Transport

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP - No, I meant parents organizing and paying for a bus through the PTA. Granted, I have no idea how much it costs. We are waitlisted at multiple schools, and we haven't bought a place yet. Unfortunately, I lotteried for schools too far away from where we now realize we can get the best bang for our buck. The inbound schools aren't too great. Our options now seem limited to bus, or a painful commute for a year and doing lottery again next year hoping for a good number.

‘Bang for buck’ if you that you mean larger house with a yard EOTP and already good IB schools doesn’t really happen in DC. You have to give on something — smaller home or commuting to a school you are happier with, assuming you have good lottery luck.

Welcome to DC.

[Anonymous]

Did you try MV Calle Ocho? Add it now, anything can happen.

Shining Stars is a disaster of a school, but they do have some kind of Spanish program and you can likely get in.

[Anonymous]

There’s no guarantee your older child will be admitted off the waitlist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Don't be one of those parents that expects the PTA to do the legwork on this unless you're willing to help.

Our PTA is a joke. I laughed at the idea of them handling anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP -- I said PTA meaning fully parent-led and open to anyone who chooses to partake. Of course, only the bus beneficiaries would pay. I was curious to see if any schools had surveyed parents and had tried but failed or succeeded (not trying to recreate the wheel).

My PK4 daughter matched at Oyster as Spanish dominant (test pending). My son is in first grade and matched at HD Cooke (8th choice). We initially thought we would live near there in Mount Pleasant or Crestwood, so fairly close to Oyster (son is waitlisted #2 and is also Spanish dominant), He is #8 at Marie Reed and #12 at Bancroft.

But looking at house prices, we are now seeing that we would we way better off buying in NE. Unfortunately, all the charters around there are now in the 50s, 60s in their waitlists. My son is also #1 at Breakthrough, which is also far -and my daughter is #68 there as well (post lottery app), so doubt we can have them there together. No way I can afford anything WOTP, unless it was a fixer upper and I don't have that kind of time or patience. If we can get a house up near Takoma, Sixteenth St. Heights, Brightwood Park, the commute would be better, but we've really liked the areas around Brookland the best.

The other option would be to "send" my daughter (via online learning) to Oyster for PK 4 just this year and try to find something in Capitol Hill zoned for Maury, JO Wilson, Watkins, LT or Maury, send my son there as IB and switch my daughter next year. However, I really want them to keep up the bilingual education which they've had before now. My husband and I are both native speakers, so this is pretty important to us. I didn't do enough research on charters before so did not list the obvious: Stokes, MV, LAMB. I feel dumb, but the move was sort of unexpected.

Lamb doesn’t accept past K. Stokes is a tier 2 school. MV is a good option for you for next year.

Housing prices in Capitol Hill are crazy. Just try again to lottery next year. I personally wouldn’t send a boy to oyster unless he was really really well behaved.