonymous]

This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

Why wouldn’t GW (especially for a small fee)? It builds community, connection, and goodwill. Local hotels offer community memberships, why can’t GW offer the same to a small school-based swim team?

No wonder relatively few SWW students chose to attend GW after graduation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can't believe there's no mention of Jelleff in this story. It's walkable from Walls.

I don’t think there’s a baseball field there, so it might not have seemed relevant to the story. But I agree that it should have been referenced as an example of DCPS priorities and precedents.

There is a high school baseball field at Jelleff.

[Anonymous]

I thought Walls was supposed to be non-traditional. Maybe the kids should create their own opportunities in the city and region, like hiking, running, biking, boating, instead of replicating traditional high school sports.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can't believe there's no mention of Jelleff in this story. It's walkable from Walls.

Other schools and clubs use Jelleff as well. Walls has to compete for space with all of those groups.

Two points:

First, Google "Jelleff and Maret" to learn about what's going on there. In particular anything by Dave McKenna, including this story: https://deadspin.com/private-school-that-pocketed-public-rec-center-is-tired-1839260457

With this gem:

“No one ever explained why public school students couldn’t use the public field across the street from us,” a former Hardy Middle School student told the council, according to the Post’s story. “To allow a private school five days a week at the prime time is the epitome of private-school privilege.”

That testimony surely hurt the feelings of Ian Cameron, head of the school’s board of trustees. Cameron, a father of Maret students, told the hearing about how since news of the sweetheart deal broke, he’s endured accusations that the elite private school only got preferential treatment because of the money and clout of the parents who send their kids there.

“They accused our children of being the, quote, ‘Children of the powerful,’” Cameron whined.

Cameron’s wife, Susan Rice, the former National Security Advisor and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations in the Obama administration, was unable to testify at the hearing. As Cameron was singing the rich man’s blues, Rice was speaking at a gathering sponsored by Fortune magazine called, ahem, The Most Powerful Women Summit.

Second, the Council passed a law saying that DPR has to give priority to DCPS sports at DPR facilities, the only activity that can have higher priority is DPR's own programming. DPR has just refused to follow that law. This isn't about Jelleff, it's city-wide.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Can't believe there's no mention of Jelleff in this story. It's walkable from Walls.

I don’t think there’s a baseball field there, so it might not have seemed relevant to the story. But I agree that it should have been referenced as an example of DCPS priorities and precedents.

There is a high school baseball field at Jelleff.

Ah, then it absolutely should have been in the story—especially considering that a lease agreement with Maret is a big part of why Walls doesn’t have access!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

Why wouldn’t GW (especially for a small fee)? It builds community, connection, and goodwill. Local hotels offer community memberships, why can’t GW offer the same to a small school-based swim team?

No wonder relatively few SWW students chose to attend GW after graduation.

Because, assuming GW's teams aren't using it, there are students who are paying close to 100k a year who might want to

[Anonymous]

Jelleff isn’t that close to GW. The GW team has to travel for practice too - not sure where now but they used to play out by DCA.

And CRC has rowing programs - yes, not high school but club, and MANY students row on club teams across the country.

Stop trying to make DC a small town!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

Because it has a relationship with the the school? Because it is common for universities to let high schools use their pool?


In smaller cities, local govts are much more aggressive with requiring the universities in town to actually do stuff for the local community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

Because it has a relationship with the the school? Because it is common for universities to let high schools use their pool?


In smaller cities, local govts are much more aggressive with requiring the universities in town to actually do stuff for the local community.

This isn't a small town. Maybe DC should actually build facilities for their schools. Other towns manage to do it with far lower taxes than DC

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

Why wouldn’t GW (especially for a small fee)? It builds community, connection, and goodwill. Local hotels offer community memberships, why can’t GW offer the same to a small school-based swim team?

No wonder relatively few SWW students chose to attend GW after graduation.

Because, assuming GW's teams aren't using it, there are students who are paying close to 100k a year who might want to

Stop making excuses for GW. The college has an Olympic-sized swimming pool…not a tiny wading pool. There’s enough space for a small school-based swim team to practice there for ONE season out of the year. I’m not even saying it should be free. Walls should pay a nominal “community membership” fee.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This has been one of my big disappointments with Walls. We knew there wasn't much of a Walls campus, but it is crazy that the swim team commutes to Dunbar for practice everyday when GW has a pool. J-R is pulling up the ladder on having Walls students row on their crew team because of changes in how regattas are defining schools and school districts. So that opportunity is going away. Having a place for graduation is nice, but the sports stuff affects kids day-in and day-out.

Why would GW let Walls use their pool?

Because it has a relationship with the the school? Because it is common for universities to let high schools use their pool?


In smaller cities, local govts are much more aggressive with requiring the universities in town to actually do stuff for the local community.

This isn't a small town. Maybe DC should actually build facilities for their schools. Other towns manage to do it with far lower taxes than DC

In case you haven’t noticed, it’s a lot cheaper in terms of land, space & labor costs to build school pools in small towns than it is in DC.